Sore throat?
 

About 4:30 this afternoon Riley started swallowing real hard like there was something stuck in his throat and he was trying to get it to move. I called the vet and asked if this is how he would act if there was something stuck but she (the vet tech) said no...it sounded more like the start of an upper respitory infection to her. Huh? He has no other signs of anything else going on...he's breathing fine, he eats and drinks, no throwing up, no diarrhea, he's not coughing, hacking or wheezing, no runny nose, no fever and no more tears than usual, his nose is cold and wet and his eyes are bright...he's just swallowing hard at times. I thought he may have scratched his throat with one of the leaves he was chewing on today or that he may even have a small piece stuck in his throat so we gave him a few bites of bread and some banana too thinking it might move what might have been stuck. That seems to have made it a little better and although he isn't doing it as much he still does it some. I'll watch him tonight and see how he is in the morning but I think he had something stuck and it ended up scratching his throat. Am I nuts or is that possible? The only thing different is that he finally started losing his baby teeth this week. What reactions can puppies have when teething? Can it cause a sore throat like it does in kids?

I wish I had some better advise for you. Someone will. I hope it's not the begining of an infection!! Good luck to you!

Thank you Thorsmomma...I hope so too.

unless he swallowed one of his baby teeth and it scratched a bit going down, no teething wouldn't necessarily cause that reaction.

if you think he has a scratchy throat a little dab of liquid cherry-flavored children's benedryl would help a bit and won't hurt him. :)

Thank you yorkieusa. I have some on hand...it's bacon flavored...so I'll go ahead and give him some. Will the Benadryl help if there is any swelling from irritation?

I would think so. My little Muffin used to get tonsillitus occasionally, but not very often. My vet said I could give it to her and usually one dose would take care of it and if not I gave her another dose. I don't know how we'd have made it without it! ;)

Here's some emergency info that you might want to keep just in case. :)

http://www.geocities.com/angeljulie2/firstaid.html

Thank you...I've never seen that page before...I bookmarked it. Riley wants to play with Jo and he's eating and drinking so I think he may have scratched his throat. If there was anything in there I would think the food would have made it go down...kind of like eating a piece of bread when you have a pill stuck in your throat. He doesn't feel swollen or anything like that but if he keeps it up I'll take him to the vet in the morning so they can have a look.

You're welcome. Let us know if it goes away or not.

Riley seems to be better this morning...he isn't swallowing as much as he was yesterday. He ate his breakfast, pooped, pee'd, barked and has been playing with Jo and laying in the sun. I really think he scratched his throat with one of those leaves. Our neighbors have scrub oaks and the leaves are like leather...they blow in the patio and of course the boys think it's a new toy that you can't get away from them!

Oh, good! I'm glad he is better. Yes. I know about leaves. We have a zillion regular oaks and mine is always carrying those around and chewing on them. Glad they aren't those kind though!

The one thing I have to watch out for when it is damp is mushrooms. Muffin wouldn't bother them, but I still dug them out - just in case. Kacee is a different story altogether and she can find them in the grass when I can't and I mean I look really good, too. This summer we had a seige of them after some rains, whereas, before there were just a few tiny ones. Those things are poisonous and it worried me to death! :(