Now, we’re not entirely convinced that the next patient we’re going to introduce you to isn’t a lost arctic fox, rather than one of our native red foxes! Meet “Snowball”, nicknamed thanks to her incredible white, patchy coat.
Snowball was rescued by our friends over at Wallington Animal Rescue, and arrived with not only a minor fracture to her maxilla (upper jaw), but also a fractured tail . So, in all, she had breaks at the top end and bottom end of her body. Being one of this year’s cubs, she’s not had the best start to life in the wild.
On admission, and after her head to toe examination, the vet team administered fluids, pain relief, and got Snowball started on antibiotics.
Snowball initially had to be placed on a soft-food only diet, due to the instability of her upper jaw fracture. The soft food helped to reduce the amount of movement and pressure on the fractured bone, allowing it the chance to heal on its own.
The tail however, required surgical intervention. Vet, Marco, had to remove a third of Snowballs tail, but thankfully, the remaining tail would still be able to provide important functions such as balance, communication with other foxes, and most importantly to keep Snowball warm in winter.
With young foxes like Snowball, and especially those that have been born in urban areas, we often notice with those patients that they are more curious than adult foxes that come into care. Snowball would often come out and watch the world go by, or in her case our hard-working volunteers, and we think she’s become one of our top contenders for cutest patient of the year!
Snowball is currently also under treatment for mange, and as she only weighs a tiny 3.1kg, she is also busy gaining weight. Whilst she’s still taking it easy with the types of food she’s able to have, she’s letting us know that her jaw feels absolutely fine, and she’s very ready for the good tucker!
After recieving her her final mange injection, and given the all clear on both her maxilla fracture and her sutured tail site, Snowball was release back to her home range, just in time to show off her literal winter style coat!
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