Sonoma County dog owners, veterinarians ready for foxtail season

Foxtail season has started with a vengeance, sending dogs around the region to veterinary facilities with the spiky, arrow-shaped seedheads stuck in their noses, throats, ears and paws.

Though the season is still ramping up, some believe it could be particularly bad because the area has experienced a wetter spring and winter than in recent years, producing a bumper crop of wild grasses that will eventually dry out, some of them releasing needle-sharp barbs that can pierce an animal’s skin and migrate to internal regions.

Most pet owners are familiar with the pointy seedheads and know how quickly they can lead to extensive, expensive medical interventions, veterinary personnel say.

But owners may not know how extreme foxtail damage can be, nor how easily their dog can pick up a windblown seedhead even on a seemingly innocuous urban walk.

“They’re not our friend,” said Brigitte Lamos, a veterinary technician at Valley of the Moon Animal Hospital in Sonoma, where one of several dogs treated for foxtails this week had three of them lodged in its throat.

Though the term “foxtail” refers specifically to the stiff, bristle-like structure on the flower of the foxtail barley plant, it is used generally to describe similar pointy seedheads, known by the botanical term “awns,” on a half-dozen other grass species, as well.

The awns are built to attach themselves to the fur of passing animals before dropping off and burrowing into the soil so their seeds can germinate.

But that same capacity allows foxtails to slip between a dog’s toes or into its pads, or into a patch of skin on its body. Dogs also may swallow, inhale or get one in an ear, eye or genitals, leading to irritation, pain and infection. Cats are vulnerable, as well, especially around the eyes.

Embedded foxtails generally must be retrieved with probes and narrow, bent forceps while the animal is under sedation. They are often difficult to find amid the inflamed tissue and infection, and sometimes turn brittle and break apart during recovery. They aren’t detectable by X-ray.

But because of their streamlined, pointed shape, foxtails travel easily. One entering through a paw can end up in the shoulder muscle, while one inhaled or swallowed could find its way into the digestive or respiratory tract, eventually lodging in organs or into the tissue beneath the spinal cord or into the abdominal lining, creating abscesses or other problems.

“They can weasel their way anywhere,” said Lisa Alexander, a board certified surgeon with the Animal Care Center in Rohnert Park.

They are difficult to pull out, said veterinarian Nicole Canon, owner of the Animal Hospital of Sebastopol, which already has seen about 25 foxtail cases this year.

Canon said the foxtails provide such a daily challenge through the summer that she sponsors a seasonal contest among her doctors, awarding dinner to whomever pulls out the most foxtails by season’s end.

It helps “to keep morale up,” she said, “because after you’ve seen so many, it can be frustrating,”

Shelagh Hodges, office manager at Analy Veterinary Hospital in Sebastopol, said she once saw a veterinarian open a large abdominal swelling, revealing innumerable foxtails the dog had apparently eaten.

On Thursday, a 6½-year-old pitbull named Maya had one removed from her nose and six from an ear, Hodges said.

Extreme scenarios, though rare, do happen and can prove fatal.

“I think the emergency doctors take out foxtail in the summertime right and left, and I maybe see a few (pets) a year that have bad migrating foxtails,” said Alexander, who, as a surgeon, sees some of the worst cases. “But I think anybody has the potential to have it, and especially the big, active goofy kind of dogs.”

The foxtail season runs for about half a year, generally from about April into November when the plants are driest and easily attach to an animal’s fur. Long-haired animals are especially vulnerable. During the season, “it’s rare that we go through a day without having to remove one from some orifice of a dog,” said Hal Hawkins, general practitioner and co-medical director for PetCare Veterinary Hospital in Santa Rosa.

Veterinary personnel said dog owners can help their pets avoid trouble by keeping their feet hair clipped and closely inspecting their feet, ears and body whenever they are out in grasses that might present a problem.

Those with grasses growing on their properties should try to mow before the seedheads form and, otherwise, be sure to rake and eliminate any flowers left behind.

Many veterinarians recommended a lightweight, mesh hood that a dog can wear over its head and face to safely frolic in the grass.

Alexander said her own dog, who is prone to foxtail intrusion, wears one and routinely catches foxtails in the netting.

“Every day, I pull one out I think ‘How much would this cost?’?” she said. “It’s worth its weight in gold, definitely.”

You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MaryCallahanB.