One of our alpacas, Seve, has had an unfortunate life in that when he was only 9 months old when he was with his breeder, an ulcer formed in his right (probably due to a grass seed). When he was delivered to us he still had the ulcer but it didn't seem to trouble him. However, it became inflamed and from July to November last year he received constant attention from me having various ointments or alternatively saline solution daily applied to the eye (varying opinions from 3 vets taken into account). In July, he also had the eye operated on and the lid stitched up for a week. To make matters worse, towards the end of the year his left eye also became cloudy, but luckily it settled down.
Over the last year I have continued to daily wash his right eye out with saline, and on occasion over the last month did this on alternate days. On 18th of this month the ulcer in the right eye became inflamed again - tears constantly flowing down his face. Then a week later his left eye also became whiter and obviously very sore. From my experience last year, all the creams seemed to do was irritate the eyes, so this week I am just washing both eyes out with saline once or twice a day.
It is also the time that the grasses in the paddocks turn to seed and this is a dreadful time for alpacas as they risk getting the seeds in their eyes. Sure enough last week when Seve's eye worsened, Camilo came in with pus in his left eye, so now both boys are locked in the animal shelter area constantly moaning to be let out with the other boys. I roster on a couple of the other boys each day for a 24 hour stay with them as they hate not being part of a herd. It seems that Seve's eye is going to be a recurring problem, so I am organising a small paddock for him to be made to adjoin the animal shelter so that he can at least get to some green feed and chew on the leaves of some trees. He may be in there for the next couple of months as dust is another problem with ulcers and in summer there is a lot of dust.
To make matters worse, it is now 'fly time'. October and November are our worst months for flies and they just stick on the poor boys' faces where their tears flow and also try to get into their eyes. All the boys have this problem (as do humans), but it is particularly sad for the boys with sore eyes.
So I will continue with the saline till the end of the week, and if there is no improvement, I may have to contact my new vet to see if he has any other remedies I have not tried before.
It is quite amazing how an animal which doesn't particularly like humans will stand with his halter on and let me pull open his sore eyes, squirt water in them at close range and then wait for me to wipe the area around them dry. Seve, of course has had this done for over a year, but Camilo (a very tall heavy boy with a shoulder high back kick) has never been handled this way and after just a few days he is willingly letting me help him. This afternoon after I finished, he put his head on my shoulder (he is taller than me) and just rested it there with a quiet moan as I massaged the top of his head.
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