Sow walking in circles

[jml]

Caught a big sow on a hunt last tuesday with Mike and Chris, we decided to make sausage out of her so I have her in my pen, this morning I went out to feed and she has her head cocked to the side and she has a real hard time standing up and she cant walk straight just in circles struggling to stay on her feet. Does anyone know what's wrong with her?

[Noah]

Sounds like an ear complication from being chewed on.  Tends to mess their balance up like water in yer ear... you could always take her up to the vet school and have her CAT scanned

[Mike]

That sucks... haven't seen that before?

[aladatrot]

Glad we have a friend in the veterinary medicine business :O)

He thinks along the lines of Noah's post that it is an inner ear infection. It seems to be more prevalent in penned hogs than ones running loose. He also mentioned that the infection should be isolated to just her ears - not a full body infection and that the sow would be fine to process as long as you don't medicate her. Once medicated, you have to wait out the medication before you can process, and that can take weeks or months.

M

[txboardog]

I have seen that happen a time or two. When a hog or wild cow/bull has been tied down for a long period of time it seems to mess up their equilibriem. Real wild cattle ( Feral cattle) are bad about getting the shakes and walking in circles after being tied down. I have had that happen a time or two while cleaning maverick cattle off of a Indian reservation in New Mexico.