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Papillon (and Phalene) » Papillon (and Phalene) Forum
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How fragile are paps?

This is a forum for bonding with your fellow Dogsters about the traits, quirks and idiosyncrasies of your favorite breed. Please remember that there are absolutely no animal sales or requests for studding or breeding allowed on our sites. All posts and interactions should be in the spirit of Dogster's Community Guidelines and should be fun, friendly and informational. Enjoy!

  
Rene

Slender- Butterfly		 
 
Barked: Sat Feb 14, '09 2:17pm PST 
Well, I've always heard people saying that paps have very fragile bones and we should worry about that. My pap here is a very active boy that loves playing with my other dogs. My other dogs are not big but sometimes my pap gets upset and cry when he get his fur steped on or when the play comes out a little bit more rought.
So, they always play and Rene is always jumping from couch to chair to bed to floor and then zooming like a little butterfly back to the couch.
Today, when he jumped from a chair to the floor, he landed on one of my other dogs and flipped, so he landed on his leg. He started lifting it and crying and I was very worried about him, I examined his leg to see if he was felling pain anywhere and took him on my lap to make him rest a little bit and then he was as good as new.

Rene comes from a lineage of very fine-boned dogs, so he looks to me very fragile, although he runs, jumps, plays and everything else. Also, I never had a tiny dog like him before, so I can only compare him to my small and medium sized dogs (All around 15 pounds, Rene is 5 pounds right now, still tryin to make him gain some weight)

I was wondering if anyone ever had problem with broken bones in paps?
And if you had, what did you have to do? Is there anything we can do in a emergency that helps before we get them to the vet?

I'll be keeping an eye on him the next few days to see if there's any limping or sensitivity in the leg, I'm going to try to make him slow down a little bit laugh out loud

Edited by author Sat Feb 14, '09 2:21pm PST

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Boston

King of- everything		 
 
Barked: Sun Feb 15, '09 12:17pm PST 
The Papillon is extremely hardy, but puppies should be closely supervised, because a tumble
down a staircase or a jump from a sofa might result in a broken leg. By the time the dog is an
adult, though, it is surprisingly resilient. No matter how resilient, Papillons should always be
supervised when playing with larger dogs, even friendly ones because a larger dog can
inadvertently hurt or kill a dog the size of a Papillon. Even an aggressive self defence by such
a small dog is no match for the response of a large dog.
Boston broke his leg when he was 6 or 7 months old. You can see the splint on his leg on his page. I was at work my mom was watching them. Daisy and Boston were playing on top of the stairs next thing mom knew Boston was at the bottom and all she heard was a deafening scream cry She took him in her arms the leg was turning in a way it shouldnt she called my vet they knew who the dog was so she rushed him there. Theres nothing to do with a broken leg except get them to the vet asap.
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Heidi CGC

Play Play Play		 
 
Barked: Mon Feb 16, '09 7:36am PST 
Boston glad you are betterhughughug

I hear of a lot of broken bones coming from papillons jumping out of arms. Or little kids picking them up and then dropping them on accident. They are a fragile breed comparing them to other dogs with bigger bones but I agree with Boston they are resilient.

So I always hold onto Heidi's leg when I am holding her just in case, and as Boston said with bigger dogs always supervise with children as well.
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Gray Dawn- Treader

Don\\\'t Tread- on me		 
 
Barked: Thu Feb 19, '09 6:21am PST 
I don't think that Treader is a full-blooded Papillon, but he is one tough cookie. He even got onto the roof and jumped off of it once without hurting himself.
I've read that Papillons are hardy dogs, but they can break a leg of played with too roughly.
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Isobel

OMG OMG OMG you- are home- OMG!!!!!		 
 
Barked: Mon Feb 23, '09 5:25pm PST 
Pappies are super fragile. Mine is fully grown and her legs are as thin as pencils (she only weighs around 3lbs max). She broke her front leg jumping out of my arms at 3 months but thank goodness has fully healed.

When she broke her leg I was already leaning down to let her on the ground so she jumped from a height of only a few inches or so but landed badly. It's not really the height that matters but how they land, so keep a firm hold of your pups until they have all four paws on the ground frown
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Logan

Don't THINK- about going- anywhere w/o me		 
 
Barked: Tue Nov 22, '11 7:45am PST 
I cringe when my Logan plays with my sister's Westie. They are rough. But Logan holds his own. Ironically, he went to chase a squeaky toy last week and came up lame. Vet said it "could" be a partial tear of his CCL but I seriously doubt it. After a day he seemed to be no worse for the wear. No swelling, no pain, no heat, no limited range of motion. None of the symptoms I've been reading about. I've poked and prodded and no sign of pain or discomfort. But I've kept him still for the past week and a half and will go get him rechecked at the vet next week. Up until this incident, I would have said he was very hardy and resilient. If he actually tore his CCL running for a toy then that would be false. He's about 6lbs.
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Logan

Don't THINK- about going- anywhere w/o me		 
 
Barked: Mon Apr 2, '12 9:16am PST 
I'm fine!!! Nothing torn here. I'm just a drama-King!!!!
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Member Since
11/05/2012		 
 
Barked: Thu Dec 20, '12 11:36pm PST 
Papillons ARE very fragile little fellas. As one poster noted; it's not just the height from which they fall, but also how they land. My precious little Phalene Papillon, Piper jumped off my bed which is just a little higher than most beds - she had done this hundreds of times before with no problem. I had, however, tried without success to train her to jump from my recliner chair to the bed and back again to get off the bed. But, anytime she had the chance to bark at my husband, she would just fly into action. This time she landed badly. Piper's seemingly strong little haunches (her back legs and hips) were paralyzed almost immediately. There is absolutely nothing you can do for her at home except move her as little as possible, don't hold her in your arms, avoid touching or holding her, watch out in case it's her spine that is involved, or anything else for that matter will make the pain far worse and the damage more so. Just get her to her vet ASAP. A good idea would be to be to transport her in her carrier so she can't move around so much because of the pain she can't alleviate and because she doesn't know what has happened. Ask your vet before an accident what their opinion is insofar as tying her to a board to prevent further injury. And, if she approves of this, ask her how to go about doing it.

As it turned out Piper's spine was fractured, thereby causing the paralysis of her hips and back legs. Surgery would be required. If she survived the surgery -- pins to hold the vertebrae in place, she possibly would not be able to walk again, she would never run again (if all you other papillon owners can imagine that). The prognosis didn't end there -- Piper would always be incontinent; she was always just meticulous with her dear little self. That would never do, either. She would likely always be in pain. Recovery would take at least a year.

Our precious, little Piper -- we had her with us for 2 1/2 years. Now she will live forever in our hearts.

Edited by author Thu Dec 20, '12 11:49pm PST

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Member Since
11/05/2012		 
 
Barked: Thu Dec 20, '12 11:36pm PST 
Papillons ARE very fragile little fellas. As one poster noted; it's not just the height from which they fall, but also how they land. My precious little Phalene Papillon, Piper jumped off my bed which is just a little higher than most beds - she had done this hundreds of times before with no problem. I had, however, tried without success to train her to jump from my recliner chair to the bed and back again to get off the bed. But, anytime she had the chance to bark at my husband, she would just fly into action. This time she landed badly. Piper's seemingly strong little haunches (her back legs and hips) were paralyzed almost immediately. There is absolutely nothing you can do for her at home except move her as little as possible, don't hold her in your arms, avoid touching or holding her, watch out in case it's her spine that is involved, or anything else for that matter will make the pain far worse and the damage more so. Just get her to her vet ASAP.

As it turned out Piper's spine was fractured, thereby causing the paralysis of her hips and back legs. Surgery would be required. If she survived the surgery -- pins to hold the vertebrae in place, she possibly would not be able to walk again, she would never run again (if all you other papillon owners can imagine that). The prognosis didn't end there -- Piper would always be incontinent; she was always just meticulous with her dear little self. That would never do, either. She would likely always be in pain. Recovery would take at least a year.

Our precious, little Piper -- we had her with us for 2 1/2 years. Now she will live forever in our hearts.
my posts [notify]


Member Since
11/05/2012		 
 
Barked: Thu Dec 20, '12 11:36pm PST 
Papillons ARE very fragile little fellas. As one poster noted; it's not just the height from which they fall, but also how they land. My precious little Phalene Papillon, Piper jumped off my bed which is just a little higher than most beds - she had done this hundreds of times before with no problem. I had, however, tried without success to train her to jump from my recliner chair to the bed and back again to get off the bed. But, anytime she had the chance to bark at my husband, she would just fly into action. This time she landed badly. Piper's seemingly strong little haunches (her back legs and hips) were paralyzed almost immediately. There is absolutely nothing you can do for her at home except move her as little as possible, don't hold her in your arms, avoid touching or holding her, watch out in case it's her spine that is involved, or anything else for that matter will make the pain far worse and the damage more so. Just get her to her vet ASAP.

As it turned out Piper's spine was fractured, thereby causing the paralysis of her hips and back legs. Surgery would be required. If she survived the surgery -- pins to hold the vertebrae in place, she possibly would not be able to walk again, she would never run again (if all you other papillon owners can imagine that). The prognosis didn't end there -- Piper would always be incontinent; she was always just meticulous with her dear little self. That would never do, either. She would likely always be in pain. Recovery would take at least a year.

Our precious, little Piper -- we had her with us for 2 1/2 years. Now she will live forever in our hearts.
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