Dirty sheath - what to do?

[Stacie_and_Jed]

Im hoping im not the only one with this problem and someone can help.

Jed's sheath at the moment is constantly dirty and really quite smelly.

I never used to clean it and it was fine. One day i noticed some black sticky stuff on his back legs and noticed it around his sheath too. Gave it a good clean with some warm water and a sponge and ever since then i have to clean it atleast once a week. I did use baby oil for a while which seemed to work well and stopped the build up for weeks at a time. I cleaned it with sheath cleaner and warm water on Thursday and noticed over the weekend its horrible again!!!
He has also started to hate me going near it so he must be uncomfortable.

Could it be the result of a lot of mud around and just generally getting dirty up there?

Im going to get the vet out to sedate him so i can give it a good clean and hoefully get the vet to check it over to make sure nothing else is going on up there.

Has anyone else had experiance like this?

 

[MegaBeast]

I know that the modern thinking now is not to clean a horses sheath as it disrupts the natural balance of bacteria that live there and can cause more problems than it solves. Speak to your vet and see what they think

 

[Stacie_and_Jed]

I have always lived by that and never had to clean it up until one day when it was very dirty i couldnt leave it.

 

[ester]

I have to do Franks every 6 months or so, it does seem to get worse when he is living in in winter on straw at night.

When you cleaned it last time did you get right up in? I find franks sheath has lots of different pockets

and I have to be careful not to miss them. If I am gentle and persuasive he will drop it for me so I can do his willy too.

If it was properly clean on thursday and is already bad again I would get the vet to look as I would suspect something else was going on.

Megabeast I never intended to clean mine either but when the legs are covered in black goo every day it really leaves you with no choice!

 

[lochpearl]

I agree with the leaving it to it's own devises but like you I noticed the sticky mess down my geldings legs. He also developed a swollen sheath and I noticed that he couldn't get his willy out fully and was peeing on his belly.

He had been on box rest for about 4 months by then! Anyway, the wet came out and said it was ok, but there was some swelling and it was very dirty and I needed to clean it. So......... he told me that I should NOT use sheath cleaner, baby oil or vaseline, I must use a water based lubricant. In english to us KY Jelly.

I was told that I would need to do this about 5 times before it would be sorted up there. So embarrassingly I went to the chemist and ordered a load to come with my shopping delivery - lol! And used 2 tubes (make sure you get a really long glove) covered the glove in it and squirted a ball in my hand and up my arm went, just covered every bit I could reach up there, used the 2 tubes. It was messy and stank but he quite enjoyed it and before that was kicking at me if went near it. Left the jelly up there for 24 hours and then washed it out with warm water and a sponge. It was very greasy but all lumps had gone and it washed out nicely. Only problem was the residue that got stuck on his fur.

Left it for a week and had the vet look at it again and she said it was looking great and very, very clean and the swelling had gone so I only had to do it that once!

 

[V1NN]

ky jelly it is made for these purposes (sort of) i used it to clean Vinnies willy and it seemed to do the trick it wont irritate them