Using honey for ferret bite near ear? help ASAP!

Hi, I own a 2 year old bearded dragon and he was attacked by my other pet ferret (over night she had snuck into my bearded dragons habitat due to me forgetting to close the drawer. I had found her in there at about 6 am but I have no clue how long she had been in there for!) he was scratched in both his eyes from his substrate during their encounter and a puncture wound from a bite by his ear, I went to the vet and they prescribed me Tobramycin Ophthalmic solution (a antibacterial antibiotic eye drop) to drop in his eyes twice a day for 7-10 days, I was confused because they didn’t prescribe me anything for his skin wound near his ear? I asked the assistant about it and they said he should heal on his own but I am concerned about infections? Especially being a ferret who has bacteria they are not used to in their saliva. I had read you can use Diluted manuka honey but this is out of my budget. I had also seen you can use local bee keeper non pasteurized honey on the wounds? I was wondering what advice you had. To just leave it alone? Or should I try the honey for a couple of days? I don’t wanna do more harm then good but I’m terrified he is going to get an infection? Thank you! *side note, due to covid 19 I was not allowed to go inside and ask him personal questions, because of this I was not able to show him where the wound is at. I believe he did not throughly look at the infected area because he still had some coconut fiber stuck on the wound that had dried stuck to him because of the blood so the wound was not very noticeable, he is also a fancy bearded dragon so he has a lot of orange around his beard making it even harder the tell wether it’s blood or just his skin. I am 100% certain there was blood but on the memo in his instructions he sent me he said their was no appearance of any wound, I am sure this was simply an oversight but I don’t want that little oversight to be his death sentence. He also has some pretty bad bruising on his head (if anybody has any advice for that) and his eyes are extremely swollen right now and he still refuses to open them and it’s been at LEAST 10 hours now since he has been attacked. Any advice would help. If you have any questions I will be checking this regularly.

You need to repost this in ER
Karrie

Hi there, can you post pics of the wounds ? You'll need to wash the area off very well and then go ahead with the honey. Get the loose substrate out of the tank since it will stick to the wound as well as the eyes. Here's how to post pics :

https://www.beardeddragon.org/useruploads/ Then use the XIMG to upload them

Hello,

Oh dear, that does not sound good at all!
You can definitely use just a raw, unpasteurized honey, but it doesn't have to be manuka
honey. Do you have pictures of the wounds on your dragon?
As suggested, if you haven't already done so, it would be a good idea to take out any type
of loose substrate in the tank, to help keep the area cleaner.
How is your dragon doing, does he have a black beard at all?

I hope that he is going to be ok!
Tracie

Hello I am not very familiar with this website I just started for this purpose, I will post pictures here in a second I am not sure how to reply personally to people so I will just do it this way, I went to my local farmers market today to get the honey and they decided to close 30 minutes early today for some reason so I can’t get any and I don’t want to wait until next week! So I got betadine 5% to dilute with water although I am not sure how much to dalute it, I was going to fill up a little bowl of water and put 3-4 sprays in it if that’s what y’all recommended? (A light tea color) And apply it lightly with a q-tip, I also got distilled water to use to clean the surface area before as I read that tap can cause infections, he has finally opened his left eye a couple times for a few seconds! Although I have not seen him open his right eye at all yet (which was the much more infected eye there was actually blood) I am currently completely cleaning his cage with a 1:1 ratio of apple cider vinegar and water wiping it clean and letting it air dry currently while he’s sitting on my shoulder (where he feels safest!) I cleaned out all of the coconut fiber and bought a new rock mat to cover the bottom of him cage, I bought a new under the bottom of the cage heat mat a few weeks ago to put on his hot side because I relized recently he was not getting enough heat from his lamp alone due to the big size of his cage and winter is coming up, while cleaning his cage I forgot to turn the heater off and I felt the glass bottom of the cage and it was extremely hot, I know not to use rock heaters because they cause burns but I thought the bottom tank heaters were fine, it was the perfect temperature before with the rock Matt and coconut fiber covering it but I’m worried the rock Matt alone will be too hot? I also know I had read somewhere before purchasing coconut fiber that it was ok to use as a loose substrate because it is mostly digestible but is this not true? I absolutely am in love with the way the brown (dirt looking ground) makes his cage look like a rain forest but I care much more about my little beardies health, is coconut fiber (eco earth) suitable for beardies and if not do you have any advice for an alternate substrate that is still brown and if possible loose that it completely digestible? Right now I am just keeping the rock Matt in there instead of both the rock Matt and eco earth at least until he is better because I read it can harbor bacteria easier, and I have a cotton cloth under it as well to help it not get as hot to the touch, I also had royal pillow moss in there because I bought one of those bearded dragon terrarium decorating kits only to find out later that if he eats it it can cause an impaction when I took him to the vet he checked for impactions and said he was fine but I don’t want it to happen in the future, I love the look of the green patches mixed in there but I don’t wanna take any chances, is their any other way to still create the same visual affect without threatening his health? Also yes to somebody’s question before his beard still has that black color in it but it doesn’t look to be any more than usual

Hello,

Have you been able to get any pictures taken yet? I hope your dragon is doing better.
As far as the betadine goes, dilute that until it resembles a weak tea solution & use a
swab to dab it onto the affected areas. So he has not opened his one eye at all yet, but
has opened the other one? Only one is somewhat infected? That is going to likely have
to be treated, with either raw honey or an antibiotic eye ointment. It sounds like you are
doing great, using the swab, & your dilution ratios.
Is he basking & somewhat active though? Be careful with him on your shoulder, as a lot
of accidents seem to happen because they love to jump off & get hurt.
Please let us know how your dragon is doing, we all hope that he improves for you.

Tracie