Going through some photos I found this one of my dog (Shep/Malamute - "Deebo") taken this time last year about a month after we'd moved to Avoca.

He had had a bad allergic reaction to *something* around the property and what started off looking like a black eye turned into this mess. The poor bugger was so unhappy and irritated by the wounds that it brought tears to my eyes to look at him - even now the pic is a bit upsetting.

He got moved back to Ballarat for a while to stay at my folks' and I'm readying to take him back again and see how we go come Spring/Summer. Hopefully I've removed (or will have by then) anything in the immediate yard that could have caused it. It has to be an unfortunate experiment to see which yard/paddock has the offending flora and if I can't find or control it I'm afraid that he won't be able to live with me

Fingers crossed.