Black mass on my dog

My 15 year old husky/malamute has a large black with a bit of flesh colour on it, on the side of his head, I think it’s a cancer tumour? His tail is also losing fur and has bald patches on the tail and the black tip of his tail has no fur at all? 

Hey love, I know how scary it must feel seeing that on your pup, especially at his age. While it’s definitely possible that the black mass could be a tumor, there are other things it could be too—like a cyst or a skin infection. The hair loss and tail changes could also point to hormonal imbalances or even something like mange. I really recommend getting him to a vet as soon as you can, just to get a proper diagnosis and know what you’re dealing with. You’ve given him so much love for 15 years, and now’s the time to make sure he’s as comfortable and healthy as possible. You're doing great just by paying attention and caring so deeply. 💕

Hello; there sound to be changes affecting your dogs-hair-coat.   Depending on the patient, these can be related to parasites, skin disease or hormones as well as potentially cancer.  Furthermore, your dog hs a skin-lump which might or might not be completely independent of the signs that you are seeing. If your vet is not involved at this stage, it sounds to be time to starting asking them for help;  most vets would start with a top to tail examination of your dog and by taking a full history.  They should thereby be able to identify all the symptoms (abnormalities) and thereby come up with a list of the most likely differential (ie possible) diagnoses that explain what they are seeing.  They may need to do tests to tell the difference between the different possibities; a good question at this stage is 'What are the costs and potential benefits of doing these tests?'    It doesn't sound to me as though cancer is a forgone conclusion at this stage.