holly

My girlfriends dog became very ill of late and after all the tests, the only thing the bloods etc picked up was Inflammatory Bowel Disease, her vet recommended just feeding him Eukanabu and nothing else. If your dog is a scavenger this would not help and my dogs have had blood and mucus in the stools after a bin raid. We now have the bins where the dogs can not get to them. What diet is your dog on? I found one of mine was eating stones/rocks, until his diet was changed

Roxanne let us know how Hogan goes on his new diet? Also, it is comforting that your puppies breeder has backed you with support something that they should do. Regardless of who it is, he is very decent and honourable in doing so and perhaps he didn't realise that the puppy did have some minor dietary problems. Friends bought a GSD pup sight unseen about 8 years ago from a far distant interstate breeder and from a judge, now this puppy was to be shown, they use to show and breed GSD's about 20 years before that. They paid top dollar, the breeder knew they wanted to compete with the pup and still sent them a monorhid male, the sire was well known then and now to produce one balled dogs, they just said tough when the buyer contacted them. About vets, some are not aware of various breeds differences as they grow and I remember buying a well bred puppy and at his 12 week vet visit, my then vet asked me if I were concerned about the puppies 'bite' as the bottom jaw sat behind the upper jaw. This is a scissor bite, so I explained to the vet how this bite was completely normal for this breed, the GSD. The owner of the puppy I posted the pic of was unaware the puppy had growing problems, until she sent me her pic of the puppy in a 'stack' it was when I saw the pasterns and soft ligament, that I became alarmed and commented on it, if I had not said anything she would have been none the wiser.

and the same puppy at 5 months of age

Roxanne I am really sorry to hear that your experience so far has been less than ideal. When I looked at your puppies feet, I could not see that much terribly wrong, a full photo of your puppy standing, a side one would be of great help. To me the puppy seems to have large growth plates, but then I am use to see the knuckles on our fast growing GSD puppies. You are lucky you have caught the puppies diet deficiencies early and he can have a turn around, so not all is lost. A balanced diet for growing puppies needs a phospherous to calcium ratio 1:2 A snip from http://www.gsdhelpline.com/feeding.htm Calcium and Phosphorus Calcium and phosphorus are the major minerals involved in the structure of the bones and teeth. Both the levels, as well as the proportions of calcium and phosphorus (or the ratio of calcium to phosphorus) within the diet are of great importance. This ratio is particularly critical in growing puppies, and here particularly in large and giant breeds. A deficiency, or an excess of these minerals, as well as an imbalance can cause severe skeletal deformities. Supplementing a diet balanced for growth with bone meal and the like must therefore be strictly avoided. Fresh muscle meat is sometimes seen as a healthy and natural diet for a dog, however, muscle tissue is very low in calcium and relatively high in phosphorus and does not meet a dog's calcium requirement when fed alone. Recommended Ca:P Ratio Adult 0.5:1 - 2:1 Growth 1.0:1 - 1.5:1 Gestation/Lactation 0.80:1 - 1.5:1 The requirements for calcium and phosphorus, in particular the required calcium to phosphorus ratio, change as puppies grow older and become adult. All dog foods supported by WALTHAM ensure that you feed the appropriate calcium to phosphorus ratio during all your dog's different lifestages. EDIT TO ADD: this appears to be an advert for Waltham's hence why they do not recommend adding anything to else to the diet, as they are saying that Walthams is a "complete" meal But there is also lots of useful information on that page I found this morning. About a diet high in phospherous, low in calcium: With our breed, they can pariticipate in a breed improvement scheme, called a Breed Survey, the dog/bitch must be measured as well as other things. If someone had a animal that is slightly too big, it is not uncommon for those to feed their dogs red meat and pasta only leading up to survey. This will have the dogs feet splay and pasterns drop, which will get them through, trick sure but some will do what they have to do to get classified. Are you fully conversant with the BARF diet and what your special puppies special needs are? Seeing as thou the puppy had a rough start, unless you know BARF inside out, I feed my adults BARF but always feed my growing puppies commercial, such as Advance, with bones and some tabel vegetables as well, my advice would be to go to a premium large breed growth biscuit. I can not recommend Advance Large Breed Growth highly enough and to this add brisket bones etc to his diet, chicken is fine too, but I get better results on brisket. Bones are a natural form of calcium and can be expelled from the body easier than man made forms. Your vet is right on the calcium bit, btw, your puppy has a lack of calcium stores at the moment. To this I would also add 1000mg of Ester C. The Ester C will help your puppy to absorb the calcium better. Ester C has an enzyme compound that works much better than normal Vit C, it is dearer, about $20 a bottle, but your puppy will not require this treatment long term. Here is the puppy Lia was talking about, she was on Eukanabu only and her owner had sent me a photo of her to show me how she was going, it was with this photo, that I saw the ligament problems in her feet and recommended the above diet, it did work. I do not have a standing photo as well as she got older but do have one of her sitting, you can see the difference in her feet in the two.

yes, I agree seafood is fantastic and is full of Omega oils too, we give our sardines once a week, any left over fish from the table etc. I dont' know about prawns and the like, as we never have any as left overs, lol, but the dogs have broken into a bait bag or two when we have gone fishing and never been ill

We feed raw chicken mince everyday to our adults and older puppies, have never had a problem, but I did have problems with little puppies, so I no longer feed them chicken mince, in fact I avoid raw meat all together with young puppies, only commercial biscuits these days to be on the safe side. The intestine of the dog is shorter than that of the human, that is how they can eat foods that are off and not get ill, whereas we will be cronically sick, under the right conditions.

thanks Showdog. I have the older model and must admit, I would prefer the cut out bit too the side, my back is cactus these days and any bending renders me useless for a good hour afterwards.

I have given up on wearing white T's if I am doing anything with the dogs, the darker the colour the better too. Blue and yellow towels, would look snazzy together, I would have mine Hydrobathed by you Dru, just for the look of those towels

Thanks for that info Dru. On the subject of towels, Dru, my dogs are partial to purple ones like their owner

Showdog, OT here, I have just gotten a Hydrobath for my doggies and it is fantastic, saves my back and I can do 6 dogs in an hour! It is a single tank with heater. Can I please ask: Why wouldn't you use a twin tank Hydrobath?

I do my own, I do thou, use a supplement, that I have found really helps and is a lot cheaper than some other supplements. Feeding my dogs works out to cost about 60cents a day, compared to $1.20 per day for high premium manufactured dog biscuit. My dogs look great on BARF, just have to find the balance of not allowing their love handles to get too out of control. I like minced chicken backs as it has the bone as well as gizzards, add heart/liver sometime during the week, sardines, eggs, frozen vegies a bit of Omega oil and the supplement. I did use Apple Cidar Vinegar but found my girls crusty nose came back on that, so deleted it from the diet. My other dog is on Turkey necks and Advance Turkey adn Rice adding vegies etd, the dog does better on this than chicken mince

Luckily, I have never had a dog with a scar, apart from desexing/C sections, but with our horses, I used Aloe Vera a lot. It wiped out a malenoma on a grey mare and another T.B that had been pushed through a wire fence, he had a gaping gash on his hind hock, it was hidieous, right down the synovial fluid and bone joint, but over some weeks of hosing clean twice daily, smearing Aloe Vera on the wound and blue stone for the proud flesh, all that was left wasa very fine scare. Horsey friends that had seen him after the accidnet coulnt' believe how fine the line was, so I swear by Aloe Vera these days, it is truly one of natures miracles drugs

Bandar that is good news about your girl getting better. With the dry coat, have you got some pure Omega Oils? I use that for my dogs on BARF. Also, dehydration, if the dog is hot, can make the coat brittle, I have also heard a few tablespoons of Apple Cidar Vinegar in the drinking water helps to cool a dog down. For my BARF dogs, I also feed them Feramo supplement, it contains: Vitamin B1 2 500mg Vitamin B2 2 250mg Vitamin B6 250mg Vitamin B12 2 500 micrograms Vitamin D3 1.5mg Vitamin E 1 500mg Calcium 750mg Retinol 187.5mg Yeast 150g Iron Amino Acid 2 457mg Manganese 180mg Oxide 1 300mg Carbonate 225mg Sulfate 90mg As for detox, I am no scientist, but I have seen dogs go down hill within an hour of eating a food allergen and improve again within 24 hours, I would say 3 days seems to show a marked improvement. I bought a bag of Turkey and Rice Advance on Thursday, as the large bites C/Rice seemed to make my dog itch and the eyes go gunky again, whereas the small bites didn't, I noticed by yesterday the itching had decreased a fair bit. Advance, to their credit, have asked for a sample of small and large bites to be sent off for testing, for they stated that only the size of the bites had changed and not the ingredients. Stayed tuned.

can you please share your informatino as I could only find some generic information: "Vets All Natural Complete Mix contains a combination of mixed cereal grains, dried vegetables and fruit, dried garlic, dried wheat grass, calcium, yeast, kelp, lecithin and vitamin C powder. It is available in a puppy, adult dog, cat and weight loss formula. The mix is designed to be reconstituted by soaking in an equal volume of water and then mixed with raw meat. 1kg will combine to feed an average 20kg dog for at least 2 weeks. If you feed other food such as bones then 1kg will last much longer."

You can buy V.A.N on line: VETS ALL NATURAL

Hi Sermonsta you are not sounding like an idiot, enviromental triggers are the next step, which is the hardest to elimate. My vet stated that 75% of allergies is bought on by fleas, 15 - 25% by diet, enviroment can be another, but unless you have your dog in a sterile enviroment or find a competent canine skin specialist that can do all the allergy tests, it is harder to find which are the source, so we start with the basics and build our way up the ladder of knonw allergens. Sandflies can be nasty, using non carcinogentic dips, such as Asontul can help, I have been using Frontline and also have commenced Asuntol dips, to see if this helps. Lugar was on Frontline and Advantage, we rotate the drugs so the immunities in the nasties do not build up, he was also Asuntol dipped, his was caused mainly bought on by food, his owner believed that good animal husbandry was Pal, he didn't control the fleas and the first time the vet saw him, it was my vet, he prescribed Frontline to kill the fleas, this owner was too cheap to spend the money and didn't buy it, his words were "I bought a purebred dog, I didn't expect to have to spend money on IT to keep IT healthy" I kid you not!!

Hi Workndog that photo was taken 2 weeks after he came here, he looked a lot worse on day one and was down to 26kg, at the time of the photo he was on double his daily ration to get his emanicipated condition changed. The owner said that by me taking him back, saved him the money in euthanasia. If you would have seen this dog as a baby, he was the biggest in the litter, fat and healthy and to see the dog that return, I had to use all my strength not to abuse the owner. When he came back, he stunk, even thou the owner had said he just bathed him, his chewing had bought on a yeast infection under the skin, he had no incissors, they were all worn away and he was only 14 months old, I could not even read his ear tatoo, his ears were full of crust. My heart cried at the sight and took him straight to my vet, I honestly didn't think that there was much hope for him, but we got him back to excellent health, he even got an excellent hip and elbow score. My vet first suggested Eukanuba FP, but at $120 per 18 kg bag and he was on 2kg of food a day, it would have broken my budget so my vet devised a BARF diet that did the trick, as you can see, Vets All Natural was not around back then, or not well known. He is now a much loved pet of friends, who love him to bits, he also has a super character and some of the natural things he does, are truely amazing. His owners felt sorry for him occassionally, with "his plain diet" and would feed him things, eg; sausages at BBQ's they have learnt that this dog can no longer tolerate any additivies, he will have relapses.

Hi Bandar did you manage to get the V.A.N? With this dog below we had great results with pure chicken backs, minced, rice and vegies. I was using Maleseb baths every third day, as he had developed a secondary skin infection, due to his previous owners neglect as well as Surlan for an ear infection, also bought on by the allergies. With him it was one step forward, two steps back. others I know of, used his diet and then they started on V.A.N and found it wonderful. So I hope that you have great results too. I have another dog that does not go well on chicken mince BARF, I don't use C.M because it is cheaper, I found Lugar would chew himself senseless, an hour after eating red meat. the other dog is doing better on Advance. He has to remain in peak working condition too, found mince made him flabby and I am loathed at this stage to try V.A.N, maybe in a few months once our activities have dropped off and if he has a set back it will not matter. I also find Condees Crystal baths great for soaking the dog, but wear gloves for it will turn everything orange, lol. I have all my bitches on pure chicken mince, vegies and Omega Oils and they are of excellent weight and have nice shiney coats and clear eyes. Oh, by the way, my first chicken mince wholesaler, was putting bread into the mince to "thicken it' which made Lugar chew himself, I also foudn Leonards mince was not a pure source either, as I would occassionally find bread crumbs etc and with food allergies, unless you know, exactly, what you are feedin you could be making your pet sicker rather than healthier, so make sure the meat supplier does not use additivies. I look forward to your photos

Hi Bandar there are no easy solutions with allergies, the only bit of advice I found helpful was start off iwth basic ingredients and slowly, over a few days, add another, if you find your dog chewing, gunky eyes or that horrible yeasty skin infection return, note that food and never feed again. I would try the Vets All Natural first, seeing as you only have one dog, GSD owners have reported wonderful results. Avoid red meat at all costs, if you can get turkey necks etc, these are wonderful and do not seem to have as much hormones in them as chicken mince. I will post more information tomorrow for you, Maleseb is great, Condees Crystals is another fav. it is cheap and a few crystals in the bath water, soaking the dog, brings a lot of relief.

Sorry to hear about your girl and you have eliminated the number 1 reason for itchy skin, fleas Hotspots are caused by the dog chewing and scracthing, which eventually breaks the skin and the wound gets infected, eliminating the reasons why they are chewing will eliminate the hot spots. the number one reason for scratching and chewing is fleas, the second food allergies, than enviroment (plants, dusts, pollens) so we start with the basics and work our way up. If your chicken mince is not a pure meat, some will put fillers, such as bread to make it heavier. All of mine bar my boy and a baby are on pure chicken mince and they are doing great, my boy is doing much better on Advance Chicken and Rice for adults, the chicken mince does not agree with him as well. I have also great success with Vets All Natural dog food, have you tried that?

Most Labradors are vaccums on four legs, I know my vets Labby will eat anything, my GSD's wont eat lettuce, tomato and other bits and pieces but the Labby doesn't even taste the food, he sucks it in, lol. You need to be cruel to be kind in this instance and only feed your dog the bare minium for awhile. Lean meats and boiled veggies and mearsure/weigh everything! I looked after my father in laws dog for 3 months while they were away, the 4 year old was nearly obessely overweight, he gave her food by 'the bowl full' never weighed anything. For the first 2 months, she was only fed 1 cup of premium biscuit, as opposed the 4 cups of cheap and crappy food she had been fed, with a tablespoon of lean meat. When F.I.L came back he commented on how good she looked and you could now feel her ribs, with just a light covering over the ribs, instead of diggging and not finding a trace of a rib, as was the case two months before. He said he would continue on the diet and assured me he would measure everything. Within the month, he had gone back to his old ways, of not measuring, just pouring it into her dog bowl, as the cup and a bit didn't look look like enough for this desexed, sedatory dog, she was obese, within 6months. so you will need to cruel to be kind, the boiled vegies will fill her up and the meat will give her protein source, a 1/4 c for now and lean with a calcium tablet, she sounds like she has plenty in reserve, a bit like a hybernating bear :rolleyes: so dont' feel like you are being cruel and starving her, once you have got her down to a decent weight, it can take around 3 months to do this, then you can slowly increase her biscuit by a 1/4 c at a time until you have her a maintance weight, if she puts on weight, drop it back by half a cup, make sure NO ONE else feeds her, people have a tendancy to feel sorry for those soulful eyes commony seen in the Labby. The only exercise I would be diong too, would be swimming, drive her to a swimming pool, there are doggy once in most cities, or else a river. You can also start to give her Sasha Blend, that will help with her arthritis and follow the instructions of your vet.

LOL, yeah well the boy, unless I am out there encouraging him he lays around a lot unless the Bush Turkeys decide to invade the yard or the horses on the fence, where as his litter sister is firming up a lot easier, as she is more active, my two youngsters are very active and I have increased their diet a bit more already, well before I found out they were being accidentally starved that is. The boy would make a great Lion, have the Lionesses do all the work and he just enjoys the fruits of their labour, a lot like most male species :p

Molasses, with the BARF calorie converter I found, if I find the URL will post it, that is what it said. At the moment, my dogs are doing 3-4kms on the bike and then 2km brisking walking up and down our hilly roads, the amount I am feeding the boy is actually putting a bit of weight on him, so I will have to drop it back a couple of grams. Found it: http://www.shirleys-wellness-cafe.com/misc.htm#calculator Darn, I am hopeless with maths, I should have converted kgs to pounds, whereas I had put in 40 forgetting it would be in pounds. So he should be 88lbs, which would 2.64 lbs = 1.2kgs Poor puppies I have been starving them, not, they are all in good condition, luckily with the amount I have been feeding them. They were lucky that the meat I feed is fatty, I guess, will have to revaluate it all now and watch to see if they get too fat or not. Thanx Molassess, for pointing that out, I could very well have had the RSPCA on my door step :p

I am not as up on BARF as others, so maybe some one can give you better advice. My biggest problem has been in keeping their weight down on BARF, especially those that are in work for shows etc. I have finally found a site that gave me the weights and a active dog needs 3% of its body weight per day in food and a less active 2-2.5%. So my 40kg dog, in work, is on 550g of food a day, in a bowl it doesn't look like much. I buy chicken meat that is the whole chicken minced, that is fat, meat, bone and a bit of offal (very high calorie, remember, mine are country dogs so get a lot of exercise, even if it is just in the yard :p ), I then add some slightly microwaved frozen vegies, a squirt of Omega oils, 1/2 t kelp and garlic, some L.S.A (Linseed, Soya Bean and Almonds, grounded) Feramo, during the week they will get an egg, some offal meats, brisket bones. That is about it and costs about 80 cents per day per dog Forgot to mention, I did try the Coprice and I liked it for awhile, but my dogs began to develop hot spots so discontinued within a bout 2 months. At least with BARF you are guaranteed in what you are feeding your dog, every day, sometimes commercial biscuits will substitute if the a product is hard or expensive to come by and you would none the wiser, only it will affect your dogs appearance.

I have had excellent results on just feeding BARF pure fatty chicken mince and vegies, with some vitamin/mineral supplements. Have found Advance Large Breed Growth, Chicken and Rice, the best as far as low allergy complete dog foods, where my GSD was getting hot spots. I did try the Supercoat Special diet for allergies and a GSD I had still got the hot spots on this. Another is Pal Puppy biscuit and to this I add pure chicken mince, Omega Oils are a great additive too. Eukanuba FP Skin and Coat is the premium for dogs that are allergic If you go BARF, start off on the basics and build your way up, if you find your dog reacts to one food, delete that for life from their diet.