stormie

There's Pets Warehouse who are in the Commercial Marketplace in Off Topic. They sell products for cheaper than our clinic can buy them and appear to be much easier to order through that Priceless Pets.

Nothings helping us at work at the moment. Poo is cleaned up and we have 3 different types of traps. The flies are those awful biting sucking one and are mostly interested in the dogs. I just took Orbit swimming and counted 17 on him at one go once he got out

Yeah they're residents. How do you mean it's a problem? eta - just read your very allergic!! That's terrible!! When I say residents, they live there because Ian does. They're in his house, not the clinic. We just bring them in to the consult room occasionally (Archie is actually mine) to play with them or to show people.

Just be careful with that Dane. He's very affectionate when you give him a pat and likes to knock you in the head. I heard birds twittering when our heads banged against each other. Oh silly Raz, that was probably just Archie and Chicken!!

Wow I've just seen a pic on facebook of this being used on a massive wound on a horse. Interesting!!

And Stormie. She's pretty hot! It's a really good clinic. They wont call your dog 'it'. how you doin

Is that the vet clinic near the high school with the big brick wall around it? Bennies? Yep we're just up the road from there

We're in Pennant Hills, so not sure if this is too far. For most people it's love at first visit with Ian

Hiccups are pretty common in puppies - quite normal! Enjoy them while they last

Atopica is wonderful, however it's not a drug you can give for instant relief. You need to give it over a long period of time before you start to see results, so I'm not sure it would be appropriate for your situation if you just wanted something to use before the ring. I would think a couple of days of cortisone just before would help, and so long as the dose is kept low and it's not a regular thing, you would be unlikely to see any side effects.

I'm in no way having a go, but just trying to work something out. For those who free feed due to having picky eaters, I don't understand why having food available helps? If they became hungry at say 11am and had a little pick, then again at say 2pm and picked again, surely if they were hungry at these times and no food was available, come dinner time they'd be uber hungry?

Oh right, these are puppy shots you're talking about? We prefer to do 3 puppy shots, but mostly because we've heard of pups dying from parvo who only had 2. We'd rather be safe than sorry. But in saying that, we will happily just do C3's if that's what people want.

Hey Sam, I'm in Sydney so can't give you any recommendations, however any vet should be able to give a C3. In order to give a C5, they have to use a C3 so you just need to specifically ask for it over a C5

This is what I was referring to before. So you could be doing the right thing, have the best ethics, breeding practices etc. But if you have enemies, they're not going to steer people your way if people ask them are you?

ANKC wont get an ad campaign going. Breeders have been begging them for years. It's up to us to direct Joe Blow towards good breeders. Some of them will turn around and 'save' a puppy from a pet shop window but some of them will turn to a good breeder if you get in their ear enough. What about the MDBA then? If they could get up a big campaign to try and educate the public, perhaps then there wouldn't be a need for a separate registry as people would know how to sort the wheat from the chaff from the ANKC breeders?

Did I not already say we need a awareness campaign??? Yes, so clearly I am in agreement with you.

Sway I get what you mean. But if you don't know the information is out there, you don't know you can self educate. Which is what I'm getting at - we need to educate people, to educate themselves. Inform them of what goes on, that they need to ask questions. The majority of people just don't know that this is the case.

It's like we almost need to start campaigning or something. Educate people that yes, there are genetic diseases in our Purebreds but that breeders are testing to reduce them. People just don't know this happens. If people are calling our clinic, they're calling others. How many vets and nurses are telling these people to do their research, avoid designer dogs etc? It would be great it we could direct people to a website, or give them a brochure or booklet or something. Dogzonline is my number 1 referred website for locating breeders, but there's not a lot of information there on what questions to ask, what to look for etc. Or what about the MDBA contacting a huge company like Pfizer? Their Paw Club website (also the Heart Your Dog people) has been one of the most successful marketing campaigns around. The sign up rate to that club has totally blown them away. They have a page on buying a dog that isn't very informative and their breed selection quiz leaves little to be desired? Could we contact them and ask to provide them with more information?

Sure but what I mean is, how do you teach people that they should be asking 5-10 people. Occasionally, people call us up at work saying they're looking at getting a puppy and ask if we know of any breeders. This is the extent of their research because it's all they know to do. Many of them are amazed when you mention Breed Clubs because they just don't know these exist. I truly believe people don't realise there's so much they can learn. So how do we educate people that they need to ask and research?

Research and more research, sad part is many just want a puppy and want it now!! But how do people research? Where can they go to know they're getting completely non bias information? So many breeders talk the talk and possibly even health test, but then you can find out from other people they are totally clueless and dodgy. I could ask certain people in our breed, who have been in the show scene for a while and get pointed in the direction of breeders who I class as being terrible. Then there's breeder conflict, so again you could ask a breeder about other breeders, but you're only going to get their opinion, which if they don't like them, could be quite negative. I think another issue is actually educating the public that there IS stuff to research. I think for the majority of prospective dog owners, when they want a puppy they just find a breeder. I don't think a lot of people out there realise there are amazing breeders and not so amazing breeders. So how do we educate the public that they need to research? How do we get to them at that crucial point where they decide they want a puppy?

I'm not into free feeding. My dog has high value for his food and will eat his meal straight away and lick the bowl. If he's ever feeling enough to not eat, I know straight away because it's unusual for him not to finish.

Why, when we know the heartworm cycle is something like 6 months? (I need to go find the info I printed out on this.)? The heartworm take 6 months to show up on a heartworm test. Many preventatives we use only kill one part of the life cycle. If you don't kill them, they'll continue to grow, however won't show up as a positive until 6 months after infection. I'm not sure there are any preventatives that actually kill the adults, though the daily tabs can have a reaction with them which can be fatal.

I think it's an interesting topic but one that needs a lot of consideration on the part of the new owners. Are they prepared do deal with an entire dog up until desexing? I can't speak for all dogs/breeds but I know Orbit changed significantly once he started to feel his hormones and I admit I wasn't prepared for it. In hindsight I actually wish I desexed him earlier than I did (18months). We see entires, particularly males, through work regularly, and I have to say most of them are poorly behaved. Not the dog's fault, but the owners for not providing enough leadership at the right time. I don't think there's a set answer, but rather one that should be discussed and weighed up for each particular case.

Because to use a 12month vaccine and sign off for three years is contrary to the labelling insructions so if a dog contracts the disease the vet could be liable. The Trienniel vaccine is registered and tested for three years therefore can be signed off on for 3 years and therefore the vets backside is covered. I wonder why they would 'invent' a new vaccine and test it so they could sign off on it for 3 years, rather than testing the existing annual vaccines for the same thing. I think this is what they did. It's not really a 'new vaccine' as such, it's still covers the same diseases but with more updated strains, eg the newer parvo strain. But to get registration is still a big process. They have to prove that it offers protection for 3 years after administration, so that involves at least a 3 year study, a control group of dogs (which means dogs kept in isolation in sterile conditions for 3 years who are given the virus at various stages to compare to the ones who have the vaccine) and the ones who had the vaccine. They don't just titre test because they don't actually know enough about titre testing to be able to prove 100% that the results equate to cover. It's why I find the whole vaccine issue so difficult. Obviously I'd love to see all vaccines gain a longer registration, but knowing what needs to happen in order to get this, makes me upset.

Because to use a 12month vaccine and sign off for three years is contrary to the labelling insructions so if a dog contracts the disease the vet could be liable. The Trienniel vaccine is registered and tested for three years therefore can be signed off on for 3 years and therefore the vets backside is covered. Yep this is why we elected to use it. Plus it keeps boarding kennels, training clubs happy too. We can be confident when we tell people they are covered for 3 years and won't need another. If people want to use the annual vacc triennially, we're happy to do that too. One company is soon to have a vaccine which doesn't have a set time in it's registration, but rather, it's open to vet's discretion, in line with the new protocol. So I think this means that however the vet choses to use it (within a 3 year period I think??) then they are covered. I'm not 100% sure whether it's only up to 3 years or if you could use it say ever 7 years with cover, but hopefully will find out more soon.