stormie

Sometimes dogs that have upset stomachs can give you the impression they are constipated when in fact they can have diarrhoea. They can get cramps and an urgency to go just like people do, but if there's nothing left in there, not much would come out. The fact that mucous is passing sounds more like there is some inflammation in his intestines. Panting can be a sign of pain/distress/fever. The lamp flaps may have been too fatty which has given him an upset stomach, or worse, a case of pancreatitis or intestinal obstruction. just read you've gone to the vet - good idea

FTPO - Orbit got a positive result back to oats with his SPOT test and I always found any oatmeal shampoo or conditioner did make him worse. There is a fair amount of question over the validity of the food results with the blood test (though the company that does it had a lot of info proving it's correct, but who knows), but this made sense for us so we avoid it. Mind you, I'd be avoiding it anyway regardless of the test results because it makes him worse. I now only use shampoos that have no oatmeal or any plant extracts.

Huski is it the shot that lasts about a month? How much relief does Cherry get from the injection? Does it completely stop the itching? Theoretically, cortisone doesn't help food allergies so well. It gives relief, but not as much relief as it seems to give for environmental allergies. This isn't to say that if the shot works, it's not food allergies, but you can sometimes get a bit of an idea. If you're starting the diet now, I'd definately go for atleast 12weeks. That way it gives you about 8 weeks after the cortisone has worn off to determine whether there's any change. No use looking for changes in the first month while the cortisone is still active. Try to keep everything else the same as best you can while doing the diet too. Another thing to keep in mind, is with winter coming in, we're heading into the pollen off season, so its possible that any improvement could also be related to that too. But these are things you can test after the diet when you challenge her with some of her old foods. Goodluck!!

Huski if it's not too late, ask your vet for oral cortisone!!! It only lasts about 24 hours and you can wean her off it yourself as you need. You can also taper the dose down to the lowest dose she is comfortable on, and still do the elimination diet and notice results. Oral cortisone is much better/safer for them than the injections, too.

One of our clients recently changed her dogs onto the Nutro and is just thrilled with the results. There is a very obvious improvement in the condition of all of them. She is thrilled.

Yep Huski I'd go with the roo meat and sweet potato. We were told to do the elimination diet for a minimum of 12weeks. Unfortunately with allergies, they tend to get worse as the dogs get older, so things can be going ok, but then their bodies find something else to be allergic to. And they can be pretty much allergic to anything. Chicken is a big no no for Orbit, if he eats it, he's a real mess in about 12hours. There are quite a few foods he can't eat, both meats and grains. He is also allergic to dust mites, cat dander, lots of different grass pollens, plant pollens etc. Have you tried any antihistamines?

Blood in the stools is pretty common for dogs with upset tummies. When their colons become irritated and inflamed, they often produce lots of mucous which comes out in the stools and commonly is blood stained. There are conditions, however, where dogs will pass large quantities of blood, such as HGE - something that needs vet attention. If the dog is otherwise well - bright, happy etc, with holding meals for 24hours can help and give the intestines a chance to settle down. After this, you can introduce small frequent meals of chicken and rice.

Ries I feed Orbit raw and due to his allergies, am quite limited on what meats/offal he can have, but he is doing really well on it regardless. Basically he gets 0.5-1k of meat for breakfast, and about 1kg of RMB for dinner. I add eggs and offal/heart to his breakfast on weekends. I have to feed small amounts of offal/hearts regularly because too much and he has the foulest black/green diarrhoea ever! You seem to have a better range of meat up there just in woolies than we do here. I've yet to find a woolies that has tongue but it was everywhere up there when I was up there last!

Symbion Pathology also send theirs to WA (in fact I'm pretty sure they bought VetPath). The price list I have from VetPath says that only Distemper and Parvo titres are done onsite, and that the Hepatitis needs to be sent away and generally has a 2 week turnaround time. This pricelist is 12months old though. I think those on dol that titre mostly only the the Parvo and Distemper? If you can persuade your vet to send the samples directly to VetPath WA, it'll be cheaper as you'll avoid the other labs handling fees etc.

Do you know when he ate it Stormie? The dog ate the corn cob on the 3/5 (as far as the owners know) and didn't come in to clinic until the 8/5. Even on the 8th the dog was still bright and it wasn't until the next day that he really went flat.

I didn't realise I replied so soon to your post! Yeah Orbit is so so... he goes along ok until he decides to have a big roll in the grass - then we pay for it for a couple of days. It's good with the weather being cooler because I can keep him in his coat more which helps.

Sounds good!! Will keep fingers and paws crossed for you guys!

The difference being that the 'monthly' ones release over the whole period of 45 days? Save that the active ingredient in the daily drug is (from what I'm informed) the more 'kinder' drug for the dog. So how do you figure the monthly one is better? This is not actually correct. The monthly tablets do not slow release - the active ingredient only stays around in the body for a couple of days. It's during this time that it kills certain life stages of the heartworm - all prior to the adult stage. Basically speaking, the ivermectin kills heartworm larvae from the age of 0-30days, so on the day you give the monthly chew, any heartworm aquired in the last 30 days (or probably 45-60 days) will be killed. The daily tablet kills the larvae in the final stage before it becomes an adult. That's why it's important to give it every day, as by missing just a couple of days allows the larvae to reach adult hood. It's dangerous to give the daily tablet to a dog that has adult heartworm, because the babies that the adults produce, can react with the drug. The daily tab is also not 100% - we have had dogs test positive to heartworm that have been on the daily tabs. So basically, giving a daily tablet is actually giving more chemicals, as its a regular daily dose, where as the monthly tabs is only around for a couple of days. not saying that your wrong as im still new to all this heart worm, but do you ahve any info to back up what youve sed, or whats makes you think that way? Not that I can give you a link to, sorry. I got it from our IVS Annual (Index of Veterinary Specialties). Basically it's a database of drugs which gives information to vets on how they work, dose rates etc.

I haven't yet, FTPO, but will be very soon, so I'll let you know how we get on. Are you doing it under dermatologist advice or vet? I don't know a lot about it yet, but my advice before you start would be to make sure you get the best advice possible - I know that it is recommended to try get them off cortisone as best you can whilst you do them, to improve get the best results, but not sure about Atopica, but it would be something I'd be finding out before you get started! Goodluck!!

Chiccy you really need to have this investigated more thoroughly by your vet. Hopefully the faecal analysis will give you some answers, but if it doesn't, you must insist on getting to the bottom of it. Try the chicken and pumpkin/or rice, and maybe instead of natural yoghurt, add a powdered probiotic in case the yoghurt is upsetting her tummy. At the end of the day though, you need to get to the bottom of it. As you would know, a growing dane has specific nutritional requirements so you can't really afford to be playing around with diet too much or having her unwell with diarrhoea. As Kaz said - come into the dane thread!!

We took a corn cob out of a JRT on saturday night! In this particular case, the cob never passed out of the stomach. The dog vomited a couple of times at the end of the week, but was still his normal self and passing faeces. Wasn't until sat morning that he went really flat and was vomiting much more.

The difference being that the 'monthly' ones release over the whole period of 45 days? Save that the active ingredient in the daily drug is (from what I'm informed) the more 'kinder' drug for the dog. So how do you figure the monthly one is better? This is not actually correct. The monthly tablets do not slow release - the active ingredient only stays around in the body for a couple of days. It's during this time that it kills certain life stages of the heartworm - all prior to the adult stage. Basically speaking, the ivermectin kills heartworm larvae from the age of 0-30days, so on the day you give the monthly chew, any heartworm aquired in the last 30 days (or probably 45-60 days) will be killed. The daily tablet kills the larvae in the final stage before it becomes an adult. That's why it's important to give it every day, as by missing just a couple of days allows the larvae to reach adult hood. It's dangerous to give the daily tablet to a dog that has adult heartworm, because the babies that the adults produce, can react with the drug. The daily tab is also not 100% - we have had dogs test positive to heartworm that have been on the daily tabs. So basically, giving a daily tablet is actually giving more chemicals, as its a regular daily dose, where as the monthly tabs is only around for a couple of days.

this is a little OT, but it really bugs me when people refer to the annual injection as a 'vaccine'. It is not a vaccination at all - it's a slow release injection.

lamb necks and roo tails? Not too much fat on either of these and might just be something they can tear the meat off without actually eating the bone? Might be something they can have a chew on, and then you can take them away before they go hard and brittle. Tearing meat off bones is great for teeth. Or maybe turkey necks? Again these don't have a lot of fat and the bone it is small and soft so would be less likely to cause a problem. Would they chew on raw carrots? If there's nothing they can eat that will help their teeth, you may have to resort to brushing them yourself.

The mucous is just a sign of inflammation in the colon - most likely from the wood in this case. A bit of blood is not uncommon with mucous also. If it continues, off to the vet.

Kavik, the only problem with using rice and pasta, is that its unlikely to be a novel carbohydrate source. Most dog food contains rice, and most probably has some same ingredients as whats in pasta too. It's possible it could be rice, so using it in the elimination diet isn't going to help you. Here's the link to BURNS - they have horse muscle meat and horse brisket. They have duck frames too.

Hey Erny, Spirulena gives Orbit foul diarrhoea. Fingers crossed removing those two things helps with his stools.

Just a question - metrogyl is most commonly given for gastro-intestinal upsets. Has your dog been vomiting or had diarrhoea? If so, I would be holding off on the metacam until the tummy issues are all settled.

Candida is not the same as malassezia

Agree with sas on the Rufus and Coco - was much kinder on Orbits skin and didn't dry it out like the malaseb or pyohex does. I have the pyohex conditioning lotion which I used when his skin gets bad. He gets areas of pustules (staph) when he's having a bad period, and I find the lotion really great for getting rid of them. I put some lotion on the pustules at night and by morning they are looking much better. The normal dose for phenergan is 1mg/kg twice daily. It comes in 10mg and 25mg tablets, so depending on his weight, might be easier to buy the 25mg tabs. Orbit gets 50mg morning and night and I wouldn't say it makes him excessively drowsy. He does sleep more, but not to the extent where he acts sedated or anything like that. Still just as keen to play and train etc.