WoofnHoof

Yes, in US. Most do focus on triggers - ie, dog chained, male with female dog in heat, etc etc, but groups of owners are mentioned Ah thanks. I guess that leads to the next question, on the basis of that research where in the world have measures been taken to reduce incidences of dog bites/attacks and what where those measures? Not suggesting that you need to go looking at all Jed just throwing the question out there in general

The emphasis has to come off the dogs altogether and prosecution of owners has to become the focus. I grabbed a couple of dogs off the highway today and I couldn't tell what breed they were other than that there was obviously a bit of bully or staffy in them they seem to stamp the head shape but that could have been 10 generations away for all anyone knows that's why the bullies get the blame because they have a few easily identifiable features which seem to breed true no matter how many other breeds are in the mix. I wonder if there have been any investigations into the trends in owners/type of owners in attack stats? As much as people like to whinge about ownership regulation (ie licenses and compulsory courses) I'd rather have that than continue to stuff around with this or that breed identification issue.

Maybe see if he will use a ramp? That would be an easy way to know whether it's pain-related.

I'd agree with consulting a specialist, I wonder if the bone could be rebroken and reset? (I'm no vet just speculating) It will be interesting to see how this pup goes regardless he sounds like he's in good hands

Several mild to moderate colics (cause unknown but suspected impaction mostly treated with walking) didn't sweat, one severe colic suspected impaction/sand colic resolved in a day or so with treatment (drenching, walking and pain relief - no abdo scans availabe) didn't sweat, and of course my fellow who went from moderate to severe in two hours scans showing multiple distended loops senior vet advised that severety indicated surgery if condition didn't improve but didn't recommend it and it resolved overnight (root cause took longer to resolve). Maybe it depends on whether it's grain associated since grain would raise temp anyway, I know that sweating and pain are usually associated but with those cases though they were definetly showing clear signs of pain and colic (severe agitation, pawing, rolling, restlessness, lack of appetite etc) didn't sweat. There are also plenty of cases which did sweat but those are the ones I remember which didn't. If you know that clipping an IV site is not practiced at all times what other signs of IV injection were you referring to in your earlier post?

I've seen enough colics to know they don't all sweat and I've never seen a vet clip a horse in summer coat (which this one definetly was) for an IV. Obviously our experiences are very different.

Umm it would be highly irregular for a horse to show a sign of an IV injection, why would there be unless the horse had a reaction? I've never seen any noticable signs after IV drugs. Not all severe colics sweat either. What else would make you think the horse had been shot? Why is that any more plausible to you than if it had been put down by any other method and what difference does it make anyway? It makes little difference to me how the horse was put down because either method is acceptable as long as they are administered quickly and effectively by trained personell.

Great to hear!

Ideally the dogs would remain with the current owner and be effectively contained and enforced as such, in addition to educating the owner. Currently there are no compulsory courses for people who are found guilty of ineffective control of their animals, perhaps there needs to be.

Cats don't have the huge variation in morphology that exists in dogs, a large dog in prey drive is hardly going to stop and check that the little fluffy animal it is chasing is the same species. Many toy breeds look different, act different, they can even smell different and a dog that hasn't had a lot of contact with toy breeds is far less likely to identify it as 'the same species'. I wouldn't consider it abberant behaviour unless the dogs were similar shape and size, even then a normal dogfight can result in deaths dogs aren't necessarily always benevolent they are just as prone to arguments and leadership challenges as many other species.

Either that or adopted out straight away/very early on so that all decisions made regarding it's ongoing care (and the assoicated costs) were the sole responsiblity of the owner. If anything this case has made me realise how very difficult it must be to balance the needs and responsibilities of the rescue with those of the carers, while still ensuring that the animal is both given the best possible chance for a future and not having to suffer for longer than is absolutely necessary. And we see here what can happen when the system fails.

Would a horse pass a vet inspection anyway if moving it was so risky? What if there was a fire or flood and the horse had to be moved? What if the carer hadn't decided to adopt her and she had to be moved to a new home?

Haha casowner sneaky! I was wondering about the reference to JCU! Thanks for the info wolfgirl71

Depends on what is causing the colic, if the root cause were known it would depend on whether it is ultimately treatable or not and what the treatment involves, duration etc. If the cause is unknown well it then becomes a personal decision and everyone has a different place for their 'line in the sand'. When my boy was colicing severely I was prepared to have him undergo surgery even though it wasn't recommended because of his age (17), but the cause was unknown and because the horse was having other health issues when for most of his life he'd been exceptionally healthy, I felt there was a root cause and if we could only identify it and treat it then the problems would resolve - which they did thankfully. Whether he would have survived surgery at his age I don't know ultimately it may have made things worse but those are the choices you have to make as an owner you have to assess the information you have and try to make the best decision you can.

Maybe they would put people in rescue roles with better communication but maybe they were all volunteers? Maybe there aren't enough volunteers in townsville with good communication skills or even good horse knowledge? Who knows? And who knows exactly how much communication actually occured between the parties? Obviously not enough but where exactly did communication break down when in the beginning the relationship appeared to be satisfactory? What was the catalyst for the breakdown? Staff turnover has been identified as a possible reason for the communication issue, is that the only issue? Whether or not the horse should have died or would have died cannot be ascertained since it's unclear whether the colic was ultimately treatable, perhaps the horse should have been put down 5, 6, 7 months earlier rather than having to repeatedly endure colic episodes and treatment? God knows there are plenty of people who will keep treating an animal with a serious and recurring illness who is to say whether it's the right thing to do? I'm not passing judgement about whether the horse was better off dead or not, or whether the carer was making decisions that were merely prolonging the inevitable, or whether the RSPCA was wrong in taking the horse, because I don't know enough about the nature of the illness or the circumstances leading up to and including it's death. As far as I can tell no one here has that information we only have some newspaper reports and facebook so any judgements made (whether they be by brain surgeons or otherwise) have the potential to be way off the mark. At the end of the day I'm not interested in whose 'fault' this is I'm interested in how it happened and why, so shoot me if I'm a little skeptical about the how and why being put down to 'the RSPCA sucks', that really doesn't answer any of the questions posed by this situation, nor does it do anything to prevent it happening again.

That question will never be answered but she was prone to colic and the decision to PTS was made 3 weeks after she'd been moved, had it been within a week of moving I'd be more inclined to think it was related to the move but after three weeks who knows? If they hadn't moved the horse and had decided the horse was too unstable healthwise to be rehomed responsibly would the carer have allowed them to come and put the horse down? It's difficult with horses it can take quite a long time to know whether they are going to fully recover and assessed as able to live a reasonably healthy life, ideally I would think that moves to assess and adopt the horse should have been sorted out within weeks of it being rescued and responsibility for vet bills etc worked out beforehand, not 7 months later but of course this situation is far from ideal. Perhaps attempts were made to do this and for some reason it didn't happen? There isn't a lot of information about what was actually happening re communication between carer and RSPCA in the 7 months prior so it's really difficult to say where things started to go wrong and why.

I imagine that all animals which pass through the RSPCA are sent to the dead animal dump, as the horse was. That would be standard practice, so the horse was sent there as standard practice. That was exactly my thoughts.. why lie about it? I'm sure the lady would have been much less offended if she was just told the horse was euthanized and disposed of.. even better they could have given her the opportunity to dispose if it herself since she seems particularly sensitive about it and saved themselves the trouble! It just seems so silly that they lied about it and I think it proves that they are running scared and trying to patch things up.. silly silly. Maybe they didn't lie, maybe whoever she spoke to genuinely didn't know. I enquired about a horse at the council animal management centre once the woman at the desk said when the time for reclaiming is up the horses go to the sales. I said "oh so they get dogged", she said "no they go to the sale", turns out she genuinely didn't know that an unknown, unridden horse at the sales has a snowballs chance in hell of not being dogged, a ridden horse is generally better off but still not necessarily safe. I rode a horse in a sale a while back because the chicken s*** owner wouldn't even give the poor bugger that chance and I still had to specify to the auctioneer he wasn't to be dogged because the first bidder was a dogger! Combine that with the fact that most non-horsey people (and even some horsey people) are unaware of the regulations surrounding the burial of horses and it's entirely possible that many of the people without this knowledge assume that horses are generally buried. I've known people who've had horses die and they've just dragged them down to the back of the property - out of sight out of mind for some, well except for the poor buggers on neighbouring properties downstream

DAFF deals with animal welfare policy and research, trouble with animal welfare regs at the moment is that some stuff comes under RSPCA jurisdiction, some comes under DPI and some comes under the police and there are several areas of overlap.

The puppy pics of him you posted in the other thread do remind me of my sibe as a pup so there could be more in there than it appears at the moment.

Not in my area it doesn't, the quotes I got last week weren't even close to that.

:D Probably just means he had all the markers for sibe and no markers for any other breed, it is odd that they specify that they think it's pure when it only relies on a few genetic markers as far as I'm aware.

Actually I can see a lot of sibe in this fellow

With horses there are more regulations associated with it than there is with smaller animals. They are not allowed to be buried near watercourses or areas where the water table is close to the surface, many councils require a certain amount of lime placed over and a certain depth for the hole etc. It does cost money to bury a horse you need a backhoe I hired one last week it was $340 per day and $300 to transport it to the property they can't go on a trailer they have to go on a truck. Then you need someone who knows how to operate it who can dig the hole for you, and you have to hope you don't have a lot of rock on your property. If the mare in this scenario was colicing at the time she was PTS it would have been extremely difficult to tranport her to the carer's property, you run the risk of the horse dying in transit then you have to find some way of getting her out of the float/truck, hooking a rope on and dragging the body out isn't all that dignified an end either. I do believe she should have been given the option though, whether there would have been time is totally dependent on whether the horse was ill at the time of PTS. It's really difficult with horses, I hope to be lucky enough to be on my own place when my lot start to drop off, otherwise I will beg borrow or steal so I can afford cremation which apparently is around $600+ The tip is the last resort for a caring owner, an uncaring owner drops the animal off at the sales while it's still alive

Well most people know my two are pet shop jobs so it was just walking past of course I always have to look I can't help myself. The first was my little chi he was the same colour as the chi I had as a kid and he was just the cutest little puppy! Chi babies are totally irresistable so I had to have him, my mum actually paid for him as a get well present as I'd been in hospital My sibe was a little different he was very subdued in his little glass cage, his brother (a black and white) was very active and bouncy I knew he'd be ok but the little red guy just mildly looked around, he looked very tired (yes I know at this point warning bells should have been ringing - I think my warning system is broke!) When they got him out for me to cuddle he was so frail and thin he weighed hardly anything I put a deposit on him so I could *think* about it He grew pretty well and picked up a lot of condition but always had intermittent diahorrhea and about 6 months of age got very sick, after lots of dramas with misdiagnosis I finally found out he had a liver shunt so we made a big trek by car to Sydney where he was operated on by arguably the best shunt surgeon in the world and never looked back (the gory details are recounted somewhere else on this forum can't remember where) If you look closely you can see the scar running down his belly they had to cut through his sternum, diaphragm etc all the way down to follow the shunt and make sure it didn't diverge anywhere else

My son has asthma and has 'died' several times before his 5th birthday and only been revived with adrenalin injections. THank goodness these days he is great We have always had many dogs and cats and they have slept with him. He was allergic to cold air!!!! which is why we moved to QLD and he has never had an attack since. Maybe you need to brush up on asthma. italmum, I'm devastated for you and your family, I know how much you were looking forward to sharing your lives with Ollie. I'm very very sorry. Hopefully you may be able to find a pet that does not spark off your son's allergies. I will be keeping my fingers crossed for you all.xxxxxxx Monah mine is triggered by cold also, more specifically the drop in temperature rather than the temperature itself, and exercise does it too. It's interesting how it can manifest in so many different ways with such finite triggers. I couldn't really avoid changes in temperature so I've had to rely heavily on correct medication, thankfully I'm on a great one now in the past it was a nightmare to manage Abigail don't feel too bad there are a lot of misconceptions about asthma that abound unless you have been through the treatment merrygoround the information is not always freely available. Italimum fingers crossed you can find a suitable breed that wont trigger your son's reactions, has the doctor suggested any tests to isolate the cause so you can find out whether another breed would suit without having to go through the stress of trialling a dog at home for weeks?