RuralPug

I think badly bred pet brachys are most likely in the majority since the crosses became fashionable and the pure bred but badly bred (yes, some pedigreed) frenchies, cavaliers, bulldogs, pekes, pugs, shih tzus and bostons etc etc. Their popularity as pets has led to this situation. So this is a reason to bar them all? Do bear in mind that there are many brachy breeds that DO NOT have a majority of their members with extreme brachy syndrome - Do you associate Amstaffs with Brachy Syndrome for instance? And yet they are categorised as Brachycephalic. This is one example of tossing the baby with the bathwater. I believe that all of the sighthounds are categorised as dolichocephalic, the other "extreme" in head shape. "Normal" head shape for a canine is categorised as mesocephalic. I believe that pointing the finger at a single head type is just a foot in the door, and I will resist ANY legislation that is breed-centered or type-centered. It would make more sense to institute a fitness test for ANY dog or bitch of ANY breed or mix that must be passed before any puppies from them can be sold. Accidental litters where a fitness test has not been passed should be disallowed from sale, and the offspring handed over to rescue to rehome with full disclosure.

But the sighthounds, as a group, are very healthy. I don't think you could honestly say the same of brachy breeds? If your dog needs its nostrils widened and its soft palate trimmed just to be able to draw breath like a normal dog, I think you have a massive problem with conformation and the standard that isn't going to be fixed by telling people not to be idiots. 100% agree. Are you of the assumption that well bred brachys need nares and palate surgery before they can comfortably be walked around the block? This is not true. Only poorly bred ones do. It is as simple as that. Long lived, problem free brachys do exist - although there are vets that will happily do nares and palate surgery where it is absolutely not needed. We can point to flyball and agilty champion brachys, but these will be thrown out with the bathwater if those behind the push get their way. And don't for an instant assume that the animal rights people will not find an excuse against sighthounds - it will be something. Too much prey drive for recall training perhaps?? It is never safe to assume that your own breed is comfortably safe against AR driven legislation. Consider that historically, greyhounds had the earliest BSL in Victoria against them (thankfully gone at long last.)

Agreed. Vet ASAP. This time of year it could be something like a grass seed lodged in his nostril - it needs to come out before it migrates somewhere even more dangerous.

It does sound as though it had more offal included than you are used to. I would ask your supplier if they have changed their recipe and explain that your dogs don't do as well with the offal-rich mix. You can get good quality pet chicken mince, but without very much offal, and a decent amount of minced bone, for very reasonable prices from Lenard's chicken stores, if you have one near you.

Exactly. And the type of breeder that ignores current legislation (age of rehoming puppies, microchipping and vaccinating before sale) etc. etc. is the type of breeder that will continue to supply puppies regardless of this new legislation. They are hardly ever being prosecuted for breaches of the law now, where is the incentive for them not to continue ignoring the law? It is quite possible that the result of this law is that 90%+ of the law abiding ethical breeders in this state stop breeding and the majority of Victorian puppies produced will be from less than ideal sources and hardly carefully bred. One point of this petition is that VicDogs breeders are at least required to pass a basic examination before getting their prefix, if the legislation required ALL breeders in this state to learn about basic genetics and basic canine obstetrics and how to rear healthy well socialised puppies before being permitted to sell a single pup, I would be all in favour of it. All dogs, purebred or not, are equal. All breeders are definitely not.

Trot along to your nearest Flyball club (most often associated with an obedience club) and ask to attend a Flyball practice. It takes a ball mad dog to get the most enjoyment out of this sport!

I agree with you all, encouraging improved breeding choices IS the very best way to avoid problems in brachy breeds. There is no reason to alter the current ANKC standards to do this, simply to encourage better interpretation. But I honestly don't think that this seminar is going to take that approach more than superficially. It will, I believe, be cited as a reason to avoid pure breeds and the uneducated public will continue to buy crosses of brachy breeds in the mistaken belief that "hybrid vigour" will automatically delete all "bad" genes. And the vets will continue to include the crosses as brachy with brachy problems not bothering to differentiate between carefully and thoughtfully bred brachy dogs without problems and BYB and crosses. It is the task of the ethical breeders to DEMONSTRATE that healthy dogs without extreme examples of brachy syndrome can be and are being produced. Then let the RSPCA spend public money on seminars explaining to the public how to choose an ethical breeder - I wish!!

Done.

Another celebrity vet all set to push an agenda on Brachy breeds, there are brachy specialist vets that could have been approached but they may not have supported the agenda of the organisers.... grrrr. Toss the baby out with the bathwater seems to be the AR platform. Badly bred brachy breeds can and do have problems - so lets get rid of them all, and then the short legged breeds and then the coated breeds and then the sighthounds and the giant breeds. And so it goes.Let us not fix the problem by encouraging health first in breeding programmes, let's ban anything that is not a Dingo. And our commonwealth taxes are paying for this seminar!!!

What about something like this galvanised horse feeder, which you can attach to a fence or wall? Might be better in a heavy plastic, you can buy those as well. I have basically found that securing water dishes in place by chaining them to a fence discourages most dish tossers. Or if you are handy you could build a wall bracket. I have several large ice buckets chained to pen fences, those that are not enamelled inside have a slightly smaller plastic bucket inside them.

I wouldn't be strapping them - horse musculature is very different to dog. I would be concentrating on good diet plus walking him on gravelled surfaces, which does aid foot placement and can correct bowed pasterns in puppies. Sometimes a powdered Vitamin C supplement plus correct exercise will assist pups with weak pasterns, but assuming that his pasterns developed like this in puppyhood I'm not really sure if they can be corrected this late in his life. I would be interested in following this case and would appreciate it very much if you kept us updated.

Thank you! He does have the basic facts right, although his spin could alienate some...

darn it - subscription only. Must I drive 70 km return for a copy of the Herald Sun or will some kind soul copy and paster here for me? Pretty please??

No council requires a dog to be desexed before registration, (except for certain declared dangerous dogs) but state laws require that they offer a considerable discount for desexed animals. Edited to add - I am behind the times it seems and a few councils do have mandatory desexing requirements. State law also requires dogs and cats to be registered with council by twelve weeks of age, so you a risking a hefty fine if you do not register her. The fine is a lot more than the difference between the entire and the desexed registration fee. The law plus her small size probably means that you will need to register before she is desexed and pay the higher fee for the first year.Some councils are reasonable and will refund the difference between registration fees after proof of desexing is received, if it happens within a certain time frame of the original registration This won't apply if your council does have mandatory desexing. Perhaps ask if council will accept veterinary proof of chemical contraception until she is large enough for a general anaesthetic? . Being too small for safe general anaesthetic IS a medical reason and the council should accept a vet's letter as reason to defer desexing - but they don't have to charge you the lower desexed rate before desexing has actually occurred.

This old thread tells you how to build your own hydrobath. That plus a booster bath will save your back. Not every commercially made hydrobath is designed to avoid bending, but some are so if your back is the main reason for buying a dog bath, make sure that it is the right height for you. If you have the money to spend, the stainless steel dog baths are usually the very best for bathing large breeds. You can always add a high pressure pump (see old thread above) or or concentrator nozzle like this one.

Those Zenhaus circular ones look a bit like garbage bins! I couldn't get the handheld pyrometer link to work

Sometimes even I struggle to get the lid off!

I only feed kibble once or twice a week, except for fosters. I have a 15kg plastic drum with a lid, plus a 20 kg tin with a lid. The tin came from a pet food manufacturer about 20 years ago and has been great. I don't care that it advertises a brand I no longer use! The plastic drum came from a department store about 15 years ago. I have also a heavy plastic 20 kg drum with a lid that came as a bonus when you bought two 20kg bags of food - unfortunately the lid of that one is not as heavy and field rats nibbled right through it so it currently is serving as a temporary poop holder instead! Tin garbage cans (about 50lt) are terrific for large kibble storage if you don't have dogs that can knock off the lid and help themselves, or can put them where the dogs can't access them. Check out homeware and hardware stores for these.

Witch hazel and isopropyl alcohol are both stocked by most pharmacies plus non-pharmacy Priceline-type places. Yeast is opportunistic so if he is chewing due to stress that will leave damp moist places for it to colonise. Same with allergies that stress the skin - yeast can jump in there as well. Occasionally you never actually find the root cause, but treating the symptoms and maintenance against further yeast incursions can work well. My rule is that if you don't see an improvement after 10 days of intensive anti-yeast treatment, then look for another cause.

You might be interested in a couple of home made yeast killers that are mentioned in this thread. My recipe I have been using for over 30 years with great success and those who have tried it for yeast (and crusty nose rolls in flat faced breeds) have been very pleased. With extreme yeast infections, bear in mind that boosting the immune system and checking the diet for allergies is also of assistance.

I have a similar homemade yeast killer - 1/3 cup white vinegar, 1/3 cup witch hazel, 1/3 cup isopropyl alcohol plus 10 drops tea tree oil. A squeeze applied twice a day for 10 days it will clear out yeast in ears, on feet and in deep wrinkles etc. and a few drops used once a week as an ear or wrinkle cleaner keep them yeast free. It even works on dogs with a lot of hair in the ear canal! I will also grab it as an antiseptic on cuts, mild abrasion etc. plus it cleared Athletes Foot from my teenage sons (I kid you not!). If you buy a set of make-up squeeze bottles from any travel section in a store, I find that the one cup you make up fills three of them, and they are a very handy size. ,.

Gorgeous drooly George! Keep the water dishes outdoors, they manage to get as much in the outside (to drip everywhere) as they do on the inside! Congratulations to George for finding you and to you for being honoured with him! He is a handsome boy for sure!

I've never used roadkill, heaven knows there is enough of it around here, but I never know how fresh it is...the roos I have hit myself certainly would have been fresh enough LOL but I didn't think the towies who came to haul my front end damaged vehicles would appreciate a carcass on board. However, I have always fed a lot of roo, it is a good lean meat, and when I lived in central SA the roo I fed was sourced by my husband of the time who enjoyed shooting on his days off. I fed a lot of roo and rabbit to my family too, at that time. Hours of peeling roo tendons out of the meat mincer... Here in Vic the shooting laws are quite different and I will get the odd freshly shot rabbit, but no natives. I purchase my roo from pet food suppliers these days. I don't have any ethical or moral objections to the use of roadkill, providing that one does know how fresh the kill is, does butcher it correctly and doesn't feed offal from it. In snow country where the carcass would freeze immediately, you would have quite a bit of leeway timewise (and a hell of a job butchering a frozen carcass LOL). Speaking of freezing, I was always taught that red meat is best kept frozen at or below minus 20 degrees Celsius, perhaps that is old fashioned now? I do recall the big kerfuffle in the USA some years ago when it was found that some pet food manufacturers accepted roadkill brought to them along with knackery products for inclusion in their formulae. It was my understanding that this triggered the USA Federal law requiring manufacturers to list the exact protein source (e.g. beef, chicken, chicken by-products etc.) instead of a vague "Meat and/or meat by products" which prevented the roadkill practice from recurring. Or so my memory tells me, it was some years ago now.

I saw on Facebook a really nice home made large dog crate made from a wooden slatted cot. The legs were cut way down and part of one side hinged for a door (it sat flat against the crate front.) Finished with a polished timber "roof" ( from an old dining table). It was beautifully sanded, stained and varnished. Very stunning, but if you have a dog that enjoys chewing wood not very practical!

For future reference, if the seller won't part with copies of the health tests of sire and dam BEFORE you hand over the money - run! And always ask for the prefix and check with the relevant ANKC state body so that you get an independent contact number for the supposed breeders, again before parting with any money. If it is a scam, it is good for the breeder and the ANKC to know, if it is not a scam then no harm done.