MolassesLass

Ah ok then, glad you explained. I guess the question for this thread then is "is 6 months prepuberty for a BC" given the assumption the CTD is wondering what to do with her immenently arriving new pup.

:D Aw shucks, thanks, I think so too! Chloe is the pup at the bottom, she is a nice girl and I think you'd have a fight on your hands with her owners! Those are all pups from my litter (you can see them all here), I recommend brushing 1-2 times weekly except for shedding times when they should be done daily. Good coat conditioner, good diet and brushing (which releases and spreads skin oil) all help keep coats shiny. DB, how does a human study relate to dogs?

Firstly, 6 months is not too early, it is the standard, especially with medium or small breeds. In BCs, I have not seen coats going "wooley" from desexing, early or otherwise. Coat only seems to go wooley with age. In fact, other than the lack of hormonal coat drops keeping coat on all year around, I've seen no difference in any of the dog's I owned, bred, rescued or met. Genetics plays a far bigger part in the coat of a BC than hormones it would seem. A BC done at 6 months is very unlikely to have any significant extra growth as they are beginning to slow down growing at around that age anyway. If you believe in desexing after the first season in females then you will definately notice no difference. BCs usually have their first season around 8 months old. Normal texture coats all desexed at 7 weeks

David, as others have said, immediately changing foods can cause tummy upsets and SuperCoat has a lot of undigestable rouhhage in it, so does cause copious amounts of poop. Changing brands of dry dog food should be done gradually and over a period of at least four days (preferably longer). On the first day of change, you should have plenty of the old dog food left. Add three quarters of their old food, and one quarter of the new food. You should do this for at least two days. After two days or so, add in another quarter, so you have half old food, half new food. Again, keep it at this level for another two days or so. Then add in a third quarter (one quarter old, three quarters new), and finally you can phase out the old food completely. I notice in previous postings that your old dog has started eating it's poop and you are also worried about the health of her coat. This all sounds like a definate diet deficiency. What has the older dog been fed on most of it's life? Was there a reason you changed to Optimum and now SuperCoat? Is the old dog on any athritic supplements or recently been perscribed long-term medication?

I believe some are concerned that a non-specific animal source could contain things like road-kill and/or deceased dogs and cats. Not quite that bad, Dr Harry endorses SuperCoat. I too ignored the endorsements points, I believe anyone would sell their soul for the right price. It's not a perfect grading system but it's a start, perhaps it can be improved on?

Firstly, dry food is only a supplement to the BARF mix I feed, but I think I'd go for Product A, but I don't choose by first 4 ingredients so it wasn't an easy choice to make. 1.Would you feel that paying 4 times as much for one over the other is justified and if so which one. ? With just the information given I wouldn't pay 4 times as much for one over the other. 2.Would you choose to try the most expensive or the cheapest first ? I would try them both for about a month and unless I saw results that justified the 4 times as much cost I would stick with the cheaper one. While I don't think cost should be the first deciding factor in anything for my dogs, I won't use something just because it's expensive. 3. Do you choose your dog food based on something else? There are some brands I have a personal dislike for, no good reason, I'd just avoid them. I prefer to buy Australian owned and made products for everything. I try to evaluate the ingredients as best I can as to the quality and correct amounts. Look for food without chemicals and other non-natural things in the ingredients. Then I'll check cost to feed (rather than just cost per bag), I have multiple and large dogs, no point in going broke trying to feed them if there is a cheaper, similar quality product IMO.

Yay! Well I hope to see you at the November training clinic too then!

Thanks Scarlet! Maddy is so keen and has the idea too, just needs some practice. Hope to see you at our Beginners clinic in November. Ris was mostly sitting half-way up the field taking photos, shame you guys didn't meet up.

Oh photos cool! Congrats to all competitors and especially today's winners! Novice - Kerri and Jo - 16 points (and FDA title) Open - Liana and Molly - 8.5 points (yes the novice kicked our butts! ) Pro (Freestyle) - Damian and Tigereye

Seeya there

No word that it has been cancelled and it's sunny down at my place. If you are driving a long way, call the number in the first post to check.

Ok, well you'll be our second nutty red BC owner. It may rain tomorrow, we're hoping it will only be showers. Our club has stated that "If it was pouring rain on Sat afternoon/evening and we thought it was very likely that the weather on Sunday would be raining/horrible then we could cancel it then." So I will check with our club and report back here if it is to be cancelled due to rain (if it is the date will be moved a weel or two and we'll try again). :cool:

Oh, I think I just had lightbulb moment, are you a member already?

BUMP Make sure to come introduce yourself if you make it Scarlet (from another thread), I'm the goose with the nutty chocolate Border Collies.

BCs, fed once a day, BARF with some dry - twice a day. Bullmastiff, fed twice a day, BARF with some dry - three times a day.

SuperCoat has Chicken as the first ingredient. No unidentified by-products in SuperCoat. SuperCoat is fixed formula. SuperCoat, even being 100% Australian owned, manufactured and ingredient sourced is AAFCO accredited. Being Australian also probably accounts for why it is never listed in any of the American comparison studies. I've done up a comparison chart here rating a number of items, and SuperCoat is not that much different to most of the "Super Premium" foods you listed (and I'd say a fair bit better than Advance). While I certainly don't think SuperCoat is the best food out there, I do think it's incorrect to list it so far removed in your listing (hence why I questioned whether it was merely personal opinion) especially given Advance's results and the listing you gave it. SuperCoat does need to be fed at a slightly higher amount, contains a little less protein and a fair bit less fat but it is quality ingredients and it presents suberb value for money. Sorry to harp on, but like Macca's, I guess I'm sick of the stories and would prefer people made up their own mind. And thank you for passing on those links, it's always good to re-evaluate your dog's food even if it's only a supplement item. :D

Fair enough, apologies for my assumption. Can you provide a link or other information on what you used to grade the brands you listed for quality and concentration (always learning)? My quick calculations using the recently posted method produced the following (with recommended feeding amounts for a 25kg dog eating only dry): Royal Canin 4800 Energy - 96 (438g) ProPlan Performance - 87 (~299g) SuperCoat Adult Energy - 85 (450g) Science Diet Active Adult - 85 (~275g) Eukanuba Premium Performance - 85 (310g) EaglePack Power Formula - 84 (?) Advance Adult Energy - 64 (490g) Adzza, there is an old (2002) Choice study on pet foods that may be of interest here.

For a large breed mix like you have, he's probably still growing to a certain extent (will probably be up until 2 years) and being lean while growing is good. If he's underweight rather than just lean and if you're only feeding once a day, try twice a day (add a little to his current single feed and then split in two), not only can this allow him to consume more food if he needs to but it can help lessen the chance of the deadly bloat condition.

10 is just the number I have decided on, not much science behind it, so please don't take it as gospel. Dr Malcolm B Willis, highly regarded genetisist, says the following in an article about Border Collies and HD: - SourceWhich would most probably relate to other breeds as well. OFA hip scores trends here. Plenty more reading linked from here.

Yes, I get what you are saying now, I read the "/" as indicating a hip score of "0:1" rather than what you meant of "0 or 1". Sorry for heading off-topic WMR. I know of a GSD that had a score in the 50's that did agility and retired at what would be considered the usual age, in his case it didn't matter. If I was purchasing an adult dog for competition then I would want something less than 10 and roughly even ("roughly even" for me means take the scores, add them up and divide by two, ensure the difference between the hips is not greater than that. 2:4 yes, 1:5 no). However, if I wanted to breed with the dog then I'd be more stringent, if the price was quite high I would be more stringent. It would really be a case by case issue for me. Sorry to be of no help!

Hazz - Are you saying that you wouldn't get a dog with hips 1 point out or just that you think even is better? Sorry, I'm probably being daft in having to ask.

Hip scores can be expressed as a score for each hip (1:2) or a total score (3). A perfect score is a total of 0, the worst possible is 106. Each breed has an average score for all submitted xrays. Generally breeders won't use a dog with a hip score above the breed average. IMO hips that are even (3:3 = 6) are better than the same total but very uneven (1:5 = 6). May be of interest: International Hip Score Comparison (Australia is the same as Britain)

Remember that each person's definition of "super", "premium" and "good" is only that person's opinion. IMO SuperCoat is a much better food than Advance or ProPlan, too many people can't accept it's a premium food because it doesn't come with the premium price tag. I feed a majority BARF mix (probably pretty similar to Shoemonster and Lozzie's) with a little SuperCoat dry (Adult Energy or Working for the BCs and Adult Large Breed for the Bullmastiff).

BUMP

Oh you ain't got nothing on me for scaryness - just ask around! :rolleyes: