Rascalmyshadow

Am trying to track down the actual research that has been done. Also after working with 50+ dogs a week for 23 years majority of the dogs with serious dental issues have been on a dry food only diet. Dental issues are also hereditary, bad genetics is a factor in gum disease and dental issues, dogs bred with pushed in faces, over crowded teeth, under shot and over shot jaws etc all these factors contribute to dental problems. Have had customers and my own dogs trial so called dental dry food over the years when I worked in a vet clinic didn't see an improvement in a single dog. Maybe you can explain to me how a piece of dry food that breaks up when a dog crunches it in a few seconds is of any benefit?

There is no dry food that is good for teeth, they are all crunched up too quickly and leave trapped particles between dogs teeth, doesn't matter how big the pieces are. The marketing and consumption of dry foods is one of the biggest causes of an increase in dental issues in dogs along with crappy breeding.

Canned food is also not great for the teeth but it isn't as bad as dry food as it leaves less particles trapped between the teeth. Brisket bones are good, I generally use rib bones then throw out the unfinished bits. I also used to give them very small marrow bones but since moving none of the local butchers have them. If I find the odd bit of tartar on my dogs teeth I just use my finger nail to remove it.

Do some research about EXCESSIVE water intake, it is very bad for dogs kidneys, the same as humans.

I would be feeding less of the dry and adding in more of the other stuff, dry food on its own isn't a great option, all dry foods make dogs drink more water than they need which long term is very bad for the kidneys, dry foods are also bad for their teeth (despite what most vets will tell you). Have you considered adding in daily a high quality tinned food (if you don't have the time to do an all natural diet). We only feed a small amount of soaked dry Canidae mixed with Ziwipeak or Holistic select canned in the morning and at night they get either more canned or fresh meat and veg, we also add in bones, lambs ears etc to help keep they're teeth clean. We have three small dogs (did have four) and they all do very well on this and it doesn't cost us a fortune.

Are you feeding just dry food?

Black Hawk is not very good quality, some people report their dogs doing well on it but some dogs also do well on Pal and Chum doesn't make it the best option.

We use Canidae all life stages, it's $118 for 20kg from Pet Circle, sometimes even cheaper when they have it on special. All our dogs have done well on it including my toy poodle who gets an upset tummy easily.

Just spoke with the vet, with the rapid changes we are now seeing in Claudia's behaviour she feels there is probably a tumour or legion in her brain or she's getting a build up of excess fluid. Our only option left is high doses of cortisone but that will only buy us time if anything. We start the cortisone on Sunday unlesss it works wonders we will faced with having her PTS before Xmas.

Hi thanks for asking, at this stage it's not looking good. She did initially improve, started behaving more normally, was out of her crate more, back to interacting with everyone etc. however less than a week off antibiotics and the nasal discharge started again. She's still on the Metacam however last night her behaviour suddenly became more erratic, she went for my daughter (toddler), tried to attack Hugo (poodle), I put my hand up and she bit my finger instead then just before bed she launched at my oldest cat who was sitting on my lap. None of which she was provoked. For the first time ever she didn't come out of her crate for breakfast this morning, at first I thought she must have been locked in the loungeroom, I had to coax her out, and even then she reluctantly ate very slowly then ran back and hid in her crate. Normally she is a guts and will eat anything, and fast. I have to speak with the tommorow morning, we spoke on Tue but she wanted another update, after her sudden behaviour last night and this morning I no longer have much hope for a good outcome.

Have used them in the past with no issues, we generally use petcircle and the order usually arrives within two days but I put an order in last Tue and it didn't arrive until this morning, so I guess with Xmas everyone is behind.

Check out 'Funky cat' they do full timber carpeted pet steps, you can choose your carpet colour and their three step is 61cm high. Clark rubber also do covered foam steps they are cheaper but not sure how high they go.

Thank you for the support, I don't have any from anyone else, as much as the dogs are part of our family their entire responsibility falls on me. I have had a good talk with the vet, we are starting Claudia on Metacam rather than cortisone, if there is pain/inflammation that should help, if we see no change then I have been advised to prepare for the worst.

Have to call the vet tomorrow with an update, not sure if the antibiotics are doing anything, her nose doesn't seem to be runny but she has had a couple of funny choking/breathing episodes, guess we will be giving the cortisone a try. We have also had a couple more incidents, including going for one of our cats without any reason. Lucy wandered into the loungeroom we were all in there watching tv, Claudia flew off the couch and went for her, chased her through the house and out the back door. She has always been good with all the other animals so this is another new behaviour, has me more concerned because unlike visitors the cat is not a threat. Last weekend my dad and his wife came for a visit, they were at our house for the whole day, Claudia was fine (she usually is), on their laps getting cuddles/pats etc. then randomly she went for my dads wife when she went to get a drink, had to lock her up until they left. What I do know is no matter what happens we won't be moving her on to another home, I know it has been suggested we don't have the appropriate environment but neither myself or the vet think it's just behavioural and is more likely stemming from her medical issues. I can't conciously rehome a dog I know bites and I also don't want to put her through that to find out down the track she has either a nasal or brain tumour. So at this stage I am a bit lost with the whole situation.

Thank you is there a particular brand you use?

When she started with the nasal issues initially the vets kept treating it as allergies which is why she got so bad, the drugs kept masking the problem. I honestly don't think it's allergy related (although not impossible) due to her history, she's also not sneezing, doesn't have itchy skin or runny eyes.

Ok so we've been to the vet and she isn't 100% sure if it's just behavioural or if her medical issues the cause. What we do know is there is something going on in her sinuses/nasal cavity again which could potentially be giving her on and off head aches. I showed her a video of her weird breathing and head shaking that she does if she runs around or eats anything dry and it's definitely not reverse sneezing (I didn't think it was especially since she had the palate surgery). At this stage she has been given a long course of antibiotics incase it's the beginning of another infection, if in 10 days we see no improvement we stop the antibiotics and move on to cortisone, if that fails we are looking at CT scans (which we can't afford) as there is a possibility she has an inward growing tumour either back/high up in the nasal cavity where the scopes can't reach (due to her tiny size) or in her brain. So at this stage we hope for the best and keep her out of confronting situations.

We see the vet tomorrow so I'll post once I get home. On the upside she was very good and her normal self when my mum came over on Sat ( didn't like the friend she brought with her however) and she has been fine around my daughter this week, even curled up on the couch next to her. My stress levels have been up since the weekend but funny my anxiety levels have dropped, no panic attacks so I'm really starting to think I'm the cause of a lot of her behaviour.

We watched it, was interesting but at the same time very sad.

This is our first pure Chi, we've mostly had poodles, Astro (the boy we lost recently) was a Chi x Pom and Rascal is Silky x Lhasa. Years ago ago we had a couple of other bigger breeds. We chose Claudia because she was raised with kids and my older two were at an age to understand how delicate she is. One of the reasons we went to other breeds as we lost our poodles was because none of them were ideal with either our kids or other peoples.

Oh I've just re read my last post and Persephones post, something I never thought of just occurred to me, could her increasing behaviour possibly be linked to my severe anxiety attacks.

My toddler won't actually approach Claudia she's learnt very quickly that Claudia snaps. I know banning them from the lounge sounds like a good idea but it's one of the things we enjoy the most about having dogs, just like having them on our bed although Claudia generally prefers to sleep in her crate. It is also a big stress relief for me especially at the moment with the anxiety attacks I'm having, sitting down with the dogs calms my nerves a lot.

Sorry if Claudia is on any of our laps she will get snappy with my daughter, normally we just keep her off us while my daughter is wandering around

Ok I think I might have misunderstood your post, Claudia was initially in the breeders home and was being shown by her son, due to a couple of minor faults (at least that's what I was told) they stopped showing her and she was moved out of their home and into their kennels with other dogs, I have no idea what she went through before getting her but the way she is so afraid of both collar/lead and the car leads me to believe she was majorly stressed and forced into being shown when she shouldn't have. I don't want to put our girl to sleep but I would like to hopefully get her to a stage where we can have visitors without her getting so wound up by it. We have worked so hard to build her confidence from how she was, I am in no hurry to give up but I can only afford so much, not because I don't want to. We have already spent thousands on her between desexing, dentals, scopes, palate surgery, biopsies, medications, chiro, etc and that doesn't even include all the basics so it's not like we wont spend money on them if we have it.

I don't know much about this crowd funding idea, we are not people that usually ask for money or that type of help, advice yes. I guess it"s something we may need to seriously consider if medical issues are ruled out and we don't want to lose her. This is the first time I haven't worked and had plenty of money put away for these situations, its also the first time I have been completely out of the dog industry so I have lost all of the connections (vets, trainers etc) that I once had.