sandgrubber

In defence of the vet... sort of... most vets get very little training about whelping and aftercare of the nursing bitch. Many come out of vet school never having witnessed a natural whelping (I talked to a few vet students who said that watching a sow farrow was as close as they came). In my days as a breeder, I often found that breeders were a better source of information about such things that the run of the mill vet. I had the good fortune to have a vet who was a breeder before she went to vet school. She agreed that vet school was pretty shallow on natural whelping and aftercare.

If you are going the Small Claims route, find out from the local court how it's working these days and get a copy of the forms. I used the system many years ago. Covid may have changed procedures. When I went, in WA, some people (mostly property manager who use the system regularly against renters) did use lawyers. Those who were layered up were heard first. It was a tedious day. I spent almost the whole day in court and won by default because the person I sued didn't show. If you win you can probably add the cost of going to Court to the settlement. This may include lawyer's fees. So although a lawyer isn't required, and will be expensive, it may still be worthwhile to hire one.

Small claims tribunal does not require a lawyer. I'd suggest googling "demand letter" to find a good template. Demand a refund by xx/01/2022 and state that you are planning to go to small claims tribunal if the deadline isn't met. Organise any relevant documents and a chronology. Be matter of fact. Not polite, but not threatening.

3 mo is fine for heartworm. It takes 4 or more months for the parasite to get to reproductive age, so killing any possible juveniles every 3mo is adequate. My vet in Oz said it was sufficient to give heartworm meds on a 3mo schedule. I used Bravecto when I lived in Florida (horrible for ticks, fleas and mozzies, heartworm common) and Bravecto alone was great. I don't know about allergic reactions. I think they say to avoid Bravecto for dogs with any nervous system problem.

Embark and Wisdom Health Genetics now provide tests that calculate a coefficient of inbreeding (COI) based on DNA. Does anyone know if any such test is recommended by any of the breed clubs?

For anyone that isn't up to reading the original article you can find a short verse here https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211202162148.htm

https://cgejournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40575-021-00111-4 First article I've seen that relates a DNA based measurement of genetic diversity to health outcomes. Raises questions about the mantra "improving the breed". Impressive dataset. AND NOT BEHIND A PAY WALL Extracted from the article Abstract Background Dog breeds are known for their distinctive body shape, size, coat color, head type and behaviors, features that are relatively similar across members of a breed. Unfortunately, dog breeds are also characterized by distinct predispositions to disease. We explored the relationships between inbreeding, morphology and health using genotype based inbreeding estimates, body weight and insurance data for morbidity. Results The average inbreeding based on genotype across 227 breeds was Fadj = 0.249 (95% CI 0.235–0.263). There were significant differences in morbidity between breeds with low and high inbreeding (H = 16.49, P = 0.0004). There was also a significant difference in morbidity between brachycephalic breeds and non-brachycephalic breeds (P = 0.0048) and between functionally distinct groups of breeds (H = 14.95 P < 0.0001). Morbidity was modeled using robust regression analysis and both body weight (P < 0.0001) and inbreeding (P = 0.013) were significant (r2 = 0.77). Smaller less inbred breeds were healthier than larger more inbred breeds. Conclusions In this study, body size and inbreeding along with deleterious morphologies contributed to increases in necessary health care in dogs.

Sad story. It would be interesting to know if the rest of the litter was similarly affected. Overemphasis on the visual aspect of conformation at the cost of temperament is a widespread malady in the pedigree dog world. It sickens me when someone is shamed (instead of encouraged to do health testing) as a back yard breeder because they want to have a pup from their boy because he is a fantastic dog and they love him so much. Most of our pups end out as family pets. Temperament should be far more important than conformation to a somewhat arbitrary breed standard set down more than a century ago.

There may be individuilized cancer therapies that could belp but if they exist they are probably experimental. Try the vet school at your nearest university. As for conventional cancer treatment, my understanding is that once it has spread, there's not much that works. Support your pup and be grateful for the time you have had. Get the best out of the time to come. Many cancers aren't painful until the end... and you may want to consider the green dream when it gets bad.

Time spent on hobbies is counted differently.

Oh Crap! What idiocy. I'm in NZ but this requires fighting. Are the KCs lobbying? Are there petitions circulating?

http://click.springernature.com/f/a/oKglD9AWT7aEH9jvg9nD9Q~~/AAEGiQA~/RgRjRTDpP0RIaHR0cHM6Ly9jZ2Vqb3VybmFsLmJpb21lZGNlbnRyYWwuY29tL2FydGljbGVzLzEwLjExODYvczQwNTc1LTAyMS0wMDEwOS15VwNzcGNCCmFg6atiYYjSN1ZSE2pyb2Jpbi5hdUBnbWFpbC5jb21YBAAAAAA~ Heritability and genetic variance estimation of Osteosarcoma (OSA) in Irish Wolfhound, using deep pedigree information Mehdi Momen, Nyah L. Kohler, […] Susannah J. Sample Canine Medicine and Genetics volume 8, Article number: 9 (2021) Cite this article 3 Accesses Metrics details Abstract Background Osteosarcoma (OSA) is a devastating disease that is common in the Irish Wolfhound breed. The aim of this study was to use a pedigree-based approach to determine the heritability of OSA in the Irish Wolfhound using data from a large publically available database. Results The pedigree used for this study included 5110 pure-bred Irish Wolfhounds, including 332 dogs diagnosed with OSA and 360 control dogs; dogs were considered controls if they lived over 10 years of age and were not reported to have developed OSA. The estimated heritability of OSA in the Irish Wolfhound was 0.65. Conclusion The results of this study indicate that OSA in the Irish Wolfhound is highly heritable, and support the need for future research investigating associated genetic mutations.

If a dog regards laughter or smiles as a reward, and acts to provoke that reaction, I'd say it has a sense of humour. No anthropomorphism required.

I believe it's all over the map. Some breeders place dogs on breeders terms with no payment, often to friends or relatives or dog people they respect. Others sell the dog/bitch for real money but expect it back for a mating/litter.

The various dogs I've owned...mostly Labs...have varied considerably in their senses of humour. The first pup I kept, unfortunately named Jolly cause I expected a fun type, was very serious. Sprocket, my pound rescue, was a delightful clown. It sorta goes by breed, but it's very much an individual thing.

Costs have gotten inflated. Start from health breeding stock (free whelping, large litters, good maternal instincts, ancestors know to be healthy), do cost benefit on testing (eg, skip annual eye exams unless there's a reason to expect serious eye problems, do genetictesting, it's cheap and doesn't need to be repeated) use a local stud (prog testing unnecessary), don't bother with super premium food, and you're looking at hundreds, not thousands of dollars per puppy....presuming you don't pay yourself minimum wage for looking after the little time wasters and don't add in the costs of purchasing and raising the mum. Unfortunately people who follow such a strategy get castigated as backyard breeders. OK, so what if most of the pups are 'pet quality'. kids want pets.

But who should make that decision, when? The pedigree dog fancy has made a mess of it (although a few countries are seriously trying to clean up the mess...Finland is doing some amazing stuff). If clubs were seriously trying for health and good temperament, health data and indicators of temperament would be kept along with parentage, and decision about what to breed would be postponed until breeding age. BTW, the expense of breeding a pup is usually exaggerated by citing the case where things go wrong...unless you pay a living wage for the hours put in caring for the little time wasters. When I was breeding Labs, I considered my time freely given, and I never had a litter that didn't yield a decent net profit. When I started, pups were going for $600. Of course things do go wrong more often when bloodlines have been selected for conformation to breed standard as currently interpreted by show judges...and lots of inbreeding is done to attain titles. The relatively random genetic mixing done by breeding much loved family or working dogs is probably better from the perspective of health and temperament...and generally rules out bitches who can't whelp naturally or are prone to singletons. The current high puppy prices encourage breeding anything that is fertile, especially in favoured breeds or cross breeds.

I disagree. The beauty pageant should be no more important in determining what dogs get bred than temperament and health. Show rings are capricious and fad prone, often favoring extreme characteristics and failing to filter out unhealthy specimens. Sure, show folks do health testing, but they commonly ignore obvious health defects, especially allergies. Some things that I personally would consider to be faults, such as an extreme coat that is high maintenance and unsuited to Australian climate, are elevated to being virtues. Another problem is that the registry decision is made too early in a dog's life...commonly before 8 weeks...and doesn't get reversed if, later in life, the dog turns out to be something that should not be bred from...say an epileptic or an extreme resource guarder. Likewise the pup that gets off to a slow start and appears to be 'pet quality' at 6 weeks, may turn out to be a late bloomer. Among Labradors, I'd much rather have a pup that passes screening for guide dog training than one whose sire and dam were both GrCh's.

"last breeder i went to had 2 bitches she was breeding , she told me her pups are always healthy ansd strong and they usually have 8-10 pups twice a year" You must have heard wrong. The KCs don't allow two litters a year. I agree with you. ...mostly. limited register, as practiced, is a bad institution.

IMO limited register should ONLY be used to prevent breeding of dogs that shouldn't be bred from, especially for reasons of health OR temperament. Problem: Many such things cannot be identified by 8 weeks. As stands the two tiered register is used for various things. Increasing revenue. Preventing competition. Perpetuating some interpretation of a breed standard. Pretty stupid. The system needs a major overhaul. I'm not optimistic it's getting one any time soon.

I googled and found that colostr might be a good thing for strengthening immunity and preventing digestive problems. https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/bovine-colostrum

I was surprised to read the label on ProPlan medium puppy food and find they add colostrum. I thought colostrum was only valuable for neonates. Is it really good past the first month?

The active ingredient in the tablets is probably Ivermectin. It is a pretty safe drug (the dosage for mange is 10 x that for heartworm prevention, and even that is considered safe), so don't worry about starting while the injection is supposed to be in effect. On the otherhand, if there are no mozzies there'sno danger, so don't worry about delaying. Also, my vet says Ivermectin every third month is sufficient to prevent heartworm...so some lapse in coverage isn't a big deal.

About time. It's more like kidnapping than theft.

I'm picking a pup from a litter of 7. The one I liked first off has gotten into noisey wining at 5 weeks, while one I had previously overlooked is silent, stands back, and gazes into you eyes when he wants attention. Are these traits likely to hold true as the pups grow up?