Posts Tagged ‘dogs’

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Final Heat Wave Of Summer Too Hot For Dogs

Sunday, August 29th, 2010
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#dog #dogs #toronto — Up here in the Toronto area, we are heading into probably the final week of a heat wave for the summer.  Lots of strong sunshine out there for the next couple of days.  Average temperations up here will be about 32 degrees Celcius which is about 89.6 degrees Farenheight.  At these temperatures along with the sunshine, it will be too hot for my Lhasa Apso dogs Chester and Roxie to be outside.

So I’m going to keep them indoors during the daytime until late in the day or even early evening when the sunshine won’t be as strong and perhaps when the temperatures will be a bit lower.  My two dogs in particular get hot really easily during these types of days and they let me know with their heavy panting.

This will be the same for many other dogs out there as well so do be careful during the heat.  Definitely do not leave your dogs inside your car parked outside during these days.  Better to just leave them at home with the air conditioner turned on if necessary.

There have been cases where dogs left inside hot cars where police and animal control officers were called in by worried passerbys.  Owners later got fined or even arrested for their negligence.

So do the right thing over the next couple of days.  Enjoy the last part of summer but also have some common sense when it comes to your dogs outside in the heat.

For me, I’m going to spend much of the daytime working inside on my next book which will be on potty training dogs with a litterbox.  My two dogs will probably be either watching the world go by from a window while they are nice and cool inside or taking their naps.

By the way, summer time and fall are great times to do some dog training outdoors with your dog.   I still put my dogs through some fun drills outside during our walks usually late in the afternoon or early evenings.  If you haven’t seen my basic dog training video yet, you can do so for free.  Just look at the info on this at the blog sidebar on the top left or at the Dog Training tab at my Life With Dogs Facebook page.

The Crowd Favorite
Creative Commons License photo credit: Morgan for Mizzou

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Half Day With Cherry Eye

Monday, August 23rd, 2010
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#dog #dogs #doghealth #pethealth — Well, looks like when I woke up yesterday morning, my boy Chester had Cherry eye again in the same eye as before.  My original post with a photo I took showing him with his Cherry eye condition is still there if you haven’t seen Cherry eye before.

I still had eye ointment left over from the last time.  I gave him a dosage that very morning.  By lunchtime, the Cherry eye was still there so I applied another application after lunch.  After some work at home, we took a nap in the afternoon and when we woke up about 4 pm, Chester’s Cherry eye had regressed fully.

So the eye ointment once again was quite effective which suggests that maybe my dog’s Cherry eye was a result of some allergic reaction to who knows what?  The eye ointment has an anti-inflammatory agent that probably shrunk the Cherry eye enough for it to regress back under the eye lid.

I will probably expect these Cherry eye incidents to occur again with Chester so I should probably get a supply of that eye ointment on hand at home.

The vet is puzzled by Chester’s case because he doesn’t know what is setting off the Cherry eye on my dog.  He said that Cherry eye usually occurs more in younger dogs (my Chester is five years old).  And he adds that in most cases, Cherry eye does not regress as it tends to stay out which in turn requires surgery to correct it.

Well, as long as we have an effective treatment in the form of the eye ointment, than we can at least avert eye surgery indefinitely for Chester’s weird bouts of Cherry eye.

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New Study Suggests City Dog Owners Treat Our Dogs As Kids

Friday, August 20th, 2010
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#dogs #dog #pets — There is a new study out of the University of Indiana and it suggests that city dog owners are more apt to treat our dogs as our kids compared to those dog owners who live out in the country.  According to David Blouin, the cultural sociologist behind the research, he said that he found that attitudes about dogs usually fell in one of three distinct categories:

“Humanist, where dogs were highly valued and considered close companions, like pseudo people; protectionists might be vegetarians and they greatly valued animals in general, not just as pets; dominionists saw animals as separate and less important than people, often using the dogs for hunting and pest control and requiring them to live outdoors”

The study results were announced in a special university press release.  Dog owners in rural areas see dogs as animals although I’m sure that there are some country folks who also see their dogs as kids too.  But we just see more of this in the cities.

I would tend to agree with this study as having lived in major cities all my life while being a dog owner and observing other city dog owners as well, many of us certainly do consider our dogs as pseudo-children.

But one thing I really do have to state based on my observations over the years, is that my two dogs as well as the two before them, certainly listen a lot better than most human children do!  Maybe that’s why I have always chosen to be a dog owner rather than a father of human kids.

What do you think of the study results?

black and full of puppy
Creative Commons License photo credit: jeffreyw

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Dogs Like Training

Thursday, August 19th, 2010
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#dogs #dog #puppy #puppies #dogtraining #puppytraining  —  Some new (and old) dog owners never put much into training their dogs, even with basic commands.  Some say that it is too much hassle and the dogs won’t enjoy it.  But guess what?

The opposite is actually true.  Dogs actually like training.  It is much better than leaving them bored all day.  Dogs enjoy the mental stimulation that training sessions provide and the interaction with you as the owner.

Since there is so much emphasis on positive reinforcement during dog training, dogs will just love the interaction with their owners during training sessions and classes.  Even though my two lhasa apsos know their basic commands quite well, they still go through drills every single day for their treats.  They don’t get freebies.  But that’s okay with them because they enjoy the interactions with me.

Dogs like to please their owners and when they do a good job during training whether learning new commands, tricks or just drilling ones they already know, they love the positive praise they get.  I can see it in my two dogs’ eyes when they do their drills well.

During a typical day, we would go through some of the basic commands like ‘sit’, ‘come’, ‘down’, ‘stand’ and sometimes even ‘shake’ (a paw) or ‘up’.  These are put through a quick drill during noon hour and they get healthy fruit treats.

During a walk outside, they would usually go through a one minute ‘stay’ drill at a distance about halfway into our walk.  Then I would give the ‘come’ command where they would come with much enthusiasm.

They never get bored of training drills because they never get bored of mental stimulation where they have to observe what my next command is as well as the positive praise I give them for a job well done.

So if you have avoided training your dog because you felt that it would be too much work and no fun for your dog, think again.  Dogs like training and so should you.

To see my free video demonstrating basic dog training with my two lhasa apso dogs, go to my dog training website.

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Creative Commons License photo credit: CRYROLFE

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Funny Video Of Bulldog Skateboarding

Friday, August 13th, 2010
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#dogs #dog  – Since I was looking for this funny video of the bulldog skateboarding, I figure that I might as well put it up here on my dog blog as well.  It’s absolutely amazing what potential dogs have and what they can be trained to do.

I probably won’t go to such lengths to train my two lhasa apsos Chester and Roxie to do such tricks as just having them as obedient good dogs will be good enough for me.

But I certainly appreciate seeing the results of the efforts that some dog owners have taken with their dogs in terms of tricks.  So here it is — enjoy!

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Dog Ear Infections Same Time Each Year?

Friday, August 6th, 2010
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#dog #dogs #doghealth — Just got back from the vet for a followup visit and had my girl Roxie’s ear infection looked at.  But first, back to the booster vaccine issue.  We decided not to do the booster shot for the new Lyme disease vaccine.  I asked my vet if the first shot gives at least the same level of protection as last year and he said yes.  So we would rather risk the next few months left of the season rather than go for the booster shot for extra protection but results in another round of adverse reactions.

I’m kind of glad that we didn’t get those booster shots today.  I wouldn’t have been looking forward to see my two dogs spend another 24-48 hours feeling crappy.

My girl Roxie did get an ear infection in one of her ears last weekend and as mentioned on a recent post, I used Panalog that I still had.  The vet checked her ear and it looked pretty good.  He suggested using Panalog once a day for another five days.

The strange thing is that according to records, it was Roxie who got the ear infection last year and we used Panalog that time.  In fact, it was about the same time of year, July.  So the vet thinks that there might be something in season that she’s allergic to.  Maybe something in the woods that she rubbed her head against since she tends to like to check out different plants out there.

Have any of you ever had dog ear infections around the same time each year?  The vet doesn’t think it’s an internal ear canal thing but more external from something dogs might be allergic to.

If you have had dogs with recurrent ear infections around the same time of year regularly, please share your experience and what your vet said about them.  This will help shine a light to what might be happening out there.

fluffy
Creative Commons License photo credit: Pixel Addict

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Saw My Dog’s Third Eyelid

Wednesday, August 4th, 2010
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#dog #dogs #puppies #puppy #pets  – As I was applying the eye ointment in my dog’s eye last night, I finally got a good look at his third eyelid!  All these years of being a dog owner, I never knew that dogs had a third eyelid.

According to my vet, this third eyelid goes across the eye when the dog’s main two eyelids are shut.  That’s why we hardly ever notice it.  It serves like windshield wipers to clean the eye better.

Last night, as I put my fingers near Chester’s eye, he instinctively closed his eye.  So I used two of my fingers to gently pry them open and as I did that, I saw that his third eyelid was about halfway across his eyeball.  It was sort of opaque in colour.

It quickly retracted back inside towards his nose so it didn’t stay there for long but at least I got a good look at it.  It was really weird.  Almost like what sharks do!  So I was thinking that my Chester boy has shark eyes!

It’s this third eyelid that is connected to this gland responsible for about 1/3 of tear production and when this gland blows out of proportion, we end up with cherry eye.

According to my vet, another time that you might be able to see this third eyelid is when your dog is half asleep and groggy.  You might be able to go in and check it out then.

This third eyelid is really strange but since all dogs and apparently many other animals have it, it must serve its purpose quite well.  Of course, I would much rather see both of my dogs with their beautiful eyes beaming!

Here is a photo of a dog with the normal third eyelid.  It’s pretty gross but all dogs have this.

dog third eyelid lid

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Panalog Works Great For Dog Ear Infections

Tuesday, August 3rd, 2010
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#dog #dogs #doghealth  – Just when my boy Chester is recovering from his last bout of cherry eye with the help of that excellent BNPH ointment for his eye, my girl Roxie developed an ear infection on her right ear.  The entire inside ear was red with some more wax than usual.

Chester did get an ear infection a few months ago and the vet prescribed something that I used on my two previous dogs before.  This is Panalog ointment which is an antimicrobacterial agent.  It use to work wonders for my previous lhasa apsos and this time it worked really well for Chester as well.

Since I had quite a lot of leftover Panalog, I used it on Roxie a few nights ago.  In the morning, I noticed a dramatic improvement already with much less red in her ear.  I applied another dose in the morning and by evening, her ear had practically cleared up.

Rather than like the tube shown below, I always got Panalog, which is a yellow coloured ointment, in a little plastic bottle that the vet clinic dispenses it in.  This plastic bottle is quite handy in applying doses of Panalog directly to the ear canals of dogs.

Roxie will get morning and evening applications for a week even though her ear looks fine today.  Floppy ear dogs like lhasa apsos are prone to ear infections so it’s not surprising that both of my dogs had them.  In fact, I’m kind of surprised that my present dogs don’t get them more frequently as my previous lhasa apsos use to get their ears infected on a regular basis.

Panalog is definitely something very useful to have around especially if you have a floppy ear dog.  It’s one of the old standbys from the vet clinics as it had been around for some time.

panalog ointment dog ear infections

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Check If Your Dog Licks Inside Legs

Saturday, July 31st, 2010
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#dog #dogs #pets  –  Yesterday, I took both of my dogs out to the woods for a nice walk which we do on the trails there several times per week.  In the middle of the walk, my boy Chester suddenly stopped and sort of licked the inside of one of his hind legs but only for a moment.  I didn’t think anything of it but I should have checked right away.

He did the same thing at home one or two times as well as this morning.  He spent a bit longer doing that this morning so I decided to check to see what’s going on.  Sure enough, he had one of those spurs from the woods stuck on the inside of his leg right underneath his belly which is why I didn’t notice.  It was pretty hidden.

So I trimmed it off with scissors to make him comfortable again.  This has taught me to check both dogs for those nasty spurs after walks in the woods.  Normally, if Roxie gets a spur, she will stop walking right away and just look at me.  This is good since it alerts me to the spur.

I would usually try to remove it right on the spot if I can.  Chester on the other hand, doesn’t quite do this as his sister does so this is why I missed the spur.  In fact, I even missed the spur during their evening brushing since I don’t normally do their undersides.

But perhaps I should check their undersides from now on especially again, after a romp in the woods where sometimes spurs are a common nuisance.  It’s probably a good idea to give a quick total body check anyway to not only check for spurs but also anything else like tangles and mats that should be removed as soon as possible before they get worse.

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Enjoying No Cherry Eye On My Dog

Friday, July 30th, 2010
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#dog #dogs #doghealth  —  Well, we are still using the eye ointment on my dog Chester and certainly enjoying the fact that he has no cherry eye now.  It’s so nice to see his beautiful eyes in their real glory again!

He will still be on the ointment each day but for only one single dose at night for another week before we have a follow up appointment at the vet.

In case if some of you are still unclear about what cherry eye looks like again, here are some photos of other dogs with cherry eye.  It’s not a pleasant looking condition but is not painful for them fortunately.  However, they do have to have this condition corrected or else their eyes will get dry.

Nina up close with Cherry EyeCherry Eye
Creative Commons License photo credit: spacemanor
Creative Commons License photo credit: Chris-Gonzales90

You will notice that on one of the eyes in each of the dogs above, there is a red protrusion on the inside corner of the eye.  This is the gland that is responsible for about 1/3 of the eye’s tear production.  If this gland dries out after prolonged exposure like this, the dog will lose this 1/3 of tear production and the eye will get dry.  This will require eye drops permanently.

In most cases of cherry eye, surgery is required to correct it.  The vets will stitch this gland back underneath the eyelid.  In our case, the eye ointment worked to regress the cherry eye on Chester so surgery was averted.

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