Rubzoe

Hi again, Our dog Prince has the strangest reaction to the TV. He sleeps in our room at night, and if any of these sounds - dog barking, doorbell, telephone ringing, police sirens, car horns or if he notices on the screen - animals of any type (other than human) he goes nuts. He tries to get at the TV - but it's on top of a chest of drawers so can't get at it - then he runs to the mirror, then he goes from one window to the other window. It seems like he things that the TV and mirror are windows and he's looking for a way to catch those things. Most recently, he's taken to charging at the TV room television which is low to the ground. Any ideas of how to break him of this are welcome! Thanks, Rubzoe

My 11 year old diabetic Choc Lab - Ruby - had an adverse reaction to Deramaxx (no reaction to Rimadyl) and I almost lost her. There is a rare but highly dangerous adverse reaction (very high incidence of death) that anyone starting a new treatment of Deramaxx should be aware of (search www for Deramaxx adverse reaction brings it up). Long and short of Ruby's story was after 2 dosages - she began vomitting, brought her to hospital - CBC's showed she was septic and vet suggested I put her down. I told him I thought it was an adverse reaction. He insisted I was wrong, old dog's time to go, and if I wanted to treat it was going to be thousands of $'s. I told him specifically what he needed to do to treat the adverse reaction - he did it and within 48 hours she was back to normal CBCs. I posted the case with ASPCA poison control, the pharmaceutical company's on staff vet, and the FDA. Ruby was with us for another 4 years before old age did take her from us - at 2 months shy of her 15th birthday.

Have you had her tested for tickborn diseases? My Zoey came to us with Erhlichiosis (sure I spelled it wrong) and although he was treated when we adopted him, after a couple of years he started limping/significant pain. After getting advice from the Tick group - thanks for the referral - we put him on a higher dose/longer period and that's done the trick. BTW - my normal vet suggested x-rays and possible surgery. We then went to a larger vet hospital where they ran the blood test.

We recently had a fence with training flags put in around the perimeter of our property. Our 9 month old has done beautifully with it. We've been very diligent with training which involved several trips around the perimeter daily while tempting him with treats to cross the line and then a stern "bad flag" when he enters the fence's zone (his collar beeps when he's entered the do not enter zone). It took less than a day for him to be totally unwilling to move close to the perimeter. The collar has varying degrees of zap (from 1 to 8) and the fence company suggested we gradually move from the starting point of 1 up to 4. After one month, we've kept him at a 2 and he has not come off the property after the first 3 days - even with full distractions. We haven't had our older BC mix use the fence because he listens and never goes beyond the woods behind our house. When they go out together, our young guy watches his older brother travel, and waits on the property in a crouched position, ready to leap on his brother once he's back on the property. They then play a fun chasing game where they both do laps around the house - at a very fast speed. His favorite is chasing the squirrels, and it's been really fun watching him chase them at full speed till they make it to safety - up a tree or off the property. They haven't figured out yet that he comes to a dead stop well before he gets into the fence zone. Susan, Zoey and Princey

Thanks, yes, I've ordered the book - it's coming on Tuesday. Sounds perfect - based on the title, I think it is exactly what I'm looking for. In case you can't tell, I hate taking "no" as an answer! Susan

Hi again, I've continued reading through this string, and came upon Penny's comments (2 years ago!), which speaks to my earlier question. It just seems nuts to me when I read "the AKC refused" and so the breed club knuckled under. Why take no for an answer? What needs to happen for AKC to not refuse?? Why can't they (AKC) be influenced?

This may sound pretty naive, but has this group tried to influence/educate the AKC judging/evaluation of BC's? Would it be possible to add categories for evaluation of a BC to measure working ability rather than looks? Does the AKC evaluation measure the same things regardless of the breed? This group has such a vast knowledge on what will keep the breed what it was intended to be, and it seems a shame to me that AKC (who like it or not - NOT) is looked to by the uninformed as an authority in what makes a breed "good". What can be done to change AKC?

LOVE IT - yeah, that's it. Just showed my kids the picture you had posted so they don't get so worried when it is going on with Zorro and Prince.

Thanks for all of your input. I totally agree that watching them play-fight is more fun than TV. It is so interesting observing all of these dog behaviors. Susan

I also recently got a pup through a breeder, after unsuccessfully trying to adopt through a rescue. They wouldn't let us adopt because we didn't have our property fenced. I planned on fencing the property, and just this week had a hidden fence installed (6 months later), but at the time, no fence - no rescue. Our 15 year old had passed in April and I wanted the dog and didn't want to wait until after the fence was installed. PS: Our 5 year old did come to us through a rescue org and he is the best dog I've ever had.

Hi everyone! Little background - 5 year old Zorro (BC mix) and 8 month old Princey (BC). Prince came to us at 3 months (Aug '07). Our 15 year old lab had passed in April '07, and so Zorro had a few months where he was a single dog. Princey loved Zorro on first sight. Zorro didn't return the sentiment. Princey tried and tried to get Zorro to play with him and his perseverence finally paid off. For the most part it is really fun-play, where they will play tug of war with a stuffed animal. Princey almost always starts the play sessions by waving the toy in Zorro's face until he takes hold. They can get into some play-fighting that looks really scarey - all teeth and mouthing one another. It's going on right now. There are sometimes vocalizations that come with it and much less frequently yelps. To start the play-fighting Princey frequently puts his head off to the right side and reaches down and grabs at Zorro's front leg/knee to get the game started, and that sometimes gets a yelp from Zorro. It sometimes gets so frenzied that my twin 9 year old sons get concerned that they are really fighting and are going to really hurt one-another. When it seems to be too much I do step in with a firm "no" and it ends it. My question is, should I not allow them to play this way? Thanks for your thoughts! Susan

Thanks. We definitely treat Zoe Zoe as the king of the house. Even my children's friends greet Zoey before Prince. I definitely like the idea of a "chill out" time when Prince goes too far. I'm hoping as time goes on Zoey will like playing with the puppy more and stake his own claim. For now, we're there for him. Just today I saw Princey snarl at Zoe when while Prince was eating. Now that I really don't like. I've never had a food aggressive dog. Princey is always famished! I always thought BCs were picky eaters. Not mine!

Our new puppy (5 mos) is much more assertive than our 4 year old. About a week ago while they were playing all of a sudden one of them started yelping. I ran immediately to the puppy thinking the older guy had had enough, only to find out it was my Zoey crying. He was holding his front right leg up and wouldn't step on it. He cried for a full 2 minutes, during which time I held him and held his front "knee" firmly but gently while I calmed him down. I was all set to drive him to the local hospital when my mother offered his favorite treat - liverwurst. At first mention of the "L" Zoey seemed to forget any pain and ran into the kitchen and right up to the fridge. Grandma gave him his treat and the "event" seemed to be over. So, what I'm noticing now is the puppy - Princey, is lunging for Zoey's front leg (sounds like what you've described as gripping). I think it's probably because Princey wants Zoey to play with him, but Zoe's not all that interested. Princey's behavior is very nasty and rude. When I call his name he stops, but I'm not always right on top of them. Zoey is very submissive and doesn't defend himself at all. We'll be starting obedience training after my hubby's hip replacement. Any suggestions in the mean time? Thanks,

I can't even finish reading your whole note because it is so very, very sad. I'm so sorry for your loss. My prayers are with you.

Hi everyone, We went to the animal hospital yesterday and my 4 year old rescue's (Prince Zorro - Zoey) blood test showed positive for Ehrlichia. When we adopted him in July 2005, the rescue let me know that he had Ehrlichia and they had already started him on treatment and gave me meds for him to continue. They said it wasn't a big deal and I shouldn't be worried about it. Early this summer, Zoey started limping very slightly. My local vet suggested x-rays - thinking that maybe he had broken something. It just didn't seem to me that this was a broken bone and I didn't proceed with the x-rays. Here are some of the health concerns I currently have: -limping on left leg (almost appeared like he had a splinter in his pad); sometimes he doesn't limp at all, but most of the time he shows a slight limp -he's been very lethargic -didn't want to go out of the house much at all (I thought these were because of the hot summer versus his very heavy coat or that he was sad because we lost our 15 year old lab in April) -his appetite has been very strong and he's put on about 5 pounds since the wintertime Our visit yesterday was with a very large, experienced animal hospital. The Dr's physical exam showed that he has some pain in his left shoulder area - Dr thought it was soft tissue related, and said that he expected he was going to tell me to use a nsaid, keep his activity to a minimum, and that it would probably clear up after a couple of weeks. After he got the blood results and saw the positive for ehrlichia he felt that the pain might be related to the ehrlichia and started Zoe on the Doxycycline. It wasn't until he mentioned the Ehrlichia that I remembered that he had it when I adopted him. Dr's given me enough for 4 weeks - I definitely don't remember giving it to Zoe for that long in 2005. My questions are this, - Can ehrlichia recur, or is it likely that Zoe had another tick give it to him again? - Maybe it recurred because I didn't give him meds for a long enough time - If it does recur, will it come back for the rest of his life? Does the 4 weeks of doxycycline "cure" the ehrlichia? - After the 4 weeks, if Zoey is tested again should the test result be negative? Any other advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks so much, RubZoe