In my opinion, Karen Delise compiled the definitive study of dog attacks in her book Fatal Dog Attacks. She did painstaking research, and took a close look every fatal dog attack in the US over the course of about forty years. She broke it down from every conceivable angle. We read in terrible newspaper accounts
No one can predict when or even if a dysplastic dog will start showing clinical signs of lameness due to pain. There are multiple environmental factors such as caloric intake, level of exercise, and weather that can affect the severity of clinical signs and phenotypic expression (radiographic changes). There is no rhyme or reason to the severity of radiographic changes correlated…
I make this statement at the expense of being tarred and feathered but increasingly, the best dog youll ever breed may be the hardest dog you will ever finish. It will be the odd man out and look different from the majority of dogs represented in the ring. Why? Some judges, insecure in a breed…
… meantime we can use the drawings from Alan Mitchells book (with hispermission) to explain what we are looking for in photography. Dish-faced – A slight concaveness of foreface, the tip of the nose is higher that the stop, when viewed in profile. Down-faced – where the muzzle inclines downward from the skull to nose .
At the recent American Holistic Veterinary Medical Association Conference, I discovered that I am not the only one questioning the use of grains in commercial and home-prepared pet foods. Grains, such as oats, wheat, rice, barley, etc, are composed mostly of complex carbohydrates. They also contain some protein, fiber, B-vitamins and trace minerals. However, they…
Here is the thing. Why would you want to purposely encourage behaviours that are not acceptable outside the dog park. Barking, chasing, biting, prey drive, stalking, marking, jumping are all things we want to stop or at least thats what I am told when I go to peoples houses. So if these are things that…
When people refer to the top line they mean the vertebrae of the spinal column from the base of the neck to the beginning of the tail. When judges critiques mention that a particular dog has a level top line, they dont, or at least shouldnt mean a perfectly level one as this would be…
Expecting a sofa dog to run 600 yards at full speed is foolish and can also be dangerous. Your dog will be inspected by members of the field committee before it is permitted to run to ensure it is in good health and you will be asked to gait your dog to inspect for lameness….
Kidneys are made up of tiny structures (glomerulus and tubule) called nephrones. These nephrones filter and cleanse the blood and remove waste products from the body. The kidneys help control sodium, potassium, chloride, bicarbonate, PH, Phosphate and magnesium. Eventually over time these nephrones break down and literally wear out, which is a natural part of…
Your article on bite was very good; however, in spite of the AKC’s breed description as to bite and the acceptability of a “level” bite, you indicate that the “level” bite is undesirable. It may be undesirable in England but in the US, it is acceptable. This leaves judges and others who are not familiar…