JulesP

My sable border collie has a black & white dad and a blue & white mum.

Have maybe a week left of the dry. I guess I'll just use the tins if I can't find more. Probably good to find an alternative in case it is needed again.

HE is hepatic encephalopathy. It is when the toxins build up in the blood and effect the brain causing all sorts of problems, the worst being coma and death. Can be as mild as the dog pressing its head into a wall or walking around in circles. The only time I've given Amber a bone (vet said it was ok occasionally) she had a seizure and issues with walking.

I go through about a bag a month. What is your dog's problem as that will effect what you can feed? Mine has multiple liver shunts and has HE episodes so I can't feed any meat products.

OMG my dog will basically die if I stop feeding the Hills L/D. There really isn't an alternative in Australia. This has been my biggest fear that they stop stocking it or something. I would also suggest just using the tinned. The US liver gurus don't think much of the L/D dry anyhow. I'll ask for an alternative and let you know.

Yeah! Great news.

It is totally pointless to get your knickers in a knot over a media story. The article quotes one line. Other articles have a totally different spin on it. I ignore all emotive stuff in articles and simply focus on the facts, which in this case is that the boy is back home. This has the mother saying that she knew the dogs kept the little boy safe - http://news.ninemsn.com.au/smartphone/article.aspx?id=8542488

It is not the 'meal' bit that is the problem. It is the fact that they don't say what meat it is. I ain't feeding horse meat for instances and 'meat' could be horse meat. And then some dogs have allergies to different meats.

Yeah it is the 'meat' meals bit that would put me off. I want to know what meat.

This is different to a dog being distracted by sight, smell, movement etc. when I said I've never seen it, I meant I've never seen a dog fixate (through eye) on an obstacle during a sequence to the point it can't move, although I have seen dogs...including mine, fixate on the wrong obstacle...but they are moving towards it, not stuck on it. I think the agility thing is different from sticky eye on stock. To me the agility thing is more that there is massive value for certain obstacles. Poppy was nuts about contacts and will still, years after doing agility, run and stand on something that looks like a contact. She still offers a nose touches. And agility wasn't a high value thing for her at all so I can imagine what a dog would be like if it did have high value for agility. It might all be part of the 'over achiever' syndrome though :laugh:

Now, why would we do something so logical when m-sass and Brookestar know everything? For the latter's FYI, just because no one sees a dog being walked, it doesn't mean a dog is not being walked. There are plenty of DOLers who walk their dogs at stupid o'clock because of various factors. I currently never walk my dogs out of my house. We go in the car to various places. Anyone spying on me would say I never walked them.

My family moved from UK to Australia and our Corgi came with us. I can't remember the dog being traumatized at all and had no change in personality. Can't remember him being bothered by the change in weather either. He was in quarantine for a fair time too.

It isn't. It is prey drive without the chomping. The human is supposed to do the chomping bit.

A visual example! My 2 love stalking their Belgian friends. Lots of motionless staring. Poppy was quite painful when I first started herding. She would get the sheep in a corner and then go in a trance. I had to physically break her line of sight sometimes and she certainly couldn't 'hear' me. Poppy always greets me with a leaf Sheena but she isn't doing the trance thing when she does that. There is usually lots of squeaking involved. If I yell at one of the other pets Poppy will go get a leaf or stick then too.

Just to encourage you - it is really brill when you find a food your sick doggy does well on. I still get a kick out of Amber scoffing her food after a year of her looking like I was trying to kill her at meal times. Hills was probably second last on my list of premium foods I would feed too. Had never used their products and nearly died when I read the ingredients of L/D. But it works and my dog is alive. The whole thing was a massive mind set lesson for me. The best food for your dog is the one that it does well on. Forget what you think is right, food snobbery etc. My specialist did give me a home made diet sheet btw but the people on my liver list advised me to use the Hills due to the severity of my dog's condition.

All my border collies would have left their full dinner bowls if something interesting was happening. Interesting could just be me walking around the garden :laugh:

I had this issue with a couple of older handymen. They just wouldn't do exactly what I asked. One even said on the first (and last) job that he wasn't going to do what I said! Weird. So yes I think a bit of 'we know better' has occurred.

Why don't you do agility with Lucy at Croydon? I avoided a nasty incident on Saturday. Was walking the dogs at Lilydale Lake. One off lead bit was dog free as normal, all good. The other one had too many dogs for my liking so I didn't go down. I felt like a mean mum but sorry doggies. As I was walking past a GSD attacked a GR. Took a while for the GSD owner to grab it. She then proceeded to lay into the dog I was too far away to do anything. Reinforces my loathing of off lead areas.

Get blood work done. I've had 2 pets now that were fussy eaters and ended up having health problems.

Sorry that your doggie passed away. What was she?

Amber eats her beds (it is part of her liver condition). So I get chewed beds but no mess to clean up. I was super cut up about the Clean Run bed that she chewed, usually I just shrug.

You just described one of my border collies Interestingly my borders get on well with their Belgian friends and usually don't like other dogs much. They all act snobby together!

So what would you do if you were told not to vaccinate? You can titre test but if immunity is low you can't do anything about it without risking the dog. You might get away with a vaccination or it might kill your dog.

No L/D is for dogs with liver problems. It is what I feed my dog which is why I knew that it was meat free. If the dog can eat soy it does give you a novel food source.

L/D doesn't have liver in it. That is why I suggested it. It has chicken liver flavor.