Sandra777

The arrivals seem to have slowed down! China is very uncomfortable today so maybe Saturday for her. Mouse has started bouncing around like an idiot so I'm guessing she's 3 or 4 days out and the pups have just started to drop so she can breath again

I understand supplementing with cod liver oil causes considerable problems with inhibiting calcium uptake. Just stick the dog out in the sun for 10 minutes every day Kelp, yes no, depends on the dog. Certainly won't hurt if he's not allergic to it. Brewer's yeast - lots of dogs are allergic to it, wouldn't go there to start with. If you feed a sensible variety IMO you don't need supplements of any sort unless the dog has a diagnosed medical condition. ETA: BIZARRE law! In NZ (hydatids capital of the world) dogs could be feed offal provided it was frozen or cooked. Illegal to feed it uncooked/unfrozen. Agree with the idea of chicken offal, and beef wasn't considered a host for hydatids.

I wouldn't be putting more on him so soon. Those sorts of chemicals do have a pretty wide range of error but for me, nope. ETA: just curious, why the mention of putting it on him while he's eating?

How about buying her some bitches-britches (panties) so she doesn't have to be locked in the bathroom?

Bones - literally any are fine with the exception of bacon/pickled pork/ham bones Try to source whole chicken carcasses - you're probably familiar with those if you make chicken soup - and even the "broiler" chooks sold for commercial use - 1/2 a broiler chook is a meal all by itself. If the budget extends to whole supermarket chickens then 1/3 of one of those is probably about the equivalent. Turkey necks are much better than chicken necks for a dog that size. Wings are good because they're an odd shape so not a lot of dogs can swallow them whole. Drumsticks yeah maybe, probably too small - thighs or marylands would be a whole meal too. Beef brisket bone is frequently in bags in Woolies, only problem being that they cut them soooooo small these days (sign of the times I guess, a lot of people have small dogs) probably be OK for a Goldie pup but a bigger one would be better when she's older so make friends with a butcher. Lamb flaps are the fatty rear rib/flank cut, used to be able to buy it rolled and stuffed but I guess it's gone out of fashion. They have short ribs and a large hunk of fatty meat, some dogs might need this trimmed. Pork spare ribs (not marinated ones) are a good change, but get a big portion not one all chopped up small, and start with a small amount because some dogs don't do well with pork (hard to digest, just as it is for a lot of people)

Talk to your vet and find out if parvo is prevelant in your area. If it is then you may need to be extra careful, if it's not then generally speaking it would be safe to take the puppy places there aren't a lot of dogs and to let the pup interact with carefully chosen dogs and puppies you know are vaccinated and belong to equally careful people. You could bring parvo home on your clothes/shoes so nothing is 100% sure. Being sensible (like not letting the pup sniff dog droppings, not taking it to the dog park etc) is best but paranoid may not help

Just imagine the khaki one all grown up with it's own tank and machine gun

You lied you got a blue :D

A fingernail full is a technical measurement - however much you can pick off the treat and get stuck under a finger nail, that's a good amount - and the smell lingers under the nail enough to use as a treat at least twice as well....

One of those mini red sausages of death can train a Portuguese Water Dog to enter the weave from the correct side and hit both contacts on an A-frame......

I've only seen one bitch (in real life) with a flank caesarian and that was getting on for 30 years ago. The wound took weeks to heal and months for the hair to grow back fully. Unfortunately had a few midline ones since and except on one memorable occasion when the vet managed to neglect to tie off the stitches correctly and the whole thing started to come unzipped I've never had a problem with healing. It's a matter of keeping an eye on the wound and acting if things don't look right. Agree, it's definitely more out of the way than a flank incision!

Congrats on your pups too Storm Sorry about the ones that didn't make it. Certainly was a Stafford weekend, my two can make next weekend a Stafford weekend too!

Congrats to Koda, glad it all went well. Nine :) :o :o Have fun there! Think you've won, I'm picking eight for Mouse

21 weeks, so 5 months old. Not something I would expect if she is a Great Dane, but otherwise very possible :-) Many vets won't spay an in season bitch so I would talk to the vet about it if it's desperately urgent to have her spayed now... but I wouldn't leave it until the 30th, if you are going to get her spayed while she's in season do it sooner rather than later.

Best of luck tonight Ellz, and Koda

Congrats to Cassie! And all the other new bubbas :-)

My little sausage factory.... Mouse - 52 days

The heart problems with Boxer's aren't the same as the heart problems in humans AFAIK - dogs don't have cholesterol issues so put that thought out of your head! No it's not bad to add some tinned to his dry food if that's what you want to do. According to the advertising dry food is a complete diet so feeding supplements like extra vitamins and minerals is a very bad idea as it "unbalances" the whole diet. Personally I feed raw, but this is my understanding of the dry food philospy! Dogs don't need carbs so rice is worthless to him. Dogs can't digest vege unless the cell wall has been broken down, so vege unless it's pureed is useless to him. Put him somewhere he can't follow you - laundry for example. He's only so willing to follow you because he knows that the food will be there when he gets back. If you put him somewhere he has to stay and leave him alone with his food for whatever length of time (I would start with 10 minutes myself, but it's up to you), then you know he has had every chance to eat. He will quickly figure out that he's there to do that job. Healthy dogs don't starve themselves, but I do understand Boxers can be a bit odd with food especially when they're puppies, so you have to be strict and make sure he doesn't train you to feed him on demand.

If you are absolutely determined to feed him dry food then you're just going to have to change to something he does like. Try to find sample packs or at least brands that offer a money back guarantee But since you're half way there adding other things to his dry food, why not investigate a more natural diet - it's pretty simple (especially with the commercial patties available) and he's shown you what he does like already. Personally I wouldn't feed eukanuba to a dying rat.

Congrats on the new babies & good luck for those about to pop

I second the use of mince, for a start it's more appealing to most pups and secondly it's a whole lot easier to deal with. If you want to use cereals formulated for human babies then a small dab of farex on the edge of a reasonably flat crockery plate sometimes works - the pup sort of sucks/chews the food off and figures out after a number of attempts how to lap. If they make a huge mess just clean them up with a warm face washer - I can assure you there's heaps more mess to come

SIX! SIX! All that drama for SIX! SIX! :laugh: :rofl: What's she having - six dane babies Hope it is only a couple more, and all goes well.

If he's the right weight, obviously happy and really obviously very energetic stop stressing. He must be getting the amount of food he needs. Some dogs can survive on very little, others need heaps of food to just maintain their weight - same as people. Forunately for dogs however, mostly they don't get wound up about eating for reasons other than they're hungry (except for Labradors ) so he eats what he wants and leaves the rest, where a person might eat the whole amount so as not to be rude about your cooking, or for comfort or for some other weird reason. Make sure what he's getting is good quality (like lillysmum suggests) and just be happy you have a dog that doesn't need much to keep well.

So far as I know (having never owned a neutered dog ) yes. It is a lubricant for the day-to-day running of the sheath so to speak, nothing to do with mating - so I can't see why neutering would alter it's production.

Just measured Mouse and she is 68cm, on day 47 (due 30th not 28th sorry). 2 days before she was mated she was 14.8kg and now she's 17.2kg I think I'm starting to stress I think Koda will win - but not by much!