WoofnHoof

Sometimes councils do urgent works on weekends and public holidays, we've had heaps around with the floodwater damage sometimes storm water works get damage and require urgent repairs. It's a possibility.

Research on animals these days (at least in Australia) has to fulfill a lot of criteria, it has to be the minimum number of animals possible but still provide a statistically viable result, it has to be absolutely necessary for the project to show a result, and it has to be something that cannot be replaced by another method (eg computer modeling) in order to be approved. It's not pleasant but imagine the problems were the product not tested for overdose and people were to find that an overdose is potentially fatal after the product has been approved for use. The results of these tests must also be put into context, the implications of an overdose are harmful but not fatal so the only way to compare the safety of this product is to compare the result of similar tests of the other flea control products.

I'm not really much help my dogs are inside most of the time, I generally consider 25 degrees or more too hot, whether thats his tolerance limit or mine I'm not sure but he likes being inside. I'd look at the laundry option maybe put a dog door in to the outside and close the door to the house so he cant get to the cats. I hate muggy hot days I get really uncomfortable even though I grew up in some very hot arid regions I just don't have the tolerance anymore, he could be the same or he could just be happier inside.

How old is he? My sibe was very similar a bit underweight and digestive issues and vomiting he had a liver shunt. It can occur in shelties from memory, other symptoms include listlessness (my dog only had 'off days' where he looked a bit down but then he'd bounce back) and neurological symptoms such as pacing and head pressing although my dog only displayed these symptoms at around 6 or 7 months of age after having some higher protein food. Vet should be able to do a blood test for it.

I didn't really understand that comment either. I would have thought the bigger issues were any financial incentive provided to pounds to move animals through faster and the psychological impact on veterinary students. These might legitimately be issues and I've not heard how they are being managed, only a lot of carry on from people who seem to have a bumper-sticker slogan understanding of veterinary training, animal welfare, and ethics. Some facts would be nice. No doubt they are there somewhere, under the piles of emotion. I don't know whether there has been any research done on the psychological impact on students, which is the part which interests me the most, the only study I know of was one on attitudes towards the practice which tended to change from 1st and 2nd years who were generally against it, to 4th and 5th years who supported it (some very agressively so apparently). There probably is some research on it somewhere though since there are a lot of unis around the world which don't use non-recoveries in their programs, I would like to see internships or something similar introduced to cover the surgical skills development phase in the unis where this is currently absent.

Not only that there are some behaviours that can't be bred out for whatever reason, ie they might be a part of the original purpose of the breed (eg guarding, retreival etc) or they might be linked in a less obvious way but in a can't-have-one-without-the-other kind of way. Many genetic traits are linked because they might be on the same area of the chromosome as the traits people are breeding for so they will inevitably 'tag along' when certain traits are selected for. There is also a big difference between supervised controlled feeding of the dogs by children and a child 'playing' with the dog while it is eating.

That's really interesting thanks for posting The wording in the article isn't clear about whether they will still be doing non-recoveries and just aren't allowed to use pound animals or whether there will be no non-recoveries allowed at all. Also interesting is this bit from the comments section:

Very true Souff we live in a world where anything will sell if you market it right, and social attitudes and perceptions can be moulded if you know how to do it. I personally would love to see a tv series on dogs at work and play, each show could focus on a sport or working dog setting and show how a well trained, well bred dog can strut it's stuff! ;) I wonder if the MDBA or someone could approach tv stations/producers and pitch something like this? Each show could start with the puppies and hook the viewers in, then talk about and illustrate how they are raised to optimise their breed specific traits, then go through the training and preparation and finally the finished product at the end

Exactly. I know how my dogs would react in certain situations but not all situations, my chi is dog aggressive but sometimes he surprises me with his ability to blend into a group, my sibe is the friendliest dog around but he and my chi have had 'differences of opinion' and are therefore never left together unsupervised. My sibe does not understand that the chi is much more fragile than he is, nor does he understand that killing mice is fine but not lambs, we are talking about dogs here not people. They are not vicious killers, they are not bloodthirsty savages they are the domesticated version of the grey wolf and share 99.9% of it's DNA, to expect them to have the mental capacity and moral compass that exists in humans is completely illogical.

Totally agree Souff, if breeders don't get out there and promote then how can Joe public be blamed for buying a pet from a pet shop? Most people don't go to dog shows because they don't want a show dog so they see no need to go to a dog show, why is breeding for the pet market such a bad thing if the animals are quality and the homes are checked for suitability?

Depends on what markers they are using, the canine genome has been mapped but that doesn't mean we know which genes are responsible for which traits, my understanding of these tests is that they use genes which are mostly found in that breed, so a gene might be present in a dog that looks nothing like the breeds that it is actually made up of simply because somewhere in the dogs ancestry was a dog with the marker gene which has been passed down. There are very few genes we know are linked to certain traits and these are mostly disease and colour genes, it will be a long time before we know which genes are responsible for the traits that make up a 'breed'. Dogs are the same species and the huge variation we see in breeds is due to a very small (0.01%) percentage of genetic variation, that is why they are looking for breeders to help with the testing because it is still very much a work in progress. I agree that breeders with dogs of known ancestry shouldn't have to pay because they are helping the development of the genetic profile.

There is a reason genotype does not equal phenotype, what a mixed bred dog looks like tells you nothing about what breeds are really in it. Genes aren't like colors you can't just mix blue and yellow and get purple.

There were interns assisting with my dog's surgery when he was at Sydney Uni vet, they were working under the supervision of arguably the best shunt surgeon in the world, I'd suggest that the vets coming out of that program would be very highly sought after indeed. At least they would be able to recognise shunt symptoms when they saw them, unlike my local vets! Actually I tell a lie I'm pretty sure that the junior vet at the practice suspected a shunt but she was overruled by the senior vets, but that is only the impression I got nothing was said outright. Interesting you mention the adoption program Mita unfortunately I heard the fool on river 949's breakfast show making a very distasteful comment about the dogs available for adoption from UQ he got in trouble for it and had to apologise but his whole attitude made me sick There is a real perception problem associated with pound dogs and it's frustrating, it would be good to get the uni program on the same wave of promotion as the Pedigree adoption drive which seems to be perceived much more favourably.

Yes they do, donated cadavers are used in many unis as I understand it and of course play an important part in those unis which don't participate in non-recovery surgeries. It's something I've never really thought of with my dogs although with my sibe it would be extremely educational for vet students to see the results of a successful liver shunt ligation, so it is something that might be worth finding out about as long as I get him back at the end though for my own peace of mind Jo I don't believe the non-recoveries are cruel. I do believe that it's possible that non-recoveries aren't absolutely necessary. And I do believe that the issue of desensitisation requires further investigation as I feel that it is a valid concern. The devaluation of a life simply because it is unwanted by society and therefore becomes a 'waste' if not 'used' in some way is a concern to me, but whether that is a valid or justifiable concern I don't know as it hasn't been thoroughly investigated. There still exists in science a perception that anything that could be perceived as even slightly anthropomorphic is automatically dismissed as 'emotive fluff' and anyone who questions this is labelled 'unrealistic', the reality is that this is a species which has evolved very closely alongside us and therefore we hold in great respect. Why shouldn't we look at the ethics of using their bodies for science? Why shouldn't we look at the effects of that on our own psyche and the effects on the profession of veterinary science as a whole? Why do people dismiss these questions with such vehemence? I find it all very interesting.

Why dont they have the balls to just say - right we're having an aerial cull rather than subject these wild animals to terror in transporting them and that's all there is to it. Because they know damn well that it's not the best they can do it's just the easiest and cheapest. Management of feral horses is difficult but really it's not about the environment or animal welfare it's about freeing up grazing land, if government wanted a humane solution they would put money into researching it. I don't believe they had any intention of trucking those horses to Qld it's not financially viable and most of the animals would be dead or useless as meat by the time they got here anyway. Interesting points I'd like to ask you about - how about a new thread so we stop derailing this one. Sounds like a plan

Why dont they have the balls to just say - right we're having an aerial cull rather than subject these wild animals to terror in transporting them and that's all there is to it. Because they know damn well that it's not the best they can do it's just the easiest and cheapest. Management of feral horses is difficult but really it's not about the environment or animal welfare it's about freeing up grazing land, if government wanted a humane solution they would put money into researching it. I don't believe they had any intention of trucking those horses to Qld it's not financially viable and most of the animals would be dead or useless as meat by the time they got here anyway.

Exactly what I was thinking when I saw the other thread. Makes you realise that the animal rights activists are just constantly shooting themself in the foot Not really like I said I think that it's political they don't want a sh!t fight about an aerial cull so they come up with some outrageous scheme to get people to agree to aerial culling.

Rightyo that makes sense. I didnt think there'd be a market here for horse meat on the table. As for use in unis, I was thinking more along the line of non recovery surgery - same as the issue of pound dogs. I'd much rather see a horse being used for the future benefit of vet science than ending up in a can of dog food or pot of glue. I still cant get my head around how they transport them, though. Poor bloody animals. Sorry for going OT Yeah transport is by far the biggest issue, sedation would also be difficult they would have to be darted which has it's own stresses and risks. It's a bit of a different issue to the dogs because dogs are transported, housed and put down the same way regardless of where they are, but with say a domestic horse it might benefit from the individual housing and transport associated wtih a uni euth. When they go to slaughter they are penned together regardless of whether they get on, so there are often injuries and crowding issues. Feral horses on the other hand would be stressed by any handling, mind you some domestic horses are also stressed by any handling because of treatment they have had in the past. Apparently the WA government is planning to remove some feral horses in the kimberly region by trapping them and transporting them to slaughter in QLD would you believe! Hard to believe that an aerial cull is actually the lesser of two evils but it seems as though that is the case (no doubt a ploy to get welfare groups to agree to an aerial cull IMO), effective population management doesn't seem to be something governments are interested in it's always some dramatic cull because numbers have gotten out of control. Again. Sorry I've gone more OT it's a bit of a pet topic of mine. :D

They are slaughtered here and the meat is exported, approx 40 000 horses a year according to DAFF. For Brumbies transport and handling is stressful and dangerous so it's debatable whether use in a uni research or study program would be beneficial for the horses but I'd say probably not unless they were trained and desensitized to human contact first which of course is too time consuming for most people much less a commercial enterprise. Like I said the person I spoke to about this issue was a vet who had been through the program, it was she who felt that the desensitization was an issue and upon thinking about it I do wonder whether this is something that is often overlooked because people need to be 'tough'. While desensitization is a useful tool to a certain extent it can go too far, most vets become desensitized to a certain extent through their work and you'd seriously have to be a fool with little general animal experience if you think everything is going to be all sunshine and rainbows going into it. And you'd have to be a real fool to believe the same at the end of the course regardless of whether non recoveries were performed as part of it. I also think that sometimes people confuse desensitization with perspective, perspective is what makes a good vet able to look at every aspect of a case and not allow emotions to override their judgement, not desensitization.

Thanks Kirty that is where I'm coming from, I first became aware of this issue after speaking to a vet grad who had been through the course and was so concerned about what she believed was desensitization of the students she made it the focus of her honors project. I find it really interesting and I think it's worth looking at, it could just be the culture at that particular uni too, like I said I got the impression when I was there that sensitivity was percieved as a 'weakness'. Raz the horse slaughter issue has many different facets particularly those that go to slaughter for human consumption rather than dog food, there are a myriad of issues but perhaps they would be used in unis if they weren't worth so much for meat (around $500) no doubt it would be preferable to slaughter in many cases although probably not for Brumbies since the stress involved would be the same if not more than slaughter.

Actually I do see a problem, when I took my dog into the vets and he crashed the vets didn't do a full run of blood tests which would have identified the problem. Now it's possible that they believed that a blood test wouldn't prove the diagnoses they were leaning towards, but it's also possible that due to his advanced and rapid state of decline they believed that the dog was 'going to die anyway' and so further investigation was a waste of time. Now I cannot confirm or deny that this was the case but it certainly makes me wonder whether the 'it's going to die anyway' mantra is as harmless as it initially appears. There is no correlation between the use of pound dogs in vet schools and your belief that your vet failed to do what you considered his best for your dog. Maybe he did think the dog would die anyhow and you wouldn't be prepared to pay hundreds for blood tests for a dog which was dead (a frequent scenario), maybe he was quite sure of the diagnosis, maybe he was an idiot Since no one has done a study on it AFAIK I don't know how you can categorically state that there is no correlation between the use of pound dogs and the subsequent treatment philosophies of the graduating vets? Either way it was a team of vets they freely admitted the diagnosis was their 'best guess' because they had NFI, and they were told repeatedly that I was prepared to authorize any test or treatment that would give a clearer diagnosis. Whether it is correlated or not I believe it is something worth thinking about and looking into.

The US has a different legal system they don't really have broad national animal welfare laws mostly just specific laws forbidding this or that and often varies a lot between states, things like this they wouldn't think they'd need a law so it's not until something like this happens that a law is passed making it illegal.

Dogs do not think the way we do, much of their world is lived in the moment they don't weigh things up and have no real concept of the danger they are in when they take on a bigger dog, they aren't able to connect the thought big dog = I wont win this fight, the way we would. So sorry for the OP, when my big dog was young I allowed my little dog to bully him which was unfair and just plain wrong but I thought it would teach the big dog to respect the authority of the little one, it didn't it just resulted in a nasty fight when the big dog reached maturity and now they have to be seperated when I am not right there to watch their interactions.

I had my sibe's rear ones taken off when he was desexed I wouldn't have bothered if they lay flat but they stuck out at right angles so were pretty much an accident looking for a place to happen. If you asked me to prove it was done at the vet I'd have to give you the name of the vet because paperwork in this house disappears into the abyss never to be seen again

Actually I do see a problem, when I took my dog into the vets and he crashed the vets didn't do a full run of blood tests which would have identified the problem. Now it's possible that they believed that a blood test wouldn't prove the diagnoses they were leaning towards, but it's also possible that due to his advanced and rapid state of decline they believed that the dog was 'going to die anyway' and so further investigation was a waste of time. Now I cannot confirm or deny that this was the case but it certainly makes me wonder whether the 'it's going to die anyway' mantra is as harmless as it initially appears.