Hunny

Thanks guys I agree Stormie, I think I will hunt around for some cheap cans of fish instead. It would have to be better for her. Mason Gibbs, seems we've got ourselves a fussy one! She has to be very hungry before eating them plain. Mind you..any thing else is gone in seconds!

Our 7 month labby is fed a pretty basic diet I think...one or two chicken wings a day, plus the RC Lab puppy biscuits. She looks great, shiny coat and lean (I am paranoid about her weight). Brisket bones seem to have a lot of fat on them, so will be giving them a miss. Anyway, with the dry biscuits, she will eat them under sufferance and they can sit there all day. I have bought some sachets of fish (can't remember the brand) that you can mix into dry dog food and she ate them up straight away then. Hubby sprayed them with olive oil spray the other day(I don't know why he did that either... )but they were eaten up straight away, she loved it. Is this okay to put on her biscuits?

Hi Woodbyne, Great news indeed! We have also had success with our lab puppy, Tilly. She was limping around the same time as your puppy. She was locked in the laundry for ages to keep her quiet, and then started on small walks which we have been building on. If we have overdone it, she will have a bit of a limp again, so she is then rested and we start again on short walks. She finally 'graduated' from beginner classes this week at dog school....still don't know how we managed that though! :D

I love reading these stories! After my Daisy (staffy x) went earlier this year, I couldn't bear the thought of another 'quirky' little dog. So, to help ourselves move forward, we started researching what sort of dog we would have next. I would love a GAP greyhound, but OH didn't, he grew up with working labs in England and after finding the right puppy, Matilda came to live with us. We love her to bits and she is totally different, such a boofhead! As someone mentioned earlier though...the hair!!! It drives me crazy...and OH is already talking about another one!!

Great thread as we are looking having our nearly 6 month old female lab puppy sterilised. My old staffy I had done as soon as she was 6 months old...after reading some of these replies now, I am not sure what to do!

Hi Olivebaby..we thought we were being careful with Matilda and as you may have read, we are having problems with her limping. She was walked maybe about 10 minutes a day,we did short bursts of training her on the lead, she played fetch (we didn't do it a huge amount), we've got a raised verandah so about 2 -3 steps down on to the garden..she did leap on and off those. Whenever she was around the horses, she was on a lead but would get tangled up in that at times. She had a paddling pool that she would jump in and out of, and of course when it was wet, it was slippery. But nothing was overdone...or so we thought. We think the damage came from her first (and only) class at dog school where all the puppies played very hard...lots of leaping,twisting, turning etc but it could have come from anything really. Thankfully, after a few weeks of confinement, things are looking pretty good again but we are so worried about her reinjuring herself when it comes time for her to be 'normal' again. Just tweaked something at the wrong moment I guess.

Thank you!!! I wasn't sure if we should just ignore the barking...like when they bark for attention. I will definately start on the 'leave' command.

Guess I'll just have to buy the cat some ear plugs.....

Our 5 month old lab puppy very often barks at our old cat, and bounces around her all the time wanting to her to play. Our cat is well used to dogs and has 'trained' a couple in her day to be polite...(and to let her share their beds)... but Matilda just doesn't take any notice! We remove her when she becomes boisterous and put her in a quiet spot for 'time out' and also try the distraction method as well which does work to a certain extent. Any other ideas?

Ring around, and even double check with the original quote perhaps? We got a quote to bring our lab puppy from Mt Gambier in SA, to Geraldton WA for well over $900!!!! Boy did I feel sick, and was certain divorce was in my near future. We got another quote from another carrier and it was $392. The original carrier then contacted the breeder and said they had misquoted, and it was about $400. Thank goodness for that!

My old staffy, Daisy was on Macralone (cauterzone) from about 10 years old, for about 3 years. She has severe arthritis in her spine, hips and tail and spurs everywhere. When she started on the tablets, she had a huge appetite and thirst but it settled down when she went to a maintenance dose. It made her like a puppy again and that is when we realised how much pain she was in. The vet said it was our last resort as nothing else had helped. We had to help her over the rainbow bridge earlier this year, I thought she might have had Cushings but it didn't come up in the blood tests. She did have a big tummy though considering she was hardly eating in the end. Another product I used towards the end of her time was Technyflex, a NZ green lipped mussel powder. That perked her up for a while as well.

Thanks Ness! Nope, not in Perth.. we have found the local dog chiro who did his best with a wriggly puppy, but said he didn't really like treating puppies (he is a people chiro predominantly)...however I am going to ring up the dog physio that we have in town and give that a go as well. She has taken to being an 'laundry dog' very well! The big test will be tomorrow when we go back to work though...I just hope she comes good, I hate to think of her limping her way through life.

Well, xrays have not come up with anything, although the vet did say that a particular kind of fracture in the elbow may not show on there. They did mention 'growing pains' (??) especially as she's such a big, solid puppy. And because she is so big (everyone comments on her size), she is on a course of Cartrophyn as a precuation...and more rest of course. At the moment we have her in the laundry when we are not here, and in the house when we are, and fully supervised of course as she chews everything. When we are at work we'll leave her in the laundry as well and the boss has said I can take a longer lunch (only get 30mins) to come home and take her outside. I am still working on hubby to get a pen, so she can be confined on the back verandah as well.

Woodbyne, I think I may be working along the same lines...inside doggy! Would be all okay if only she stopped trying to get our old pussy cat to play! MissMonaro, no they didn't give me anything, didn't really tell me anything about from resting her. It's only from this forum that I even realised about crating etc and the extent to what 'resting' really meant. I've just dropped her off this morning for her xrays, and a different vet checked her leg again. She thinks it's definately in the elbow . Anyway, will soon find out.

Well, she is going in for xrays on Friday. The lady I spoke to at the vets, said there was a note on her records about something going on with an elbow joint....they didn't tell me that at the time. Rest is definately the answer.

Well..we went to the doggy chiropracter last night (there is actually one in our town) She wasn't limping in the morning before I went to work, but my husband let her play when he got home, and by the time I took her to the chiro, she was limping badly. (Husband has since been severely spoken too). Chiro couldn't really find anything apart from the shoulder muscle being sore, and something happening up between the shoulder blades. He reckons it's muscle....he did some work with his 'thumper' thing, she still limped badly and now this morning she seems much better again. Always better in the morning, I gues after sleeping all night. I am going to keep her in the laundry over the weekend so she can't move about. We also have a dog physio in town as well, so that is our next step.

Hotwyr, you have definately eased my mind.

Thanks Woodbyne, I was reading your thread before and wondered how you were going! It is all very scary that this is happening and I can't but help think the worst. We are terribly disappointed, my husband had vision of 'trampsing about the countryside' like he did when he was a kid in England (they had labs as gundogs and used to go 'beating' for the local squire)and at this stage it just isn't going to be happening. I wouldn't let him take her out anywhere until her vaccinations were done and on the very first day she was allowed out 'in public', we went to dog school and think this is where the injury happened. I guess it's just waiting game at the moment.

We have been very strict with her weight so am happy with that side of things....however, can't be too careful! I will definately take her in for xrays next week if the limp is still there. It is alot better than it was, yesterday I couldn't see it at all. Tonight there it was again, but still nowhere near as bad as it first was. I've had two horses with OCD ....I definately do not want our puppy to have it too.

It is her front leg Persephone. We don't have a dog chiro in our area, but will definately make more effort to restrict her activities. Thank you for your help!

Our 4 month old lab puppy has been limping since she went to dog school for the first time, over a week ago. She played hard with all the other puppies so we are hoping it's just muscle. She's been to the vets who can't actually find any sore areas, although I guess it's hard when she didn't really sit still for the examination. They have advised rest and then xrays in a couple of weeks, although they also said that xrays can be inconclusive. It's such a worry....sometimes she looks okay, then the next she is limping along. We are trying to keep her as quiet as possible, although it's hard when she is outside all the time. By the way, her parents had ratings of 0/0 and 1/1 for their hip/elbow xrays...although I guess that doesn't mean our puppy can't have something go wrong in that department.

Olivebaby, how funny if we bought from the same breeder! Matilda is black as well, same age and her parents scores were like 0/0 and 1/1 or something like that...we bought her from Victoria. (We are in WA). Drifter, when we decided to buy a lab puppy, I spoke to breeder in Perth who was fantastically helpful. Told me what to look for and ask for and said if a breeder said 'oh that doesn't matter' then to walk away from them..she went into plenty of detail and explain the xray scoring, genetic testing and even arranging travel! I felt quite happy about asking lots of questions when we did contact the lovely lady we bought Matilda from.

Hi Olivebaby! I've got a 4 month old lab puppy too. She doesn't eat all her food at once either, rather has a bit here and there, and sometimes she doesn't eat it all up either...she certainly doesn't eat as much as the biscuit bag recommends! Our Matilda is an outside puppy, and she seems very happy with it. She can get through a doggy door into the laundry at night (or day) and has a big cosy bed in there, but she does seem to like being outside on her 'day bed' mostly. We have 'puppy proofed' the back garden as much as possible as she is by herself while we are at work and so far, so good. she does come inside for a brief time in the mornings before work, and perhaps a little bit at night before she is fed. We do spend lots of time with her in the mornings (she helps me feed the horse and clean paddocks) and she has lots of playtime in the afternoons. No idea how to help you with Olive in the mornings, but good luck!

Thanks for all the ideas...you've all been so helpful and I'm off to the shops today to stock up on all the goodies required for doggy school!! I am already finding old cat biscuits in my pockets.... :D

Do you all use those 'bum bags' to store your treats in while training? Or just pop them in a pocket or something?