JB1824

I think Westies (unfortunately) have a reputation for allergies. It could be that she's gotten through an itchy phase and the black patches are what's left - chronic licking can result in pigmentation of the skin. I agree with Boronia and westiemum, keep on with your grain-free diet. If she gets itchy again, you might want to rule in/out food allergies - although this can take a long time. We're taught that, ideally, dogs should be put on a hydrolysed diet (expensive, but should have no allergens) for 6 weeks before a food allergy can be ruled out. So if she stops itching and her skin gets better over the next 6 weeks, you might want to change her food temporarily to a diet with grain in it - then, if she gets itchy again, you can confirm that she has a grain allergy! :) On the other hand, if she's still itchy, and you still want to find out if she has food allergies you'll have to try changing ingredients, or try a hydrolysed diet like Hill's z/d or other alternative (hopefully there are cheaper options, but I've never had to research it). It's better to change 1/few ingredients at a time, but that will be very time consuming and difficult (which is why investigating food allergies can take a long time). Otherwise you could opt to manage her like an atopic dog (it's kind of like hayfever, except they could be allergic to many different allergens - not just pollens, and it might not just be seasonal) - in which case, what you're doing now I think would be good. Plus things like possibly increasing the dose of flaxseed oil (depends on how much you're giving now), oatmeal shampoos and trying antihistamines before having to control the itching with corticosteroids. Good luck!

Thank you Sir Snook! It's been fun recording and sharing all the little things he does :) After another brief hiatus from these forums, here's two more videos again. This one is one of my favourites (along with the How to "Catch" video): This is once when he woke up and got the hiccups: How often do dogs get hiccups? Wilson's my first ever dog so I really don't know!

Hi Kialee, There's a cardiologist from Victoria who comes down to Adelaide every so often (I'm not sure if this is just for consults, or if he performs any surgery as well), and his website lists pacemaker surgery as a service, so that may be another option for you. I haven't had any personal experience with him, but he gave us our cardiology lectures a few months ago :) http://cprvictoria.com.au/

Lizards/reptiles can carry bacteria like Salmonella, which can cause diarrhoea (and I would think vomiting) if you contacted/ate enough of it. I'm not sure if dogs could get it from eating them, but humans certainly can after touching them! (Don't know if we're more susceptible than dogs at getting an infection)So wash your hands after touching any reptile, just in case :)

I think the vacuuming is a great idea. :) In regards to seeking more intensive treatment (please feel free to disagree anyone cos I have had no experience with it!) I think I would try something more if you notice him having longer fits of coughing, or if it looks like he's using effort to breathe, or if he starts showing other signs (he might be more prone to secondary infection)

Thank you VizslaMomma! Wow it's already been 4 months since I last posted...I'd gotten so busy with uni work, but now for some more videos :) This is probably my favourite video so far: And this is just one where he fell asleep against my leg, he can be quite a loud sleeper and he's not even snoring in this haha.

In this video, I can only assume Wilson was dreaming of eating or drinking something tasty! It's a bit hard to hear, so you have to turn the sound up (I only had our iPad near by which obviously isn't the best!)

Thank you!! I try to post one every week :) Here's Wilson as a puppy, playing with a pot. Not sure if it's common for puppies to stick their heads in the pot while they're playing, but it looks funny!

Wishing all the best for you and your staffy. Based on your description of head tremors, changed behaviour, funny mouth movements, turns and different pupil sizes, I would suspect some form of CNS disease. Unfortunately, there are heaps of things that can cause it, including parasites, bacteria, tumours/cancer, liver shunts and other liver disease (as other people have said). I read a case on placement recently of a dog that had presented with circling, pupils with different sizes (with 1 being non-responsive to light) and many neurological signs. He worsened over the next few days so much that the vets thought he wouldn't make it. The owners were, luckily able to afford everything. He had an MRI, cerebrospinal fluid culture and tests for Neospora and Toxoplasma (parasites) as well as a few nights at an emergency centre where they could monitor his progress more frequently. The diagnosis was GME, which you can read a bit on google I think (there's a PDF from the AVA somewhere on the Internet). After a few days of treatment, he massively improved.

Yep! I wouldn't say their ramming it down our throats, I think it's more like there's so little time and so much content to cover that they can't really go into much detail or discussion about it. They've certainly mentioned a few disadvantages of desexing such as increased risk of hip dysplasia with early age desexing (which is 6-16 weeks). I guess one of the problems is, in practice, it'll be hard to tell if an owner is actually going to be responsible and prevent unwanted litters, etc. But I'd say everyone on these forums are more likely to actually know what they're doing. There's plenty of stuff for us to learn and kind of little time to do extra research on things like these, so it's good there are these kinds of discussions here! You should show her some journal articles next time :p

I haven't done the research myself, but at uni, we've been taught that basically the longer you delay desexing (the more seasons she goes through), the higher the risk of cancer will be. I don't know how small or large the risk is in intact females, but that's what we were taught! I'll see if I can find any journal articles if you're interested in finding out more? :) So, I read a few articles for those interested: Apparently, mammary gland tumours are the most common tumours in female dogs, with an incidence of 3.4%, 50.9% are malignant, and 77% metastasise. An old article(from 1969!) reported that dogs spayed before their first estrus have a 0.5% risk, dogs spayed after 1 estrus have an 8.0% risk, and dogs spayed after 2 estrous cycles have a 26.0% risk of developing mammary gland neoplasms when they get older. A systematic review published in 2012 however found that the evidence for this is weak, due to poor reporting in the journal articles (they generally didn't show how the calculated the percentages, and didn't control for other variables like age, breed, etc.) There are obviously many other benefits/disadvantages to desexing, but I would tend to agree with the other posters here, especially if you are responsible and can safely keep her while she's in season (as Haredown has said below)

Wilson seems to like grass so much that I can use it as a dog treat. Does anyone else's pets like eating grass (specifically, the one you've picked yourself :p )?

Here he is seeing a blue tongue lizard for the first time. He's a bit of a scaredy cat!

I started a youtube channel to share the weird and cute things I see wilson doing :) Here is when he was still a puppy, playing with a sprinkler: He's since learnt that we control the water coming out of the sprinkler and watches for us to turn the tap on! :D

I haven't been here for ages! But, we got kind of lazy with lead training and didn't really do much lol. He doesn't mind the lead being put on though, and shortening the training sessions have been really good. He seems to happily walk around with me, BUT he likes to carry the lead in his mouth as well! It looks pretty cute though. He still occasionally starts playing tug of war, but he's getting better with 'Give'