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| answered a question | Why does my dog scoot on her bottom? As already mentioned, anal glands are a cause for bum scooting. It's also a symptom of worms, so maybe check their stool and see if there's anything out of the ordinary in there. |
| answered a question | What happens if my dog bites someone? If he's nipping/snapping at people, look for signs that he's about to do it or what the cause is. It could be that he's nipping when people grab his tail, or spook him from behind, and that gives you a start on how to train him not to nip. If it's more like nibbling/gnawing, then the question is how old is he? If he's under a year, it's likely he's still teething and he'll grow out of it. However there are still ways to train him it's not ok to chew on people. When he nips/snaps, he's doing it for a reason, so once you figure out the trigger, it's easy enough to redirect him. For instance, my dog started getting aggressive around unneutered male dogs shortly before I got him neutered. It's been 7 months and he's still trying to play alpha dog. However, since I knew his triggers, and he occasionally gave a warning via body language (hair up, ears back, tail lowered), I could step in and redirect. My favorite redirection game is "watch me/focus." It's getting eye contact from him while the trigger goes by behind his back. I train this by taking a good high value treat and leading it from his nose to my eyes. When he focuses on me, he gets the treat. Then I add the distraction into it. I'll take him somewhere I know he'll run into dogs he doesn't like-like a pet store, and I'll stand up front while customers come in with their dogs and make him focus. To start out, I'll walk him around the store and get a little energy out and let him smell all the good doggy smells, then I'll park him near the door but far enough away that he can't reach dogs coming in on 6 foot leashes (I keep my dog right next to me on a short leash, but I can't control other owners. If they allow their dog to approach mine on a retractable, any injury to their dog is on them because I kept my dog near me like a responsible owner). If he ignores the focus command and tries to bark at the dog I give a correction marker-I use a correction spray that's basically a can of air so compressed it makes a very loud CH sound. Just a short burst is usually enough to break a dog's concentration and they start looking around for the source of the noise. That's where I jump in and get that treat right in front of his nose and bring his focus back to me to allow that dog to walk past. As he gets comfortable ignoring the things he wants to bite, you gradually bring those distractions closer. Now he still has the occasional issue with some dogs but for ... |
| answered a question | Is cesar food good for my dog? Cesar dog food is filled with by-products and non-specific meat sources. by-products are what's left over after all the good parts of the animal are gone. For chicken, it will include beaks, feathers, feet, non-delicacy organs. Blech! Non-specific meat sources are things like "poultry," "meat," or "fish." Poultry can include anything bird-like. Could be chicken, could be turkey, could be duck, could be quail. Fish is anything fish, maybe salmon, maybe whitefish, who knows? And meat could literally be anything. Depending on the state regulations where the food is processed, it could literally be roadkill scraped off the highway. You always want it to say what the meat source is. Whatever brand you go with, keep an eye on those meats. Cesar uses low quality non specified meat. |
| answered a question | What is the best dog food for my dog? I have a few key things I always look at when deciding if a food is good or not. Obviously every dog is different and has different needs, small breeds need different percentages of protein vs. fat. vs fiber etc. than medium breeds and large breeds. Younger dogs have different needs than older dogs. First thing is age-depending on breed size, they may need to remain on a puppy formula until they're 2 years old. There's 3 major age groups-puppy "growth" formula, adult "maintenance" formula, and senior "weight loss" formula. If your dog falls into the adult category but is underweight, a puppy formula may be fed to help gain weight. If they're overweight, a senior formula may be fed to help lose weight. However if they're so severely underweight or overweight a vet visit is best before just changing their diet. Then the things I like to focus on is ingredients. When looking at meats, you never want to see "by-product" after the meat. Chicken by-product can include anything from good whole meat to bones to beaks and feathers to feet to non-delicacy organs like the intestines. You just don't know what you're going to get and it's almost never the actual meat. Beef by-product can include hooves and fur. Basically by-product is what's left over when the good meat is used for something else. You also want to watch out for non-specific meat ingredients like "meat meal," "poultry," and "fish." If it's not a specific source, even though it's the actual meat and not by-product, it's inconsistent from batch to batch. One batch with poultry may have mostly chicken with a little bit of duck, then the next batch has mostly turkey with maybe some duck and chicken. If that's the primary source of meat, your bags of food will always be slightly different, which is why brands like iams and purina have such a bad reputation for making dogs sick from bag to bag. Then you have to know what exactly ingredients mean. "Chicken" means chicken meat with it's water weight. It isn't as solid of a protein source as "chicken meal." It's a common misconception that "meal" is bad. It's not. What it means is that the meat is dehydrated and ground up. There's no water weight. It's solid protein. Then for grains-avoid corn, wheat, soy, and sorghum. As for rice, generally rice is good, but there's definitely different quality. The best rice is going to be whole ground brown rice. If you're adding rice at home, standard white rice is a great addition to their food. Anything else is going to be medium-low quality rice. Generally with good brands of food you won't have an issue with low quality grains. Another thing to think about is if you need grain free. Grains can be a huge allergen, and a grain free option is always ... |
| answered a question | Why is my dog shivering? The first thing to know is-is this a new thing? There's a lot that could be causing shivering/shaking. Sometimes it's just a breed thing-little dogs like chihuahuas tend to be "shiverers." Sometimes it's excess energy escaping the only way it can-same way people tap their fingers/pen on the desk in school because they can't run. If that's the case, all you have to do is give him a little extra exercise throughout the day-if you don't have time for extra walks or fetch, try brain games. Puzzle toys where they have to work to get the treats out. Also a 15 minute training session with them is equivalent to a 2 mile walk, so depending on the breed that might be just about all they need during the day on top of their normal routine. If they're trained on all the basics this is a great chance to teach them new tricks (and yes, old dogs can do this too). It could be something a little more serious though. If it's just random bouts of shaking that last a couple minutes at most, it could be seizures. The dog tends to sort of freeze in place, and lose the ability to walk, sometimes they'll fall over. There's usually quite a bit of drool, and occasionally they'll get aggressive afterwards. If that sounds like what's happening I'd definitely recommend a vet visit. When in doubt, a vet visit isn't going to hurt anything except maybe your wallet. You can tell them, maybe even show them, exactly what's going on and they can provide better recommendations for you. |
| commented answer | My dog has been in a fight, and why is she now snoring? Since you say it's a new sound and her breathing sounds labored now I would definitely get back in touch with the vet! They may need to do xrays and make sure it's going to heal on it's own and not maybe collapse suddenly or something scary! |
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| answered a question | Why does my dog lick her feet? You don't want your dog to lick their paws all the time! It's normal for them to lick their paws if they've been outside and it's wet out or just got out of the bath-they're just licking off excess water. However if they're constantly licking there's quite a few reasons they could be doing that and none of them are good. There's boredom, which is the best out of the lot. That can be fixed by just providing mental stimulation like puzzle toys for them to focus their energy on instead. The next possible reason is that there's an injury-do a thorough check of her paws and see if there's any cuts, cracks in the pads, rocks or debris between the toes, basically anything out of the ordinary. It could be that something is hurting her and she's trying to get it out. If that's not the case, I would suggest looking into her diet. One of the common symptoms of food allergies is paw licking. Sometimes that's the only symptom of food allergies. I knew a lab that licked her paws all the time and they were dry and raw because of years of constantly licking. She was a super sweet lab, but if you touched her feet at all she would try to rip your hand off because it hurt her so much. Made doing nail trims very difficult. No matter what the case, I would recommend making attempts to get her to stop, either by giving her something else to do, or consulting with a vet to see if it's a food allergy or injury. Sometimes it's as simply as changing their food to a grain free formula, or changing the protein type. |
| commented question | Should I let my dog eat grass? Dogs eat grass for many reasons-it helps digestion, they're bored, they're hungry and it's there. It doesn't hurt them unless it's covered in pesticides or germs, so if he's only eating it on walks, it's probably better to just teach him to leave it because you don't know what might be on the grass. |
| commented question | food agression? Some things to try are pretending to eat the food before Miles is allowed to eat, which will show him that even though you're around the food, he'll still get to eat. You can also feed him from your hand first before you put the bowl on the floor. Also make him sit and stay as you put the bowl down. |
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| answered a question | Where do you buy your dog food? I work at Petco, so of course I buy my food there. I also feed my pets Merrick/Whole Earth Farms which is only at Petco and little mom-and-pop stores at this time. They are very high quality foods, with their various formulas all rating 4 or 5 stars on http://dogfoodadvisor.com. Not only is it very high quality, buy Whole Earth is price comparable to Eukanuba/Iams/Purina. It's cheaper than many Pro Plan or Science Diet bags of the same size, and the dogs will get more nutrients in less food so they'll go through it slower, so you're saving money every month. Quality food is my priority, followed by price, followed by convenience. Personally I try to avoid petsmart because of their stance on certain breeds of dogs (must be muzzled/not allowed in stores/etc). It's doggy discrimination based on myths, and when a company has policies like they do about these breeds in their store, it's just perpetuating the problem, not helping it, and I've heard a lot of people say they choose petco over petsmart because of it, even for things like cat food and fish. So I will avoid any stores that I think have bad policies, because there will never be a store that is the sole retailer for national brands like that. |