Carolk9s

I am feeding Chicken Soup for the Pet Lovers Soul Senior kibble and Science Diet canned. They only get the canned meat in the evening, less than 1/2 ounce each. It's just to add a bit of 'excitement' to the bowl! :D They would eat the kibble dry, I use it as training treats as well. In the morning, they each get a dollop of yogurt on top, each dog eats the yogurt first then polishes off the kibble. My dogs also get at least one egg each week, cooked fresh fish, canned sardines, and the girls will eat strawberries, apples, melon, and pineapple. (no grapes of course) Brittany will eat tomatoes, Jesse does not think fruit and veggies are food at all. 8)

I have always heard that you should not cook the bones at all, it does not make them softer by the way, it makes them more brittle. The excecption to that is if you put a whole chicken in a pressure cooker with water and veggies and slooooow cook it for many hours, then you can simply mash the whole mess up. I sure wish we had a butcher shop around here, I can get beef bones at the supermarket but they are $1.50 per lb! Used to be about .49 a lb til the supermarket owners got wise to the fact that people really WANTED these bones! I have, in the past, given my dogs raw chicken wings. All 3 would settle down and chomp away. Jesse is the only one who had a problem with them, MANY hours later, he'd puke the whole mess back up, usually it was about 3am. Nothing like waking from a sound sleep to a stinkin evil mess to clean up. As for the bigger beef bones, another thrill is to step on one that has been snuck into the house, that'll bring a tear to your eye.

[color=darkblue][/color][size=6][/size]HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELI FROM THE VARIETY PACK! :new-bday:

Well my dogs are spoiled, they each get a greenie every day, after dinner. They know they are going to get it and come looking for it as soon as they are done eating. They can be pricey so I don't buy anything but the petite ones in bulk from Petedge.com Once I had a bunch of coupons to get 1 any size greenie free so I got the jumbo ones. Brittany was in heaven! Candy and Brittany have nice clean teeth, Jesse has icky looking teeth but his gums are in very good condition. I've recently started giving them Pnutz, made by the same folks that make greenies. Dogs LOVE them. They too are somewhat expensive so they are a special treat.

[url]http://wildlife-nature-posters.junglewalk.com/Dog-Posters.asp[/url]

I have used melatonin MANY MANY times during T-storms, does not make them sleepy or knock them out in any way. Just seems to help take the edge off of their fears and keep them more relaxed. It is possible that melatonin in a dog that was NOT excited or fearful might induce some sleepiness but is it not a sleeping pill per se.

[quote name='JackieMaya'] It just doesn't sound to me like she cares where the dog goes, as long as she gets something for her.[/quote] I agree, 100%.

Aside from the entire idea of someone trying to find a new home for their 'baby', if we'll take money for a dog, why not take another form of payment? Not something I would do personally, but if she wants $200 for the dog, and someone has $200 worth of hay instead, I don't see the difference. Let's say the someone with the hay is a good person who will give the dog a really good home, still don't like the 'trade for hay' idea? Just tossing that out as food for thought.

I'm late as usual, SO VERY GLAD to hear Peanut is on the mend! Please give her a little hug from me!

I hope Penny is on the mend, I know how sick at heart you have felt. Please give her a hug for me and tell her that her ONLY job is to get better, she's not to worry about anything else right now. Hoping for good news...

Glad to hear Jackie had a good/so so/icky/wonderful ending day!

Jesse is still doing very well! Sorry I have not been here recently, between work, fussing over my pooches, and other stuff, just have not had any spare time. Jesse is looking good, he is still on antibiotics til Tuesday. Last night he even decided to jump up onto the bed, something he has not attempted in weeks. His front end made and I assisted with the rear! He went swimming this morning, first time back since he was ill. He did very well but would much rather have flirted with the 15 year old female swimming in the other pool. I recorded some footage on my digital camera, transferred it to the pc, and can't play it! It is in MOV format, I think I would need Quicktime to play it. Not sure if I want to load Quicktime back on this ole pc, last time I had it, it blew my pc's mind. Had a follow up cbc run today, will know the results by tomorrow. Still don't know what was wrong, all tests were negative. :-? Costs at usual vet: $659 Costs at critical care vet: $1421 Healing Touch performed by friends: No Charge Having my best buddy home again: PRICELESS

My boy is back in the house! He was up and dancing in his old dog way when he saw me come through the icu doors last night. Ok, so he had to pee, he was still happy to see me. We were sent home with a bag of pills and instructions. His vet at the critical care center said a Western Blot test would differentiate between active Lyme disease as opposed to exposure. That info should be back today or tomorrow. He was tested for Erlichia and Rocky Mt. both of those were negative. White cell count is back in the normal range. He will have another cbc run in 10-14 days. His temp was 100.5 this morning. I will be checking it am and pm for at least a few days. His appetite still needs to improve. He only ate about 1/4 cup this morning, will offer him more at lunchthime and of course dinner. I am wondering how much I should 'dress' his food up to encourage him to eat, don't want to create a spoiled monster but do want him to get that much needed nutrition! I walked out with him this morning using a sling but took it off as he was handling walking ok. He did not want to stay out long. I will go out with him each morning, come home from work at lunch to take him out and again in the evening. For now, I don't want him even trying to use the doggie door, too afraid he might fall. The girls, especially Candy, were glad to see him. Candy wanted to wash his face and Brittany settled down right next to him on the beds in the living room. Time to take him out once more then off to work.

[quote name='gigishiba']How are the girls coping without Jesse?[/quote] ha, the girls are like 'jesse who?' They do sniff me over pretty thoroughly when i come home, at first i thought it was them sniffing his scent. then i realized they were zeroing in on my hands, the hands that fed the chicken to jesse.

[size=6][color=red]Jesse is continuing to improve![/color][/size] His temp is normal, he is eating, standing up on his own and wanting to come home! He may come home as soon as Tuesday. This morning he had chicken, gerber baby food and beef sticks for breakfast. Dog food is going to be mighty pedestrian after getting such royal treatment. He was quite disappointed when I left without him, he was standing at his gate watching me. He is still being walked with a sling, that will continue for a time after he comes home. He was tested for tick diseases, in fact testing came back today. Dr. Grant said he tested positive for Lyme BUT since he was vaccinated some years ago, not sure if he actually has Lyme or antibodies from the vac. She is going to look into this further. Seems like he had something that the antibiotics are handling but don't have a solid lead on what yet. He has an appt with the internal med specialist for Wednesday, that was the soonest appt available. I was a little disappointed in the delay but since he is doing so well, he might not even need to see them. If he was still as sick as he was Friday and Saturday, I'd be putting up a fuss about having to wait but I guess I don't have to do that! [size=6][color=red]I TRULY DEEPLY SINCERLY THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR SUPPORT AND CONCERN![/color][/size]

Jesse is showing some improvement! His temp went down to 103 last night, came back up to 103.5, last check (while I was there) was 103.3. First time his temp has been below 104 since at least Friday morning. No vomiting since 7pm last night. Still no diagnosis, an internal med. specialist is on the chart for tomorrow. I went to see him this morning, as I walked into the icu, he saw me coming. As I opened his gate, he got up! He stood on his own. Shaky, but up. The nurse said OH MY GOD 3 times. Said to her knowledge, that is the first time since he's been there that he got up unassisted. He is of course still very weak, stood for a few minutes than sank into a sit. Unhooked his cath., put his sling on, and took him outside for a pee. He tottered about and peed like a pup. Convinced him he needed to go back inside. He was very tired from his little walk. The nurse brought him a pillow and he stretched out on his blankets to rest. His vet told me this morning it was ok to boil some chicken and offer him a small amount. I took that and the water used to boil the chicken. Offered him the water first, was very interested but did not drink. Offered him a bite of chicken, I have never been so glad to him chomp on my fingers! I only gave him a very small amount of chicken, he also drank some of the broth. The rest was put in their fridge for a bit later. His left side, legs, and back got a nice massage, I will give him another later and be parting the hair more to check for a tick as has been suggested. I keep telling myself he is by far not out of danger yet but I am thrilled at this progress.

Yesterday, Jesse was still running a fever of 104.5. Still very quiet, I stretched out on the floor beside him for a while. Still not eating or drinking but he is on continuous IV fluids and antibiotics. I just spoke to the vet a few minutes ago, there IS some improvement. Tiny but hoping he continues. His temp went down to 103 then back up to 103.5. Beats 104.5! As his temp has been over 104.5 since Friday morning, I am thrilled to hear 103.5. He has not vomited since 7pm yesterday. Vet did add an anti nausea med. She's given the go ahead to try and get some food in him. I'll be boiling some chicken tenders within the hour and hope to get him to eat a bit. I will update again later, hoping my boy has turned a corner.

Thank you all, is it truly uplifting knowing that you all care and send your well wishes to Jesse. He is in the ICU at the vet emergency clinic. The main worry is trying to get his fever down. It was 104.7 when I first took him yesterday morning, has gone up and down between that and 105.5. Hovering right at 105 when I talked to the vet this morning. He is on 3 antibiotics, Amoxicillan, Baytril and I think Flagyl. He vomited twice overnight so the vet is now withholding food to try and stop that. I will be going out to see him shortly and will tell him of the good thoughts and prayers for him. Thank you again!

My sweet old boy is at the vets today. He was fine Wednesday, then refused to eat his breakfast, refused at lunchtime, refused again at dinner. Has not eaten anything today. I called in sick and took my boy to the vet. He is weak, lethargic, and shaky. His temp is elevated and he is breathing a bit hard. When I picked up his collar this morning, something that normally brings him right to his feet, he made a weak attempt to get up, then settled back in resignation. I literally had to pick him up and steady him to put his harness on. He's been very quiet since Wednesday night. Vet will run full panel bloodwork, urinalysis, tick serology, full xrays. He will also get subcu fluids to hopefully bring his temp down. Vet was very concerned. He also showed a severe lack of response to having a hind foot turned over so it was resting on the knuckle. Just stood there swaying while being supported by vet and assistant. He can barely walk. Vet suspects an infection, more will be known later. I am, quite frankly, a mess. I know he's old and his time is coming but it's unbearable to consider. I managed to stop crying for a few moments to tell the vet as much as I could to try and help pinpoint the problem. I am hoping whatever is wrong is fixable. The vet showed me the estimate and wanted me to understand more might be needed. I told her, do WHATEVER needs to be done, if we can find out what is wrong and make him better, lets do it. I'll know more later or tomorrow.

Have not been here in a few days, so glad to hear your Lucky baby is fine!

That vet is in the wrong line of work! He obviously does not give much thought to the bond between animal and human. I guess he would tell me to pack Jesse of to rescue because he's old and physically failing? Sorry to hear of Laurels impending blindness, but I know she is in the BEST POSSIBLE home. You love her, you will care for her, and Free will help.

[quote name='xavierandrea']Carolk9s--- Actually for once I was nice..(LOL :lol: ) She is a very nice older lady in her 70s. She feeds the feral cats in the church parking lot every night. She's a retired school teacher Ether is her name.( I know her whole life story. :roll: ) I did explain the different markings and the wieght difference. She actually giggled and said " To think I taught kids for over 30 years and now a kid is teaching me something new." :D[/quote] Yeah! THATS WHAT I'M TALKIN ABOUT! Good for YOU for taking the opportunity to EDUCATE. Just got back from the Animal Planet Pet Expo, had all 3 dogs with me. I must have heard 'LOOK AT THAT WOLF' 15 times. The first time or two, I looked for the wolf, then realized they were talking about Jesse. I was too happy to tell anyone who wanted to know what breed of DOG he really is.

Well, just to play a little devils advocate.... When this lady asked you (I'm assuming politely) if your dog was one of 'those' pitbulls, this was YOUR chance to educate her in an equally polite manner. NOT saying you were not polite, don't think that. Just wondering at the 'tone' of this thread, knowledge of dogs does not just fall from the sky or soak in through the skin. If someone is ACCUSING you of having pitbulls, and they're not, or someone is RANTING about you having pitbulls, and they're not, still an opportunity to EDUCATE. We can bitch and moan about the uneducated calling all dogs pit bulls but if we are not willing to EDUCATE politely and properly when given a chance, how are they going to learn? From the media? 8) We all know how often the media is dead wrong.

Today was almost as much fun as yesterday. We had 1 wrong course in our Standard run, even without that bobblewe would have been 2nd as the 1st place dog was way faster than us. Our jumpers run was fantastic, even with her slow weave poles we ran fast, we ran clean and took the blue ribbon for that. We are all tired, we all had fun. I think I must be nuts, I only ran twice each day this weekend, in 3 weeks I have trials in which I signed us up to run 4 times each day. I may have to call in sick to work the day after to recuperate. 8)

I took the dogs to the park this morning for a quick run around, then off we all went to an agility trial. We are going back tomorrow for another but I just could not wait, I am just plain tickled at how TODAY turned out. Candy and I had a 'twofer'. I ran her in AKC Novice Standard and Novice Jumpers W/Weaves. We had 2 clean runs, We got 2 qualifying and perfect scores, We got 2 blue/first place ribbons, We finished 2 titles! We were 10 seconds under maximum course time each run. I actually thought we might have NQ'd in our standard run, she went blasting through the collapsed chute and right out of the ring, she thought we were done! Not so, we had 3 jumps left, I called her back, she zoomed back to me and we finished. Some judges might have NQ'd us for that but I am guessing since Candy responded to me quickly and no one touched her, we were still good to finish. I also walked Jesse and Brittany individually around, both really enjoyed it. Jesse perked up quite a bit, he's pretty old but has not forgotten AT ALL what pockets are for! His sniffer still works just fine. Brittany got a little excited to be out and about, she got to meet a very nice Boxer. I could have moved Candy up to the next level but I'll wait for fall to do that. We'll run again in Novice tomorrow and we can TRULY run just for fun.