Socialization is a critical component of a healthy, well adjusted adult dog. This is especially important in breeds that are known for their protective or aggressive nature. The personality and behavior of a mature dog will be strongly affected by how he interacts with littermates, his mother, and other pets – as well as people. . . especially children, when he is young.

From puppyhood on, it is imperative that you make every effort to expand his environment and expose him to new things. At this stage of life, puppies should be around as many different people and animals as possible to help eliminate fear of the unknown. Try some of these effective socialization methods with your pup:

	Enroll in a puppy socialization or obedience class, run by a professional, where he will meet other dogs.
	Take him with you on walks, when shopping, or even to work (where allowed). Gradually get him used to new sights and sounds.
	Invite your friends, including men, women, children and seniors, over to your house at different times to meet your new puppy.
	Involve him in as much of your daily activities as possible. Be sure to offer treats for good behavior.

Puppies that have been exposed to various groups of people and pets are less likely to be aggressive to those groups as they mature. And you will be well on your way to having an excellent companion for years to come.

Article courtesy of Dr Foster Smith

Colitis refers to inflammation of the large intestine (colon). Symptoms may include abdominal pain, diarrhea, dehydration, abdominal bloating and increased intestinal gas. Colitis can be caused by a primary disease, irritation of the bowel, antibiotic use, parasite infestation or ulceration.

Two Major types of Colitis are Ulcerative Colitis and Ischemic Colitis.

Ulcerative colitis
Ulcerative colitis is an inflammatory disease of the colon, the large intestine, which is characterized by inflammation and ulceration of the innermost lining of the colon. Ulcerative colitis affects only the colon.

Research has shown that in ulcerative colitis, the body’s defenses are operating against some substances in the body, perhaps in the digestive tract, which the body recognizes as foreign. These foreign substances (antigens) may themselves cause the inflammation to begin or to stimulate the inflammatory process to continue without control.

Symptoms of Ulcerative Colitis
The first symptom of ulcerative colitis is normally a progressive loosening of the stool. The stool is generally bloody and can be associated with crampy abdominal pain and severe urgency to have a bowel movement. The diarrhea may begin slowly or quite suddenly. In addition there may be skin lesions, pain in the joints and failure to grow properly.

Ischemic Colitis
An inflammation caused by interference with the blood flow to the large intestine.

Symptoms:
Severe abdominal pain, fever, vomiting, bright red blood in the stool, diarrhea and muscle pain.

Treatment for Colitis

Because Colitis can be similar to Irritable Bowel Disease and can be triggered by many factors, it is important to have a thorough examine done by a veterinarian. If you decide to seek natural methods, Purely Pets recommends a consultation with our on-staff nutritionist.

A consultation will include a personalized diet and holistic program suggestions, all custom-tailored to your pet’s personal needs. This is particularly imperative with pets suffering from Colitis.

The nutritional program and other recommendations outlined in this article are designed for pets that have been diagnosed with Colitis, but does not apply to every pet.

Feed What is Right for Your Pet
Good nutrition is essential in any chronic disease but especially in this illness, which is characterized by diarrhea and rectal bleeding that can rob the body of fluids, electrolytes, and nutrients. Maintaining proper nutrition is important in the management of colitis.

The most important thing to remember when choosing a food for your pet is to choose a food that is right for YOUR pet, not what other people think is right. Raw diets are great, and home cooking is wonderful, but if your pet doesn’t do well on it, don’t feel guilty.

Some pets suffering from Colitis do very well on a BARF (raw) diet, others do well on a home cooked diet and others only do well on dry or canned food. Every case is different, so it is a matter of experimenting and sticking to what works best. There IS NOT one diet that works for every pet.

However, when choosing a dry food avoid synthetic preservatives such as butylated hydroxyanisol (BHA), butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT), propyl gallate, propylene glycol and ethoxyquin. Avoid animal fats (found in many pet foods), high fat treats, processed foods, spicy foods, sugar and diary products. These foods may aggravate the problem.

Eating the wrong combination of foods can trigger symptoms. For example, when proteins and grains are eaten together, the grains start to ferment and cause gas. Also, as the combination slows the process down, proteins start to putrefy and cause toxins to be released into the system. Therefore, you may need to eliminate grains.

In many cases, feeding a very simple diet helps. Diets that seem to be beneficial are chicken and one vegetable, or ground meat and one vegetable. Some pets only do well when brown or white rice is added to the diet. In other cases a dry food containing beet pulp is beneficial because it hardens the stool.

Structure Meal Times
Feed small, frequent meals instead of one large one. Offer all food at room temperature for best digestion.

Recommended feeding schedule:
Breakfast: High quality pet food, raw or homemade food.
Lunch: High quality pet food, raw or homemade food.
Midday: Light Snack.
Dinner: High quality pet food, raw or homemade food.
Before bed: Light snack.

Use Bottled Water
Toxic metals such as lead, copper, mercury, and aluminum are often found in drinking water and some pets are very sensitive to these metals.

Rule out a Parasite Infestation
A parasite infestation is a very common problem with dogs and cats. Symptoms of an infestation are — vomiting, lethargy, loss of appetite, weight loss, diarrhea, inability to absorb nutrients, bad breath, skin problems, chronic ear infections, yeast infections, foul odor to the stool, and many other minor and major ailments.

GIARDIA does lead to Colitis and many other illnesses! Giardia is a gastrointestinal infection caused by a microscopic parasite called Giardia lamblia. This is a common parasite causing gastrointestinal illness. It is found in the stools of many animals, including rodents, dogs, cats, cattle, and wild animals.

A Giardia infection can be acquired when your pet ingests food or water that has been contaminated with the parasite. It then multiplies in the small intestine. The infection can also be spread person-to-person when hands, which are contaminated with an infected person’s stool, are brought in contact with the mouth. Swallowing as few as ten parasites can cause the infection.

Symptoms of Giardia are diarrhea, foul, greasy stools, abdominal cramps, bloating, increased gas, weakness, and weight loss. These symptoms are similar to Colitis, so it is essential that your pet be tested for this parasite. This test is normally not done by your veterinarian, so you need to request it. This simple and inexpensive test can save you hundreds of dollars and invasive testing.

Giardia is usually diagnosed through a laboratory examination of a stool sample. Your veterinarian will forward the stool sample to a laboratory that will use a microscope to look for the parasite. Several stool samples need to be examined to detect the parasite.

If your pet is diagnosed with Giardia, always thoroughly wash your hands with soap and water before meals, before preparing food, after having a bowel movement, after changing diapers, and after playing with your pet.

Eliminate Toxins in the House, Yard and on your Pet
Because Colitis can be triggered by stress, it is important to put as little stress on the body as possible by avoiding toxins that may deplete the immune system.

Avoid the following:
Carpet powders
Air fresheners
Plastic bowls – All plastics release some undetectable fumes, especially when heated. This out-gassing means the fumes can pass into the foods that are served or stored in the bowl or container. Stainless steel or glass bowls are recommended.
Cheap ceramic bowls – Cause the same problem as described above.
Fumes from all bathroom cleaners.
Fumes from bleach.
Fumes from dusting products.
Toxic flea products – If the product states “Hazardous To Humans And Domestic Animals”, it is hazardous to your pet.
Toxic shampoos
Toxic flea collars
Paint fumes
Paint chips from lead based paint.
Rawhides – Many are dipped in a solution of salt and bleach
Cheap painted pet toys
Red food dye
Ethoxyquin

Supplements
Purely Pets does not recommend discontinuing traditional medications cold turkey or discontinuing them at all. This is YOUR decision based on how the following program works. We highly recommend you work closely with your veterinarian.

Although medications can be very effective, some may cause side effects that can eventually lead to other symptoms. Many pet owners are now looking into other methods for treating Colitis. A more natural approach is outlined below.

Supplement Recommendations:

Giardia & Parasitic Cleanse
Provides an excellent compound containing bitter principles which activate digestive secretions. Can be used safely to clean out the colon, when parasites are suspected as a trigger.

Digest Zymez
Since Colitis can be triggered by an inadequate amount of digestive enzymes, adding them to your pet’s diet cannot be stressed enough. A lack of enzymes can lead to decreased energy, excessive gas, allergies, poor skin condition, loose stool, consumption of their own stool, foul breath and/or body odor. Without digestive enzymes even the most nutritious foods will not be of any use to the body.

Digest Zymez are capsulated enzymes which can be fed orally or opened and mixed directly into the food. This product reduces intestinal gas and cramping and is very helpful in treating Colitis.

Yucca Intensive
Yucca is a natural steroidal supplement containing steroid saponins which are nature’s most powerful anti-inflammatory agents. This product reduces pain without gastric side effects and is effective for arthritis, bone and joint problems, soft tissue swelling and digestive and bowel problems.

Mega Pet Daily
This is our most outstanding multiple nutritional supplement. Higher potency, easy to feed gel cap provides daily support of important vitamins and minerals, including the A’s, B’s, Selenium, Chromium, Zinc, and Choline, all the vital nutrients for optimum immunity and health.

Exercise Your Pet Daily
Exercise increases the efficiency of the immune system and helps with muscle development, digestion and overall health. A well-conditioned body will work and perform better and increase the ability to carry blood and oxygen to muscles. Exercising burns fat and increases your pet’s metabolism.

Be sure your pet gets at least an hour of exercise everyday. However, age, health and weather should be taken into consideration when exercising. Do NOT over exercise older pets, or pets suffering from hypoglycemia, epilepsy, heart problems, during bouts of diarrhea, etc. Pets suffer from exhaustion just as humans do.

Conclusion and Tips for Treating Colitis

1. Feed what is right for your pet.

2. During bouts of diarrhea, Pedialyte and baby food may help. Plain yogurt replenishes the intestinal tract with friendly bacteria and does help in some cases. Rice can be helpful for bouts of diarrhea, but this is not true in all cases.

3. Large breeds that eat off the floor from a bowl are forced to gulp down their food and this may cause bloating and slow down digestion. Raising the food bowl for them eases the digestive process and causes less discomfort.

4. Feed small, simple meals throughout the day.

5. Test for Giardia and other parasites at least 3-4 times.

6. Eliminate any food or supplement which seems to upset the digestive tract or aggravate the symptoms.

7. Exercise your pet regularly as this helps with digestion.

8. Give supplements to strengthen the immune system and most importantly give digestive enzymes before or during each meal.

9. Avoid using toxins on or around your pet.

10. Offer only bottled water.

11. Last, it is important to keep a positive attitude, as your problems and your stress level will affect your pet.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Purely Pets!

Article Copyright to Purely Pets

The word pyometra is derived from Latin pyo meaning pus and metra meaning uterus. The pyometra is an abscessed, pus-filled infected uterus. Toxins and bacteria leak across the uterine walls and into the bloodstream causing life-threatening toxic effects. Without treatment death is inevitable.

What Might Make a Veterinarian Suspect this Infection?

Classically, the patient is an older female dog. (Pyometra can occur in cats but its not nearly as common.) Usually, she has finished a heat cycle in the previousl 1 to 2 months. She has a poor appetite and may be vomiting or drinking an excessive amount of water. In the more usual open pyometra, the cervix is open and the purulent uterine contents is able to drip out thus a smelly vaginal discharge is usually apparent.

There is also a form of pyometra called a closed pyometra, where the cervix is closed. In these cases, there is no vaginal discharge and the clinical presentation is more difficult to diagnose. These patients also tend to be sicker than those with open pyometra due to retention of the toxic uterine contents.

Lab work shows a pattern typical of widespread infection which is often helpful in narrowing down the diagnosis. Radiographs may show a gigantic distended uterus though sometimes this is not obvious and ultrasound is needed to confirm the diagnosis.

How does this Infection Come About?

With each heat cycle, the uterine lining engorges in preparation for pregnancy. Eventually, some tissue engorgement becomes excessive or persistent (a condition called cystic endometrial hyperplasia). This lush glandular tissue is ripe for infection (recall that while the inside of the uterus is sterile, the vagina below is normally loaded with bacteria.). Bacteria ascend from the vagina and the uterus becomes infected and ultimately pus filled.

What is the the Usual Treatment?

The usual treatment for pyometra is surgical removal of the uterus and ovaries. It is crucial that the infected uterine contents do not spill and that no excess hemorrhage occurs. The surgery is challenging especially if the patient is toxic. Antibiotics are given at the time of surgery and may or may not be continued after the uterus is removed. Pain relievers are often needed post-operatively. A few days of hospitalization are typically needed after the surgery is performed.

It is especially important that the ovaries be removed to remove future hormonal influence from any small stumps of uterus that might be left behind. If any ovary is left, the patient will continue to experience heat cycles and be vulnerable to recurrence.

While this surgery amounts to the same end result as routine spaying, there is nothing routine about a pyometra spay. As noted, the surgery is challenging and the patient is in a life-threatening situation. For these reasons, the pyometra spay typically costs five to ten times as much as a routine spay.

• Pros: The infected uterus is resolved rapidly (in an hour or two of surgery). No possibility of disease recurrence.
• Cons: Surgery must be performed on a patient that could be unstable.

Is there an Alternative to Surgery?

In the late 1980s another treatment protocol became available that might be able to spare a valuable animal’s reproductive capacity. Here, special hormones called prostaglandins are given as injections to cause the uterus to contract and expel its pus. A week or so of hospitalization is necessary and some cramping discomfort is often experienced. The treatment takes place over the course of a week. This form of treatment is not an option in the event of a closed pyometra as described above.

• Pros: There is a possibilityof future pregnancy for the patient (though often there is too much uterine scarring). Surgery can be avoided in a patient with concurrent problems that pose extra anesthetic risk
• Cons: Pyometra can recur. The disease is resolved more slowly (over a week or so). There is a possibility of uterine rupture with the contractions. This would cause peritonitis and escalates the life-threatening nature of the disease.

Prevention
Spaying represents complete prevention for this condition. Spaying cannot be over-emphasized. Often an owner plans to breed their pet or is undecided, time passes, and then they fear she is too old to be spayed. A female dog or cat can benefit from spaying at any age. The best approach is to figure that pyometra will eventually occur if a female pet is left unspayed; any perceived risks of surgery are very much out-weighed by the risk of pyometra.

Date Published: 1/1/2001
Date Reviewed/Revised: 09/20/2007

Copyright 2007 – 2009 by the Veterinary Information Network, Inc. All rights reserved.

When pups are born they are little more than blobs. Muscles and their nerve connections are only in the process of forming so coordination is poor, and that’s overstated. The pup can crawl. The direction is toward its mom and her nipples. Olfaction, the sense of smell, leads the pup in the right direction and the lips, nose, mouth area in general, touch a nipple and lips, tongue and their associated musculature react reflexively to produce the sucking response. Not a lot of brain work going on there. Sucking is a reflex with no conscious effort or thought involved in it. It is an involuntary act, which functions with only rudimentary neural development and little or no brain involvement.

Gradually muscles and nerves become better organized, coordination improving concomitantly. With practice the sucking reflex improves, becomes more efficient, the pup’s crawling becomes more directed even though front and hind feet are not usually in synch. By three to four weeks the synchrony improves to the point that the pup can walk.

At first there are mistakes, pup may stumble, trip over nothing, get one foot or two moving at the wrong time, a klutz. Nothing like the elegant bird finder one would hope for. Even at four months, many pups are still gawky, ungainly, and foot plopping clumsy. The road from the four week old stumbler to finished elegance is paved with practice, pushing the muscles and their associated nerves to never fail myoneural connections and strengthened muscles with lightning speed and totally smooth contractions. But the pup can’t do this all alone; it needs help from its dam. It needs even more help from the breeder because only the breeder can control the environment in which the pup grows up.

Borrowing the adage- if you don’t use it you lose it- and paraphrasing it to make it applicable to developing pups, we can say- if you don’t use it, you won’t ever have it to lose. More than forty years ago physiological psychologists, the only people working on behavior of animals in North America at the time and that only for application to human behavior, performed all sorts of experiments on rats, cats and to a small extent on dogs, to demonstrate both the old adage and the revamped version. These experiments ran the gamut from immobilizing a limb of a young animal from weaning to adulthood, patching an eye from birth, to single muscle denervation, to partial brain ablation. The effect on muscle development in all these experiments, and there were hundreds of them, was the atrophy you would expect but the effect on nerve and brain development was not predicted. Immobilization of a limb also prevented the formation of neural connections and the portion of the brain that dealt with the limb that was immobilized was smaller and had far fewer nerve cells present than the normal contra lateral leg. Animals that had visual input to one eye eliminated by a patch or by sewing the lid shut and patching it, failed to develop the ability to focus, developed strabismus and other visual impairments in that eye. Optic nerves connecting visual projection areas of the brain with visual cortex had no or far less than normal myelinization than in intact animals. The eye itself was complete in all respects and was normal size, but because of the effects on the nerve development, vision in the covered, unused eye was always drastically impaired.

The implication for the “use or lose” or, “use or it will never develop” on pups is that the more physically challenged the pup is the better the coordination. Environmental enrichment, to borrow a term from the animal care and welfare dictionary, means adding things to the rearing pen to provide objects that the pups (in our case) can manipulate, chew on, carry, climb onto, or over or around. These objects of enrichment provide the physical and mental challenges needed for young developing dog bodies and dog minds.

The wild canids, wolves, coyotes, foxes all provide pups with these challenges by selecting den sites with rocks, tree roots, down tree limbs, hilly and uneven ground around the entrance, or they move the pups at four or five weeks of age to a secondary den site that does provide it. For five years running there was an active fox den nearby that I could see each day as I drove to and from work. Each year the dog and vixen appeared in March. In April and May the dog fox brought food to the vixen in the den. The den was an old renovated woodchuck burrow on a south-facing slope with weeds and grass typical of an old field in this part of the country. In late May the pups emerged from the den and could be seen playing or sunning at the mouth. Within a week the vixen moved everybody, troop and baggage, to a den about 100 yards south of the natal den. This rearing den was at the base of a fallen down rock fence with a few split rails lying on it.

From then on until the pups were weaned and out hunting on their own, each day was play time games in the rock pile. They used the rocks and split rails the way our kids use all the constructed apparatus we build for them in the playground. There in the rocks they developed the skills, strength, agility and coordination to catch a mouse or a rabbit or a ruffed grouse. The pups we raise need a similar physically and mentally challenging play ground to develop their muscle and brain power.

In the sterile four walls, wire or wood or cement block rearing kennels we use with only mom and the siblings, pups have nothing to use except each other to crawl over and hide behind. They still learn the stalk and pounce and the social amenities. But they are doing it in an aggressive, unimaginative way and, an aggressive, unimaginative dog is not what I want for a hunting dog. Pups need the physically challenging environment where they can develop muscle coordination, agility and strength. At least equally, or even more so, they need the mentally challenging environment. They need to develop problem solving ability, mental agility and mental coordination. They are not going to get it unless the breeder provides the opportunity. The restricted brain and neuron development that results from limb restriction and from visual input deprivation will occur in other parts of the brain if the pup is not mentally stimulated. Totally deprived of stimulation, pups either cannot learn or are poor learners at best.

Specific areas of the brain are responsible for controlling specific aspects of behavior and physiology. For example, the area of the brain known as the visual cortex serves to integrate the mass of light signals that enter the eye. We know that lack of visual stimulation in a young animal will limit development of the nerve cells, neurons and transmission of impulses along the nerve fibers and so impair the function of the visual cortex and vision. Emotion is controlled by parts of the midbrain, primarily the limbic system. A pup never experiencing and coping with frustrating situations has limited chance to develop the checks and balances of emotion controlled by nerve cells in the septum and the amygdala, both parts of the limbic system. Impaired emotional control interferes with problem solving ability and with temperament.

True, genetics plays a role. The pup must inherit the potential for development of all areas of the brain just as it must inherit the potential for muscle mass, development, reaction speed and so on. Without the inherited potential all the physical and mental challenges in the world won’t help. But conversely, with no physical and mental challenging, a pup’s potential will not be realized, no matter how much it starts with. Inherited potential and learning in the form of physical and mental exercise are so interdigitated that saying where one starts and the other stops is just not possible. But we do know that the more that is learned, the more challenged the mental and physical capacities are within reasonable limits, the more that can be learned and the more that can be achieved physically and mentally. Mind challenging problems are exercise for the brain and will enhance its development, and similarly, physically challenging pups is exercise for the muscles and will promote their development.

How do you exercise the brain? Just give the pups problems to solve. You can treat the pups singly or as a group, but at least part of the time it should be singly to be sure each pup is acting as an individual and not just following his brother or sister.

As I pointed out in a previous article in Gun Dog, pups have developmental mile posts based on the kicking in of the various sensory modalities. Solving a problem based on visual or auditory perception or on mobility is unrealistic if the pups have not yet attained these perceptual modalities or have not yet gained sufficient mobility and manipulatory skills. So the problems we pose for a pup to improve his smarts will depend on where he is developmentally. The time when that particular modality or combination of modalities and mobility skill should be challenged for maximum benefit should begin just as the pups pass that particular developmental milepost.

The challenges should start easy and simple and become more difficult and complex. What challenging “think” situations you present to the pups will depend on what problems the dog will be expected to face during the rest of his life and on your own inventive genius. An example of a problem every dog must face, and hopefully solve, many times in his life is that the best route from point A to point B is not necessarily a straight line- say retrieving a bird that fell on the far side of a hog wire fence with 4 or 5 strands of barbed wire on top when there is a gate opening 50 yards to the left. The dog that was challenged with detour problems, also known as “um weg” problems (literally “around road” problems), as a pup will have the smarts to size up the situation and make the detour, and save a lot of money in vet bills by not needing to have the wire cuts stitched up.

If we want to challenge a pup physically to improve muscle coordination, we put up a barrier that he can see over but not through and can crawl over. To mentally challenge the pup in a detour problem, the barrier must be too high to crawl over or see over but one he can see through. The object the pup wants, such as food, a chew toy, another pup, is visible but attainable only if he goes around the barrier. Creating this situation requires only a wire barrier such as a refrigerator shelf or a shelf from your wife’s new electric stove, you know the one you bought to offset the new shotgun you have on order. Set up the barrier so it reaches part way across a corridor or hallway. The goal can be made accessible by going around one end or both ends. If accessible around just one end, change the open end frequently. Gradually the barrier will be widened and angled so pup solves the problem of going away from the goal object in order to get to it instead of standing in front of the fence barking like a stupid idiot. You really want a dog whose actions speak louder than his words. I certainly do.

A few detour problems will enable the pup to later solve a variety of problems, even those only vaguely related to the original detour problems. He can solve other spatial problems that come up years later without need of a whole new learning regimen. He can also solve temporal problems like how long is 10 minutes. No, it doesn’t teach him how to tell time, but he learns patience, waiting for something he wants is not much different from going away from something in order to get it, even going out of sight of it and approaching from a different angle. Mentally exercising a pup gives him the smarts to figure it out.

Self confidence in puppies can be increased by letting them learn how easy it is to go up a see through ramp and walk on an elevated see through bridge. It also improves perception of depth by challenging them with these visual cliffs. New experiences are most important. The more pups hear, smell, touch, chew on, investigate by all the means available, the better off they are for it. From 5 to 6 weeks onward, exposure to the world in the form of walks with mom and the littermates is easy experience to give them, weather conditions permitting. Every experience pups have will stimulate neural development and so brain development. As the brain develops, so does the learning ability, insight into problems and so problem solving ability, which in turn stimulates more neural development. The pup will then keep right on self-improving.

Therefore, besides the specifically related, distantly related, and even unrelated learning relationships, there is the overall general improvement in learning ability. A criterion of intelligence is elevated learning ability. By exercising the brain with mental challenges we improve the total brain function, not just one area of it. The breeder has the power to improve nerve conductivity in both speed and accuracy, recovery time of the neural synapses is shortened as the chemical and electrical signals react faster, and the nerves can fire repeatedly quicker. The brain mass increases dramatically as nerve cell density increases. Overall brain efficiency markedly improves. Just as the effect of physically challenging the muscular system, the whole body benefits, not just one part, so the whole brain and nervous system with all its neural and neurosecretory functions benefits from the challenges of mental exercise.

Most dogs are born with more “brains” than we give them credit for. Whether the potential is realized, even beyond our fondest dreams, is in the hands of the breeder and in the environment he sets up for the pups. A sterile, coddling, do nothing environment produces sterile minded dogs. A challenging, stimulating environment that exercises both muscles and neurons produces pups that approach or even surpass their potential. The message to the breeders is to make the pups work for a living mentally and physically during the 10 or so weeks you have them and everyone will be amazed at your well balanced, super smart product. To the potential buyer, the message is to make sure the breeder that is producing your puppy works them up to their physical and mental capabilities.

This article was reprinted from GUN DOG MAGAZINE
and located on Woodhaven Labs