Health

Correction: In the list of WDJ-approved dry foods presented in our February issue, we reported incorrect ranges for the amounts of protein and fat in some of the dry foods made by Dogswell. The products in the company's Live Free dry food line contain 36% to 40% protein and 14% to 18% fat. The products in Dogswell's dry Nutrisca line contain 30% to 32% protein and 16% to 18% fat. We regret the errors. …

because Otto wasn't growling or trying to get away. He would benefit from some counter-conditioning.üThis dog loves being petted – but panics when being even gently restrained. He would benefit from some counter-conditioning, so he forms the same sort of positive association he has with being petted as he does with being held or restrained.üThis dog is uncomfortable with being touched on the head. The handler is feeding her a treat that she likes, but you can tell the dog's backward-leaning posture and tightly tucked tail that the proximity of the petting hand and the handler's body has the dog obviously over her threshold for comfort.üThat's better! When the handler leans back a bit, and feeds the treat with her hand near, but not on the dog's head, the dog relaxes a bit. Her tail is still tucked, though, telling us she is near her threshold.

You're not likely to forget it if you've heard it even once: the half-cough, half-choke – sort of like a Canada goose in need of a Ricola lozenge – that signals your dog has come down with kennel cough.

The good news: you can give your dog a thorough brush job in just two minutes a day. The bad news: few dogs fancy having their teeth brushed, and there ain't no Holy Grail of Canine Tooth Brushing, despite my attempts to extract one from Angela Mees, DVM, who owns a practice limited to veterinary dentistry in suburban Atlanta.

but he looks and acts much older. He's at high risk of a short

When experienced breeder Barbara Sorg noticed that Winks, one of her five 8-week-old puppies, was listless, not eating, and by nightfall was suffering from diarrhea, she hustled him off to her long-time veterinarian the next morning, a Tuesday.??The vet suspected that Winks had not tolerated the dewormer he'd been given Sunday. Although he had never left her property and had no suspected exposure, Sorg asked that he be tested for deadly parvovirus; her veterinarian discounted the possibility.

A few years ago, I was at my vet’s office when an older couple brought in a Chihuahua puppy who was very ill. Despite the staff’s best efforts, less than an hour later the pup was dead. The cause? A drug overdose, due to a prescription error made by a human pharmacy.

What the heck do all those letters mean? They can seem as random as letters in a bowl of alphabet soup. But those acronyms pack a lot of information in just a spoonful. Here’s a guide to deciphering all the letters that you may see that have to do with veterinary professionals.

Whole Dog Journal readers often try techniques and products described in the magazine, but sometimes years go by before we need something we read about, or it disappears from the market, or we have trouble finding it, or we simply forget all about it. Last month we revisited green tripe, Seacure, and Willard Water. Here are two more go-to products featured in previous issues that might now be perfect for you and your dog, Wobenzym & EMT Gel/Spray.

Far be it from us to tell you to put pesticides on your dog. But we’ve never heard of a single nontoxic preparation that was effective at keeping ticks off all dogs. For some dogs, only the potent pesticides seem to keep ticks away. There are, however, some nontoxic products – both commercially produced and homemade formulas – that work to repel ticks well enough to consider using them as part of a comprehensive Lyme disease prevention program.

Acupuncture Points and Trigger Points: Traditional Chinese acupuncture points are stimulated by a focused laser beam, used solely or in combination with acupuncture needles, to produce a systemic effect; high doses of laser therapy may be used to deactivate trigger points (hyperirritable spots that induce pain elsewhere in the body) found in muscle, ligaments, tendons, and periosteum.

Tick paralysis is caused by a neurotoxin produced by egg-engorged female ticks, who transmit the toxin from their salivary glands to the dog during feeding. The production (and transmission) of the toxin is greatest when the tick has been attached to and feeding from the dog between five and seven days. Five species of North American ticks produce the neurotoxin: the blacklegged tick (a.k.a. the deer tick), American dog tick, Rocky Mountain wood tick, the Lone Star tick, and the Gulf Coast tick. Most North American cases occur between April and June, when the ticks are at their peak reproductive activity.