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the odds are good that your dog's symptoms will resolve with time.

People have been using vinegar for thousands of years, and while most of it goes into salads and condiments, vinegar can be used as a household cleanser, cosmetic aid, and health treatment. Many dog lovers add vinegar to their pets' food or apply it topically to their best friends. Advocates call vinegar, especially unpasteurized organic apple cider vinegar, a wonder food. Is vinegar really a health-improving supplement, a natural preservative, a nontoxic cleaning product, a disinfectant, a source of important nutrients, and an effective topical treatment for canine ailments?

People who are interested in feeding a home-prepared diet to their dogs often delay the transition as they grapple with various concerns. Frequently, they have come to believe the claims that a home-prepared diet offers dogs superior nutrition and can result in increased health and vigor . . . but they are still beset by fears that their dogs will suffer a broken tooth or perforated intestines caused by eating raw bone fragments.

My dog drinks about a half-cup of organic milk (same as I drink) with his evening meal. He is a strong, healthy 10-year-old dog, and has never had any problems with arthritis or digestive troubles. My husband, though, is certain that milk is bad for dogs. I look at my dog and feel certain I've been doing things right; he looks great. Is there any reason to discontinue his milk?

CA 94501; or fax to (510) 749-4905

What is digestibility and why does it matter? Digestibility reflects a food's ability to deliver essential nutrients to the dog who eats it. This ultimately affects not only defecation quantity and quality (how much your dog poops and how the poop looks and smells), and a dog's propensity for flatulence (no explanation needed), but more importantly, a dog's long-term health and wellness. The graphic on this page summarizes how digestibility is measured using feeding trials with dogs.

This is the debut of what we intend to be a regular feature in Whole Dog Journal: a detailed critique of a home-prepared diet. I will analyze diets that people feed their dogs and offer feedback and suggestions that might improve the nutritional value of the diet.

Over the past few months, I've read more than 30 books on homemade diets for dogs. Many offered recipes that were dangerously incomplete; a smaller number provided acceptable guidelines but were confusing, unduly restrictive, overly complicated, or had other issues that made me recommend them only with reservations. A few were good enough to recommend without reservation. This review is about the cream of the crop: three relatively new books (one is a new edition of an older book) whose authors have taken the time to analyze their recipes to ensure that they meet the latest nutritional guidelines established by the National Research Council (NRC).

Two dogs have itchy skin and small open sores on their legs. One goes to a conventional veterinarian and receives antibiotics, steroids, or other symptom-suppressing drugs. The other goes to a veterinary homeopath, who studies the dog’s symptoms and asks all kinds of questions about his behavior and actions while looking things up in a book or computer. The homeopath selects a remedy, gives the dog a single dose, and instructs the owner to wait, watch, and report back. The remedy is chosen not because it reduces or eliminates the dog’s symptoms but because by itself, when given to a healthy patient, it actually produces those same symptoms. And the remedy is so dilute that it contains not a single molecule of the substance on the label. Welcome to the world of homeopathy, one of the most interesting and controversial alternative therapies and forms of “energy medicine.”

Chronic bad breath is not a normal, healthy condition. Even though it is true that dogs will sometimes eat UFOs (Unidentifiable Fetid Objects), unpleasant things collected from unspeakable sources that can make their mouths smell unbearable for short periods of time, their breath should never remain foul. And while hal-itosis (bad breath) is sometimes caused by indigestion or other imbalances deeper in the digestive tract, it is more commonly attributable to plaque; a buildup of anaerobic bacteria on the teeth and gum tissues.

The foundation of nearly every home-prepared diet for dogs is animal-source protein, such as beef, lamb, chicken, turkey, dairy products, or eggs. These foods are so abundant in our supermarkets that we take them for granted and assume they are nutritious. After all, our scientists, public health officials, and medical experts make no distinction between food produced by animals raised outdoors on open pasture and that of animals raised in confinement on factory farms.

Dog owners tend to think of crates as safe havens for their dogs or puppies – a place where they can stash a puppy...