I love this Etsy store, BowWowZerz. Custom tags for dogs–too cute!!
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My little dog, Bashful, passed on very quietly last week. His health was declining due to congestive heart failure and then he got an infection in his mouth on top of that. We had been to the vet to see what could be done to help him, but I think the medications on top of the added infection were just too much for his little system. It was difficult to clean his teeth because the vet was leery of sedating him with his heart condition. I was leery of brushing because he hated it and I did not want to stress him because of his heart. We buried him on the hill below the house with a beautiful view of the valley below. He was a sweet, kind little dog and we miss him terribly.
I’ve learned the hard way that there are things you need to do to keep your pets healthy beyond the standard vaccinations. Keeping their teeth clean will do wonders for their health. Some people do it successfully by providing chewies and breath buster tablets and some by brushing. Otherwise, a trip to the vet as needed to have their teeth cleaned before gum disease sets in will do wonders. My mother-in-law has a large Weimaraner that is going on 12 years old and he still bounces around like a puppy, but she has had his teeth cleaned professionally every six months or so since he was about 2 years old. I sincerely believe that it makes a big difference and will be much more diligent about tooth cleaning from now on. It is as important for them as it is for us.
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Busy hands are happy hands, so I have been looking for charity projects that would allow me to use my crafting skills for a worthy cause. Here are three that were recently highlighted in my Yarnmarket Knitting News e-newsletter:
Project Linus–make blankets of all kinds for babies and children that are hospitalized
These came from the Lion Brand web site:
Knots of Love: knitted and crocheted caps for cancer patients going through chemotherapy
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Believe it or not, this is something I’ve been pondering a lot. I feel fairly certain that if I ate exactly the same thing twice a day, day in and day out, no matter how nutritionally complete it says it is–I probably wouldn’t be very healthy.
So why is it different for dogs?
I’ve started giving mine little bits of fresh veggies, small amounts of plain yogurt with live cultures, a little shredded cheese, a little hard boiled egg–just a little something mixed with their dog food to wake up their taste buds. I must say, it has certainly perked up their appetites. Even my picky eater is eating now.
I’ve learned from experience that when my old dog eats some brands of dog food, he has seizures. He is now on Purina One and has not had a seizure since I switched him to that, and it has been many, many years now. He was seizing once or twice a month before then. Another dog had bouts of diarrhea until I put him on the same dog food. I’m not promoting a certain brand of dog food by any means–this just happens to be the one that seems to work best for my dogs after much trial and error and they eat it, unlike some of the pricier brands I got from my vet.
So I am wondering–how good is it really to keep your dog on one food day in and day out? Is there any real research to support that? (this is my doctoral training talking here)
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One thing that I have missed here is the wire panels I used for just about everything back in Texas. Welded wire comes in many sizes and I’ve used it with T-posts to make trellises, dog kennels, temporary pens, covers over my kennel–very versatile stuff.
I built a small greenhouse for my tomatoes that became their support as they grew. I cut a piece of 4″ by 4″
welded wire panel slightly larger than my tomato bed (this requires bolt cutters). I drove metal T-posts in at the corners and on the sides. I laid the wire panel over the posts and lowered it to about one foot above my newly planted, small tomato plants. I draped 6 ml plastic over the whole thing until danger of frost had passed (I was living in south Texas at the time-zone 8). As the tomatoes started growing, they grew up through the welded wire, which supported them beautifully. As they got taller, I added a second layer of welded wire and secured it near the top of the T-posts. I had tomatoes all summer, up until they froze in December (this was also a lasagna garden).
When the hot Texas sun made an oven of my dog kennel, I secured a piece of welded wire across the top and planted gourds all around the outside. The gourds quickly covered the top of the kennel and I had the added bonus of harvesting dried gourds to use in craft projects. In the winter, the foliage died back and the sun could get through, but in summer it provided deep shade for my dogs, plus little critters lived in the leaves and provided many hours of wiener dog entertainment.
The metal panel is rigid enough that you can bend it and stand it upright to make a trellis. You need sufficient length to make it as high as you need it. I used a 20 foot length cut to about 3 feet wide (actually a left over from another project) to put a trellis over my back gate. I just secured it at each corner by wiring it to the gate post or putting in a T-post on the outside corner. Once covered with flowering vines, you couldn’t really see the metal or the T-posts. We used a wider panel to build a trellis for climbing roses, then put a bench underneath it.
Because wiener dogs are diggers, we used strips of welded wire about 18″ wide to put under the sides of the kennel, flat on the ground, all the way around. We covered it with mulch so the dogs could walk on it. It kept them from digging under the kennel fence and was flat and rigid enough that we could mow over it.
I have no doubt that when I build my garden preserve here, welded wire panels will play a key role. It is definitely on my top ten list of useful material for country living.
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This is a nice collection of goodies to make for pets, provided in the weekly roundup at Threadbanger. It has everything from flea spray to home made tags. One of my next projects is crocheted sweaters for all the wiener dogs because Ruidoso gets cold in the winter time. I have a hard time getting them to go outside on cool, summer mornings. They will have their first real snow experience this coming winter. Should be interesting!
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I just got back from taking our big dog, Babe, to the vet. This is his second trip due to a corneal laceration from having his head down in the grass and brush snooping around. Having spent his whole life on St. Augustine manicured to 3″, I guess he just doesn’t know how to avoid grass injuries. Hopefully, he will learn before he puts an eye out.
While I was there, I queried the vet, a lifelong citizen of Capitan, NM, and ranch raised, on what kinds of things we need to watch out for here regarding our dogs. Her answers were a little disturbing. When the deer start fawning, they will attack a dog with little provocation. She said she sees lots of dogs, particularly small ones, that have been badly stomped by deer and a screaming, yelling, arm-waving human apparently won’t phase them (the deer) much. Deer are about like rabbits (or some people consider them to be more like rats) around here and not too afraid of people. They graze all around our house every day and we see them grazing in yards all over town.
The mountain lions and bear have gotten so tame and accustomed to people that they will come right up on your porch to look for food. Food includes fat wiener dogs or cats that aren’t fast enough to get away. She said we should put flood lights in the area where we let our dogs out at night–the bright light usually keeps the bears and mountain lions away. (Thankfully, the bears just come down in summer.) Right now, there is a mountain lion in the area that is coming right up on people’s porches and snatching their cats. Local authorities are trying to hunt him down before he decides to snatch a kid.
We also have skunks and porcupines, which our dogs won’t know anything about. My old dog, Bashful, has congestive heart failure and apparently the change in altitude means a change in medication. He has been a little droopy, so he will be the next one to the vet. On the flip side, the local ticks aren’t the kind that carry Lyme disease and we don’t have to dose for heartworm in the winter months. Mountain life is going to take some adjusting for both quadrupeds and bipeds, I think. Now I really do have something to fear in the dark.
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One of my old dogs, Bashful, was recently diagnosed with congestive heart problems and is now on pills for his heart and for water retention. Not wanting to get into the rodeo of shoving pills down his throat twice a day for the rest of his little life, I was looking for an easier way to get him to take the pills. You can buy treats that are designed just for hiding pills, but again, they are a little pricey. I tried hiding them in a small piece of cheese, but regular cheese is just too stiff and we don’t usually keep faux cheese (i.e. individually wrapped slices or Velveeta). I don’t keep Velveeta in the house because I like it too much and it settles straight to the bottom. I tried wrapping it in a little lunch meat, but it fell out about half the time.
I finally hit on something that works, though, and he gobbles it down, even though he is usually my picky eater. I pinch off a piece of bread, about 1″ square, and add just a few drops of water. I knead it a little until it is gooey rather than crumbly and if possible, add a drop or two of meat drippings, gravy, leftover frying oil or even just a drop or two of olive or canola oil. I knead it into a ball, then shove the pills into it and make sure they are covered. So far it has worked perfectly–he slurps it down and nothing falls out. Now he thinks he is getting treats twice a day and we don’t have to suffer through pill rodeos.
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