philospher77

I wasn't aware of a timeline, probably because I try and do the claim the next day to limit the time I am out the money. Can you tell us what it is, just for future reference? The downside to HP is that they don't cover routine dentals, on which I just spent 1k. But they have been awesome on covering what they do. And I can't fault the turn-around times... send them an e-mail with a claim, they generally get back to me the same day with the "this is what we will cover" part and then it's just waiting for the check to come. On Pixie's drug refills for an on-going medical condition, I've gotten the response email within 5 minutes of sending the claim!

Yep, vet visit. I have spent several months dealing with an eyelid infection in Pixie. It's not something to mess around with on your own. I'd recommend springing for cultures, since I spent several weeks trying to treat it without doing that only to find out I was dealing with the dog equivalent of MRSA.

The 14K I spent treating Trinkett's osteo is exactly why all my pets since then have had insurance. And when I was faced with spending 6K on Pixie for life-enhancing (not life-saving) surgeries, it did make it much easier not to have to worry as much about the costs.

They do get used to it pretty fast. I do treats after each drop, and put it on command: Pretty eyes! Try to keep the routine the same, reinforce the good behavior, and it's pretty much like teaching them any other trick.

I found this a very thoughtful article. It gives a different view of training and disobedience. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did! http://www.onetail.org/ask-a-trainer/march-ask-a-trainer-disobedience/

I would seriously think about finding a new trainer. I have been in classes with reactive dogs, and with dogs with other issues, and have never worried about dogs charging or disrupting the class. It takes some work on setting up the training area appropriately, but it can and should be done, since part of the training for those kinds of dogs is learning to be around other dogs and people without being out of control. My last class with my little Pixie-pup (a 9.5 rat terrier, that I often refer to as "snack sized") there was both a dog-aggressive pit bull and a human-aggressive pit. I was never once concerned about either my or Pixie's safety during that class. And that was without prong collars on either dog. It took carefully use of barriers and assistants, and of course not letting OUR dogs go invade their space, but by the end of class they were working outside the barriers for short times without incidents. So it can be done.

This is an article on how to find a trainer, that I often refer people to. It's got a lot of good insights. I will admit that I go to a training facility that the writer is affiliated with, and that the recommendations are pretty much based on that facility (which doesn't make them wrong!) I heartily agree with "go watch a class" and talk to the trainer. This is someone that you are hopefully going to have a long term relationship with (I've been going to classes for 4 years now!), so you want one that you click with. I will admit that I have taken classes with Stephanie, and that, while she's a good trainer, I just don't "click" with her the way I do with "my" trainer. And there are people that are the exact opposite, they click with her and not with mine. That's ok... it's all about finding something that works for you. And I wouldn't worry too much about finding a "greyhound savvy" trainer. You want to find one that has the skills to work with a problem or issue, not a breed. There are shy reserved dogs in other breeds, there are boisterous outgoing greys. You want a trainer who can look at you and your dog and figure out ways to make things work for both of you. http://www.whole-dog-journal.com/issues/13_9/features/Dog-Training-Professionals_20063-1.html

I would get a behaviorist in to evaluate this. The fact that the dog is biting the back of the head is very worrisome to me. That's a killing bite, not a warning one. It's also not an easily accessible spot to bite in most cases, so it sounds much more deliberate instead of instinctive. If it was biting hands or arms, that would be much more normal, and I wouldn't be as concerned. So, based on the descriptions so far, I would not feel at all comfortable in giving advice on how to treat this. It needs to be looked at by someone who can see what's going on in person.

My rattie is VERY food motivated. What I have done is to back off on the treat value. If she will work eagerly for kibble, why use steak which makes her absolutely crazy? I hold off on that for high-distraction times. And I sometimes start off with a few rounds of "find it", so that she gets some of her initial energy out and starts concentrating.

I had some issues with Pixie being very aggressive when taking treats, and the entirely counter-intuitive advice I got was "If they try and grab it out of your hand, push it in their mouth, don't pull your hand away." Something about the pushing motion makes them much more gentle about taking the treat. Pair that up with the verbal cue, and the other things suggested, and you can get this turned around. I will admit, Pixie will still take things with a hard mouth sometimes, but that's one of her stress signals, so it is now somewhat useful to know.

I know a really good trainer that moved from California out to North Carolina, although I think she may have moved to Virginia (her husband is an equine vet, hence the moves). I don't know if that is too far for you, but if it is, she may be able to recommend a trainer. And if anyone needs one in that very ill-defined area, I would happily recommend her. Let me know if you need her contact info.

Personally, not knowing you or your dog, but having read your posts about the agility class, I'd say that you and Wiley have a problem with stress stacking. You may be doing too much, too fast, without enough down time. I forget exactly how long it takes cortisol levels to come back down to normal, but it's several days to a week. So, if Wiley is exposed to something that he thinks is stressful on Monday, and then has another semi-stressful event on Wednesday, he's not going to handle it as well as he would if he had not had the stressful Monday. So my advice is to consider whether you need to scale back on what you are exposing him to. If he is not at least relaxed when you have him out (happy would be better), it may not be doing anything to socialize him, but just making the next encounter worse.

Don't have a hound on it, but have just started my rat terrier on it for what is thought to be an immune-mediated blepharitis.

Hi! Katie has been diagnosed with a histiocytoma on one of her back feet. It's not that major, and apparently is likely to resolve in 3-6 months on its own. BUT… she is licking it. And that makes it irritated. Which makes her lick it more. I've been told to try and stop that, and the vet recommended a cone. But I just can't see having her coned (or muzzled) for the next 3 months! What have other people done in this situation? Anything topical I could use? Thanks!

I'm curious as to whether the Thundershirt made a difference. I tried it on Katie and didn't see one, but the idea apparently works on like 64% of autistic people, so she could have use been in the other group.

That does make more sense, now that I think about it. Thanks!

The reason that the article mentioned the schooling failures was to demonstrate the complexity of genetics. Here we have a breed that is meant to do one thing: chase a lure very fast. Chasing the lure is a very basic thing, tied to prey drive, without which a dog in the wild would starve and die. So it should, technically, be easy to increase the number of dogs showing that drive with selective breeding. And yet, the article said that something like 25-30% of greyhounds just don't have it, even after generations of selective breeding. Which was given as an example of how selective breeding had "failed" to improve that desired trait in the breed. (Something like a retriever's soft mouth would be harder to breed for, since that goes against a dog's survival instinct.) JJnG… while I agree that most greys aren't bred until 4-5, surely that only drops the number of generations down to 95? It's not like they go four years with no pups… the ones born in year one breed when they are 5, the ones born year 2 breed when they are 5, etc. Or am I incorrect?

Hi! I was reading an article recently about why breed registries and closed gene pools were really not a good idea (basically, when you close a gene pool, you keep concentrating the bad genes as well as the good ones, and since genes are lost with every generation (since not all the animals will reproduce), you wind up with less and less diversity.) But one of the reasons they offered for why it's also not a good idea is that it doesn't work. In other words, breeding the best examples of the breed together gets you more of the same, but it doesn't get you improvements in the breed. Greyhounds were cited as an example. So I am turning to you good people to see if you can answer the following questions, since they talked in generalities in the article. The first greyhound track opened in 1912, according to wikipedia. So that's roughly 100 greyhound generations, assuming one per year. Does anyone know if the percentage of pups per litter that flunk out of training school is smaller now than it was in the past? And are greyhounds appreciably faster now than they were in the past? I speculate that there was an initial increase in speed as the breed was getting established and matings could be better documented and controlled, but that, according to the viewpoint in the article, the speed should have reached a plateau and been essentially unchanged since then. Same thing with the number of pups that actually have the potential to race. Of course, the alternative (the idea that you could get a faster dog if you allowed outcrossing) is harder to research, since those dogs are barred from racing and thus the data is not readily available. This is mostly idle curiosity on my part, but it's been niggling at the back of my mind and I figured I would see if I could get an answer from knowledgable folk. Thanks!

I will just chime in to add that "shaking off" is also a stress-reliever for dogs. Since you haven't had this dog long, and it's obviously way too cold for him to go coatless, I would try all the things suggested for static, but also watch to see if there is a common trigger for the shaking. Does he only do it when he's just walked past a yard with barking dogs, or when a bicycle has whizzed past, or kids have been playing? That sort of thing. Just in case it is an anxiety cause, and not a physical one from the coat.

You do want to work on counter-conditioning him to the noise (which may be easier said than done, if you can't start/stop the machine). If it's got to keep running until it's done, then you will need to start at a distance where he can hear the machine, but is not shut down. If that means outside the house, that means you are outside the house when you start this. Have someone turn the machine on when he is at that distance, and start feeding him yummy treats. The idea is that you want to get to a point where he hears the sound and immediately looks to you because he has learned that it means that manna is going to rain down from heaven. Then you move a little closer, and repeat it all again. You don't way to see any signs of stress while you are doing this. And at some point, you want him to be calm enough that he can do other things (shake, down, something like that) for you while the sound is being made. Tis also sounds like a dog that might benefit from some anti-anxiety drugs, at least in the short run. The problem with flooding, and just trying to habituate him to the sound, is that the brain shuts down when it is stressed. So learning is very difficult, if not impossible. So, by forcefully holding him in the kitchen while the machine runs, all he is doing is learning that the sound makes him feel very stressed and scared, so that the next time he hears it, he has had practice at being stressed and scared and is going to be that much worse. The drugs may help take the edge off enough so that he can start thinking "hm… hissing sounds mean chicken… that's not a bad thing!" The big drugs (SSRIs, TCAs, etc) will take several weeks to reach their full effectiveness. You might be able to start off with something like Valium, which has an immediate effect, give that to him a couple of hours before you want to try counter-conditioning, and see if it makes it easier. You will still need to start at a distance, etc., but if it takes the edge off, things may go faster. There are a couple of resources I have found helpful for advice for dealing with a shy or scared dog: http://fearfuldogs.com and Good luck! edited for spelling and grammar

If it's a gas stove, there may be a child lock feature on it. I have to unlock mine after every power failure. The stove came with the house, so it was a bit interesting trying to figure that out the first time!

Are the eyelids swollen any? Any discharge? Just am getting through treating a nasty blepharitis in Pixie-pup, so of course that's the first thing I think of.

I will say that my Katie is a very spook of a greyhound, with the saving grace of not being a bit aggressive. I am also lucky enough to live in the same town as Nicole Wilde, author of _Help for Your Fearful Dog_, who was able to recommend a very good trainer to work with. To give you an idea of the difference, the first meeting (at 100/hr), involved her just talking to me about how to manage the environment, etc., because she had quickly sized up Katie and realized that she was too stressed to even attempt to handle at that point. So I got advice, and had her out again to give more advice, and that time she could actually touch her, with a lot of reinforcement (i.e, chicken). And over time, Katie has taught me a lot about dogs, and introduced me to a world of dog-training and some very helpful people that I probably would not have met otherwise. But those first days were not what I had been imagining when I got her, even though I had asked for a "more difficult" dog, since I had found my first one so easy. One of the difficulties in dealing with a "project dog" is that you don't get a lot of the positive feedback that you do from a normal dog. Unless you can really change your mindset, it's not all that rewarding working with a dog that won't leave a 3 ft square area in your house for over three years (which is what the founder of the shy-k9 Yahoo group had to deal with). And one of the sayings on that list is: "It's ok to realize that you want a pet, not a project." So… breathe, grieve, and then hopefully open your heart and home to another dog. You sound like the kind of person who will make a great dog owner, and just need to find the right dog to realize that.

I'd be doing like you, and trying to find out if that co-pay would go back up and when. Is whatever caused the large payments fixed, or is it likely to recur? I'd be a bit concerned about switching companies if it is likely to happen again. The heart murmur is going to be an issue with whatever company you go with, so that wouldn't be my deciding factor. If you knew going into the insurance that there was a chance that they could drop the co-pay, and what the rules are for it coming back up, then I might stay with them and just ride it out. If they sprang this on you out of the blue, I'd be looking to get different insurance. Once you know the time frame for the co-pay readjusting, something else to think about is whether it's likely that you will have major expenses in that time. I know Kili does agility…. if it's going to be a year for the policy to reset, is it possible that she could get injured in that time? And, look down the road a bit. This may be a minor annoyance now, but as she gets older, what happens if (God forbid) something major happens to her, and they drop the copay again, and then you get a lot of normal "old dog" issues? Will you be stuck with the lower copay at that time? That's what would concern me more, honestly, than the drop now. Taking the really awful view, lets say Kili has a bad accident at a meet, so there's expensive surgery, they drop the copay, and THEN she's diagnosed with osteo. What happens then? Just things to think about.

Actually, many of these questions apply with people too. My dad died of pancreatic cancer. The "gold standard" treatment for that will double your chance of survival at 5 years, but it is an incredibly invasive procedure that involves a high risk of complications, including death, and additional hospital time. And that "double" chance is, I believe, 4% instead of 2%. And I got to watch a panel of medical experts squirm when faced with deciding whether to say that the benefit of living an additional year was worth spending 300K, the cost of a new procedure that was trying to gain approval. So this isn't something limited to vet care, but is a result of being able to do a lot more than put on a cast or do a few stitches and just send the patient home to see if they live or not.