Got Any Pet Health Questions?

[Keit]

....There are good sites in English on this topic, but I don't know any French ones. I will have to do research on this and get back to you.

But as I said, it's important to remember that bad teeth can be a sign of other problems going on in the body, so this should be checked too.

TRANSLATION
...Il y a de bons sites en anglais sur le sujet, mais je n'en connais aucun en français. Je vais devoir faire des recherches à ce sujet et je vous rappellerai.

Mais comme je l'ai dit, il est important de se rappeler que de mauvaises dents peuvent être un signe d'autres problèmes dans le corps, donc cela devrait être vérifié aussi.

Ok, so I tried looking for the sites that talk about natural diet for pets in French, but then I thought that our own resident natural veterinarian already has two good articles on the topic. Albeit they are in English, but hopefully you can translate them into French using machine translation!

In my opinion it is a good overview of how you could improve the diet of your furry babies. But, also, as I said in the previous post, it is important to check their general health (blood work, ultrasound, etc.) in order to see if there are no underlying problems. Especially with your Yorkies!

A big hug and good luck, ,Perlou.

The complete diet for dogs

Many dog owners are intimidated with the idea of preparing home made meals for their best friends. This is hardly a rocket science and making your own dog fo

www.vetmalta.com

The complete diet for cats

This diet is designed to approximate the normal, natural diet that cats would eat if they lived in the wild. It is based on 'live prey' diet as the only specie

www.vetmalta.com

TRANSLATION

Ok, donc j'ai essayé de chercher les sites qui parlent de l'alimentation naturelle pour animaux de compagnie en français, mais ensuite j'ai pensé que notre propre vétérinaire naturel a déjà deux bons articles sur le sujet. Bien qu'ils soient en anglais, mais nous espérons que vous pourrez les traduire en français en utilisant la traduction automatique !

À mon avis, c'est un bon aperçu de la façon dont vous pourriez améliorer l'alimentation de vos bébés à fourrure. Mais, aussi, comme je l'ai dit dans le post précédent, il est important de vérifier leur état de santé général (prise de sang, échographie, etc.) afin de voir s'il n'y a pas de problèmes sous-jacents. Surtout avec vos Yorkies !

Un gros câlin et bonne chance, Perlou.

The complete diet for dogs

Many dog owners are intimidated with the idea of preparing home made meals for their best friends. This is hardly a rocket science and making your own dog fo

www.vetmalta.com

The complete diet for cats

This diet is designed to approximate the normal, natural diet that cats would eat if they lived in the wild. It is based on 'live prey' diet as the only specie

www.vetmalta.com

 

[PERLOU]

Un grand Merci à Keit pour les infos et les liens...

A big thank you to know for the information and links...

 

[SevenFeathers]

Thank you for your question SevenFeathers and your response Keit. This same question has been on my mind recently as well, because we have a long car trip planned where my dog will be with us. I know if I bring it up to my vet, she will prescribe some type of sedative which makes me uneasy. My dog, 2 year old Mini Aussie, enjoys car trips as they usually result in going to the park to play, but I have no idea how to settle her down for an extended road trip. Due to her breed, she is high energy, but also not very accepting of strangers or new environments. Any tips you might have in your new health segment for travelling with pets would be greatly appreciated.

We took an extended car trip again recently. I didn't relish the idea of seeing my dog unhappy while riding. I say unhappy, but not sure that is correct word. She will just sit there, all hang-dog looking. So I did additional research. I used a homeopathic remedy, Aconite, recommended by homeopathic vet, Dr. Richard Pitcairn. I gave her the remedy about an hour before leaving. I can't say she was "happy" to be on a trip, but she was much improved. She sat up and looked around as we rode, where previously, she just sat with her head down. I gave it to her each day before going on the road, and it always seemed to help.

 

[Z...]

Yeah Aconitum is that good - I use it a lot with fractious and scared patients and it almost always makes a huge difference. So far I noticed it works extremely well in German Shepherds without a fail - funnily enough the name of the plant it is made from is Wolf's bane.

 

[munaychasumaq]

Keit,Could you please tell me what kind of bones must a dog eat? Is it possible that too much bone in the dog's diet can cause constipation?
Thanks in advance for your answer.

 

[Keit]

Keit,Could you please tell me what kind of bones must a dog eat? Is it possible that too much bone in the dog's diet can cause constipation?
Thanks in advance for your answer.

Here are two excellent videos by Dr. Karen Becker, where she covers all the possible questions regarding giving bones, especially recriational bones or chews to your dog.

And there is also this video by Dr Jones, where he talks about general benefits of giving bones to your dog, what kind of bones, and what things you need to pay attention to.

 

[munaychasumaq]

Really interesting information.Thank you very much Keit.Now i can understand why our beautiful Dazia was with constipation problems

 

[SevenFeathers]

Do worms have any benefit for dogs, such as they possibly do in humans as described in the thread, Intestinal worms - paradigm shift?

In the past, I have used Panacur for my dog about once or twice a year when I would see worms in her poop. But this time I wanted to try a natural approach. I have been trying to get rid of her worms (naturally with DE, pumpkin seeds, homeopathic remedy WRMCLR), but I am still seeing worms in her poop (maybe from licking her paws?). They appear to be flea tapeworms(?) even though she doesn't have fleas. She is not sick and has energy. As long as she is expelling them, should I just let her be? Or should I use the chemical to get rid of them?

 

[Aiming]

Do worms have any benefit for dogs, such as they possibly do in humans as described in the thread, Intestinal worms - paradigm shift?

In the past, I have used Panacur for my dog about once or twice a year when I would see worms in her poop. But this time I wanted to try a natural approach. I have been trying to get rid of her worms (naturally with DE, pumpkin seeds, homeopathic remedy WRMCLR), but I am still seeing worms in her poop (maybe from licking her paws?). They appear to be flea tapeworms(?) even though she doesn't have fleas. She is not sick and has energy. As long as she is expelling them, should I just let her be? Or should I use the chemical to get rid of them?

I've wanted to ask Keit something similar. What natural alternatives for deworming cats are recommendable? If the cats can go outside, how often do they need to be dewormed?

Next to cocnut oil, apple cidar vinegar, raw garlic and others, I've also read about the homepathic remedy Abrontanum for roundworms, Carduus marianus for hookworms, and Calcium carbonicum for tapeworms.

Do you have recommendations for what would be the best option in terms of natural treatments?

 

[Keit]

Do worms have any benefit for dogs, such as they possibly do in humans as described in the thread, Intestinal worms - paradigm shift?

Do you have recommendations for what would be the best option in terms of natural treatments?

Well, unfortunately I am not well versed in this area to answer your question in a sufficient enough manner. I think that you better ask @Deckard about it because he both has a lot of experience with homeopathic remedies, and he is also the one that posted the article about parasites, so may know more.

To be honest, although I totally understand the logic behind this idea, and the danger of "over-deworming", I don't have enough knowledge regarding this to tell you with certainty that it will be ok to let your pets be with their worms (and if you actually see them excreting them) until the negative symptoms may appear (or not). And some of them can be actually lethal, like heartworms. So my current instinct would be to advise you to get them under control.

In general, I think that animals always carry a lot of parasites and are quite capable to deal with them and "coexist" with them, so to say. The problem usually arises when there is an overgrowth, or there is other type of disbalance in the body. And my current take on the issue, that considering our environment and how most feed their pets (with highly processed and not appropriate diets), their bodies may have trouble dealing with a lot of things their natural counterparts could handle.

But perhaps @Deckard has some other thoughts on the matter.

 

[SevenFeathers]

Thank you for the response. She eats home made food (meat and vegetables), with a little canned food with no chemicals added, so the diet is pretty good. As I have given her the Panacur in the past, it probably would be OK. But if the worms are not a big problem, I'd rather not give her the chemical again. Yes, maybe Deckard would have additional thoughts.

 

[Aiming]

Thanks, Keit. I also think that the mainstream deworming medication might be useful, depending on the severity of the individual case.

As for my cat, she'll be 17 this year and is super healthy (pure meat diet). In her earlier years, she got the usual recommended worm treamtment from the vet, maybe 6 times in total, but since then no treatment at all, since she is as healthy and active as she ever was and never had a worm issue. In the warm months, she's always outside and also hunts and eats mice and since she eats mice, I thought it might be good to give her some preventive treatment, preferably a natural one.

So yes, let's wait for Deckard's thoughts on it.

 

[Z...]

I am afraid this notion of “beneficial worms “ is new to me too - ever since I stumbled upon that article. I think what may be beneficial is myriad of species that were flying (or should I say swimming) under our radar for all these years. We identified worms that cause serious health problems and were focusing on them and once we waged the war on them the beneficial ones became collateral damage. I rarely ever deworm my dogs - I use to do faecal checks for worm ova but since I never ever found anything I stopped doing it. My take on it is that dogs (and cats) fed species appropriate diet are pretty resistant to all sort of bugs not just worms. My official advice is to do tests rather then blindly deworm regularly. Here is very informative article

Complete Guide to Worms in Dogs: Signs, Causes, Prevention - Dogs First

Are worms in dogs something to worry about?

dogsfirst.ie

 

[SevenFeathers]

Thank you for your response, Deckard. The article was more informative than others I have read, and after reading it, I no longer think what my dog is expelling is tapeworm. It's not the little rice size pieces, it's an actual worm, about an inch long. But since she is expelling them, I will just let her be for now and do additional research. Thanks again.

 

[Z...]

Thank you for your response, Deckard. The article was more informative than others I have read, and after reading it, I no longer think what my dog is expelling is tapeworm. It's not the little rice size pieces, it's an actual worm, about an inch long. But since she is expelling them, I will just let her be for now and do additional research. Thanks again.

If your dog is shedding the roundworms she might have a heavy load and this won’t go away on its own. In cases like this I would resort to conventional dewormer.
I would also look into why an adult dog is riddled with worms - nutrition is always a starting point. What do you feed her?