Dog Mouth Warts

Update: Added gross pictures of Ruki's warts. 

So Ruki developed some warts on her lips a few days ago. I found the one on the inside of her lip first. It looked like a weird, white mushroom--not the bumpy, sea anenome type that you expect. I thought that maybe it was a cyst or something weird, like a tumor. I worried a bit, thinking it would just go away.

Then, almost directly through the skin, on the outside of her lip, she got the typical wart: pink and bumpy. I bet if you stuck a pin through the outside wart it would go right into the inside wart, like they're the same thing.

I then found some pictures to confirm that the weird-looking inside-the-lip white, mushroomy thing might also just be another kind of wart:

http://thnlnk.com/crvetcenter/Oral.papillomas.warts.in.a.dog/670

So, OK, a wart. It should just go away over time. Apparently, they're also pretty typical in older puppies. I might try the recommendation on the above page ("Viroplex contains lysine, an amino acid; copper, zinc, calcium citrate, vitamins A, C, B1, B2, niacin, and periwinkle, mustard, and broccoli. The latter 3 ingredients contain natural anti-neoplastic (tumor inhibiting) compounds.") to see if that'll help things improve more quickly.

Part of me hopes that when she's playing with other dogs, maybe one of the dogs will bite them off. Maybe!

Update on the Cherry Eye - Almost All Better!

So last I posted on the cherry eye, the part that wasn't snipped out was getting swollen and was all ucky. We were getting worried, so we asked about it when we took her to the vet to get spayed. They said that it should go away, and it didn't look too bad, scolding us on the removal--recommending the tacking. (Whatever.)

So then got spayed. I think that her regimen of pain medication helped bring down the swelling of her cherry eye, and since then--it's been four weeks since her spaying, her eye has been fine! So maybe just constant, regular medication like that to bring down the swelling is all we need!

Also, on the other eye, her cherry eye popped out again after some rough playing. I pushed it back in for a few seconds, and it's been back in for about a week.

Cracked Paws

Recently, Ruki's paws have been cracking. I don't know if it's bad cracking, or just normal cracking. But they seem pretty rough, and I'm worried. We've recently had an ice storm up here, and since people don't shovel their sidewalks in the city, she's been doing a lot of walking on all ice and then lots of salt. I try to clean her paws daily, but they're still cracking.

The past few days I've been putting Bag Balm on her paws, and she's been complying, which perhaps tells me that it's helping... Maybe helping her feel a little better.

I'll let you know if her cracked paws heal after some time with the Bag Balm.

Update (02/22/07): Using the Bag Balm, twice a day for two days pretty much healed the cracked paws. But then I stopped with the Bag Balm treatment, and her paws cracked again. I think I'm going to leave them be and just see if they bother her more. Maybe she has to build up some "paw toughness."

Bananas, Baby Carrots, and Blueberries

Recently, Ruki's been loving the bananas. I'll have a banana for breakfast and give her two or three bites--not that she'll bite them, but I'll take a bite off for her and make her do some tricks for the treat.

Her only tricks right now are sit, shake, high-five, down, and stay. I'm not sure how much further we can get from here.

So I read up on bananas, and some people think that bananas may constipate dogs. No proof, though. But otherwise they seem fine. Plus she loves them. Everything in moderation, I suppose.

She also loves baby carrots. Sometimes I freeze them, but usually just right out of the fridge. I'm not sure if she really digests them, though. I see the chunks in her poo the next day.

And then dried blueberries. She's a big fan. Problem is they're pretty expensive. So for every 10 or so I have she gets a few. I figure the vitamins and anti-oxidants I get will have the same benefit for her.

Update on Booda Velvet Chew Bones

So I've really enjoyed--and Ruki enjoys, too--the Booda Velvet chew bones. They last longer than any other edible chew--except for the Nylabone she's chewing on now (original flavor seems to be the kind she likes).

But a few days ago, kind of out of the blue, she started sounding like she was choking on something. She's had a cold for the past week or so, so I though, oh, she's just still sick. But then it got bad--her hacking and her looking miserable--and I started freaking out, reading up on a dog Heimlich maneuver. (Apparently, you can give them the Heimlich.)

But she seemed to work it out in a few minutes, and then she was OK.

The next morning, she puked up some yellow foamy stuff and then a chunk about half the size of my thumb. So that was it.

At first, I had no idea what it was--it looked like cubed chicken. I wracked my brain to figure out what it could be... No idea. So I let it dry out overnight to see if I could recognize it later.

I'm 95% sure it was from the Booda Velvet. She just managed to bite off a big chunk and then swallow it whole. So watch your puppy as they chew on these. You can usually tell if she's chewing or biting, and if you hear that biting take a look to see what they got. And hopefully you won't have to do any dog Heimlich in the future.

Post-Spaying Housetraining Regression

So Ruki's 6 1/2 months, and we had her spayed about three weeks ago. The night we brought her home, she was out of it--drugged up and miserable, scared of open spaces. The next day she was in pain--whining and crying non-stop. The day after that she seemed better, but then tried to run around a bit, and then I think she hurt herself again, and she was back to crying.

For a week, we limited her exercise--carrying her up and down stairs to go outside just to pee, and then right back inside. By the 6th day, I think she was ready to go. I took her for short walks to the end of the block and back. By day 10, we were back to normal. And that's when she walked into the hallway for a bit and came back and when I walked to the bathroom, there was a pool of pee waiting for me.

Over about a week, she peed in the house four times. Once on a rug, once in our bedroom on the floor, and twice, one after another, right in front of me. I thought, oh no! Incontinence due to spaying! Or urinary tract infection! Or she's challenging me!

But I think it's that she was back to drinking lots of water at night, and so I went back to taking her out to pee first thing in the morning. I don't have to "start all over," I just have to be better about taking her out first thing in the morning and trying to take her out at least once late at night, like 8.30 p.m. or 9.30 p.m.

So my thinking, "All is lost!" is not true. I just can't afford to be too lazy just yet.

(On a side note, people who think that bulldogs are a lazy breed... They don't need as much exercise as other breeds, but Ruki's in no couch potato!)

Ruki Adoration

This is just a moment for me to be cheesy about my puppy: I think that the world is a better place now that she's in it.

If just for the moment when we pass people on the streets, and they smile, doesn't that make the world a better place? If for the five or so minutes from when she runs up to and then loves the tired woman downstairs and makes her day, doesn't that make the world a better place?

I look at her sometimes, and I tell her that she's a blessing to the world.

OK. I'm done now. Now I have to interrupt her snoring and clean her stinky monster-face.

Innova (and Nutro Ultra) Dog Food

So our breeder started us out on Eukanuba Puppy, and we stuck with that for a few weeks. Seemed fine. But then I started reading up on the different kinds of food out there. It makes sense--feed your puppy better food! I mean, I eat hotdogs and other barely-human-grade meats, but I also make sure I eat healthy and go out for sushi when I can, etc. Why not the same for your puppy--especially if she's going to eat the same stuff every day?

But the I also was reading in the Dog Bible about the increasing rates of cancer in dogs these days--and they pretty much narrowly speculate that it has to do with food. Nothing else has really changed in the way people care for animals--except that people have pretty much all switched to processed food diets. Even high end foods, e.g., Eukanuba, have switched their recipes over to lower-grade ingredients.

So upon recommendations and grading dog food brands, we've been feeding her Innova Puppy, which ranks A+ and is one of the highest graded foods out there.

Since, I don't know how much of her improvements are attributable just for the food. She's gotten older. She's more used to the environment. We're feeding her a lot of different things: a lot of natural treats, all meat treats, fish oil, yogurt, etc. But all in all caring about what she eats I think counts. Her coat is shiny and super-soft. Her eyes have gotten better--less gunk and swelling. Her paws feel great, etc.

But this isn't all just about Innova. I clicked on an add for Nutro Ultra--I've been considering it since it's available at Petco, but Innova is only available at a small, local store. If that store ever goes out of business, I might switch to something like Nutro Ultra (or Newman's Own). I haven't graded it yet, but on the web site, I noticed that in all its super-biased comparison charts, it ranked Innova closest to itself while, of course, Ultra blows everyone else away. (Also, I'll note that after Ultra, Innova was the best-tasting, too!)

http://www.ultraholistic.com/performance.shtml

I also noticed that usually when I see food comparisons, I rarely see Innova compared--and I wonder if that's because Innova is high enough quality that any brand-by-brand comparison would lose to Innova. But this is pure speculation--almost fan frenzy, I suppose.

So takehome, Nutro Ultra looks potentially interesting, but it was really a confirmation that Innova's still pretty damn good.