How can I check if my dog's eardrum is water-tight with a human otoscope? He's particularly cooperative.
If the eardrum is ruptured, sometimes you can see little bubbles of air forming around it as the dog breathes in and out, since the ear canal now communicates with the nasal cavity. I can take advantage of this communication in the clinic by putting fluorescent orange dye called Fluorescein in the ear canal that glows under black light. If I see it running out your dog's nose, the tympanic membrane is ruptured.
You’ve got to put the otoscope in and physically pull down a bit on your doggo’s ear to get past the turn in their ear canal to visualize things, and make sure the ears are clear first by cleaning them or you won’t see much but wax!
I know there are anesthesia-free dental cleaning services. How feasible is it for me to buy an ultrasonic scaler off Amazon and do dental cleaning myself with cooperative dogs? I already use a basic metal scaler on my dogs.
Veterinary dentistry isn’t tooth grooming–it’s professional medical evaluation of the mouth and teeth. Dental disease is one of the number one issues in the canine population in the US right now, and good dental care is impossible to cut corners on. It’s great to take good care of your dog’s teeth between visits, but you cannot properly clean every side of every tooth, above and below the gum line, probe for pockets, x-ray suspect areas, etc without anesthesia. Clinics that advertise themselves as doing “anesthesia free dentistry” are ripping you off for a quick buck and shouldn’t be supported–clients think they are caring for their dog’s teeth, but without full evaluation, any problems are simply allowed to persist and get worse, causing the poor dog pain and making the eventual solution more drastic once they are finally diagnosed. Additionally, I’ve taken care of at least one dog who sustained a jaw fracture from an “anesthesia free” cleaning – not stress free for the dog by any stretch of the imagination. In my opinion, anesthesia free dental cleaning should be against the law for clinics to actually advertise and offer.
For heartworm and hookworm prevention, I use durvet ivermectin sheep pour-on dewormer and squirt it in their throat. Is that the right kind of ivermectin for dogs? What is the correct dosage for that? Is this the new type of ivermectin that does not cause toxicity in certain dogs?
You should swap to an oral formulation specifically for dogs. Pour on has a concentration formulated for sheep hair follicle and skin density which is too high for oral dosage in dogs. The dose of pour on is about 40 times higher than the dose for canine oral use, so it’s much easier to overdose them.
What is the best way to keep a great dane away from injuries on their back paws? It seems there are no cones long enough for them, especially since the cone slides down their long neck and their back paw can stick into the cone.
E collars are a necessary evil, but I still try to use them as rarely as possible. One of my pet peeves is folks who give you back your dog in a cone tied with stretchy gauze! It slips off, isn’t very secure, and generally doesn’t work. Best option is to thread a collar through the straps and tighten it snugly–that should keep it in place much better. Nose wise, you are correct it has to extend beyond their muzzle. They also make a collar called No Bite that works like a rigid plastic band that keeps your dog’s head from bending. You could also try covering or bandaging the back paw–we have vet wrap that tastes terrible–to keep them off the injuries without needing a collar.
What kind of ear broad-spectrum ear antibiotic (maybe also with anti-inflamatory and anti-fungal) do your recommend for initial treatment? animax ointment or posatex are what has been recommended to me but not sure if safe in every case.
This is one of those questions where you will get different opinions from asking different vets–there are so many ear cleaning and treatment products out there it’s overwhelming! Posatex is a good choice, but ultimately I can’t recommend a specific one without knowing what you have in your area, and what your vet stocks as available. Keep in mind, too, if the ear inflammation and infection is bad enough, your vet may want to put your doggo on an anti-inflammatory dose of steroids to calm it down as well as potentially systemic (in the circulation) antibiotics rather than just topical.
It’s going to be different based on if you have an active bacterial ear infection vs routine cleaning. You should avoid using antibacterial stuff long term for routine cleaning, as you will build a population of resistant bacteria within the ear canal that may not respond to the same specific antibiotics in the future. With Danes you are going to be dealing with lots of ear and skin issues!
What kind of at-home remedy might be good for ear problems? How safe are those? I'm talking like vinegar, alcohol, etc.
Routine ear cleaning works really well with a 25% vinegar solution – had that recommended by a veterinary dermatologist and I have been pleased with how well it works. There aren’t any home solutions that I know of that work against active bacterial infections, though, so pull out science for those.
In my personal experience, sex is like a drug. It gives pleasure during sex, and then there's discomfort (withdrawals) when going without. After some time the body gets used to no sex. Do you think sexual relations with dogs is a net positive for them? Or does it just take pleasure from other times for the orgasm, making it no better than abstinence?
I think dog’s deserve all the pleasure we can provide for them! Masturbation is a normal part of the animal behavioral repertoire for wild animals as well as dogs, who are capable of happily living all the other aspects of their life to the fullest–I wouldn’t worry about sexual stimulation somehow detracting from other parts of their lives. Data wise, dog’s are also much more enriched in pretty much any activity when doing it together with their human–sex is no different, and a really special unique way we zoos can further relate to our wonderful companions.
If a human does not fit in a female dog when she's in estrus, what are your thoughts on the ethics of gradually stretching her? I think that even though all dogs are different, the bigger the dog the more likely a human is to fit. I recommend for anyone looking to adopt a female dog with sex in mind to look for giant breeds so it is less likely for for there to be size issues. Is that a good recommendation?
That’s a great recommendation. You would hope that folks adopting dogs and not eventually fitting would respect them and not push the issue, but that isn’t always the case, so your position is a sound one.
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