dog training class will go on

Question:  There is a small park, Mau‘umae, at 16th Avenue and Claudine Street in Kaimuki. For many, many years, Dan Shi­ma­buku, a mailman by day but a wonderful and talented dog trainer the rest of the time, has conducted free dog-training classes there once a week as a community service without a single complaint by neighbors. Beyond that, Dan and his wife, Donna, clean the park of droppings by dogs not in his class and even pull the weeds! Recently a policeman appeared, said there was a complaint and forced some 25 to 30 neighborhood residents in the class to leave the park. The park is on the Hawaiian Humane Society’s list of dog-friendly parks. However, a sign there says no animals are allowed, a sign that we have been told was to be taken down. So we are confused and upset about all this. We all believe that extraordinary community service like Dan Shi­ma­buku’s should be encouraged by government, not hampered. The only other use of the park is for feral chickens to hang out. Don’t community members deserve as much of an opportunity to use our own park as feral chickens?

Answer: Dan Shi­ma­buku will be able to continue his classes.

The city Department of Parks and Recreation will add “dogs on leash allowed” to the sign at Mau‘umae Nature Park, parks Director Toni Robinson said.

The department does designate Mau‘umae a “dog-friendly park,” where dogs on leashes are allowed. (For a list of those parks, go to the Hawaiian Humane Society’s website, hawaiianhumane.org/Dog-Friendly-Parks.html.)

But, Robinson said, the department has never issued permits for dog obedience classes there.

“For a park such as Mau‘umae, where there is no comfort station, we do not issue permits,” she said.

“In the past, younger children’s soccer groups have even requested permits, which we declined to issue.”

But Shimabuku’s class is not an official class, Robinson emphasized. Because he is not taking money or conducting any commercial activity, he is allowed to continue gathering with dog owners and their pets, as long as the dogs are leashed.

Shimabuku, 58, said he became interested in training dogs about 10 years ago when a customer on his mail route had a problem with his pet. He offered to help train the dog, but just two weeks into the training, the dog suddenly died. It was in memory of that dog that Shi­ma­buku started his classes.

In the beginning, he acknowledged, some people complained about the dogs. When told by a police officer that the dogs would have to leave, Shi­ma­buku said he showed the officer the park’s listing as “dog-friendly” but was told police had to go by what the posted sign said.

As of Thursday the sign had not been changed.

“I do this as a community service,” Shi­ma­buku said. Classes are held Tuesdays from 6 to 7 p.m., April through September. On an average night, 20 to 30 people and their dogs show up. He emphasizes that participants are to pick up after their animals.

police tactic

In New Haven, Conn., in March, police had trapped two car-theft suspects in a multifamily building whose occupants were hiding from the suspects, thus necessitating urgency in ending the siege.

Officers ordered a K-9 unit but were told it would be delayed.

In a tactic departments occasionally employ, officers still threatened to release the dogs immediately, and to make the threat credible, available officers began barking.

The suspects quickly surrendered rather than face the vicious canines.

can I give this to my dog?

All dog owners have questions about which human foods and human prescription or over-the-counter (OTC) medications can be safely given to their dog. The medication questions will usually pop up when your dog is showing signs of illness on a Saturday night when your veterinarian is not available, and you have a number of both prescription and OTC medications sitting in your medicine cabinet?. or you are sitting on your couch eating chocolate ice cream, and your four-legged friend is giving you those Please, please, please eyes, and you think to yourself, just a taste won't hurt my little darling.

The ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center has listed the top 10 poisoning causes in 2008: 1st is human medications (both prescription and OTCs), 3rd is people food, and the 5th is medications prescribed by veterinarians. Medications, meant for dogs or humans, should never be given without first having your dog examined by your veterinarian to determine a correct diagnosis and treatment for their current medical problem.

Following is a list of the most commonly asked questions regarding human food and human medication safety as it relates to your dog.

The Dog Talk Diva

I was googling Jeff Gellman (mentioned in dwf, an interesting dog trainer in his own right) and came across this radio interview he had with Camilla Gray-Nelson who is the Dog Talk Diva..

Well, I'll tell you, when I was growing up, because I was raised on a ranch that was miles out of town -- all my other little friends in school had girlfriends and kids that they played with on the weekends and after school in their cul-de-sacs and their suburban homes -- I didn't have any of that. When I was small, it was a little bit disappointing to me. I always tell people, you know, I didn't have any friends with two legs until I was in junior high. But, the advantage of that looking back now, because everything I do in the dog world in training, is based on how animals communicate naturally with each other. And if I didn't have that background, I wouldn't know that language; I would be oblivious to it, just as all of my clients are and most of the world is.

Jeff: It's incredible. So give me an example. Because I like to -- you know, I'm a different kind of trainer, and I don't know if we're going to go too deep into actual training. Because I want people to think bigger than that. I want people to look at the holistic message here. What is something that is so common in the dog world, or even the animal world -- we're talking about pack animals -- that we're missing, the general population is missing, they're missing the boat on it.

Camilla: I'll tell you right up front what it is: It is somehow the perception that to be seen as strong with your dog, or to get your dog to do what you want them to do, you have to be loud, you have to be intimidating, you have to be full of machismo and pin your dog to the ground. And I am telling you, as a student of nature for over 50 years, that is so backwards and wrong. When you look at a -- from my early experience, my herd of cows, my horses -- keep in mind, social group mammals, social mammals -- cows, horses, dogs, and what have you, are the ones I'm most familiar with . They all follow the same social contract -- there's a leader, there are the followers, there are the ones that work in the basement, there's middle-management, and there's the executive. I'm getting off track, but I'm still on track.

Jeff: No, don't worry, I'll reign you in.

Camilla: When you look at the animals that are the leaders in that group, they are not the loud ones -- they are the quiet ones. They are the ones that are off on the side, sort of. They're humored by the one doing all the barking or all the lunging or all the kicking -- they're going, go knock yourself out, I'll just come in and clean up your mess later. And so, the secret of power in the animal world is that quietness; when there's a dog that's doing the lunging and the barking and snapping, and all of this, acting very, very aggressive -- what they're really doing is they're overcompensating for a lack of confidence and power inside. They are not unlike the play yard bully at the local grammar school. And the thing is, the dogs know it. So when we yell at our dogs, and we try to force them into doing things overtly like this, the dog looks at us and goes -- you're the imposter, I'm not going to listen to you. So that's the biggest misperception is that strength is not loud, it's quiet.

Jeff: So Camilla, do you think it's possible that if folks feel that if they discipline, which doesn't mean punishment, and in my book, there's a big difference.

Camilla: I hate that word.

Jeff: I know, there's a big difference. So if they discipline… You know, everybody needs -- I mean, I get discipline. You know, everybody gets disciplined.

Camilla: Discipline your children.

Jeff: Yes, of course. So are people afraid -- because I get this feeling as well (90% of my clients are female as well) -- if you discipline your dog, they feel that the dog is not going to like them. I find it the opposite.

Camilla: That's exactly it.

Jeff: I find it the opposite. I find, no, if I discipline and set up boundaries, my dog loves it because then they've got expectations.

Camilla: Well, the dog loves it, because they finally have the leader they have been looking for.

Camilla: Okay. In the dog world, I spend a lot of time telling people, explaining how that leader gets his position. It's not because he wears a t-shirt saying, I'm the boss of you. And it's not because there's fighting. Everyone assumes that the top position in the dog pack is earned through a bloody battle.

Jeff: No. It's just through energy, mostly.

Camilla: That hierarchy involves aggression -- and that is at the root. Honestly that is the root of all the great dog trainer divider -- the faulty assumption that aggression and dominance are inexplicably (oh sorry, another big word) are linked. But unless a dog realizes how his world is organized, he is in a constant state of anxiety. Because in his world, unless you've got a well-organized pack with the right guy at the top, the right dogs working in the mail room and the right dogs in middle-management, so everyone has a job to do -- that pack, including the dog in it, are at risk. They will not survive. So the first thing a dog looks for in life is, okay, how are we organized? Who's the chairman? And what's my job? Once you answer that question, they calm down. And what you see from a dog when you set those boundaries -- and I'll tell you how they get that leader position -- but once you set boundaries, the dog has almost an audible sigh of relief. You've seen it, Jeff, you see it every day with your dogs.

Jeff: Yeah.

Camilla: And when they look up at you, you have attention that is real, honest, organic attention. And it's really like hero worship -- that's when you have the look of love in your dog's eyes, because he is saying -- oh, finally, you've lifted the burden of life from my shoulders, I can defer to you.

Note: the whole radio show and complete transcript can be found here.

diarrhea

[7/8/13] Kimo's poop is still soft, but at least not a blob for the last couple of days.  Started him on the l-glutamine this evening. 1 capsule of 500mg.

[7/4/13]  Gave him the grapefruit seed extract.  Didn't notice much difference.  Started him on the slippery elm on 7/2/13 evening.  No dramatic difference that I could see.  Pooped in the garage yesterday afternoon. Ran to the yard after eating last night (I assume to poop). Made a small drip this morning.  I'll try it for a few more days.

[6/29/13] OK, the shipment from Amazon arrived today.  I think I'll try the grapefruit seed extract first.  But how much to give.  It comes in capsules of 250 mg.  Kimo weighs about 19 pounds which is about 9 kilograms.  This article says you only need 25 mg for 10 kg of body weight, though they found no ill effects at far higher doses.  So that's like 1/10 a capsule.  I think I'll start him out with 1/2 a capsule which is 5 times more than he needs.  This article says 10 mg for 10 pounds (or 20 mg for 20 pounds).

[6/23/13] Hey poop pretty good today.  Haven't been giving him the probiotic lately (just the probios treats).  Don't know if that was the problem?

[6/21/13] The soft poop continues.  I think I'm going to try grapefruit seed extract instead of the antibiotics from the vet.  Here's a link discussing dosage.  Apparently GSE has lots of uses.

Then I think I'm also going to try slippery elm or L-Glutamine.

[6/18/13] Darn, the puddle is back.  Did a soft poop in the early a.m.   Then noticed small puddles in garage in the morning :(

[6/17/13] His poop got better a couple of days later.  Maybe it's the chicken bone he ate.  Since then it's soft but not a puddle.

He's running out of the probiotic I got him from Amazon and was about to order some more.  In the meantime, I was considering ordering slippery elm as well (see below).  Well, I saw this comment that slippery elm saved her dog, but then I read the response to the comment that probiotics can make diarrhea worse. There's an article reference stating "Probiotics may make SIBO worse".  What is SIBO.  It's small intestinal bacterial overgrowth which is "a disorder of excessive bacterial growth in the small intestine".

"Treatment is with a course of antibiotics. A course of one week of antibiotics is usually sufficient to treat the condition. However, if the condition recurs, antibiotics can be given in a cyclical fashion in order to prevent tolerance. For example, antibiotics may be given for a week, followed by three weeks off antibiotics, followed by another week of treatment. Alternatively, the choice of antibiotic used can be cycled."

"Probiotics are bacterial preparations that alter the bacterial flora in the bowel to cause a beneficial effect. Their role in bacterial overgrowth is somewhat uncertain."

Here is what apparently worked for the author of the article:

"The method I used uses antibiotics to intitially get rid of the SIBO. Ginger and Grapefruit seed extract to keep your SIBO at bay whilst Glutamine repairs your gut until it can defend itself again"

But then that was a human.

According to the article, the ginger and grapefruit seed kill bacteria, like antibiotics.  And the glutamine repairs the line of your gut and allows it to defend itself.

Here's an article about glutamine for dogs with diarrhea.  And another.

So still another option to consider.

On the article, here's Karen Becker pushing her probiotic product.  [Also a general article on diarrhea in dogs and a recommendation of slippery elm.]

Hey, just took him out and his poop was pretty good.  Didn't make that much though..

[6/13/13] Darn.  Puddle in the garage :(

[6/9/13] Well the poop started getting bad again and took the sample to the vet on 5/20/13.
get med from the vet on 5/21/13, this time he got a new probiotic (Prostora) and special food (Iams Veteranarian Formula Intestinal Plus, formerly known as low residue) too
didn't give the probiotic right away
toward the end I would only give the antibiotic in the evening and the probiotic with the morning meal
that last antibiotic was given
plus I'm giving him raw chicken with the evening meal
the problem is that with the chicken w/bone he drags it to the dirt and it gets coated with dirt when he eats it (lately I've been giving him the chicken w/bone in the front so it doesn't go in the dirt)
the last of the probiotic was given on 5/31
runny poop came back on 6/4
but today (6/9) he made one small poop in the morning that was pretty firm and he made another one in the afternoon that was pretty decent.
So now I have hope..
I have one more probiotic from the vet left and I subbed in the other probiotic I got from Amazon today.

[5/6/13] Hey, Kimo's poop has been better the last few day.  Not rock hard, but at least I can pick it up.  Don't know what I did though.  Don't know if it was the probiotics (which never really seemed to work).  Or the raw chicken (which didn't work at least at first, but then his poop seemed to firm after he at the chicken bones), or not skipping a meal and letting him stay in the back (where there's less to bark at) and not giving him that much to eat for a day.  Maybe a combination of the above.

[4/22/13] Well, tried the probiotis and the poop never really improved

Then Kimo got tapeworm again and it was off to the vet for tapeworm pills and another diagnosis of soft poop.  This time it was just another batch of metro (one week supply)

So picked up the meds on 4/10.  Gave him the metro that night. Poop didn't improve until a day or so later.  Then gave him the droncit (the tapeworm pills on 4/12).  The good news was he didn't get diarrhea after taking the tapeworm pills (unlike the Little City Dogs wormer).

The plan was to give Kimo the metro to kill the bad bacteria, then give him the probiotics to aid the healthy bacteria.  In the meantime I was feeding him his kibble with some Alpo canned food.

His poop continued good during this time.  The last metro was given on 4/17 evening.  His poop remained good.

Then last night, I gave him a half a chicken thigh (defrosted frozen chicken).  In the a.m. he barked and I took him in front and he pooped.  Couldn't see the condition of the poop since it was dark.

But then this morning (4/22/13) when I check, it was a blob :)

So his good poop lasted four days.  I want to see if it improves from here.  Hopefully it's just regular diarrhea from changing his food.  But switching to raw isn't supposed to cause diarrhea, supposedly?

Or maybe not.  Wait and see.

[3/13/13] While waiting for the probiotics to come, I decided to try Greek yogurt (after I ran out of the cottage cheese).  There were a couple of poops that looked better (though far from firm), but today it was back to the runs.  Maybe because I mixed some table food/rice with his I/D.

dwf suggested slippery elm.  I'll keep that in mind.

[3/7/13]  Well the poop is now back to blobs for the last few days.  So much for the new food and cottage cheese.  A couple of times it didn't look so bad, but most of the time they're runny.  Last night and today, he just makes brown drops.

I'm going to try some probiotics I saw on Amazon: this one from vetri-science and this one from probios.

In the meantime, I googled antibiotics for dogs and got some information on diarrhea.

pets.webmd.com
petmd.com
caninejournal
cesarsway

vetinfo
Diarrhea is often caused by the administration of antibiotics. This is due to the fact that the dog has good and bad bacteria in the intestinal tract and when the antibiotics are administered, all the bacteria are killed. After discontinuing the antibiotic treatment, the bad bacteria will grow much faster than the good bacteria and this will lead to an imbalance and a new infection.

The bacteria that form in the intestinal tract leading to an infection can be very resistant to antibiotics, especially if the infection occurs after a previous antibiotics treatment.

Consequently, the antibiotics prescribed for dogs with diarrhea should be powerful. At the same time, the antibiotics should be prescribed so as the dog is less likely to develop new infections as a result of the antibiotic administration.

[Hmm.  Maybe the condition came from taking the antibiotic for the campilobacter.]

wellvet  acute diarrhea is actually healthy.  but not chronic diarrhea.

Conventional medicine often fails to heal chronic diarrhea. Its approach tends to follow along a couple lines. First, the dog is fed foods that are extremely bland and easy to digest, often called "hypoallergenic diets".

This may help for a short time, but the body needs complex nutrients for optimal health - nutrients that are destroyed by the extreme processing employed in making commercial diets.

Secondly, conventional veterinary medicine relies on multiple courses of antibiotics, often combined with immune suppressive drugs (corticosteroids, for example). Unfortunately, many cases are only palliated, not cured, and over time the dog will worsen. This is an excellent example where holistic therapies can help cure your dog.

Products to aid in healing dogs with chronic diarrhea.
Gastriplex
Healthy Flora (probiotic)
Ultraclear Sustain
MediBulk
Similase
Paraguard
Dipan 9

[2/23/13] Well, after going off the antibiotic on Sunday, the soft poop came back on Friday.  Then a few piles in garage.  decide to go to Dr. Lau

First thing Dr. Lau asks me if I'm giving the dog stress
I tell him about the antibiotic given by the other vet.  He looks in the microscope, but says he's just checking for worms not bacteria

He prescribes a change in dog food to i/d
and gave him 5 tablets of amforol (1/2 tablet twice a day)
Also said I can give him cottage cheese, yogurt, strained human baby food

so far poop is better, but we'll what happens after he goes off the amforol

[2/7/13] Went off the metro on 2/3 (evening).  Went to Costco and came back to see to soft piles of poop in the garage.  Well, I gave him some canned Iams last night for the first time in a while.  Skip that and we'll see what comes out tomorrow.

[1/24/13] soft poop in garage again.  no campilobacter.  Dr. Darren says he has a strange bacteria (in other words, he's not sure what it is).  Prescribed metro and probiotic (proviable)

[1/11/13]  Poop got better and firmer.  Things seemed to be going OK until this morning when I took him out and it streamed out soft (like ice milk coming out of the spout).  Then later I see a big brown mound in the garage.  OK back to the vet just in case :(

[got prescribed amoxicillin and metronidazole]

[1/3/13] poop runny again, so took sample to vet (along with Kimo).  Kimo was OK with a small dog outside and seemed OK with a small dog in a bag.  But when a couple of bigger dogs came in, he reacted.  And also reacted to a lady pushing a cardboard box on the floor.

The good news is that they didn't find campylobacter.  The bad news is that they found a whole bunch of other bacteria.  So prescribed amoxicillin and metronidazole.

[12/21/12] OK, finished up the chloramphenicol on Wednesday.  Then Thursday night, Kimo kept barking through the night and I took him out about three times.  Checking his poop the next day, it appears the poop wasn't too bad at first, but then the later poops got more soft.  And then after leaving them in the front for a while, I noticed a soft mound in the garage.  OK, bad sign.

I still have some erythromycin left, so I'll give Kimo the rest of it and see what happens.  I gave him a 1/2 pill in the morning and Kimo was in the back most of the day.  I brought it out in the last afternoon, so he's back on the steps.  He got another 1/2 pill with his dinner (along with leftover brown rice - they ate it all so I guess they liked the brown rice).  We'll see how he does tonight.

[12/9/12] Kimo got the drips again.  He runny poop seemed to clean up, but then I saw he had tapeworm and I decided to give him tapeworm pills from Little City Dogs instead of the droncit from the vet.

The next day he had the runs and was making puddles instead of solid poop.  In fact that might have been when the case in October occurred.  I looked up the dosage and decided to give him a lower dose.  That seemed to be getting better.  But then I saw he had tapeworm again.

I figured the last time he got the runs after the tapeworm pills might have been a coincidence and gave him the pill again.  1 pill is prescribed for up 8-17 pounds.  2 pills is prescribed for 17-34 pounds.  Since Kimo is about 18 or 19 pounds, right around the bordline, I decided to give him 1-1/2 pills.

And sure enough, the next day he had the runs.  I waited for about five days since I read that Campylobacter diarrhea typically lasts about 5 days.  But it never got any better and I got tired of wiping up his drips in the garage that he made every couple of hours.  Poor guy.

Back to the vet.  Another dosage of erythromycin.  This time I didn't full around and gave him the full dosage.  About the third day, his poop started to get firm.  I started giving him the pill on a Monday and kept giving him until the next Tuesday or more likely Wednesday.  Then I brought another poop sample on Saturday.

They called back saying he still had the campylobacter.  This time, chloramphenicol (250 mg) was prescribed three times a day.  And Lact-Enz two times a day.

Chloramphenicol is supposedly more effective than erythromycin in removing the campylobacter.  However it can cause bone marrow damage to humans in rare cases and should be handled with caution.

OK, what's this Lact-Enz?  From amazon, it's a gastrointestinal support product that combines digestive enzymes with normal intestinal flora. The combination of these ingredients assists in the breakdown of macronutrients and maintains a healthy intestinal environment. According to the comments (and the vet tech who called me), it's a probiotic which are live microorganisms proposed to be beneficial to the host organism.  So should not be taken at the same time as the antibiotic (since the antibiotic will kill it).

So I guess the sequence will be.  Take the antibiotic to kill the bad bacteria.  And take the probiotic to grow the good bacteria.

[10/10/12] Kimo has runny poop again.  Poop comes out as a brown puddle.  Decided to take stool sample to vet and they say he has the hippo campus again (or whatever it was).  Campylobacter maybe?  Hopefully not Campylobacteriosis (or is that the same thing)?

Anyway, they (Ann Kwock) prescribed erythromycin (250 mg tablets).  Picked it up at Walgreen.  Noticed it was like $70.  Looked up how much it was at Costco last time and it only like $13.  But then I check the bottle.  Last time they prescribed only 5 pills with a dosage of 1/4 tablet.  This time there were 20 pills and the dosage of 1 tablet twice a day was prescribed.

Maybe I'll play doctor and give 1/2 tablet.  Looking at a bottle from about 3 years ago, the dosage was 1/2 table.  OK.

Tried giving Kimo the 1/2 tablet with his kibble.  The table wound up outside the bowl with a few pieces of kibble.  Ate the kibble, not the tablet.  Wound up putting it in a pill pocket.  That worked.

But later in the afternoon, he threw up the food he ate :(

Clean up and let him lied down by the palm tree.

***

[3/30/12] Kimo doesn't exactly have diarrhea now, but his poop has been pretty runny off and on. And sometimes I can hear "sputtering" before he poops. So it is sort of diarrhea.

I was looking at the comments of this article for some ideas to try.

I tried pumpkin, as a suggestion from Linda, and it didn't really work that well.

Tonight I tried chicken and rice (on top of his regular beneful).

[not much difference..]

***

On Monday, I noticed that Kimo's right eye had some mucous build-up, so I was afraid his eye infection was re-ocurring. So since I was going to pick up Kimo's regular med anyway I requested some antibiotics since that's what they used last time (along with eyedrops and I still have some leftover eyedrops).

However the doctor said just to use the eyedrops, so I didn't get the antibiotics. I explained that his poop was runny and they said it might be bacteria (or something) and I could bring in a stool sample.

The last couple of days, Kimo mostly just lay down all day in the back and didn't eat much on Monday, though he ate some last night. His eye doesn't look too bad though, so I think it's not a re-occurrence of the eye infection.

Anyway, I called this morning to bring in a stool sample. After I dropped it off, they called me and said they found some bacteria (or whatever) and said I could pick up his medicine at the pharmacy. I chose Costco.

Looking at the bottle is Erythromycin Base 250MG. And to use 1/4 tablet twice a day.

I see this is the same medicine he got three years ago, so I assume it's the same condition.

*** [3/9/13]

Looking back in my log, I see that Kimo had the runs on 2/23/13.  That was after he ate some purple potato and threw it up.  Seems it didn't last though.  So he's had problems on and off for a while.