volume 1 for dogs without boundaries issue 4 · help you decide if crate training is for you. crate...

Volume 1

Issue 4

July 2010

www.dogsnaturallymagazine.com

For Dogs Without Boundaries

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Volume 1 Number 4 July/August 2010

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On the Cover:

Stephanie and ‘Cooper’

Photography by Karen Delong

www.kdelongphotography.com

[email protected]

Columns 4 Editorials 6 Ten Minute Trainer Confinement Training 7 Secret Garden Juniper 8 Show & Tell Susan Jenkins 11 The Apothecary Pulsatilla 16 Oversees Catherine O’Driscoll 60 Teacher Dogs

Features

12 POTCAKES IN PARADISE by Ellen Kohn

15 SHAMPOO: READ THE LABEL FIRST by Laura Boston

20 RESOURCE GUARDING IN PUPPIES by Jean Donaldson

22 PET HEALTH: WHAT WE EAT AND FEED THEM PART II by Dr. Michael W. Fox B Vet Med PhD DSc MRCVS 26 CONSEQUENCES AND CONTROL: GETTING BEHAVIORS by Dana Scott

28 KICKING THE KIBBLE HABIT: PART II by Lucy Postins

30 DOGS, PARKS AND POLITICS by Julie Walsh

32 MEAT FACTS AND DIRTY LITTLE SECRETS by Erika Phillips

34 MOST DOGS DO WELL ON RIMADYL EXCEPT THE ONES THAT DIE by Chris Adams

37 REIKI AND DOG RESCUE: FINDING HEALING THROUGH BALANCE by Kathleen Prasad

40 HEARTWORM MEDICATION by Jan Rasmussen

46 PILED HIGH: STACKING THE DECK AGAINST RAW FEEDING by Lynne Parker

48 INTERVIEW WITH DR. JOHN VIRAPEN 50 BORDATELLA: FRAUD AND FALLACY by Dr. Patricia Jordan DVM 52 ASCORBIC ACID IS NOT VITAMIN C by Tim O’Shea DC

60 IS MY DOG TRYING TO DOMINATE ME? by Leonard Cecil

Dogs...Naturally!

Editor in Chief: Erika Phillips

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Dogs...Naturally! July/August 2010

Editorials

Well, the dog days of summer are here! As I type, I am sitting with my dogs huddled up in my office, all of us jostling for the spot closest to the air conditioner. Spending less time outdoors during this heat streak means spending more time with the magazine and that is a good thing. Erika and I have some very big plans that we are putting into place. First, we are going to offer an online learning centre where we will offer courses, chats, lectures and webinars on everything dog. We hope that we can launch this shortly after the release of the July issue. We are also working hard on The PACK Society. One of the reasons we produce this magazine is to bring Natural Health Care to the forefront. This is not an easy task because there is so much power and money behind allopathic medicine and of course, they are reluctant to give up a piece of their pie. The PACK Society is an organization that will bring us together into a unified front so that we fight power with power. We hope that through education, support and unity, pet owners will put more and more pressure on veterinarians to make alternative medicine more accessible.

Our voices need to be heard now more than ever and we speak the loudest when we speak with our pocketbooks. Please sup-port The PACK in any way you can and please let your veterinarian know that we are consumers and that we are free to pur-chase whatever services we deem fit for our dogs. In the meantime, stay cool and enjoy the July issue. Dana Scott Associate Editor/Publisher

Summer has come and brought some scorching heat along with it for you east-ern and southern folks. We on the other hand have had some unusually cold and wet weather for Montana. My dogs are loving it and feel truly grateful for the ex-tended walks and hikes that normally at this time of the year would have them sprawled out throughout the house in front of fans and the A/C. The farm animals are thankful as well.

Time is traveling at break neck speeds and before we know it fall will be here and My family and I will be back on home land in Canada. After 5 fantastic years in Montana, it is daunting to pack up again but deep down we are super excited. The kids and dogs have had some fantastic experiences living in the 'hills'. Being born in Newfoundland, I am thankful for the small community mentality and the friendly, stress free attitude that our little town has but sadly it doesn't offer much for the development of an international project. The behind the scenes work is in place and now it's time to pound the pavement. If we are going to make this publication available to those that really need the infor-mation to help make better decisions for themselves and their pets then we need to be proactive. On my journey back to Canada, I am looking forward to the plans that Dana and I have put into play. We will be promoting The PACK Society ( Peo-ple for the Alternative Care of K-9s) by way of Conferences, Seminars and other education venues. We will working of get-ting Dogs Naturally Magazine into print. We will also be working on a series of books that will compliment the topics in the magazine.

We truly appreciate the support of our subscribers and we look forward to walking the road of change with each and every one of you! We do encourage all of you to express your opinions and pass along your comments. Without our readers, we are but ink on paper!

I would like to congratulate my beautiful baby boy on his high school graduation. I am so proud of you Tanner!

Erika Phillips

Editor-in-Chief


Confinement and Crate Training By: Jean Donaldson SFSPCA Owners are often unsure whether they need to crate-train their puppies or newly adopted dogs or whether to simply confine them in a dog-proofed area during the early weeks or months following adoption. Here is some information to help you decide if crate training is for you. Crate training helps with the following: 1. Housetraining: prompts the dog to hold blad-der and bowels when unsupervised to expedite housetraining 2. Chew-training: prevents the dog from chewing furniture, walls and anything else except the chew toys he is crated with so good habits auto-matically form 3. Settling down: patterns dog to be inactive when alone 4. Owner as good guy: by decimating housetrain-ing and chew-training mistakes, dog partially "self-trains," reducing amount of reprimanding and bad-guy stuff for owner 5. Preparation for possible close confinement: dogs that are used to close confinement are less likely to be stressed when caged during a hospital stay or travel. Chewing and activity management could be ac-complished with a well dog-proofed room or an ex-pen and these are alternatives if the dog is solid in his elimination habits. If the dog is shaky on housetraining, however, you're better off crate-training him as the close confinement will inhibit urination and defecation. To get the crat-ing effect, the crate should be only large enough for the dog to stand up and turn around in. An ex-pen, dog-proofed room or too-large crate allows the dog to use one end as bathroom area and the other end as bed. How To Get Him Used to His Crate You can't just throw the dog in the crate and expect him to adjust. That would be traumatic. Early association is important and, often, indeli-ble. Make the crate comfy with a nice crate pad or blanket*, situate it in a high traffic area like the kitchen and, whenever the dog isn't looking, drop a couple of treats at the back. Don't point these out to him, rather let him discover them on his own. Feed him meals in there, always with the door open. Using heavy string, tie an attractive stuffed chew-toy to the rear inside so that the

dog must lie in the crate in order to chew on it. After a few days of this, start teaching the dog to enter and exit on command. Say "into bed" or "into the crate," throw in a treat, praise as the dog goes in and eats the treat and then order him out with the command of your choice. Encourage him to come out and, when he does, praise him (no food treat for exiting). Repeat this a few times and then change the order of events slightly: instead of throwing the treat into the crate after you say "into bed," wait for him to go in on his own before dropping in the treat. If the dog doesn't enter on command, simply wait. Do not command him a second time and do not crack and throw the treat in. You can encour-age him in with hand gestures but even this is riskier than simply waiting. If he doesn't go in, end the training session without comment. Try another session in a little while, still withholding the reward until the dog goes in on his own. When he does (and they all do eventually so hang in there), give him a double or triple reward, do a few more rewarded reps and then end the ses-sion. Always leave the dog wanting more. When the dog is going in and out on command, you are ready to try the first lock-in. Play the in/out of the crate game, only now close the door after he has gone in and feed him treats through the grate for a minute or two before opening the door. Do this several times. Then practice walking around the crate and around the room while he is locked inside, pitching treats at him occasionally and then, after a couple of minutes, opening the door and letting him out. Make the whole thing a positive experience for him. The next step is to add some real duration. Rent yourself a favorite video and stuff a couple of chew-toys with some-thing extra-special. Set the crate up right next to your comfy movie chair and, just before you sit down to enjoy the movie, order the dog into the crate. When he goes in, give him the chew toys, close the crate door and start the movie. Leave a few times to get pop-corn, a drink, but always come back within a minute or so. The first experience being locked in the crate for this length of time must be an overwhelmingly easy and good one. Any noise, agitation or tantrum from the dog should be ignored. At the end of the movie, if the dog is quiet and settled in the crate, simply open the door and order him out. Under no circumstances will you open the door to the crate if the dog is misbehaving, otherwise you are con-ditioning that behavior. If you do not like it, do not reward it. When you do

open the door, don't gush and hug the dog. Make the exit an anticlimax. Behave very neutrally. All the good stuff should happen while he's IN the crate, behaving nicely. Once he's out, order him right back in for a food treat or two without clos-ing the door before you finish your training/movie session. If he refuses to go in, do whatever it takes to get him in, reward him and get your in/out exercise polished up again. Now spend a few days locking the dog in the crate when you're at home, going about your usual business. Ignore or reprimand any noise and provide interesting crate puzzles (i.e., chew toys) each time. When the dog is going in without fuss and no longer distress vocalizing, you may start leaving the house. Leave for one to ten sec-onds over and over for the first "leaving home" session. Then, over the next few sessions, gradu-ally extend the time you are gone, from a minute to five minutes to ten, fifteen, thirty, an hour, two, three and four hours. Throw in some short ones (5 to 60 seconds) in between to mix it up. Depart and arrive without any fanfare. Tire the dog out with vigorous exercise and training be-fore the longest absences. It is important to gradually condition the dog to being in the crate this way before using it in your day to day life. Later on, if you discover your dog is soiling his crate, the first thing to try is remov-ing the pad or blanket for a week - the porous material may be triggering elimination. Be sure, also, that you are not stretching the dog too long between bathroom trips and forcing him to elimi-nate in his crate. Keep both the dog and the crate scrupulously clean. It would be prudent to have him checked for a bladder infection if he is urinat-ing really often. Finally, a minority of dog are just not inhibited from eliminating by crates or have lost their cleanliness instinct by being confined continuously.


by: Erika Phillips

Juniper Common Juniper – Juniperus communis, also known as Ge-

neva. This small shrub like tree can be found throughout

North America, Europe, Asia, southern Artic, the Himalayas,

Atlas and Caucasus mountains.

Native Americans used juniper for it’s childbearing proper-

ties as Juniper berries promotes uterine recovery after

childbirth. Native Americans also used it to treat infections

and for arthritis.

It was also found by early Americans to be useful for con-

gestive heart failure, eczema and psoriasis. As a tincture it

was used to treat, although disputed, gonorrhea, bladder

and kidney infections, and other genitourinary problems.

Today Juniper is used effectively as an antiseptic, for blad-

der infections, arthritis, intestinal cramps and gout.

Of course the largest use for juniper is the drink “Gin”. Dis-

covered by the Dutch in the 17th century, the word Gin

comes from the word Geniver, the Dutch word for Juniper.

Juniper’s aromatic oil contains the diuretic chemical Ter-

pinenforol, this oil increases the fluid filtering rate of the

kidneys.

Juniper is effective in reducing blood pressure but should

be done under medical supervision because of potentially

harmful side effects.

In animal studies, juniper stimulates uterine contractions

and can be used to replace Oxytocin to expel retained pla-

centas as well as to aid in uterine inertia confirming what

early Americans believed.

Because Juniper is a diuretic, it helps reduce bloating and

premenstrual difficulties.

There are side effects to be aware with juniper. They in-

clude, in high doses, kidney damage, irritation and impair-

ment. Juniper should not be taken for longer than 6 weeks

at a time..

Overdose symptoms include diarrhea, protein in the urine,

pain in the kidney region, elevated blood pressure, purple

urine, blood in the urine, intestinal cramps. Stop using it

right away if you notice any of these symptoms.

It is important to note that Juniper has over 60 species be-

longing to this species and it is possible to mistake the com-

mon juniper to the highly toxic Juniper Sabin L. However

the berries are different in shape.

The most effective way to use Juniper is as an infusion of

dried or fresh crushed berries. 1 cup boiling water to 1 tsp

of the berries.


Waltona Labradors and Papps Dog Training

How did you get involved in obedi-ence?

I was getting ready to show saddleseat and happened to stop at a Collie spe-cialty at the local fairgrounds. What caught my attention was the Utility class. I went home and told my hus-band, Lew, that I didn't want to show horses but wanted a purebred dog to compete with. Lew was working with a lady who had titled a dog to a Compan-ion Dog Excellent title and introduced me to my first trainer (who we later bought the business from!)

Tell us about your first dog(s)

I have had dogs all my life but my first obedience dog was Becca, a field bred black Lab. She was amazing: before she was three years old she had her AKC Utility Dog title and was ranked in the top 20 in Utility for both placements and scores. She was spayed right at six months and ended up totally blowing her ACL and had to have re-constructive surgery on her knee. I still question if having her spayed so early contributed to her pain. Tell us about your current dogs

I currently have two Labradors: a seven year old yellow, Caleb, and a two year old black, Micah. I am currently work-ing on completing Caleb's AKC Obedi-ence Trial Championship. Caleb and I have had so many firsts together: my first High in Trial (he has almost 20), my first High Combined (almost a dozen), my first Utility Dog Excellent, and he will be my first OTCh. He's also been the first dog I've gone to a tourna-ment with: The All-Star Performance Dog Championship where we have placed multiple times. He's also been the first dog I've shown in breed, earn-

ing his UKC Grand-Championship and is pointed towards his AKC Championship with a Best of Breed over Spe-cials. Caleb also has his U-CDX, his Ca-nadian OTCh/UD and numbers Rally titles.

Micah is my silly happy go-lucky boy (where Caleb is Mr. Serious). Micah has just started his career and has com-pleted his AKC Rally Advanced Excellent and will be making his debut at the All-Star Performance Dog Championship this August in Super Rally. I keep telling Micah that he has some big paws to fill. Micah is third generation weaned to raw, with minimum vaccines. Boy is that nice! Why Labradors?

My husband did not grow up with dogs in the house, and was not really sure he wanted dogs, but after a huge fight and my telling him that I would never have married a man who would not have dogs, we began our search. Since I had all ready been to an obedience trial I knew I wanted to compete so I wanted something that I could show. Before I got married I had gotten a mixed Lab that stayed with my Mom and I had already fallen in love with the Lab temperament. We nar-rowed our search to Labs and Goldens and went to meet a Golden breeder. As it turned out it was a show breeder and when he brought his dogs out for us to see, they had tons and tons of long, beautiful coat. We got in the car and Lew said we were getting a Lab, which was what I really wanted all along. Why did you decide to feed raw?

As most pet owners I wanted to do the best for my dogs. Becca ate premium food all her life but she was the type of dog that could have eaten trash and still be healthy. We got our second purebred Lab, and things changed. Tobie started with anal gland problems and through a long process we dis-

covered an allergy to rawhides (during this time I found out they were a prod-uct of the tanning industry not a food producing industry), wheat and corn, and I actually had to cook for him. He was my first Lab on a totally wheat and corn free diet. Then Caleb came and he had chronic ear infections and then he was diagnosed with Pano. A lady that I was training with handed me Bill-inghurst's second book and told me just to read it. As I read it I was hooked! Even Lew said feeding raw makes perfect sense. That was over seven years ago and now I even travel with raw food for my boys.

Do you vaccinate?

Not anymore. I grew up being taught that MD's and DVM's were almost like gods and one must follow everything they say and never question. Becca de-veloped tumors at what I realize now to be the injection site . Tobie had tons and tons of health issues. My vet at the time told me I needed to keep vaccinat-ing, even though Becca was now 16 years old. Really?!

Show and Tell

Susan with Caleb and Micah


I realize a lot of Caleb's early health is-sues were due to being vaccinated while having ear infections. He was almost 3 when I finally got in with a holistic vet that helped me rebuild his immune sys-tem. One of the reasons I began looking into Micah's breeder was because she weaned to raw and did minimum vac-cines. It was one of the hardest steps I have ever taken. It is so against my "teaching" about health care for my pets. But I had already eliminated vac-cines from my personal life so why would I vaccinate my dogs?

What is your greatest accomplish-ment?

Some would say almost having my Obe-dience Trial Championship would be the greatest accomplishment since I own a training center and actively com-pete. But, I must say my greatest ac-complishment is Caleb's. He sired a littler of puppies for Leader Dog for the Blind and now has dogs in harness. One of the puppies that did not make it as a Leader Dog is helping abused children talk about their abuse and will actually sit in the witness stand as they testify against their abusers. They want Caleb back for another donation and plan on including Micah in the program once his OFA's are done.

What are your goals for the fu-ture?

Once Caleb finishes his OTCh I want to get back into tracking. I have never gotten a TD and would like one on both of the boys. This fall Micah should be making his AKC Novice debut. I have been amazed at this boy. The lady I train with thinks he will be able to go right through all three titles and be very competitive at the top levels of obe-dience--and not just the Labradors, but all obedience. He has been a challenge for me but oh do I love that boy! I also know with Caleb being over seven now I am facing his retirement which breaks my heart, but knowing that he's raw fed and minimum vaccines I do expect him to be healthy enough to keep competing for a while.

What advice would you give to peo-ple starting out with Natural Rear-ing?

The thing that helped me the most was having a good mentor who didn't "push things down my throat" but let me read and learn for myself and then was there for me when I had questions. I think now at the train-ing center most of the regular people are feeding raw now and doing mini-mum vaccinating. Also find a good vet that you can work with and talk to. I left a vet because he told me that people who fed raw are killing their dogs and that the next thing that happens is that they stop vacci-nating. I calmly told him that I had been feeding Caleb raw since he was six months old. That was my last visit there. About five years later I had a client come in and ask me about feeding raw and that her vet told her it is a good way to go if you have a good mentor. I thought, "Wow!" and asked who her vet was: it was the one who had told me I was killing my dog by feeding raw! My how things change! What advice would you give to people wanting to get involved with obedience?

Find someone who has trained to ad-vanced levels and has trained multiple dogs. Ask anyone who trains, what might work for one dog might not work for another. You want someone who has multiple tools in the their tool belt.

Most importantly it must be fun for you and your dog. If you and your dog are not having fun (and yes we all have bad days) something has to change. For my boys it's all about having fun, we play in our work.. They fight to get to be the one who gets to "work" first and the other moans and whines waiting their turn. They love to work!

Finally, be able to laugh at yourself and your dog. Have fun! I love obedi-ence. I've done some agility but my heart is obedience. It's only boring if you make it boring! I'm blessed to be able to train myself under one of the top instructors in the nation. When I started you had to be invited to come to their classes. So that means I am still being challenged to grow as a trainer which makes me continue to grow as an instructor.

Susan with Michah

Susan with Caleb


I’d like to tell you about a major campaign that’s taking place over here in the UK. I use the word ‘major’ – but this is more hope than reality at the moment, since it relies upon the support and action of those of us who know what vaccines are doing to our dogs. So … why the campaign? Although we have bodies such as the WSAVA and AAHA saying we don’t need to vaccinate every year, most vets in practice – in the UK at least - are still vaccinating against all the diseases on an an-nual basis. Even though there are vaccines licensed for boosting 3 to 4 years later, they are still using the one-year shots. And of course we all know that even the 3-4 year shots are unnecessary. There are some dog lovers who have wised-up and who won’t allow their vets to vaccinate their friends every year; there are even some ethical vets. But there are still too many peo-ple who are taking it all on trust, and then getting shocked, angry and catapulted into grief when their dogs (and cats, horses, rab-bits..) get a vaccine-associated illness or die. So back in February, we wrote to the British licensing authority, the Veterinary Medicines Directorate, calling for them to take one-year MLV core vaccines off the market. At the same time, Canine Health Concern members wrote to their political representatives to exert pres-sure on the VMD. The VMD responded the DAY BEFORE a gen-eral election was called in the UK, a minute before everyone went home for the day. Par-liament was dissolved, and we were without an acting government until the election was over. Essentially, we were in a position of hav-ing to start again with regards to our political system. The VMD’s response was a ‘position paper on canine vaccination schedules’. It was literally a position paper: “This is how it is, now naff off.” They had totally ignored our call. There-fore, with government blessing, annual vacci-nation continues in the UK (and all over the world, of course). There is some background to this which may interest you. The head of the VMD is a vet called Steve Dean. If you’ve read my book, ‘What Vets Don’t Tell You About Vaccines’, you’ll know that the book starts with a column written by Steve Dean in one of the UK dog papers. This was back in the early 90s, and

Steve was mocking the people who spoke of vaccine reactions in their dogs, and mocking anyone who said we don’t need to vaccinate every year. Then they made him the head of the government vaccine licensing body. Not only that, but it turns out that Steve Dean spent 17 years as a marketing man within the pharmaceutical industry, and then went on to be a pharmaceutical industry consultant. The government knew about his background when they made him head of the official body in the UK that monitors vaccine reactions, licenses vaccine products, and advises government on these matters. Further digging revealed that Steve Dean does-n’t have a hands off approach with the multi-billion industry he legislates. Rather, he speaks at pharmaceutical company seminars and helps them with their press launches. He’s an industry man. On top of this, half of the people at the VMD have consultancy, research grants and shares with the pharmaceutical industry. Turns out that the Veterinary Medicines Direc-torate was set up following recommendations from the chief executive if ICI Pharmaceuticals. It reflected government policy under Margaret Thatcher to effectively deregulate the pharma-ceutical industry and help it to get wealthier. This policy has been continued ever since. And this explains why the British government has successively ignored our calls to halt over-vaccination. I’m pretty sure that the same scenario applies in most countries of the world. For example, in Denmark, dog owners are forced by law to vaccinate their dogs against everything EVERY SIX MONTHS. This isn’t about the science of vaccination – it must be because they can get away with it, or else they are experimenting on our dogs. Apparently the WHO passed a resolution to experiment with vaccines on dogs some years ago. So it seems to me that you and I can keep plug-ging on, year after year, mopping up the casu-alties and hugging the people who grieve the death of their dogs, but nothing much will change – unless we make the whole corrupt system more visible. People need to know that they are being ma-nipulated by governments that don’t care about them and their dogs, but do care about industry, commerce, profits and power. We need to make the REASON why our dogs are being over-vaccinated more visible. People need to know that their vets are also being manipulated. They are educated in col-

leges that take money from pharmaceutical companies. They are stalked by the pharma-ceutical industry both in college and out of college. The pharmaceutical industry is throw-ing money everywhere. Pet charities, veteri-nary further education, vet seminars, political parties …. Everywhere that helps them sell more unnecessary product. There will be many on this list who understand that apathy is our greatest enemy. You will talk to dog owners and tell them the truth about vaccines and pet food, and their eyes will glaze over and they won’t hear you. We need to somehow find a way to turn apathy into action. I need you to go up to this website – www.petvaccine.weebly.com – and download the 369-page report I’ve written. Read it. It explains the science of vaccine damage, and it explains why annual vaccination continues. This is, in effect, a free book. Use the knowl-edge in the two-part report to open up the minds of dog lovers whose minds are currently closed. Importantly, if you are in the UK, please write to your MP. If you are outside the UK, please write to the UK’s Chief Veterinary Officer. We have put letter templates on the site, plus the addresses of the people you need to write to. Make it clear to the British government that the world is watching, and the world knows what is happening. Let them know that we don’t appreciate them selling our pets out. So – please go to the site and help expose the truth. I for one am fed up banging the drum day after day, year after year, with very little changing. It’s time to nail this one for good. Maybe if we are successful in the UK, then the light of truth will shine around the world. Typically, in any appeal, one person in a hun-dred will act. Let’s change this. Do something. Share this information with every dog lover you know, and on every list you are on. (There is a 10-page summary of the report that you can forward on to your dog-loving friends – it’s up on www.petvaccine.weebly.com. You can also forward the actual report, or the link, to your vets, dog-loving friends and anyone else you think might be interested. There’s a press release up there, too – so if you have contacts with any of the dog magazines, please feel free to send it on.) Lots of love...Catherine O’Driscoll


PULSATILLA

~ Wind Flower or Prairie Crocus

by: Erika Phillips

The mind, personality, disposition and mental state are the chief guiding symptoms to the selection of Pulsatilla. It is gen-erally a female remedy as is Nux Vomica for men but should not be ruled out in male children or animal patients, especially for mild, gentle, yielding dispositions.

Sad, crying readily; weeps when talking; Dogs that whine and want to be with you at all times. Does not want to be alone. Separation anxiety. Another interesting aspect of Pulsatilla is that the symptoms are changeable and contradictory. The pa-tient seeks the open air; always feels better there, even though he/she is chilly. Mucous membranes are all affected. Discharges thick, bland, and yellowish-green. Often indicated after abuse of Iron tonics, and after badly managed measles.

Symptoms are ever changing. thirstless, peevish and chilly. When first serious impairment of health is noted at the age of puberty. Great sensitivity. Wants the head held high. Lies with hands above head, outstretched, Dogs lie with forearms ex-tended above the head or outstretched and stiff. It is very good for mothers who reject their newborns at birth, failing to nurse. An excellent remedy to be considered for the early stages of pyometra when the discharge is white/yellow and even green and when the bitch is clingy and depressed. Also useful for false pregnancy and split seasons.

Stool can change between being bland and watery to slimy green, yellow, white “No two stools are alike”.

Better with open air, motion, cold applications, cold food and drinks, though not thirsty, walking slowly, elevating feet when lying down.

Worse from heat, rich fat food, after eating, towards evening, warm room, lying on left or on painless side, when allowing feet to hang down, does not tolerate eggs, thunderstorms, pregnancy, sun, twilight. Flannel and wool clothing.

Complementary: Coffee; Chamomile, Nux Vomica.

Higher potency seems to work more effectively than lower potency and that could be simply because of the strong psy-chology and mental picture of the remedy.

SUMMARY

Diarrhea can change between being white to Green or Yellow Discharge is bland, clear to greenish yellow Whiny, weepy, clingy (separation anxiety) Fear of thunderstorms Better with cold air, aggravated by heat Pains travel from one location to the next Irritability Irregular menstruation, false pregnancy, split seasons Cramping Irritation to flannel/wool Dry mouth with no thirst Constipation – large hard to pass stool Kennel cough—Upper respiratory infections Depression Measles Backache, headache, earaches

the


by: Ellen Kohn

It began in 2002 with a trip to Grand Ba-hama Island in the Bahamas. The backdrop was dreamy: turquoise waters, balmy weather and lush tropical beaches with white sand and gorgeous vegetation. To top it off, the quick 30 minute plane ride to Freeport from Flor-ida landed me in a foreign country! Re-

minders of the formal British colony were everywhere, including driving on the left side of the road. What fun it was! As we drove west from Freeport to West End, a boaters’ and fisherman’s haven, these beautiful visuals were quickly inter-rupted by scenes of third world type pov-erty. Broken down homes, old cars, rub-

bish and a lack of cleanliness were all around. Children dressed in school uni-forms ambled about the streets, return-ing home to sparsely furnished rooms overflowing with many siblings and rela-tives. The situation was abysmal for the ani-mals. Roaming the streets searching for


scraps of food, the street dogs were eve-rywhere. These potcakes, named after the leftover rice cake from the traditional Bahamian peas and rice dish, were starv-ing, sick and abandoned. Litters of pup-pies lived under the houses, and were left completely on their own. Never had I seen so many starving, sick and abandoned dogs and cats in my life. Every time I rode a bike or walked into the village, I saw feral strays digging in the trash or cruising dangerously next to the road. Puppies were everywhere, and they also ventured near the cars. Many were killed, only to be left there to rot. The facts relating to animal control on Grand Bahama are sobering. There is no animal control agency; the only or-ganization that deals with feral pot-cakes is The Humane Society of Grand Bahama in Freeport. It is difficult to get a van to leave Freeport and drive all the way out to West End to take the dogs to the shelter. Moreover, many feral pot-cakes are so wild that they can never trust a human, or be rehabilitated. The last, chilling fact about Grand Baha-mas' animals was that the shelter was a high-kill facility, with a 95% euthanasia rate. The advent of the hurricanes ag-gravated an existing problem; by 2005 more animals than ever were put to sleep. Deeply moved to do something, I con-tacted the Manager of the Humane Society of Grand Bahama, Tip Burrows. I explained that I wanted to help, that visiting her country with its animal problems was emotionally draining for me. I felt a sense of urgency to give back to these gentle canines, and ease their plight. The good news was that I had already started a 501(c) (3) non-profit in Colo-rado to help West End youth with col-lege funding two years earlier in 2002. That enabled me to wrap the animal welfare efforts into an existing organi-zation: The Kohn Foundation. We called our new offspring BARC for the Baha-mian Animal Rescue Committee.

This was the beginning of a very power-ful partnership with The Kohn Founda-tion/BARC and The Humane Society. Now our animal welfare efforts had an official title and role in the non-profit. It was a bit daunting to start completely from scratch, but the effort garnered its own momentum. I asked everyone I knew to send them money. Little by little funds came in and then it began to explode. Our grassroots organization was making progress. We were making a difference in the lives of

Grand Bahamas' potcakes, and it felt great. In 2007, The Kohn Foundation helped raise money for the first major spay/neuter initiative on Grand Bahama. Over 18 veterinarians and techs paid their way and donated their vacation time to per-form surgery. The result was more than 300 sterilizations in a week, with addi-tional amputations and emergency sur-geries.


Since 2007, The Kohn Foundation has helped fund four more spay/neuter clin-ics. Each time, we have been able to pay for all of the medical and surgical sup-plies needed to perform these clinics, now being held even in the more rural areas of Grand Bahama. The overpopula-tion problem has definitely been curbed. In spite of the tremendous success of these clinics, the overpopulation prob-lem still has a foothold in Bahamian soci-ety due to the belief system inherent in their culture. Because they really do not support spay/neuter, education still re-mains a challenge in our process. But we are determined to continue the work in spite of the roadblocks. Another huge part of our work on Grand Bahama involves raising money to fund puppy lifts from the Freeport Humane Society shelter to the U.S. In April, 2010, 88 dogs and puppies were airlifted via a cargo flight to Ft. Lauderdale, and then rerouted to other no-kill shelters in Flor-ida, Washington, D.C., Ithaca, New York City, Albuquerque, Denver, and Boston. With the cooperation of Delta Airlines, all of the dogs arrived safely and in great condition. All of them have already found their forever homes across the country. Looking back at the last seven years, es-tablishing The Kohn Foundation was one of the most exciting adventures I have ever embarked on. In my wildest

dreams, I would not have imagined that rescuing Bahamian potcakes would bring deep satisfaction in my life and nourish-ment for my soul. This journey has enabled me to look deeper into another culture. When given the opportunity, I have explained to young people that there is nothing mer-ciful about euthanizing healthy puppies, and that it is preventable!!

Explaining that dogs need to eat nutri-tiously to maintain proper health is an-other surprise to the Bahamians. The youth are open to learning, and many of them have departed from the ways of old, now caring deeply for their pets. Would I do it again? You bet. It has changed my life forever, introducing me to people who would give their last dol-lar to save a life. It is worth all of the an-guish and sadness that I felt in the begin-ning to know that one person can make a difference in this world. Most of all, it demonstrates to all of us that we are connected, that each time we give, we receive and that even the smallest effort can blossom into a beautiful outcome. Ellen Kohn is an Interspecies Communica-

tor, Healing Touch for Animals Certified Prac-

titioner (HTACP), Reiki Master-Teacher, Me-

ridian Practitioner and Spiritual Counselor.

She frequently uses Bach Flower and Alaskan

Gem essences for her clients. She is also a

certified aroma therapist and uses crystal

energy for her healing work. She is the foun-

der of The Kohn Foundation, a Colorado 501

(c) (3) non-profit which helps children and

animals on Grand Bahama Island, The Baha-

mas. Visit Ellen on the web:

www.EnlightenedAnimals.com.


by: Laura Boston

This article appeared in Barkleigh/Canadian Groomer Magazine. This article is copyright and may not be reproduced without permission by Laura Boston

Shampoo is one of the key tools of a professional dog groomer. They expect shampoos to clean the dogs and leave them smelling nice. The key cleaning action in shampoos is done by surfactants. Surfactants, or surface active agents, can be of synthetic origin, an example being sodium lauryl sulfate; animal origin, such as tallow; or natural plant origin, like coconut oil or palm kernel oil. Shampoos may contain a blend of surfactants to create various properties such as lather-ing and cleansing. The molecules in the surfactants contain two chemical groups; one group is attracted to soils and the other to water. In simple terms the mole-cules work together to break down dirt from the sur-face of the hair shaft and scalp and remove it.

Many of the chemical surfactants in dog shampoos are petroleum based and are known carcinogens, sub-stances known to cause cancer. Some carcinogens may cause cancer only after prolonged high levels of exposure. If groomers don’t wear gloves these chemi-cals are ingested through their skin every time they shampoo a dog. A better option is to choose a sham-poo that uses natural surfactants and non-toxic, natu-ral ingredients.

Different shampoo formulations can have different results on a dog’s coat. Shampoos are marketed as anti-itch, brightening, tearless, conditioning, anti-dandruff, flea and tick, medicated, hypoallergenic, and so on.

Many shampoos contain harsh detergents that actually strip all of the coat’s oils leaving a fluffy looking coat. Other shampoos that claim to be “moisturizing” may contain chemical additives such as propylene glycol, which is a cosmetic form of mineral oil and works as a humescent, which creates retention of moisture. This chemical is also a skin irritant, can cause liver and kidney damage and is also found in paint, wallpaper removers and de-greasers. “Tar” which is in tar-based

dandruff shampoos, is one of the first known human carcinogens. As tar is also found in all artificial colors, flavors and odors, it is best to stay away from using any shampoo containing artificial dyes or fragrances. Many perfumes that are added to shampoos are made with ethyl alcohol and synthetic chemicals. Perfumes can dry out the coat and trigger allergies in both dogs as well as humans. Some groomers even use dish deter-gent to wash their client’s dogs. These detergents are labeled as “mild” yet when you do a little research and read the “material safety data”, the specifics say, “Avoid skin contact as this strong skin irritant can cause dryness, is an eye irritant and if spilled on clothes, change clothes”. Many “tearless” shampoos use chemicals to counter-act and reduce irritation caused by other chemical ingredients, but these too may be carcinogenic in nature.

Ultimately you simply want a shampoo that gently cleans without stripping the coat’s natural sedum but for special needs there are good, healthy alternatives. A good, basic all-purpose dog shampoo should be ph balanced for a dog’s coat, be made with natural and organic ingredients, have low lather and smell great. Look for shampoos that use essential oils. Essential oils nourish the dog’s coat leaving it clean and shiny and come in a wonderful variety of scents such as lavender, tea tree, rosehip, lemon and geranium.

There are plenty of dog shampoos on the market now that offer skin treatments using natural ingredients. If a dog’s coat needs special treatment for dryness or itching, a natural shampoo containing oatmeal and aloe vera may be used; shampoos containing essential oils of rosemary, neem and tea tree help prevent dandruff; tea tree and pennyroyal shampoos are good anti-bacterial and flea repellants; lavender and calen-dula calm and sooth the skin. Natural oils such as jojoba, macadamia oil or safflower oil all naturally condition the dog’s coat leaving it soft and silky. These treatment shampoos are best left on the coat for up to ten minutes in order to allow the ingredients to pene-trate thoroughly.

Allergies have become quite common in dogs. An allergy is “ a hypersensitivity acquired through expo-sure to a particular substance (allergen)”. Pollen,

foods, and chemicals can trigger allergic reactions in dogs. The body reacts by releasing chemicals that result in allergic symptoms such as rashes and dry, itchy skin. Dogs absorb a lot of allergens through their skin. One way to alleviate allergy symptoms is to wash the dog frequently with a hypoallergenic shampoo. These shampoos are specifically formulated with ingre-dients that have little likelihood of causing an allergic reaction. This does not mean that the dogs will not react to these shampoos whether or not they are made with all natural ingredients or chemical based ingredients. Ingredients that are likely to cause allergic reactions that may be listed in hypoallergenic (and other) shampoos are mineral oil, methyl paraben and propyl paraben. These ingredients can cause hypersen-sitivity and are linked to long-term health problems.

My favourite way to apply dog shampoo is with a squeeze bottle that fits comfortably into the hand. This method is fast, easy and allows the shampoo to pene-trate close to the skin. Mix your favorite professional concentrate shampoo with lukewarm water. Start at the base of head and neck and squirt the shampoo mixture into the dog’s coat. As you work your way down the back and the rest of the body, your other hand is free to massage the shampoo into the dog’s coat.

When choosing your shampoo remember to read the ingredients. Familiarize yourself with ingredients that are known to cause serious health problems in hu-mans. Choosing a shampoo with healthy, natural and organic ingredients may cost a little more but in the long run the benefits are worth it for you and the dogs!

Laura Boston is President of Animal Sense Pet Prod-ucts Inc., a privately owned Canadian pet product company specializing in organic pet foods and eco-friendly pet products. Heavenly Organic™ is a line of 100% chemical free dog shampoos and spa products that that are now available for your four legged and furry-faced friends.

www.animalsensepetproducts.com [email protected]

905-886-6975


Here is a picture of Edward O’Driscoll, with little Georgie in the background. The photo was taken in June, the day before Edward passed over to the Great Mystery. As they say, every pic-ture tells a story. Here is Edward’s story and, later, Georgie’s story. Edward was the most perfect dog in the whole universe. I don’t want to start a fight here, but it’s true: Edward was the perfect companion and the perfect teacher. There simply couldn’t be a greater dog. Edward came into my life thirteen years ago, and he lost no time in alert-ing me to the fact that he was a Master Dog. He did this, perversely, by peeing on all the dog beds in the house, and escalating the campaign to my own bed. In those days I didn’t know I could communicate with animals, so I tele-phoned a medical intuitive friend to

ask why he was doing that, and what I could do about it (I have never really followed the conventional training norm). “He’s upset because you haven’t ac-knowledged that he’s a Master,” my intuitive friend said. I did of course know his status; I just hadn’t thought to tell him I knew. So I went to Edward and apologised. He never peed on the beds again. I shouted at Edward once. He was still a puppy at the time, and he adored old Chappie. He used to sit in front of Chaps and suck up to him so Chappie would bark loudly and tell him to go away. One evening I couldn’t hear myself speak on the phone, so I shouted at Edward in exasperation. Edward went into the garden and stayed there for two hours until I went

out and apologised. I never shouted at him again. I never actually needed to – he was the perfect companion. If using Edward as a measure, everyone would have believed that I was the most tal-ented dog trainer in the world. The thing is, he was intelligent and he was happy to live in harmony. His perfec-tion had very little to do with me. Edward was introduced to chicken wings far earlier than I had intended – on the day I brought him home from the breeder’s. She had insisted that I change him over to raw gradually, for fear of upsetting his stomach. So, duti-fully, I mixed the Eukanuba with scrambled eggs and took it into the beautifully sunny garden for him. He, being a Master, naturally turned his nose up and refused to eat it. A little later, I took the older dogs’ chicken wings out for them. (For any-one who thinks we are in charge of the dogs, consider this: who is the one who works to buy the food and then does the washing up afterwards?) Anyhow, Edward jumped into Chappie’s bowl and wolfed down five whole chicken wings. I could not stop him, and I was slightly alarmed. That night, my tiny little puppy lay on the bed panting so frantically that the entire bed shook. I thought that per-haps I had killed my puppy with all those bones. But we went to the gar-den and Edward peed, and then we went back to bed and back to sleep. From that day onwards, Edward was often called ‘Mr Bones’, and he grew into a strong and handsome man. Be-fore the vet helped Edward to leave last week, we took him for a walk and gave him his last five wings. He loved his food to the end.


‘Intelligence’, ‘enthusiasm’ and ‘companion’ are words which sum Ed-ward up. We talked with each other all of the time; he was one of those dogs who was everywhere we were, in the middle of the action and directing events. One of his specialities was in dealing with people who didn’t like dogs. He had a way of demonstrating to them that dogs aren’t just dogs – they are people. He also had a way of showing them that they weren’t just humans – they were beings of light who were worthy of great love.

When my husband Rob and I got to-gether, Edward quickly showed him that Golden Retrievers are just as won-derful as the German Shepherds that Rob was used to. Edward soon became Rob’s best friend, and accompanied him into the garden to play football and to help Rob with the gardening. Ed-ward was the sort of dog who thought everything was fun; he’d turn the mun-dane into the happiest adventure. Rob and I were on our way home from teaching an Animal Communicating and EFT course a few summers ago, when we had a call from Rob’s Mum. Mum had been doggie sitting for us. So we were driving home, and the cell phone rang. Mum had fallen in the gar-den and knocked herself out. She was naturally shaken, but she was also in awe. Apparently, she was lying uncon-scious on the lawn and, as she came round, she felt Edward licking her face. There was blood everywhere, and Ed-ward was cleaning her up and resusci-tating her. Too frightened to stand up lest she lose her balance again, Mum got herself back indoors by shuffling on her bot-

tom. Edward went with her all the way, keeping her going, tending to her lovingly, kissing her face. Mum sent Edward a thank you card. It may not have meant much to him – dogs don’t read cards after all – but it meant the world to Mum. She felt that Edward had saved her life. He may have been ‘just a dog’ but I’m certain that he felt the love and gratitude com-ing his way. I read somewhere that a dog’s memory extends to only ten minutes. I don’t know the name of the twit who wrote that, but he was surely wrong. During our next weekend trip, Edward refused to go into the garden unless Mum was with him, and when she did go out, he escorted her at every step. He was a kind and loving dog, a healer, and his will was set upon ensuring Mum’s safety. I also had deep respect for the way Ed-ward dealt with other dogs. Rob, Ed-ward and I had a hard year last year. Dannie and Gwinnie died, and we were all heartbroken. So we decided to bring someone else into the house who we could love and care for. This was Georgie, a tiny Papillion who, we were

told, didn’t like men and who bit. It soon became apparent that this wasn’t a behavioural problem, though. Geor-gie has a form of epilepsy. The world is a confusing place for him, so if you put your hand out to him or touch him, he trips into a spin and snarls and attacks himself. I feel so sorry for the people who rehomed him, who just thought he was a bad boy. He is, in reality, an ab-solute joy, and incredibly worthy of love. For the first weeks of living with Geor-gie, we wondered what on earth we were going to do. We couldn’t touch him. We couldn’t cuddle or stroke him; we couldn’t get a lead on without trig-gering an episode. If we did get it on, we couldn’t get it off. How were we going to care for him? How could we expect a vet to sew up a cut paw, or take blood, or feel him for lumps? But Edward didn’t mind. He treated Georgie like a normal dog, and made him feel safe. He wasn’t frightened of being bitten, either. He just went in there and let George know it was safe to be near him, and he ignored it if the little man went into a spin. Edward also stood and shared our emotions

Freddie and Ruby

“There is a deep wisdom in the animal kingdom that you can

tune into if you have the humil-ity to listen. If you think they’re

just animals who ought to follow our commands, think again. If

you listen to a dog, they can tell you how to grow and evolve as a

human being. “


when, for the first time – after weeks of gentle reassurance and gradual incre-mental improvements - Rob was able to sit down next to Georgie and brush him and stroke him. Rob and I had tears running down our cheeks, watch-ing this little man enjoying being touched in what must have been the first time in years. Georgie, a tiny little fellow, was vacci-nated annually until he was five, before he came to us. At the same time he was wormed and given a topical flea treat-ment. The shots he received were the exact same dose as might be given to a Pyrenean Mountain Dog. Vaccines can cause brain damage, and they can cause epilepsy, and studies indicate that little dogs fare the worse than big dogs from unnecessary shots. And his owners thought they were doing the right thing for him. We treated Georgie for vaccine dam-age. He had the canine combination nosode and a variety of homoeopathic remedies for epilepsy. He was changed to the raw diet, and fish oils (which improve brain function) were given daily. So when the new puppies arrived just a few weeks ago, we saw with relief that our worries were unfounded. Georgie loves the pups and wants to be with them, so long as they refrain from jumping on him. Every morning, now Edward is gone, Georgie goes down-stairs to where the puppies sleep until they’re housetrained, and checks that they’re OK. Wherever they are, he wants to be with them. When he first came to us, he was a frightened little man, but because we were aware of the effects of unnecessary vaccines, we were able to treat him appropriately and help him back. Edward, before he left, had a few weeks to teach the puppies Freddie and Ruby how to behave with other dogs. He taught them about bounda-ries. He waited until Rob and I were set up again with puppies to love, and then he succumbed to the grief that had caused his broken heart, and went off to be with Gwinnie and Dannie again.

Edward was thirteen years old, too young to die. He had never been vacci-nated, he ate raw food, and he was never subjected to conventional drugs. Until a year ago, he was the healthiest of dogs. He was never ill. Never. It seems to me that we mortal humans can do everything right. We can give our dogs the very best food and protect them from the very worst pharmaceu-ticals and chemicals. But we are not God, and our dogs have their own agendas. They, like us, come to this earth with missions to accomplish, and when the mission is completed, they, of their own choice, decide when to de-part. I have a feeling that Edward has just gone for a little while. He’s de-parted briefly so he can come back in a new body. I hope so, anyway.

Unless you’ve had a relationship with a dog, you can be forgiven for thinking that they’re just hairy things with waggy tails. They jump around and bark a lot – but they’re just animals, you might think, and they leave muddy footprints on the carpet and hairs on the sofa. Yet many of the most poignant and ten-der moments in my life, the most meaningful and spiritual moments, have been with dogs. If you doubt this, wait until you hold your friend’s paw as they die, and they thank you. There is a deep wisdom in the animal kingdom that you can tune into if you have the humility to listen. If you think they’re just animals who ought to follow our commands, think again. If you listen to a dog, they can tell you how to grow and evolve as a human being. Our dogs are concerned with our physical wellbeing, our emotional wellbeing, and our spiritual wellbeing. They can teach us how to love one-another, respect one-another, and cherish one-another. They can teach us about boundaries. They can teach us how to have fun. They can teach us that human beings are not superior to them; just different. They give us hu-mility, and they can fill our hearts with gratitude and joy.

They can also break our hearts when they leave – but I think they know that, if we can find a way to heal our broken hearts, love will become a conscious act rather than an indulgent feeling. They can set our feet upon the healer’s path, which is born of sorrow and the search for truth and life. Catherine O’Driscoll has been running Canine Health Concern since 1994. In June this year, she spearheaded a cam-paign to forcefully persuade the British government to put an end to the normal practice of annually vaccinating dogs in the UK. To support this campaign, she has written a 369-page response to the UK’s licensing body, the Veterinary Medi-cines Directorate. This report is available free by logging onto www.petvaccine.weebly.com. It contains the science to explain why vaccines cause so many diverse adverse effects in our dogs, and also explains why governments around the world will not legislate to halt unnecessary vaccination. Catherine also asks her fellow dog lovers to write to the British government to lend their voices to the campaign. Contacts and template letters for you to send are also carried on the site.

Catherine and Edward


by: Jean Donaldson

Dear Jean, I just got a new nine week-old Rottie puppy. He’s stunning, smart and generally friendly but growls and snaps if I go near him while he’s eat-ing. He also does this to my adult Rotties. I’ve never seen this in a puppy so young. Is he some sort of lemon? Is he a dominant dog? Is there anything I can do? Help!

It is indeed alarming for most people to see frank aggression in puppies. In the case of resource guarding – food, bone, bed etc. possessiveness – there is good news and bad news. The good news is you can start addressing it in a young, hopefully plastic, spongy puppy with weak jaws. The bad news is that there is some sentiment out there among trainers that aggres-sion in puppies is an insidious sign of the problem having Deep Genetic Roots and therefore fruitless to tackle. I’m going to explore the whole nature-nurture debate later but for now will simply say that there doesn’t seem to be any overwhelmingly tidy correlation between behavior problems that are thought to have a strong genetic component and their susceptibility (or lack thereof) to behavior modification. I recently had a similar case, in my own foster puppy. Buffy, a stray six week-old Chow, presented with object and food guarding against people and dogs. I elected to not touch the dog-dog issues, which is a relatively common approach. Her socialization and play skills were coming along nicely and she was developing good acquired bite inhibition. The guarding against people, however, needed to be actively resolved. The following is a summary of Buffy’s food guarding exercise re-gime. Incidentally, Buffy also presented with socialization defi-cits and severe body handling problems, which were also ad-dressed, as was her object guarding. The key to good hierarchy design is small enough incremental steps that at no point do you see the original guarding problem. In the case of a puppy, such as this, there may actually be more aggressive increment jumps. I did a few other things in the can’t-hurt-might-help category. These included impulse control (stay, off and wait) and extra soft-mouth training.

Baseline When approached while eating from her dish, Buffy would freeze and, if approach continued, growl briefly and then lunge and snap. If touched while eating, she would growl simultaneous to whirling and biting. Due to the independent body-handling problem, this had to be partly resolved prior to combining it with food bowl exercises. Buffy did not guard an empty dish. Hierarchy Step 1 (day 1): Installment feeding of canned food. I sat on the floor next to Buffy’s dish and spooned in one mouthful. Once she had swallowed, I spooned the next mouthful into her dish. By the end of the second meal, she demonstrated a clear happy anticipatory orientation to my spoon hand after each swallow. Step 2 (day 1-2): Overlap. This was essentially the same as Step 1 except that I added the next spoonful to her dish while she was still consuming, always a much dicier proposition. We did this for three meals without evidence of guarding seen. Step 3 (day 2-3): Approach overlap. I was now standing. I spooned larger installments, withdrew two paces, re-approached and added the next spoonful while Buffy was still consuming. So, this combined approach with the overlap exer-cise. We stuck with this for three meals, at end of which time a Conditioned Emotional Response (CER) had become evident – Buffy wagged and looked up on approach. We then repeated the exercise for one more day (5 small meals) with larger with-drawal distances and intervals. Step 4 (day 4): Trumping. Now I spooned her entire puppy-sized ration into her bowl. I withdrew five paces, paused 15 seconds, approached and added a (hidden) marble-sized dol-lop of goat cheese. I had pre-auditioned the goat cheese out of context and ascertained it to be in Buffy’s Top Five All Time Foods. I withdrew to six paces and waited for Buffy to continue to consume – this was not immediate (typical of trumping – dog orients to handler rather than back to dish) – then re-peated. On the third trial I got a clear CER– withdrawal from bowl on approach, orientation to me and tail wag. Clever little thing. Step 5 (day 4-6): Covering High Value Base. To up the ante, I tried some approaches while she was consuming a top food (bowl of treats), rather than normal meal ration level food. I trumped it with higher value stuff (gorgonzola). In two trials, I


once again saw her happy anticipatory CER, a very rapid curve indeed. Step 6 (day 4 onward): Cold Trials. To better simulate real life, I initiated random trumping. At least once per meal, from a random direction, at a random time and with one of Buffy’s top foods, I approached and added the bonus. Bet-ter than 80% of the time, I got an evident “yippee” CER. At no point did she guard. Step 7 (day 8 onward): Generalization. I re-cruited my husband, colleagues in my office and a neighbor to do some random trumps, with careful monitoring for any evidence of regres-sion, including the absence of “yippee” CERs to their approach. Had this been an adult dog, the hierarchy – and, notably, a much more gradual one too – would have been recommenced at the beginning by each new recruit, with likely accel-erated progress rate for each successive person. Step 8 (day 15 onward): Body Handling. It was only here that I commenced patting, grabbing or pushing her around while she was eating. In most cases this would come earlier (prior to cold trails), however with Buffy it took me this long to get the independent body-handling problem up to speed. The handling during eating exercise consisted of the body touch (later handling) fol-lowed by a trumping addition, repeated until the body touch/handling elicited the “yippee” CER. Buffy’s CER consisted of a wag as well as orien-tation to my hand. If I stored the bonus in my other hand behind my back or my pocket and reached with a blank hand, she would wag and orient to my face. Buffy is now on maintenance with a cold trump-ing or body handling trial usually once per meal and use of other people whenever an opportu-nity presents itself. I ended up adopting her. You can throw in bowl removals if you like, rather than sticking with approaches and body handling. The principles are the same. Good luck with your Rottie!

© Jean Donaldson, all rights reserved

Jean Donaldson is a native of Montreal, Canada. A graduate of McGill, Jean holds degrees in Music and Comparative Psychology. In 1996 James & Kenneth Publishers published Jean's first book, The Culture Clash, which has won numerous awards, including The Dog Writer's Association of America's Maxwell Award for the best training

and behavior book of the year. Since its publication, The Culture Clash has been the number one recommendation for dog trainers of The Association of Pet Dog Trainers (APDT) each year it has had a recom mended reading list. Her other books include the multiple award- winning MINE! A Guide to Resource Guarding in Dogs, Fight! A Guide to Dog-Dog Aggression, and the newly released Oh Behave! Dogs From Pavlov to Premack to Pinker. She has also recently authored a DVD on basic obedience, Perfect Paws in Five Days. In 1999 she founded The Academy for Dog Trainers at The San Fran-cisco SPCA, which has gained a reputation as the Harvard for dog trainers. Jean is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in Evolutionary Biology. She lives in the San Francisco Bay area with her Chow, Buffy, adopted from The San Francisco SPCA in 2002, and currently the only Chow registered with the North American Flyball Association.

Vic Neumann


By: Michael W. Fox BVetMed, PhD, DSc, MRCVS

PART II

Herbicides and Digestive Sys-

tem Bacterial Health

It is not widely understood that the diges-tive tract is not simply an organ system designed for the assimilation of food. It is our primary organ of defence against po-tentially harmful food and water-born tox-ins, viruses, bacteria, and other potentially harmful organisms. Integral to this lym-phatic-intestinal defence system is the population of intestinal ‘flora’---bacteria and other micro organisms -- that are sym-biotic, having a symbiogenetic relationship with the cells of the gut that recognize them immunologically as eubiotic enteric residents (i.e. helpful resident organisms). This is an adaptive response because these enteric bacteria act as a defence against invasive organisms, and provide the cells with various nutrients essential to the health and functional integrity of the rest of the body, much as the mycorrhyza do around the roots of plants. Agrichemicals, especially the herbicide residues in GM crops and their even more toxic breakdown products, when digested by humans and their pets, could cause a host of health problems if the normal gut flora is harmed. If this healthy, disease- preventing, nutrition-providing, and im-mune system-supporting population of symbiotic bacteria in the intestines is dis-rupted, nutritional deficiencies, overwhelm-

ing bacterial infection (Clostridia in dogs, for example), increased susceptibility to ‘allergies’, and other neuroendocrine and metabolic changes may ensue. These health problems have been linked in recent re-search to imbalances in the intestinal bacte-rial population where some species of bac-teria come to dominate. This condition of dysbiosis is compounded by the over-prescribing by doctors of anti-biotics and their wholesale use in livestock feed. What we have done to our digestive system bacterial flora and to that of our companion animals mirrors what we have done to the life of the soil. The most widely used herbicides sprayed on GM (genetically modified or engi-neered) herbicide-resistant cotton, corn, soybean and canola, such as Monsanto’s Roundup (glyphosate) and Bayer’s Ignite (glufosinate), can also have toxic effects on the body. Glyphosate may be an endocrine disruptor, and in test animals has caused elevation of some liver enzymes and cal-cium oxalate crystals to form in the urine, along with inflammatory changes in the kidneys and lower urinary tract. Glufosi-nate can inhibit glutamine uptake. Defi-ciency of this amino acid is linked with bowel/digestive problems, impaired im-mune function, and possibly obesity due to increased appetite. It may be no coinci-dence that glutamine is widely prescribed for pets with ‘leaky gut’ syndrome and in-flammatory bowel disease, and probiotics and prebiotics (like inulin and oligofruc-tose) prescribed to help animals with aller-gies and other related health problems.

Dysfunctional Agriculture, Haz-ardous Foods We should not be surprised that there are so many nutrition-related health problems when we look at the soil that is used to produce food commodities that are not organically certified. As one California farmer told me some thirty years ago, ‘Farmers today just use the soil to prop up their plants. Then they pour on the chemical fertilizers that they must, because they killed the soil with pesticides.” Petro-chemical-based agriculture has made our life-sustaining soil deficient in micro organ-isms that provide vital nutrients to the plants---and so our staple foods are also nutrient-deficient, especially in essential trace minerals and antioxidants like magne-sium, zinc, and selenium.

Dead soil means no food without chemical fertilizers, herbicides, nematodicides, fungi-cides, insecticides, agricultural biotechnol-ogy’s genetically engineered, cloned, and patented ‘improved’ varieties of crops and animals, with a frosting of USDA- & FDA-regulated food irradiation. While denying that Mad Cow Disease could be an en-demic problem in US cattle, it is notable that the FDA prohibited the inclusion of brain and spinal chord in pet foods (the primary source of prions responsible for this neurological disease in cattle, pets and people), soon after the exposé of ‘downer cow’ cruelty at a California cattle handling and slaughter plant in early 2008. Studies have shown that crops from or-ganically certified producers, along with the


meat and milk from farmed animals fed organic feed and allowed to graze on or-ganically improved soils, contain far more essential nutrients than conventionally produced foods**. And they suffer from far fewer viral and bacterial diseases which pose a serious public health concern today because of the intensive, concentrated animal production systems of the poultry, dairy and meat industry’s ‘factory farms.’ The billions of pounds of offal that is recy-cled into pet food and farm animal feed is the bedrock of the main stream pet food industry. But it is a hazardous waste. Bacte-rial contamination, as with Salmonella, can be so difficult to control that Mars Pet care decided to permanently close one of its pet food manufacturing facilities in Everson, Pa in 2008 because the entire plant could not be effectively sanitized. There had been repeated recalls of contaminated dry dog and cat food, associated with nearly 80 reported cases of human illness. Another form of offal is termed "by-products" which are presumed heavily contaminated with harmful bacteria, and is therefore subjected to high temperature and pressure sterilization and then slow cooking to evaporate off all moisture. The resultant solid is ground into a meal of essentially heat-denatured protein of little nutritive value. It loses more amino acids by evaporation, and others by cross- linkage into an indigestible product. Beef by-products have less protein than chicken by-products, and the actual digestible pro-tein is significantly lower than the calcu-lated ‘protein’ content of the manufactured foods. Time for Change There is already a rush-to-market special and expensive, prescribed diets to help obese pets lose weight, along with an ap-proved prescription-only diet pill for obese pets. Many veterinarians see this as a legiti-mate, profit-making business. There is a plethora of special prescription diets to help pets with a host of illnesses, such as allergies and digestive and urinary tract problems. But compared to simply transi-tioning cats and dogs onto a more biologi-cally appropriate, whole-food diet with specific supplements and health restoring nutraceuticals as needed, these costly manufactured diets are of very limited value. Their scientific validity and medical

efficacy are also questionable, especially the low-cal, high fiber weight loss formula-tions. The veterinary profession is as yet behind, rather than leading, as it ought, the human medical profession, in addressing a host of health problems arising from manufactured pet foods, in part because of its ties to in-dustry as an organized profession, colleges of which a richly endowed by the pet food industry: and in part because of indoctrina-tion as students, that manufactured pet foods are scientifically formulated, animal tested, and provide complete and balanced nutrition for the health and maintenance of cats and dogs. There is much more to the basic ingredients and misleading terminol-ogy on the bag and can labels of these mainstream, main-street pet foods that the public trusts, no thanks to professional dog and cat performance events and other dog and cat shows, local, national, and interna-tional, that the pet food industry helps underwrite ! Commercial pet foods that people buy are a major factor in this obesity epidemic as well as a host of other health problems that are in part due to ignorance, overfeeding, and sheer convenience; and to the belief, shared, it would seem, by many veterinari-ans, that high cereal diets are not a signifi-cant contributing factor. Yet once in-formed, many pet owners will readily even cook home-prepared, wholesome, biologi-cally appropriate meals for their animal companions, and attest to the almost im-mediate benefits observed in their animals’ demeanor and vitality. Fortunately, new approaches and solutions are on the hori-

zon. This necessitates an understanding of how nutrients act and interact at the mo-lecular level. Accordingly, nutrition re-search has shifted from epidemiology and physiology to molecular biology and genet-ics. Diets for animals should be designed and tailored to the genetic profile of indi-viduals in order to optimize physiological homeostasis, disease prevention and treat-ment, and promote desired athletic, obedi-ence or reproductive performances. For example, a series of specialized semi-moist canned pet food formulas containing all human grade and organic food ingredi-ents is now in clinical trials in Italy. These diets act as cleansing foods for the bowel and specific organs (e.g. liver and kidney) of pets with sub-acute and chronic ill-nesses. The specific needs of these animals are determined by applying the principle of nutrigenomics, where optimal nutrition can be designed based on an individual’s unique genetic makeup or genotype. The resulting food formula is termed the “molecular dietary signature”, and is formulated to restore the animal to health. The Codes of Practice for the Welfare of Cats and of Dogs established by the UK Government’s DEFRA (Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) opens up pet owners to prosecution under the Animal Welfare Act (potentially facing up to 12 months in jail and a fine of up to 20,000 pounds sterling) if they allow their animals to become overweight/obese.

“The billions of pounds of offal that is recycled into pet food and farm

animal feed is the bedrock of the main stream pet food industry.

But it is a hazardous waste.”


This may help veterinarians and pets' care-givers to work together to solve the prob-lem of feline and canine obesity---DEFRA's Cat document clearly states cats are carnivores. This should mean that ce-real-based cat foods will soon be off the shelves. So I would heartily endorse similar animal welfare legislation in the US and other countries that indirectly induces the public to be more responsible and support better farming methods and more nutri-tious prepared and convenience foods for their pets and for themselves. It is time for a revolution in agriculture and consumer choices and habits. According to Business Week (August, 2008), two thirds of adult Americans are either overweight or obese, along with 23 million children. This food health crisis cannot be denied any longer by those who claim to regulate agriculture, the food and beverage indus-tries, and allow the mass poisoning of people and their pets with erroneously considered safe and nutritious basic ingre-dients, like corn, wheat, soy, dairy products and by-products. In these basic food com-modities are metabolism and endocrine-disrupting ingredients, like corn fructose syrup, wheat and soy gluten, and certain cow milk immune-system disrupting glyco-proteins. The public heavily subsidizes this agribusiness food industry with billions of dollars in government subsidies and price supports, indirectly underwriting its own demise---and nemesis. Conclusions The above documented concerns about manufactured pet foods are not meant to imply that all manufacturers do not care enough about dogs and cats to really be-come part of the solution. By ‘solution’, I mean becoming a creative participant in the food and agriculture revolution like those ‘green’ pet food companies and other pet product manufacturers and suppliers profiled by the author. It is no coincidence that the Western diet, based on highly processed components of corn, soy, and cereal grains, and on the dairy, meat and poultry products from animals fed these food commodities, should result in several recently identified, endemic health problems that are mirrored by cats and dogs fed the by-products of

this diet. The pork, poultry, egg, dairy, and beef industries, along with the prepared foods, beverage, and candy industries, use companion animals as highly profitable waste-recyclers. The irony is inescapable, considering the fact that these sectors of agriculture receive the greatest government support in subsidies and incentives, all at taxpayers’ expense since these are public funds. But they are not being spent on the public good when we calculate the enor-mous health and environmental costs of the Western diet; and not to forget the horrendous existence of the animals down on the factory farm and feedlot. Consumers and health-care providers alike are more widely realizing the connection between diet and the prevention and alle-viation of a host of complex, so called degenerative, auto-immune, and idiopathic diseases that are in turn recognized as being brought on by other factors in addi-tion to nutrition, or lack thereof. The so called pluri-causal, multifactor nature of such diseases makes it challenging to iden-tify and control causal agents. But as evi-dence-based medicine affirms, often most effective treatment comes through atten-tion to dietary factors. With a burgeoning human population and growing social unrest with shortages of food, water, land and fuel, such a revolu-tion---that includes the adoption of or-ganic, low-input, sustainable farming meth-ods and a reduction in meat production and consumption by many -- is as vital to global food security as it is to national se-curity and progress in public health. The more that pet food companies obtain food ingredients from organic and alterna-tive, sustainable sources rather than from

conventional ones that rely on pesticides, cruel livestock and poultry confinement systems, and ‘cheaper’ imported crop and food-products and supplements, the more ‘green’ they become. It is enlightened self-interest for pet owners to support this food and agriculture revolution in their market choices for their pets and for themselves. POSTSCRIPT Eat grain and suffer the consequences: http://wideturn.com/Holdingdirectory/CarbEating/fatthincarbs.htm Michael W. Fox, BVetMed, PhD, DSC, MRCVS is a member of the British

Veterinary Association and an Honor Roll Member of the American Veteri-nary Medical Association. He has doc-toral degrees in ethology/animal be-havior and medicine from the Univer-sity of London, graduating from the Royal Veterinary College London in 1962. In 1961 he was awarded the gold medal and Fellowship of the Royal Veterinary College Medical Association for his report on the effects of poor nutrition on the health of working sheepdogs, (published in the J. Small

Animal Pract., 5:183-192, 1964). Spend-ing most of his professional life in the US as an advocate for animal health, welfare and rights under the flag of One Medicine, One Earth, he has pub-lished over 40 books and writes the syn-dicated newspaper column Animal Doctor.

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Part 3 Getting Behavior

Dogs are always behaving. Your job as a trainer is to con-vince your dog to do the behaviors you like by reinforcing the behaviors you like. The problem is, you have to get that behaviour in the first place! Fortunately, there are several ways to set your dog up to start doing the behaviors you want, although some are much more effective than others.

Luring Luring would involve having the dog follow a cookie or toy in order to produce the behaviour you want. An example of this would be putting a cookie on his nose to entice him to sit or holding it up to your face to get eye contact. There are definite limitations with luring. The first problem is the timeline: you are putting the reinforcer before the intended behavior. You learned in Part 1 that consequences drive behaviour. If you intend to teach your dog to look at you by luring him with a cookie, then you must be aware of what he is doing when you pull that cookie out of your pocket because you will be reinforcing that behavior. This is a problem with luring: the trainer can inadvertently reward an unwanted behavior. If your dog looks away and you then pull out a cookie to lure him to look at your face, you are rewarding looking away because it is that precise be-havior that makes the cookie appear. This brings us to the second problem with luring: it re-wards passivity. Clicker trainers love behavior: the more behaviors a dog can give you, the faster and better we can teach him which ones you want. Trainers normally bring out lures when the dog is doing nothing and the dog quickly learns to do nothing because that is exactly what earns him reinforcement. The third problem with luring is that the dog is not actively involved in the learning process. If you lure the dog into a sit with a cookie, the dog is not thinking about the sit, he is thinking about following the cookie. The sit just happens and there is little learning occurring. Once again, the dog is passive in the process. Finally, luring can be very reinforcing for the trainer be-cause the dog actually does the desired behavior very quickly. The problem is, you want the dog to learn, not just behave. The dog will be a lot more reliable if he is actively learning, not just following cookies. Prompting Prompting is similar to luring although you would use body language to persuade your dog to do the things you want. You might blow in your dog's face to teach him to wave or start running to teach him to come when called. Prompts have the same limitations as lures.

Capturing Capturing would be waiting for the dog to offer the behav-ior himself and reinforcing it when you get it. If you wanted

by: Dana Scott

© K Delong Photography


to teach your dog down, you might sit on the couch with a clicker and cookies and wait for him to lie on his bed and reinforce that.

On the up side, capturing actively engages the dog in the learning process. When the dog lies down and hears the click, he will eagerly engage in other behaviors, trying to make you click again. He might sit, spin, lift a paw, and fi-nally lie down - Click! It may take you a bit longer to get the down this way, but because the dog is actively deciphering what earns him reinforcement, he will easily remember and repeat it willingly, unlike a dog who is prompted or lured. The draw back of capturing is that your dog may not feel like lying down at the moment you want to train. Although cap-turing promotes better understanding in your dog, it can be very inefficient to have to wait for him to offer desired be-haviors. To speed the process up, you can use shaping.

Shaping Shaping is the process of successive approximations. If you want your dog to lie down and he is not freely offering it, then you can start with a muscle movement that would pre-cede lying down. To shape a down, you might first click your dog for standing still. Then when you have that, you might look for the next step to a down like a movement of the head toward the ground or even a sit or a bow. You can split the behavior down into very small sums and ask for those one by one, until you get the complete behavior, the down. Another example would be to teach your dog to spin. You would first click for any head movement, then a head movement to the side, then moving one foot to the side, then two feet, then curling his spine, then a half a turn, then finally a full turn. This seems like a lot of work but dogs who are clicker savvy learn to offer a lot of behaviors very quickly and be-come very engaged in the learning process. They will keep moving and trying new things in order to get you to click and once your dog is freely offering behaviors (in other words, the dog is operant), you can shape even complicated behav-iors in minutes. Unlike luring, because the dog is actively involved in the process, the motivation and reliability for the desire behaviour are built in and the behavior will be very strong for a very long time. Let's make the difference between Luring/Prompting and Capturing/Shaping more clear. Let's assume you are in a strange city and need directions from your hotel to the dog show site. Fortunately, there are dog people staying at your hotel and they say you can fol-low them to the show site. You climb into your car and follow the bumper in front of you, playing with your radio and singing to your dogs as you drive there. You arrive in just ten minutes and haven't made any wrong turns: the "driving to the show site" behavior would appear to be strong. Now let's say the next morning you have to return to the show site. You go down to the parking lot and look around and your

dog friends are gone. You get in your car and try to find your way back to the show site. It suddenly dawns on you that you really don't know how to get there, even though you did it just yesterday. Now assume that there were no people going to the show the first day so you bought a map. You got in your car and maybe had to pull over once or twice to get to the show site and it took you fifteen minutes instead of ten. The following morning when you are ready to go back to the show, your efforts will have paid off. You have retained the street names, landmarks and turns because you were actively look-ing for them the previous day. You get to the show site the second day with almost no hesitation. Luring and Prompting are the same as mindlessly following a bumper. You will quickly get the behavior you want but when you try to repeat it, you will have difficulty because you were not actively involved in the learning process. Cap-turing and Shaping are like following a map. Map follow-ing may be slower than bumper following in the initial steps, but retention is much greater and subsequent efforts are easier and faster. So what methods do clicker trainers use? To be honest, they use all four. Although shaping and capturing create the best environment for learning, they can be a bit slower in the ini-tial stages. It is OK to use a lure or a prompt to get the ball rolling but if you do so, it is important to begin shaping as soon as possible. An important rule of thumb is this: if you must use prompts or lures, use them only three or four times, then move to shaping. This will get you maximum learning in minimum time. Now you are well on your way to getting the behaviors you want. The next step is to put the behaviours on cue and we will look at this important step in Part 4.

The owner of WatchMe! dog training, Dana Scott has a degree in animal behavior and has titled her dogs in obedience, rally, conformation and in the field. Dana breeds Labrador Retriev-ers under the Fallriver prefix. She can be reached at www.fallriverlabs.com

© K Delong Photography


by: Lucy Postins

Part II: Embarking On A Home-Made Diet For Your Dog

If you’ve fed a kibble diet for a long pe-

riod of time, it can be a daunting pros-

pect to make the switch to fresh fare.

Some animal guardians are especially

intimidated by switching to 100% raw

foods and there are some concerns

about combining kibble and raw food

together since they digest at different

rates and this can increase the risk of

illness from bacterial contamination.

One option is to begin combining some

fresh vegetables and fruits plus lightly

cooked meats, organs and fish as well as

plain yogurt or cottage cheese, with your

dog’s regular food. Several companies

provide premixes or ‘base diets’ or sup-

plements to be used as the base of a

homemade diet and these can be helpful

in making the transition as well as ensur-

ing an adequate array of nutritional com-

ponents to the diet.

Following is a list of suggested ingredi-

ents to include in your dog’s homemade

meals, or to combine with a premix as

you gradually make the move away from

kibble, to a varied healthy diet:

�� Ground meat such as chicken, tur-key, beef, and buffalo, which can be served raw or cooked depending on what you’re comfortable with.

�� Raw Meaty Bones such as chicken necks or backs. It’s a good idea to grind bones to begin with, to allow your dog to get used to them. Your butcher may be able to do this for you, or you could in-vest in a good quality meat-grinder capa-ble of grinding bone. Never feed cooked bones!

�� Raw (or lightly cooked) organs and other muscle meats.

�� Raw or lightly cooked white fish such as cod, sole and haddock as well as oily fish like salmon, sardines and herring (salmon should be cooked because of the possible risk of parasitic infestation in raw salmon) as well as low sodium canned fish.

�� Root vegetables such as sweet pota-toes, yams, pumpkin, parsnips (these vegetables should be lightly steamed or pulped to aid digestibility), plus other fresh vegetables such as zucchini, green beans, kale and celery.

�� Plain yogurt, cottage cheese, kefir and eggs – these can be lightly scrambled if preferred but are perfectly acceptable raw for most dogs. Some raw feeders also include the finely ground shell as a

great natural source of calcium.

�� Fresh or dried fruits like melon, blue-berries, cranberries & pitted peaches.

�� Fresh herbs such as parsley, nettles, watercress and dandelion leaves. Ground nuts such as almonds and seeds like shelled sunflower, pumpkin or ground flax, also make an interesting addition. Ingredients to Avoid

�� Chocolate �� Grapes �� Raisins �� Macadamia Nuts �� Onions

What are the challenges of preparing

your pet’s food, yourself?

�� It takes some homework to prepare

balanced, nutritional meals but it's not

much more difficult than providing our-

selves or our human children with whole-

some & healthy nutrition, when a broad

array of foods is offered throughout the

week.

�� Homemade meals can be time con-

suming to prepare, and messy as well.

Some regimens for homemade food re


quire the acquisition of a meat grinder

capable or pulverizing bones, which can

add to the initial start-up costs.

�� Some vets advise against homemade

meals and if this causes a conflict, it may

be necessary to locate an alternative or

holistic vet who will support and assist

you with your decision.

If you have larger animals or a multi-pet

household, the ingredients storage can

become an issue – a dedicated chest

freezer might be a wise investment, so

you can store raw ingredients and fin-

ished meals.

Here are two tasty recipes you might like to prepare at home and offer as a treat or accompaniment to your dog’s regular food – and a first step in getting off the kibble bandwagon:

Liver Loaf Treats

This delicious recipe is nutritious and delicious, and can be sliced up into any size to make training treats suitable for your individual pet. The added bonus is that this treat is completely wheat-free.

Ingredients

1 lb fresh raw organic beef liver

3 free range eggs

¼ cup canola or other vegetable oil

1 clove fresh garlic, crushed

2 cups instant oats

1 tbsp applesauce

2 tbsp nutritional yeast (optional)

3 tbsp powdered kelp (optional)

Filtered water sufficient to make a batter

What To Do

Process the liver in a blender or food processor, until completely pureed.

Beat the eggs in a bowl and pour in the oil. Add the liver. Mix in the dry ingredi-ents slowly, so they are thoroughly com-bined. Add water gradually, until you have a ‘batter’ consistency. Pour into a loaf tin. Bake at 350 degrees for 50 min-utes. Cool in the tin then gently turn the loaf out onto a rack and refrigerate to cool completely. Slice with a sharp knife and dice into bite sized pieces appropri-ate for your pet.

Salmon & Peach Cooler

This recipe is super-simple to prepare makes a refreshing recipe to beat the summer heat. Be sure to use cooked boneless salmon only.

Ingredients

1 cup very lightly cooked boneless salmon fillet with skin.

2 diced fresh peaches, stones removed

1 cup roughly chopped watercress

¼ cup diced cucumber

¼ cup flaked almonds

½ cup plain yogurt

3 tbsp honey (optional)

2 tbsp olive oil

1 sprig fresh basil to garnish

What To Do

Combine the first seven ingredients in a bowl so they are thoroughly mixed.

Spoon into a serving dish or use to top your dog's regular food.

Add the mango on top and finish with the fresh basil.

Serve for your dog in moderate portions, once cooled. Store in a refrigerator and serve a little each day, or freeze in indi-vidual portions for later use.

Once you understand and witness the benefits of serving fresh, healthy, home prepared food that’s been created with your own hands – and infused with love and good intent – the habit will likely become a part of your routine. Even if it’s just a more occasional treat, the fun of making (and sometimes actually shar-ing) the food that your dog eats, is novel and rewarding for everyone!

Lucy Postins is a companion animal nutritionist and founder of The Hon-est Kitchen, a natural pet food com-pany in San Diego, CA. More nutri-tional resources are available on www.thehonestkitchen.com or (866) 437 9729.


DOGS, PARKS AND POLITICS

by: Julie Walsh

The verdict is in. Off-leash play is not only good for dogs, but for their people too! Off-leash advocates have successfully made this case over and over again, prompting cities and towns all across the country to establish “dog parks” or off-leash areas. These parks are not only found in heavily populated places such as Virginia and New York City, but also in rural states such as Montana, Wyoming and Iowa. Indeed, Eco-Animal now lists over 1,500 places nationally in its online “Dog Park Directory.”

A Sampling of Benefits

Given the social nature of dogs, it is not too surprising that the opportunity to play and interact with others benefits them. Dogs are pack animals, who delight in the company of canine friends. Off-leash areas additionally provide room for dogs to exercise vigorously, an essential need for many breeds and almost all young dogs. Studies show that well-exercised and properly social-ized dogs are less likely to be aggressive and/or destructive. Hu-mans certainly benefit from that fact alone, but there is more!

It is not just the dogs who have fun at these parks. Humans en-joy watching their dogs play and often bond with the other hu-man observers. They build friendships and communities. At our local park, the humans threw a baby shower for a father-to-be, who walks his golden retriever regularly, and his wife. They also had a party for a long-time walker who decided to move away after his dog had died the previous year. At both events, several

people spoke about how meaningful these friendships were in their lives. When people have had to confront their dogs’ deaths, the outpouring of love and support has been extraordinary and perhaps the surest indication of the strength of this particular community. Clearly, via the creation of these human connections, these spaces contribute to psychological health, which, according to more and more studies, yields physical benefits as well. In-deed, the mere act of walking provides beneficial exercise for the humans.

Dog Parks or Dogs at the Park

Typically, off-leash areas are fenced, single-use spaces set aside from the rest of the park. In many cases, they have been estab-lished because dog walkers, shut out of common areas via the enforcement of leash laws, have battled for some space to exer-cise their dogs. Multiple factors account for this dynamic, includ-ing suburban sprawl, increases in population, and a general de-cline in community. These factors and others have led to greater competition for less park space, with dogs finding themselves on the short end of the stick. Dog parks compensate for this loss and are thus a positive development that helps to fulfill a need. However, they are not enough!

It is also necessary to retain some access to multi-use areas for off-leash dogs. For example, a multi-use area might be a hiking trail or a wide open field or a beach, all of which are used by non-dog walkers. Given the growing demand for off-leash areas, single-use, fenced spaces cannot possibly accommodate it on their own. Indeed, the more outlets for off-leash recreation, the less likely that there will be problems at any one location. Overcrowding or “too many dogs” is the oft-cited complaint of other users, one

Victor neumann


which should be remedied with more (not fewer) places for this activity. Hours restrictions can help to balance the needs of other users with dog walkers as well.

Because authorities in so many places have cracked down on off-leash walking, multi-use places are increasingly rare gems: and gems they are! Arguably, multi-use areas multiply the already considerable benefits of dog parks. It is much more likely that humans will exercise at such places via walking or running than they would in a fenced area. Given the need to share the space with other users, it is imperative that humans develop a good relationship with their dog(s). That requirement tends to lead to better trained dogs. For their part, the dogs have even more op-portunity in such places to be “dogs,” chasing squirrels, investi-gating scents, and using their minds.

A Human Pack for the Dogs

Multi-use places have more often than not formed “naturally,” perhaps due to a lack of enforcement of a leash law or the lack of such a law altogether. As the number of places allowing for off-leash activity shrinks, such gems become more attractive to dog walkers, who sometimes travel to get to them. A growing num-ber of visitors can trigger complaints from other users and calls for a leash law. The political fight can then be a formidable one, which it would obviously be better to avoid.

While that goal is much easier said than done, there are some steps to take if you enjoy such a place with your dog. Be pro-active. Do not wait passively until there are complaints and an organized attempt to enact a leash law. If there is a community of dog walkers at the location, organize them into an association and dedicate it partly to the service of public ends. For example, such an organization can educate people about proper etiquette with other users. The group can invite local dog trainers to speak or give a demonstration, which would give the trainers free advertis-ing and help to encourage people to seek training for their dog. On this matter of training, members of the dog-walking commu-nity can additionally help one another out with tips. That is more

likely to happen with an organization that might, for example, have an online discussion group. Importantly, the group could identify stewardship of the land as one of its public priorities and sponsor clean-up days.

Be aware that it is not always easy to organize people in the ab-sence of a threat to their interests. A few dog walkers might have to take the initiative and convince others of the need for this. It helps if you make the endeavor fun, not all bitter medicine. Our group had meetings to discuss our goals, develop our website, and plan activities. We all brought goodies to the meetings and con-versation was not all business. In short, they were enjoyable events that strengthened friendships already developed at the park. We also capitalized on the individual talents of our mem-bership. For example, some were artistic and they created our business card; others were computer savvy and they developed our website. People were very generous with their time and tal-ents after they bought into the idea of the group.

Once organized into such a group, it becomes possible for dog walkers to reach out to other users at the park. It is amazing how beneficial this can be. At our park, the mere fact that a group of us were trying to encourage good etiquette won over some indi-viduals who had previously advocated a leash law. In some cases, people want simply to be heard and to have their concerns vali-dated. Too often, dog walkers are defined by an irresponsible few who are arrogant and combative. Do not let such individuals define you! Let the non-dog owners who use the area see the humanity of the dog walkers and know that most are just as upset with irresponsible behavior as they. In attempting to eradicate that behavior via education, dog walkers are identified on the same side as the other users. They are a part of the community, not a group in need of segregation.

Sadly, even with these efforts, there is simply no guarantee that a multi-use area will not be threatened with a leash law. In that unwanted event, be mindful of appearances. Raw displays of anger are not helpful. Use your association to mobilize all who walk their dogs at the park. Learn the precise steps in the political

process, which can vary widely from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and focus on prevailing in them. Al-though elected officials tend to take notice when con-fronted with a fully mobilized group, dog walkers are unfortunately still in the situation of convincing of-ficeholders and citizens about the legitimacy of off-leash walking and play. Dog walkers must explain how passionate they are about it and must do so in terms that non-dog lovers can understand. Remem-ber that many people have not heard the case for this activity, let alone the verdict on it!

Julie Walsh lives in Bloomfield, Connecticut with dogs Devin and Sadie.

Vic Neumann


by: Erika Phillips

We are what we eat. Raw feeders take this simple statement

very seriously and eschew kibble for its dubious origins and

questionable ingredients. We rightly feel more comfortable

feeding foods to our dogs with known origins: we like to know

not only what foods are going into our dogs but where they

came from. Unfortunately, we might not know as much about

the origin of feed animals as we should.

The Times They are A-Changing ~Bob Dylan

For generations our food has been raised on soils rich in nutri-

ents. Cows ate grass, sheep ate grass. Chickens ranged and

ate worms and frogs and other meaty morsels rich with pro-

tein necessary to produce wonderfully nutritious eggs. Pigs

received 80% of their nutritional requirements from rich and

living soil. Life was simpler and life was in our nutrient-dense

food. Sadly, this does not ring true today: cows are now grain

fed with many of them never seeing a blade of grass, chickens

are grain fed and factory raised without sunshine and never

seeing a bug or a worm, pigs are raised in concrete buildings

and sheep are normally pastured but too expensive to eat.

The ramifications of industrialized farming have very real

health implications for us and for our dogs.

The cow is nothing but a machine which makes grass fit for us

people to eat. ~John McNulty

Cows are ruminants, and ruminants are designed by nature to

digest grass and only grass. They digest it first by eating it raw

and then by regurgitating it and eating it again in a partially

digested form known as cud. As ruminants, cows have four

chambers in their stomachs, and as a cow digests, the food

moves slowly from one chamber to the next.

Raising cattle on pasture not only makes sense for their diges-

tive systems, but makes sense for humans too, by turning

something we can’t eat (grass) into something we can (meat)

and dairy products. Cattle raised on grass provide meat that is

leaner and lower in calories, and higher in omega-3 fatty acids

and vitamin E. Grass-fed dairy products also have five times

the levels of conjugated linoleum acid (CLA) than their grain-

fed counterparts. Grass fed cows also convert Chlorophyll that

they get from grass into Vitamin D that they get from the sun

which in turn produces vitamin A found in the liver and other

organs. Without grass Cow’s are not worth eating!

On factory beef farms the staple of the cow’s diet is corn and

soy which are not well digested by cows. In fact, cattle can

develop severe health problems from grains, some of which

include liver abscesses and sudden death syndrome. For filler,

factory farms will also add animal by-products to industrial

cattle feed, and these additions can transmit diseases like mad

cow to both animals and humans. Grains ferment in the stom-

ach and create serious bacteria overloads including salmonella

and e-coli. In large production facilities where the animals

stand and sleep in their feces, the bacterium is spread

throughout the herd and when the time comes for slaughter

the feces/bacteria often remain in the meat unless bleached.

On top of that, run-off from factory farms and feedlots can

contaminate surrounding crops with salmonella and e-coli and

this has resulted in numerous illnesses and recalls.


Regard it as just as desirable to build a chicken house as to

build a cathedral. ~Frank Lloyd Wright

Factory farmed chickens fare no better than cows . Millions of

tons of meat and bone meal from post-slaughter animal waste

are recycled back into animal feed each year, and poultry and

hog producers are the main purchasers of these products. On

industrial poultry farms, a range of antibiotics and additives

are also added to the birds’ feed and water and are necessary

to combat the ill effects of poor quality feed and lack of sun-

shine and fresh air. Factory farmed chickens are regularly fed

arsenic (and sometimes turkeys and pigs) to encourage weight

gain and create the appearance of healthy color in the meat.

If the chicken is eating arsenic, your dog is eating arsenic and

the insidious effect of this low level exposure mimics many

chronic diseases. Arsenic exposure leads to cancer, nerve

damage, diabetes and cognitive dysfunction. Like e-coli, arse-

nic is not only found in the meat but in the feces which even-

tually pollute surrounding water supplies.

The Dark Side Of The Other White Meat

According to the Sustainable table, “In some states, garbage

can legally be fed to pigs, and if this garbage includes rotten

meat, pigs are at risk for diseases such as hog cholera, Foot

and Mouth Disease, African swine fever, and swine vesicular

disease. Other pathogens of concern are Salmonella, Cam-

pylobacter, Trichinella, and Toxoplasma. These diseases may

be spread to other livestock or humans if hogs eat contami-

nated meat in improperly treated food waste.

Pigs have a completely different digestive system than cows

and unlike cows, can digest soil and dirt. As a matter of fact

most pigs can get 80% of their daily food ration from soil

alone. They eat grasses, legumes, ground cover, standing

plants and are about the easiest animal to raise on pasture

without the worry of supplementation. Unfortunately, this

is not the practice that is employed by large pig operations.

What does this all mean for ourselves and our pets? With-

out the nutrients that are normally found in healthy soil and in

turn the plants that soils contain, our companion animals are

at critical risk for disease and insufficiencies.

If you knew how meat was made, you'd probably lose your

lunch. ~k.d. lang

As much as possible, ensure that your meat comes from local

farmers who raise their animals as naturally as possible. If you

are forced to feed grain-fed animals, then you might want to

supplement a prey-model diet to replace the nutrients erased

by factory farming and to boost your dog‘s immune system to

fight the ill effects from additives such as hormones, antibiot-

ics and arsenic. Although the full extent of the dog’s ability to

digest plant matter is largely unknown, all of the deficiencies

in vitamins and minerals are readily available in herbs. Unless

you are able to feed exclusively organic, grass-fed animals, the

benefits of feeding plant matter to dogs likely outweighs the risks of feeding deficient meats which have joined the alarmingly large and growing list of products contami-nated by increasingly powerful industries.

Erika Phillips is the Editor in Chief of Dogs Naturally Magazine and the proprietor of The Controversial Canine.

She can be reached for consultations in Homeopathy/Herbs/

Behaviour/Nutrition at www.controversialcanine.com


by: Chris Adams Staff Reporter The Wall Street Journal

With the aid of slick commercials featuring once-lame dogs bounding happily about, Rimadyl changed the way veterinarians treated dogs. ""Clients would walk in and say, 'What about this Rimadyl?' "" says George Siemering, who practices in Springfield, VA. Today, those TV spots are gone. The reason has to do with dogs like Montana. A six-year-old Siberian husky with stiff back legs, Montana hobbled out of a vet's office in Brooklyn, N.Y., six months ago accompanied by his human, Angela Giglio, and a supply of Rimadyl pills. At first, the drug appeared to work. But then Montana lost his appetite. He went limp, wobbling instead of walking. Finally he didn't walk at all. He ate leaves, vomited, had seizures and, eventually, was put to sleep. An autopsy showed the sort of liver damage associated with a bad drug reaction. Pet drugs are big business -- an estimated $3 billion world-wide -- and Rimadyl is one of the bestsellers. It has been given to more than four million dogs in the U.S. and more abroad, brought Pfizer Inc. tens of millions of dollars in sales, and pleased many veterinarians and dog owners. But the drug has also stirred a con-troversy, with other pet owners complaining that nobody warned them of its risks.

Montana's owner, Ms. Giglio, is among them. After she informed Pfizer and the Food and Drug Administration of her relatively youthful dog's death, Pfizer offered her $440 ""as a gesture of good will"" and to cover part of the medical costs. Insulted by the offer and a stipulation that she agree to tell no one about the pay-ment except her tax preparer, she refused to sign and didn't take the money. ""There's just no way in my conscience or heart I can release them from blame,"" she says. After reports of bad reactions and deaths started streaming in to the FDA, the agency suggested that Pfizer mention ""death"" as a possible side effect in a warning letter to vets, on labels and in TV ads. Pfizer eventually did use the word with vets and on labels, but when given an ultimatum about the commercials -- mention ""death"" in the audio or end the ads -- Pfizer chose to drop them. Pfizer's director of animal-products technical services, Edward W. Kanara, says that when reports started coming in, ""we acted ex-tremely promptly based on the information we had."" Pfizer points out that reported adverse events involve less than 1% of treated dogs. Since Rimadyl's 1997 launch, the FDA has received reports of about 1,000 dogs that died or were put to sleep and 7,000 more

that had bad reactions after taking the drug, records and official estimates indicate. The FDA says such events are significantly underreported. While the numbers include cases ""possibly"" related to Ri-madyl, it is hard to be sure. Many dogs given the arthritis drug are older, and few are autopsied after they die. Pfizer says it ana-lyzed cases of Rimadyl treated dogs that died in 1998 and found a link to Rimadyl to be ""likely"" in 12% of cases and ""not likely"" in 22%; it says there was too little information for a judgment about the others.

Still Approved Despite these problems, the FDA says Rimadyl deserves to be on the market, provided vets take the proper precautions. These include advising dog owners what bad reactions to watch for and periodically doing liver-function or other lab tests. Within a few weeks, Pfizer will begin affixing a safety sheet di-rectly to packages of Rimadyl pills. It is the first time either FDA officials or Pfizer can recall such a step being taken in the world of animal drugs.


Rimadyl -- generically carprofen -- is an anti-inflammatory medi-cine. Developer Roche Laboratories expected to market it for people in 1988 and received FDA approval, but shelved the plan after concluding the market for such drugs was too crowded. In addition, some outside experts expressed concerns; a commen-tary in a pharmaceutical journal noted unusual liver-function readings in 14% to 20% of test subjects and opined that ""until additional data on carprofen are available, older compounds should probably be tried initially."" The idea of switching the product to the animal-drug track soon arose. A couple of corporate transactions later, it ended up in the hands of Pfizer's animal-drug unit. There, it was treated to the kind of sophisticated marketing Pfizer does well. A survey of 885 dog owners was done. Besides shedding light on favorite dog names (Jake, Ginger, Lady), the poll revealed that one-fifth of dog owners would be willing to spend ""whatever it took"" to buy an aging dog an extra year or two of life. No fewer than 53% agreed that ""my dog is a better companion than other members of my family.""

The FDA requires safety and efficacy testing for animal drugs just as for human ones, but animal-drug tests are smaller. Pfizer says about 500 dogs got Rimadyl in various trials, which is no more than a fifth of the number of subjects in comparable human-drug trials. Some dogs showed unusual liver-function readings and one young beagle on a high dose died, but for the most part, the FDA and Pfizer didn't find side effects alarming. The drug was approved for an early-1997 launch. That same year, the FDA made it easier to market drugs directly to consumers on TV. Soon, Pfizer was running commercials in which a once-stiff yellow Labrador retriever named Lady bounded over a fallen tree as she fetched tennis balls beside a lake. In another ad, a dog leapt through a window and slid down a banister. There were also full-page magazine ads and a public-relations cam-paign, whose results, the PR firm later said, included 1,785 print stories, 856 radio reports and 245 TV news reports ""generating 25.5 million positive impressions on the product."" Early on, vets were floored by the drug's effects. ""The results in some cases have been pretty darn close to miraculous,"" says David Whitten of the Hilldale Veterinary Hospital in Southfield, Mich. ""I'm using this drug on my own dog. It has been effective. But as with all medications, side effects are certainly a problem.""

The First Complaints Indeed, within months of the launch, vets at Colorado State Uni-versity in Fort Collins noticed troubling reactions. Labrador re-trievers seemed particularly affected. Since the safety studies for Rimadyl had emphasized testing on young beagles, Pfizer went back to conduct another, small test just on Labs; it says that test showed no particular problem. Bill Keller, an FDA veterinary-medicine official, notes that ""any time you take a product from the investigation and put it into ac-tual practice, you're going to see things you didn't expect."" But reports about Rimadyl came in by the hundreds. The FDA had received just over 3,000 animal-drug bad-reaction reports in 1996, the year before Rimadyl's launch; in 1998, the drug's first full year, Rimadyl alone produced more than that many. They swamped the FDA's tiny Center for Veterinary Medicine in Rockville, MD. Pfizer was scrambling as well. ""Basically, their response,"" says Dr. Keller, ""was 'Tell us what you want us to do. We love the fact that it's selling so well, but we don't know what to do with all these adverse reactions.' "" The FDA and Pfizer discussed a ""Dear Doctor"" letter to be sent to vets. FDA records show the agency found parts of an early Pfizer draft ""unacceptable as they are promotional in tone... ."" It was revised. The records also show Pfizer disagreed with the FDA's suggestion that the letter cite ""death"" as a possible side effect. To get the letter out, the FDA told Pfizer it was ""agreeing to your exclusion of the 'death' syndrome from the letter at this time. However, we will revisit the 'death' syndrome issue and other potential side ef-fects for possible inclusion in labelling at a later date."" So the term didn't appear in the first warning Pfizer sent, in mid-1997.

“The FDA had received just over 3,000 animal-drug bad-reaction reports in 1996, the year before Rimadyl's launch; in 1998,

the drug's first full year, Rimadyl alone produced more than that many. “


Clear Benefits Meanwhile, dog owners were asking for Rimadyl. ""It was their advertising that sold me on the drug,"" says Michelle Walsh, a Phoenix woman who says her miniature schnauzer was given it and later died. Not that vets needed much convincing. They saw clear benefits from the drug. On top of that, they could get points from Pfizer for each Rimadyl purchase they made; points were redeemable for PalmPilots, Zip drives for PCs and other equipment. Although Pfizer's letter told vets to explain to owners the signs of a bad reaction to Rimadyl, such as vomiting, lethargy or diarrhea, it is evident that a great many didn't. The FDA's Dr. Keller says, "There are a lot of veterinarians who don't think they need to take the time, or who forget, or for whatever reason are not providing animal owners with this information." Donna Allen, whose chow-mix, Maggie, started on Rimadyl last summer, says, ""All my vet did was give me this little bag of pills, with no information."" She says ""Maggie didn't want to take it, but I made her."" After four weeks, Maggie began to vomit violently, Ms. Allen says. The dog vanished from their home outside Birmingham, AL, and later was found lying in a ditch. Ms. Allen loaded her into a truck and sped 35 miles to a veterinary clinic, but the five-year-old dog died. Her vet wouldn't implicate Rimadyl in the death until Ms. Allen urged him to send the dog's internal organs to the University of Illinois vet school, where an examination showed liver toxicity. Maggie was buried under a marker adorned with the figure of an angel. Ms. Allen took to the streets, delivering a letter to all the vets in the area urging them to ""understand that Rimadyl helps certain dogs, but it is poison to other dogs.""

The D-Word As the complaints poured in, the FDA told Pfizer it would have to revisit the label issue. Pfizer had referred to ""fatal outcomes"" on the label as a possible effect of the drug class to which Ri-madyl belonged, but not specifically of this drug. Now the agency asked that Pfizer cite ""death"" prominently as a possible side effect of the drug. Describing the back and forth with Pfizer, the FDA's Dr. Keller says, ""They did it. They weren't enthusiastic about it, but they have always been cooperative. And that's part of the nature of the game we play with industry."" But the FDA also wanted the word ""death"" in the audio of commercials. Pfizer indicated this ""would be devastating to the product,"" FDA minutes of a February 1999 meeting show. A company spokesman says that ""putting 'death' on a 30-second commercial and in proper context was something we didn't think was possible."" Rather than do so, Pfizer eventually pulled the commercials.

Pfizer says it now will do traditional marketing to vets, making sure they know the proper way to use the drug. Another ""Dear Doctor"" letter will soon go out, and the company will start at-taching a safety sheet to pill packages. Pfizer acknowledges it has a perception problem with some dog owners; a consumer group, for instance, has mounted a campaign dubbed BARKS, for Be Aware of Rimadyl's Known Side-effects. The company is contacting dog owners who have told their sto-ries on the Internet, and it is offering to pay medical and diagnos-tic expenses for some dogs who may have been harmed by Ri-madyl. But Pfizer stands firmly behind the value of the drug, of which it says sales have continued to grow. Most vets also remain strongly behind Rimadyl. Owners, too, generally say they think the drug is important -- they just want to know the risks. Atlantan Roger Williams gave his mixed-breed terrier, William, Rimadyl for more than a year and believes it contributed to the dog's death. ""But if I had to do it all over, I would give my dog Rimadyl again,"" he says. ""The difference is I would have known what to expect. Without Rimadyl, William was miserable. And what's the point of living another three years if you're miser-able?""


The shelter dog had clearly been neglected in his past. His coat was dull, and his eyes stared blankly into space as he barked continuously. The staff asked me to please try to help calm him, since he had been hysterically barking since he had ar-rived. I sat quietly outside his kennel, put in my earplugs and took a deep breath. I imagined the energy of the earth flowing up through my body, grounding and centering me, and men-tally offered the dog some healing energy, if he chose to con-nect with me. I closed my eyes and inside my mind imagined myself in a quiet, beautiful place. Peace, safety and harmony: I held these three words in my heart. I imagined how the dog looked when he was calm and perfectly relaxed. I imagined I could embrace him with love from my heart. Sure enough, as I’ve seen in so many Reiki treatments, after a few moments the dog stopped barking and stared intently at me. A few more moments passed and he lay down in the kennel, took a deep breath and rested his head on his front paws. Silence had never felt so golden. Reiki, a system that creates relaxation and stress-relief, is a wonderful way to support the healing journey of rescued dogs and to support ourselves as we walk this path with them. The name Reiki, pronounced “ray-key,” comes from the Japanese words “rei” meaning spirit and “ki” meaning energy. It is usu-ally translated as “universal life energy.” Reiki is about being able to hold a space of balance within ourselves—even in the midst of a chaotic or troublesome situation. If we can practice maintaining this kind of inner balance and calm in our own lives, we will see a ripple effect in all that we do. In working with rescued dogs, we can see them responding to our inner state of balance in a positive way, becoming calmer and more peaceful. We can also see our relationship with them going much deeper.

The Five Precepts Reiki as a healing modality is a meditative art. It is simply about focusing one’s compassionate intention to support an-other being. When using Reiki to heal a dog, for example, the practitioner simply sets an intention to facilitate the healing process of the dog and then allows Reiki to flow in whatever amount the dog wishes to receive and for whatever he or she needs most.

Reiki is ideal for use with animals because effectiveness is not dependent upon physical contact. The animal controls the treatment, accepting Reiki in the ways that are most comfort-able, either hands-on or from a distance, or a combination of the two. Easy for anyone to learn and use, Reiki can do no harm, even when used by the most novice practitioner. It al-ways goes to the deepest source of the problem and always supports a path toward balance and harmony. Since we often don’t know a rescued animal’s past, with Reiki we can simply allow the energy to flow where it will, knowing that a healing shift toward balance will occur. The five Reiki precepts for balanced living, taught by the foun-der of the system, Mikao Usui, are as follows: Just for today … Do not anger. Do not worry. Be humble. Be honest in your work. Be compassionate to yourself and others. These precepts are not only the foundation for self-healing in the system of Reiki, but can also be used as guides when work-ing with rescued animals. 1. Just for today do not anger. Working with rescued dogs can be very difficult when we see the results of past abuse or ne-glect. We can begin to feel ourselves becoming very angry about how the dog was treated, what he had to go through and so on. This anger at the dog’s situation can spiral into an-ger about the world as a whole and anger toward humanity’s treatment of dogs in general. Pretty soon we can find our-selves encompassed in a bubble of anger. This anger will merely distract us from our primary goal, which is to help the dog. If we are angry, the dog will sense that and not want to connect with us. If we can focus instead on our desire to help the dog, our anger can be mitigated by our compassion. It can also help us to see the dog with our heart instead of our eyes. If we can see deeper into the very essence and spirit of the dog—see that shining star just waiting to brighten our life—it will be easier to work through any difficulties we face with patience and calm. When we approach our rescued dog

by: Kathleen Prasad


with this kind of inner peace, everything will flow toward heal-ing much more easily. 2. Just for today do not worry. When working with a rescued dog, we can find ourselves dealing with many health problems. We might rescue a dog suffering with Parvo, kennel cough or some physical injury from past abuse or neglect. As we nurture the dog toward healing, we may find ourselves worrying: wor-rying about other problems that might manifest, about how and if the dog will be able to fully heal from illness and injury and so on. We also might worry about our rescued dog being able to fit into our family, especially if we know the dog has faced difficult and traumatic events in the past. Worrying and fretting about things beyond our control is not helpful for us or the dog. If we can again look deeper into the heart and spirit of the dog to see him as already healed, we can help our dog find the hope and courage to get better. We can, for example, see how shiny their coat must have once been, how they would look with proper weight on their bones. We can imagine they are breathing freely and running with strength and vigor across our yard. When we begin to look at our dog for who he really is, he, too, will see us for who we really are, and the relation-ship can deepen. And in that deepening of trust, the healing of the heart begins. This is where it all starts for the rescued dog—with healing of the heart.

3. Be humble. Working with a rescued dog can bring us back into humility. We might have thought initially we were the one doing the “rescuing”—and yet as we create a new and loving relationship with this dog, we might find that our lives are for-ever changed for the better. We may find our hearts opening more than we had ever thought possible. In working through the healing journey of our rescued dog, me may learn about ourselves and in so doing, find that we are better people for it. And so one day we may realize that it is we who were rescued by this dog. We find ourselves humbled by their capacity to heal and forgive, to let go of the past, and to move forward into a new future with courage, joy and selfless devotion. If only we could learn to live our lives as a rescued dog lives his. 4. Be honest in your work. Going through our lives, how often do we ask ourselves, what is our life’s work? When we work with a rescued dog, we are helping him to heal, nurturing him physically and emotionally, providing exercise, food and atten-tion, and helping him to build a new beginning as a part of our family. We can realize that it is in this daily practice with him, where we devote ourselves single-mindedly to our task, that we find our heart’s true calling. In helping this dog to heal from the past and live his life surrounded in love, we suddenly find that it is in this place that we are being truly honest in our work.


5. Be compassionate to yourself and others. Helping a res-cued dog is a very compassionate action, which I believe has a ripple effect out into the world. By working with rescued dogs in your life, you are not only helping that individual dog, but also making the world a better place by being a model for oth-ers. So first and foremost, be kind and gentle to yourself. In following your heart for the dogs who need you, you will de-velop and nurture the compassionate spirit within you.

Using Reiki in Animal Rescue

If you are a trained professional or volunteer involved in ani-mal rescue, you may find yourself in unexpected situations with extreme stress and sometimes even danger. This can take a toll on your body, mind, emotions and spirit. Images and memories of what you have seen may stay with you long after you have left the scene. Here are some ways Reiki can help support rescuers’ health and the animals being rescued:

Preparing to go to the scene of the rescue and arriving on the scene: Breathe. Picture a calm and peaceful place in your mind. Keep this place with you in your heart as you go about your work.

Rescuing animals from the scene: Whatever issues the ani-mals are manifesting, stay positive. Find affirmations to hold in your mind and heart depending on the animal. For example, for a very fearful dog, you might use the affirmation courage. For a dog that has been neglected, you might use the affirma-tion love.

After the rescue: Imagine you can breathe earth energy up from ground and into your heart. As you speak to the dog and spend time with him, see him with your heart—see through to his spirit and imagine he is already healed.

Many of us aren’t professional rescue workers, but choose instead to support rescue efforts by opening our homes to these animals and asking them to join our families. Here are some ways Reiki can support adopters and the rescued ani-mals in their new homes:

Preparing to go to a shelter or rescue to adopt an animal: Set your intention that your heart is open to connect to the per-fect animal for your home and family. Breathe earth energy into your heart to help you to stay grounded and centered. Try to listen to your heart as you meet each animal. Feel for that special heart connection—that animal will be your rescuer!

Bringing your new dog home: Your role will be to assist your new dog in healing old wounds and creating new beginnings. Use affirmations to help the energy stay positive and suppor-tive as your dog adjusts and begins his new life. Remember to always see your dog as you know he is at his very essence—as perfectly in balance. Anything outwardly out of balance (illness, injury, behavior problems and so on) is simply a mani-festation of wounds which you will help him to heal. In seeing and believing in his healing potential, you will help him to reach it.

Reiki teaches us that our role in dog rescue is not only an out-ward physical “doing” of the rescue. We can also nurture the healing of the dog’s body, mind and spirit in focusing our com-passionate intention in a positive direction. Through the Reiki techniques of staying mindful of the precepts, remembering to connect to the earth and ground ourselves, using affirmations and seeing with our hearts, we are better able to stay in bal-ance. And when we ourselves are in balance, we are better able to help our dogs.

Kathleen Prasad is an Animal Reiki Teacher, founder of Animal Reiki Source and President of The Shelter Animal Reiki Associa-tion. Kathleen is a student of classical Japanese Reiki methods, training with internationally recognized Reiki researchers Frans and Bronwen Stiene of the International House of Reiki. She is a registered practitioner with the Shibumi International Reiki Association (www.shibumireiki.org). She has co-authored The Animal Reiki Handbook (Lulu, 2009), Animal Reiki (Ulysses Press, 2006) and edited and contributed to the books Tails from the Source and Animal Reiki Tails, Volume 2. She has writ-ten many educational articles on animals and Reiki for holistic publications around the world. Kathleen has taught Reiki to the staff of organizations such as The San Francisco SPCA, The East Bay SPCA, The Humane Society of Silicon Valley, BrightHaven Healing Arts Center for Animals, Guide Dogs for the Blind, and The Elephant Sanctuary. She has also authored The Animal Reiki Practitioner Code of Ethics, which has been published in professional Reiki publications and adopted by practitioners around the world. In addition to offering an extensive animal Reiki training program and worldwide practitioner directory on her website, she self-publishes a free e-newsletter on Reiki and animals. Kathleen enjoys life in beautiful Marin County, Califor-nia with her husband, daughter, and two horses. Visit Kathleen online at www.animalreikisource.com.


by: Jan Rasmussen

TRUTHS, OMISSIONS AND PROFITS

It’s getting warmer outside — time for sellers of heartworm medications to start scaring you to death. Television and print ads, which used to push meds only during warm summer months, now urge you to keep your dog on medication year round. The question is: why the change?

Drs. David Knight and James Lok of the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine, addressing recom-mendations for year round meds, warned: “The practice of some veteri-narians to continuously prescribe monthly chemoprophylaxis exaggerates the actual risk of heartworm transmis-sion in most parts of the country and unnecessarily increases the cost of pro-tection to their clients.”

So, is the change to year round meds all about money? Or is there more to this story?

Heartworm “prevention” is a major health decision for pet parents and multi-billion dollar Big Business for drug companies, veterinarians, test-ing laboratories and on-line sellers of medication. When health intersects money, there’s a lot of room for conflict of interest. Only by understanding the business aspects and the truth about heartworm transmission can you make an informed decision about if, how and when to protect your dog with commer-cial products.

While everyone agrees that heartworm infestations can be life-threatening, in-festation is far from inevitable nor is it the immutable death sentence advertis-ers would have you believe.

(Otherwise, all dogs and cats not on meds would die of infestation. But they don’t.)

Every holistic vet I’ve consulted had concerns about the long-term safety of heartworm medications. Well-known vet, author and columnist Martin Gold-stein wrote in his wonderful book The Nature of Animal Healing that he sees heartworms as less epidemic than the “disease-causing toxicity” of heartworm medicine.

Dr. Jeff Levy, vet and homeopath, con-cluded “that it was not the heartworms that caused disease, but the other fac-tors that damaged the dogs’ health to the point that they could no longer compensate for an otherwise tolerable parasite load.” Those factors include, “… being vaccinated yearly, eating com-mercial dog food, and getting suppres-sive drug treatment for other symp-toms….”

Heartworm meds do not, by the way, prevent heartworms. They are poisons that kill heartworm larvae (called mi-crofilariae) contracted during the previ-ous 30-45 days (and maybe longer due to what is call the Reach Back Effect).

The heartworm industry authority, The American Heartworm Society (and their cat heartworm site) offers a wealth of information. Their website is a public service but also a marketing tool aimed at buyers and resellers of heartworm meds. Sponsors of this website are a Who’s Who of drug companies. Fort Dodge Animal Health (Wyeth), Merial and Pfizer are “Platinum Sponsors.” Bayer merits Silver. Novartis, Schering-Plough, Virbac and Eli Lilly get Bronze. Most of these

companies have sales reps that regu-larly call on vets and show them how to sell you heartworm meds. With any purchase of any drug, we recommend you ask for information regarding pos-sible adverse effects, the necessity for taking this drug and available alterna-tives.

How Heartworms Infect Dogs: It’s Not Easy!

Well, now that we’ve looked behind the scenes of the heartworm industry, let’s take a look at how the heartworms themselves (called Dirofilaria immitis) do business. Seven steps must be com-pleted to give your dog a dangerous heartworm infestation:

Step 1: To infect your dog, you need mosquitoes (so you need warm tem-peratures and standing water). More specifically, you need a hungry female mosquito of an appropriate species. Fe-male mosquitoes act as airborne incu-bators for premature baby heartworms (called microfilariae). Without the proper mosquito, dogs can’t get heart-worms. Period.

That means dogs can’t “catch” heart-worms from other dogs or mammals or from dog park lawns. Puppies can’t “catch” heartworms from their mothers and moms can’t pass heartworm immu-nity to pups.

Step 2: Our hungry mosquito needs ac-cess to a dog already infected with sexu-ally mature male and female heart-worms that have produced ba-bies.

Step 3: The heartworm babies must be at the L1 stage of development when


the mosquito bites the dog and with-draws blood.

Step 4: Ten to fourteen days later — if the temperature is right –the microfi-lariae mature inside the mosquito to the infective L3 stage then migrate to the mosquito’s mouth. (Yum!)

Step 5: Madame mosquito transmits the L3’s to your dog’s skin with a bite. Then, if all conditions are right, the L3’s develop in the skin for three to four months (to the L5 stage) before making their way into your dog’s blood. But your dog still isn’t doomed.

Step 6: Only if the dog’s immune sys-tem doesn’t rid the dog of these worms do the heartworms develop to adult-hood.

Step 7: It takes approximately six months for the surviving larvae to achieve maturity. At this point, the adult heartworms may produce babies if there are both males and females, but the kiddies will die unless a mosquito carrying L3’s intervenes. Otherwise, the adults will live several years then die.

In summation, a particular species of mosquito must bite a dog infected with circulating L1 heartworm babies, must carry the babies to stage L3 and then must bite your dog . The adult worms and babies will eventually die off in the dog unless your dog is bitten again! Oh, and one more thing: heart-worms Development Requires Sus-tained Day & Night Weather Above 57˚F

In Step 4 above I wrote that heartworm larvae develop “if the temperature is right.”

The University of Pennsylvania vet school (in a study funded by Merial) found: “Development in the mosquito is temperature dependent, requiring approximately two weeks of tempera-ture at or above 27C (80F). Below a threshold temperature of 14C (57F), development cannot occur, and the cycle will be halted. As a result, trans-mission is limited to warm months, and

duration of the transmission season varies geographically.”

Knight and Lok agree: “In regions where average daily temperatures re-main at or below about 62˚F (17˚ C) from late fall to early spring, insuffi-cient heat accumulates to allow matu-ration of infective larvae in the inter-mediate host [the mosquito], preclud-ing transmission of the parasite.”

The Washington State University vet school reports that laboratory studies show that maturation of the worms requires “the equivalent of a steady 24-hour daily temperature in excess of 64°F (18°C) for approxi-mately one month.” In other words, it has to be warm day AND night or de-velopment is retarded even if the aver-age temperature is sufficiently warm. They add, that at 80° F, “10 to 14 days are required for development of micro-filariae to the infective stage.”

Jerold Theis, DVM, PhD, says, “If the mean monthly temperature is only a few degrees above 14 degrees centi-grade [57 degrees F] it can take so many days for infective larvae to de-velop that the likelihood of the female mosquito living that long is remote.”

I have never found this temperature-dependent information on a website promoting “preventatives,” but only in more scholarly works not easily ac-cessed by the public. There is, as far as I can find, only one mention of tem-perature on the Heartworm and

none in the Merck/Merial Veterinary Manual site or Merial’s heart-worm video — even though Merial funded the UPenn study.

The Society also reports, “Factors af-fecting the level of risk of heartworm infection include the climate (temperature, humidity), the species of mosquitoes in the area, presence of mosquito breeding areas and presence of animal reservoirs (such as infected dogs or coyotes).”

OPTIONS TO FEAR BASED RECOM-MENDATIONS

A Heartworm Society news release states: “By giving heartworm preven-tion every month, forgetful pet owners will have their pets protected when they need it most.” But doesn’t that also mean they get it when they need it least? Or need it not at all? Are you a “forgetful” owner?

In this part of my heartworm series, we’ll discusses informed decision-making, and suggests ways, if you want them, to limit or eliminate heartworm drugs. I am a researcher and holistic health advocate, not a vet. Please learn the facts then discuss with your vet the appropriate course given your dog’s location, lifestyle, travel schedule, health, climate and the time of year. Expect an open-mind and respect from your vet, or find another vet. Just as with vaccination, “one size fits all” is outdated, profit-driven, lazy medicine.


Take a look at the map above, courtesy of the Heartworm Society. As ex-pected, dark areas of the map, which show the most heartworm cases per clinic, are found in the hot, humid Southeastern US, especially the Atlantic and Gulf coasts and Mississippi Delta.

Don’t let the map scare you. If pub-lished seasonally, map colors would pale significantly during cool months. Also remember that you’re seeing gen-eralities, not specifics. A clinic near a rural pond will likely have many cases while an urban clinic 15 miles away may have a much lower inci-dence. Maps are general. Determine your own microclimate. Ask your vet how many cases of heartworm infec-tion he/she treated in the past year. Also ask if he/she treats all posi-tive cases, or just those with advanced infestation. If the vet doesn’t keep de-tailed records, that should tell you something.

Conservative start/stop maps from heartworm researchers Drs. David Knight and James Lok (in “Seasonality

of Heartworm Infections and Implica-tions for Chemoprophylaxis”) show only two areas requiring year round

heartworm meds: the southernmost areas of Florida and Texas. Houston, New Orleans and similar areas are shown requiring meds for 9 months. Other states range from 3-7 months. The Drs. wrote: “For nearly 80% of the states, the potential for heartworm transmission is limited to 6 months or less.”

The Heartworm Society warns that heartworm infections are getting worse. DVM Magazine, a magazine for vets, reports that recent results do show a rise in the number of positive cases per clinic in 31 states. DMV reports: “The reasons likely are multifactorial, including increased heartworm testing, increased client base per clinic or even climate trends.”

Does Year Round Medicating Bring Extra Protection?

Applying sunscreen at night is useless. So is taking heartworm medica-tion when climate conditions prevent transmission. Only a small percentage of climates permit year-round trans-mission. Everyone else is unnecessarily subsidizing drug companies and “preventatives” sellers and, more im-

portantly, exposing their dog to unnec-essary risks.

Two exceptions: 1) “Forgetful” and ir-responsible pet parents who won’t be-gin the medication on time or build their dog’s natural immunity might want to medicate year round, although that means they have to remember to give meds every month. 2) If your dog contracts heartworms within a few years of beginning medication … and you can show you gave meds year round … and your dog had the required blood tests (2 or 3), you may benefit a little financially because drug compa-nies will pay for dog’s treatment.

Are Heartworm Preventatives Safe?

You’ve seen those scary photos of worm-strangled hearts, right? Shouldn’t you give meds year round just in case? Isn’t safe better than sorry?

But is that harmless little pill or yum-mie medical “brownie” really safe? No drug is completely free of risk and ad-verse reactions. I can find no long-term studies regarding cancer risks and or-


gan damage for dogs receiving heart-worm insecticides year round (or even for a few months). Such a study would be difficult to conduct and very expen-sive. Who would fund such a study – or publish any negative findings?

One clue to the possibility of adverse reactions should be label warnings: call your doctor immediately if ingested; keep away from children; wash your hands immediately after use…. How can medication be good for dogs but so dangerous for you?

Another question: is your dog healthy enough for these medications? The “Heartworm Prevention” page of the American Animal Hospital Association states: “Healthy kidneys and normal liver functions are essential in metabo-lizing most medications.” Many dogs, including my Jiggy, do not have healthy organ function. I wonder how many unhealthy animals are neverthe-less on meds?

Adverse Reactions to Heartworm Medications

With any drug, study FDA and manufac-turer information before medicating.

These adverse reactions have been re-ported to the FDA by manufactur-ers. (Click the links for more informa-tion; write or call manufacturers with any questions). Terms you might not understand include ataxia (gross lack of coordination of muscle movements), pruritus (itchy dermatologic condition), urticaria (hives), mydriasis (excessive pupil dilation), and erythema (skin red-ness). Other terms should be self-explanatory.

HEARTGARD and TriHeartPlus (ivermectin): Depression/lethargy, vomiting, anorexia, diarrhea, mydriasis, ataxia staggering, convulsions and hy-persalivation. INTERCEPTOR (milbemycin oxime) reports the above reactions plus weakness. Sentinel (milbemycin oxime) reports vomiting, depression/lethargy, pruritus, urticaria, diarrhea, anorexia, skin congestion, ataxia, convulsions, hypersalivation and weakness.

REVOLUTION® (selamectin), Topical Parasiticide For Dogs and Cats: pre-approval reactions of vomiting, loose stool or diarrhea with or without blood, anorexia, lethargy, salivation, tachyp-nea, and muscle tremors. Post-approval experience included the above plus pru-ritis, urticaria, erythema, ataxia, fever, and rare reports of death and seizures in dogs.

Proheart 6 : severe allergic reactions (anaphylaxis): facial swelling, itching, difficulty breathing, collapse; lethargy (sluggishness); not eating or losing in-terest in food; any change in activity level; seizures; vomiting and/or diar-rhea (with and without blood); weight loss; pale gums, increased thirst or uri-nation, weakness, bleeding, bruis-ing; rare instances of death. This prod-uct was voluntarily withdrawn from the market in 2004 because of deaths but has been reintroduced.

For any other brand, research the prod-

uct or its active ingredient before even thinking of administering it.

Also, never give any meds without first learning if any vitamins, minerals, herbal products or drugs interact nega-tively with the medication. Note age restrictions. Most importantly, learn what symptoms alert you to a reaction. Important note: Collies, Australian Shepherds and related breeds have a sensitivity to Ivermectin (Heartgard and others).

Beware any website or person profess-ing the absolute safety of any medica-tion. I’d like adverse reactions for pet medications to be included in all TV ads, as they are for meds for humans — but I don’t expect it.

Reporting Adverse Events: Call your veterinarian immediately if you suspect a reaction to this or any other drug. Discuss alternatives and treatment and make sure the reaction is recorded in your dog’s file. The AVMA says : “… no-tify the US Food and Drug Administra-tion (FDA) by contacting the manufac-turer. The FDA requires that manufac-turers of FDA-approved drugs forward adverse event reports to the agency.”

Is the fox is guarding the hen house? Ask your vet to report the reaction, then follow up and make sure your vet did it. Under-reporting is common. (An estimated 99% of adverse reactions go unreported according to the FDA.)

Tests for Heartworm Infection Heartworms can, and should, be de-tected by a simple blood test before ad-ministering medication. The antigen test detects an adult female worms at least 5-8 months old. The Merck Veteri-nary Manual says: “The antigen detec-tion test is the preferred diagnostic method for asymptomatic dogs or when seeking verification of a suspected HW infection.”

Microfilariae (babies) in the blood are detected by a different blood test.

These show exposure, but do not de-tect female adults (potential breed-ers). Antibody tests (as opposed to anti-

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gen tests) are not preferred because they indicate only that the dog has been ex-posed to heartworms at some time in his or her life, even if the worms subse-quently died.

If you plan to give “preventatives,” test before beginning medication, preferably within a month of when daily tempera-tures consistently climb above 57˚ F.

If you’re not going to use meds, homeo-pathic veterinarian Jeff Feinman wrote me that he advises semi-annual testing when not using preventatives. My own vet, Tamara Hebbler, agrees. Testing twice yearly helps you catch disease early when it’s easier to treat. Dr. Martin Goldstein in The Nature Of Animal Heal-ing says: “Only a small percentage of dogs who get heartworm die of it, espe-cially if they’re routinely tested twice yearly for early detection. Even in un-treated dogs, after a period of uncom-fortable symptoms, the adult worms die….”

Did you know that the latest canine movie star “Benji” was found in a shelter, infected with heartworms? Benji was treated successfully and went onto ca-nine fame and a healthy life.

Heartworms, like other parasites, don’t become life threatening quickly or inevi-tably. It takes at least 5 months, and more often 7-8 months, for a baby to grow to a reproducing adult — presum-ing the dog’s immune system doesn’t intervene. Also, adult males and females must both survive to breed.

Important Note: If your dog’s antigen test comes back positive, holistic vet Tamara Hebbler suggests that before you rush into treatment with harsh, poi-sonous drugs, you should get a cardiac ultrasound to determine the extent of the infestation. Heartworms, like other parasites, often live with their hosts without ever causing a dangerous prob-lem. It’s quite common for animals in the wild to live entire lives with heart-worms. (If worms always killed dogs, they’d soon run out of hosts.) Unless heartworms are re-introduced by an-other infected mosquito, the adults and their babies will eventually die off.

When Should You Start Administering Meds — If You’re Going To? Remember, you kill heartworm babies after the fact. You can only “prevent” them by avoiding mosquitoes. (You can

also kill them with a healthy immune system.) This means starting meds 30-45 after the weather warms and mosqui-toes appear. Also, Washington State Uni-versity warns, “If your pet travels to heartworm areas, prevention needs to be administered within 30 days of expo-sure to infected mosquitoes. Adult dogs (older than 6 mos.) need to be tested before starting preventative.”

Dr. Margo Roman, an integrative vet from in Massachusetts, documentary film maker and Founder of the first-ever Integrative Health Pet Expo, tells me she begins medication six weeks af-ter sees mosquitoes. This allows 2 weeks for the microfilariae (baby heartworms) to mature inside a mosquito to the infec-tive stage and be transferred to a dog, plus 30 days additional days covered by the medication working backwards to kill those babies.

When Should You Stop Heartworm “Preventatives”?

Dr. Roman recommends stopping meds after the first frost for people living in an area with cold winters. In other areas, vets recommend stopping 30-45 days after weather is consistently below 57 F degrees and you see no mosquitoes. See Part 1 of this article, and the start/stop maps, for more details.

What Brand Should You Use?

Consumers often think that “preventing” as many parasites as possible with one product is a bargain — and ulti-mately safer for the dog. But why ex-pose your dog to additional, unneces-sary toxins? Most holistic vets will tell you to protect against only those pests (and diseases) your dog is likely to en-counter. .

More than a decade ago — on June 4, 1998 — the FDA approved a 1/5 dose version of Interceptor heartworm medi-cation, a product called Safeheart. This expensive field trial was conducted and the dosage approved — but inexplicably the product was never marketed in the U.S.

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To duplicate the Safeheart heartworm “prevention” method — which you can’t buy — you have split the Intercep-tor dose into quarters. Check with In-terceptor first, and ask your pharmacist or vet how to do this accurately. The recommended once-a-month dosage is 0.1 mg of milbemycin oxime per kg of body weight (0.05 mg/lb). (Interceptor’s regular dose of dosage is 0.5 mg milbemycin oxime per kg of body weight.) Print the FDA’s Safeheart report and take it to your vet for your prescription and additional instruc-tions.

Note: At this dose, only heartworms will be treated with the Safeheart method, not other worms or fleas.

How Often Should You Give Meds?

In his important book Homeopathic Care For Cats and Dogs, veterinarian Don Hamilton says of heartworm: “In dogs the “monthly” preventives are ef-fective if given at six week intervals, and possibly even at seven- or eight week intervals….” Author/veterinarians Richard Pitcairn and Al-len Schoen told us essentially the same thing when we were researching our book Scared Poopless. If you opt for this “less is more” treatment with “preventatives,” mark dosing dates on your calendar and don’t miss them.

The vets at Holistic Vet Center say: “… monthly heartworm preventatives are actually 100% effective if given every 45 days and 99% effective if given every 60 days.”

I presume that the monthly schedule was designed for the ease of remember-ing when to give meds. However … giving meds monthly rather than every 45 days requires more doses – and offers more opportunities for ad-verse reactions. For someone medicat-ing year-round, that’s 4 fewer doses per year.

Are There Natural Heartworm Pre-ventatives?

Mosquito control is the ultimate natural preventative. No mosquitoes, no heart-

worms. Control mosquitoes by elimi-nating standing water and staying in-doors at dusk and dawn. Use bug spray (marked safe and non-toxic for animals and children). Buy bug zappers. (All these are good ideas for human protec-tion from mosquito-borne diseases as well.)

Is mosquito control 100% effective? No, but Mosquito.org has some great tips. (Note: one study showed that a full moon increased mosquito activity by 500%.) Find more information on con-trolling mosquitoes in this University of California report.

What do I do? Well, for me, the choice was easy. I live in So. California. I rarely see mosquitoes. My dogs spend most of their time indoors. Nights are invaria-bly cool.

With the advice of two local vets, I de-cided to protect my own dogs (both of whom have health challenges) against the toxicity of heartworm “preventatives” rather than protect against an unlikely infection. I use non-toxic alternatives like mosquito control, an excellent diet and no drugs unless they’re absolutely unavoidable. I in-crease safety by testing blood twice yearly. I haven’t used “preventatives” for five or six years and my dogs remain heartworm free. This is my personal decision. I am not a vet.

If I lived in a mosquito-heavy area, however, I might do much the same. I would determine local risks and would consult a local holistic vet to get help preventing heartworms natu-rally. I would control mosquitoes and test blood twice or more yearly. Some-one who had “outside dogs,” and who was the nervous about heartworms, might also use heartworm meds or the Safeheart method during the peak heartworm months of July and August, but only if their dogs had healthy kid-neys and livers. They should make any decision with a knowledgeable vet.

Dr. Will Falconer, a holistic vet certified in acupuncture and homeopathy, has written an e-book called “Drug-Free Heartworm Prevention Program.” This

9-page, well-written e-book (currently $9.95) is delivered electronically. I do not profit from sales of this book. Drs. Richard Pitcairn and Martin Goldstein have also written about this in their books.

Please leave us a comment and let us know how you liked this article. Tell us about your concerns and decisions. If we have made any errors, please let us know so we can rectify them. And, please, tell your friends the facts behind heartworm transmission.

Most importantly, do not make deci-sions out of fear. Don’t let anyone, even your vet, intimidate or ridicule you. Be an educated consumer and a rabid ad-vocate for your dog’s health.

Disclaimer: The information provided here is for educational purposes only. Do not rely on this information without do-ing your own research including consul-tation with your own veterinarian. Do not buy or fail a product for treating heartworm without evaluating it care-fully.

Jan Rasmusen is a former computer industry executive and a life long dog lover and equestrian. She has writ-ten four books, two of which are hid-den in her closet. She shares her life with 2 gorgeous Maltese dogs. One of which wrote the book "Scared Poopless: The Straight Scoop on dog Care". Jan has a very informative blog that host all kinds of informa-tion on the dangers of vaccines and medications. www.dogs4dogs.com and www.truth4dogs.com She can e reached at [email protected]


Monetary interests are working to stack the deck against raw feeding and they are building quite a pile. One glaring example of this is the recent proclamation by the Delta Society, a non-profit organization in Bellevue, Washington. According to their website, “We help people throughout the world become healthier and hap-pier by incorporating therapy, service and companion animals into their lives.” Therapy dogs are welcome—unless those animals are raw fed.

Delta’s board of directors recently voted to preclude animals eating raw protein foods from participating in their Pet Partners program. They claim that scientific evidence backs up their concerns over raw fed pets shedding significant amounts of pathogenic bacteria. Ac-cording to the board members, “The use of raw animal proteins to promote animal health has not been based on proven or known scientific facts, only anecdotal incidents.” Dr. Tom Lonsdale would be surprised to hear this. Dr. Tom Lonsdale’s book Raw Meaty Bones: Promote Health—first published in 2001—includes a 20 page bibliog-raphy citing studies that back up his assertion that raw feeding pro-motes health.

Questioning the validity of health claims from raw feeding is merely a side issue. The main show is the increasing response to raw feed-ing by those who are heavily invested in maintaining the status quo. The Delta Society’s website carries this entry:

What was the role of pet food manufacturers in the adoption of the Raw Protein Diet Policy? No pet food manufacturer representatives contacted, encouraged, lobbied, or influenced the Delta Society Medical Advisory Group in recommending to the board that they approve a Raw Protein Diet Policy.

They didn’t have to—they have a pet food representative on their board of directors! Delta Society Secretary Brenda Bax is the Mar-keting Director for Purina. On Delta Society’s home page is the note “Thank you to our incredible partner, the passionate pet lovers at Purina” atop the Purina logo. It would certainly not be in the Purina corporation’s interests to support raw feeding, would it?

Bax is not the only board member with a conflict of interest per-taining to this issue. Board member Rebecca Johnson is the Direc-tor of the Research Center for Human Animal Interaction at the Missouri University College of Veterinary Medicine. The center’s last conference was sponsored by Mars, Purina, Hill’s, and Bayer Healthcare.

Board member Laird Goodman is the owner and Director of the Murrayhill Veterinary Hospital. Goodman is a guest speaker/educator for the Pfizer corporation. He has served on the Veteri-nary Advisory Board for The Heska Corporation since 2001. The

Heska Corporation is heavily invested in products such as vaccines and heartworm preventatives. Goodman has also served since 2003 on the Veterinary Advisory Board for The Intervet Corporation. The Intervet Corporation: Intervet/Schering-Plough Animal Health is a global, research-driven company that develops, manufactures and markets a broad range of veterinary medicines and services.

Raw feeding threatens not only the pet food manufacturers but also the pharmaceutical industry as well. Healthy dogs require far fewer “medicines” for the illnesses caused by kibble fed diets. Those pet owners who choose to raw feed frequently eschew pest control chemicals as well. Conventionally trained vets continue to push the kibble and chemicals, however, despite mounting evidence that both are harmful to pets.

In their book Whole Health for Happy Dogs: A Natural Health Hand-book for Dogs and Their Owners, authors Jill Elliot and Kim Bloomer write, “While a raw diet has long been a common practice in Europe and other countries, it is still not readily accepted in the United States. European veterinarians commonly recommend a raw diet for dogs, while American veterinarians commonly recommend feeding kibble. The fear of feeding raw meat in the United States is usually due to concern over salmonella, e. coli, and parasites. As we stated earlier, dogs are bacteria machines, and their digestive sys-tems are designed to handle raw meat. They are much more likely to get parasites or bacteria from sources such as another dog’s feces or dirt rather than the human-grade meat you’ll provide for them.”

One motivation for the Delta Society’s decision may be based on fear. On their Raw Protein Diet Policy page they include this sen-tence: “Also, your veterinarian is not assuming legal responsibility for you and your pet, Delta Society is.” Board member Chuck Granoski is an attorney and owner of The Law Offices of Betzen-dorfer & Granoski. One of the areas of practice listed on their web-site is Animal Injuries. The fear of a lawsuit is probably uppermost in his mind.

One can only speculate on the pressures that donors may place on the board as well but it is hard to know for certain. According to the Charity Navigator (www.charitynavigator.org) Delta Society has a written donor privacy policy.

The Delta Society is not responding directly to questions about their decision. I sent an email to them on June 2, asking, “What studies back up your claim that raw fed dogs are any more dangerous than kibble fed dogs?” and received the following form letter email: “Thank you for your question, comment or concern regarding the Raw Protein diet policy, all will be reviewed and addressed through global FAQ and the Delta Society's website.—Medical Advisory Group” Their initial statement of policy was apparently not re-searched enough to answer a simple question.

by: Lynne Parker


Recent developments raise some disturbing questions about the true motivations behind the decision. In a June 4th post for Truth-AboutPetFood.com, Susan Thixton exposes the patent applica-tion by Brenda Bax, the Delta board member and Purina repre-sentative. The goal of the patent is to control marketing of prod-ucts through animal welfare organizations. Thixton writes in her post:

“I am confused and concerned. Why would Purina Pet Food want to patent a marketing method associated with an Animal Welfare Organization? Is this patent application a concern to all Animal Welfare Organizations that do not currently work with Purina Pet Food? Does this patent provide Purina Pet Food control over all other corporations working with/donating to an Animal Welfare Organization? Is/was Delta Society their first test market and the "wherein the animal welfare organization must meet a specified requirement to be a part of the marketing program" was the ban of pets fed a raw diet?”

The full patent application can be read at http://www.faqs.org/patents/app/20090254418 The implications are frightening to consider and do not bode well for animals or the people who love them. How will the animals truly be served if the welfare and rescue groups are turned into marketing tools for the pet food industry? Pet owners who have been raw feeding for decades are, as one put it, “just plain tired of this debate”. Unfortunately, the battle between pet food corporations and enlightened pet owners is only in the beginning phase. Decisions made by animal welfare and rescue groups will continue to be impacted by pressure and

donations from these corporations. All we can do is continue to care for our pets in the healthiest, most natural way possible. Our pets’ health will speak volumes. “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”—Mahatma Gandhi Lynne Parker has worked as the advertising and design manager for a University press for 10 years. What free time she has is devoted to her dogs and learning more natural, healthy ways to care for them.

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DN: How did you discover that pets were targeted by the Pharmaceutical companies?

John Virapen: Although I was primarily involved in this for children, I had met a homeopath who owned two Yorkshire Terriers. As I observed her relationship with her dogs, I understood that people could become as close knit to their dogs as to their children. The common thread is life; and Pharma, with the help of the government, is destroying it.

DN: How has pet insurance changed veterinary care?

John Virapen: Expensive new diagnostic and surgical gadg-ets are primarily designed to screw the insurance compa-nies. Vets and doctors are both very well paid to use these fancy tools and the pet owners pay the price in higher fees. There are numerous opportunities for Pharma to corrupt the marketing of animal medicine because nobody really checks them. These people make a lot of money be-cause nobody questions them and the animals get the short end of the stick. Vets can do whatever they want without fear of malpractice suits because dogs are property and their value is insufficient to be much of a threat. Last year they released a new anti-depressant for dogs and this is just crookery. The pharmaceutical companies have a strong hold on the veterinary business and they are incapable of being honest. In the end, the individual vets and their asso-ciations must be the ones to stop the madness.

DN: Why are dogs targeted so heavily?

John Virapen: With all of the debates going on regarding vaccination primarily, the animals get short changed be-cause government makes people believe it is for granted that if we, as humans, get vaccinations then animals should as well. They depict dogs and cats as nasty carriers of bugs. This is why in North America, dogs aren’t allowed in markets, stores or restaurants. It is discrimination really. The bottom line is money and the Pharmaceutical companies are fleecing people of their money. Pet owners must purchase licenses which should give them rights but does the opposite because we all no that dogs have no

rights. Pretty soon we will need to get permission to deal with our kids too. In Leipzig, there is a push for mandatory psychiatric evaluation of infants and soon, mothers will lose control of their children.

DN: Why are animal vaccinations more problematic

than human vaccinations?

John Virapen: The pharmaceutical companies use vaccina-tions and drugs they can’t dispense for humans on dogs. This includes expired lots as well as products not approved for human use. They then use fear mongering to market it.

I recruited the General Manager of animal product in Scan-dinavia and we had frequent conversations. He warned me of the many issues with the animal products. For example, while the company was still trying to get approval for Hu-man Growth Hormone for animals, they were already in-jecting it into pigs and cows. They didn’t care that the HGH was contaminated: they were mostly waste from the human market although humans would be consuming these animals in the end.

DN: How are these products marketed?

John Virapen: The media now works so closely with Pharma that it is called seeding. For example the press might claim that women with big bums are protected from diabetes. Soon thereafter, the media will feature a doctor talking about these findings then a few months later the press will announce “we are close to a breakthrough for diabetes”. This build up is meticulously designed to scare people because Pharma knows that people still run to their doctor when the government or media reports any new virus or disease.

Marketing strategies are planned years ahead. If a new product is on the way, the Pharmaceutical companies will do the market research first and based on that, lay down strategies in terms of time and method. This is normally done with a five year projection before launch. Their ploys

Interview with Dr. John Virapen Pharmaceutical insider Dr. John Virapen has worked more than 35 years in the pharma-ceutical industry. In Sweden he was general manager of Eli Lilly & Company and was involved in the market launch of several drugs, all with massive side effects.

John Virapen published his first book under the pseudonym “John Rengen in 2006. “Rubio Talks – A Story From A Pharma-Insider” is about his activity as a manager in the pharmaceutical industry. In 2008 his new book “Side Effects: Death” was pub-lished and is currently a best-seller in Europe.

John Virapen is now dedicated to expose and create awareness on how the pharmaceuti-cal industry is operating with their own best interest as their primary goal.

John’s website is http://www.john-virapen.com


include personal letters to vets and doctors with large prac-tices, targeting specific sections of medicine (dogs, cats), gathering information on how many animals can be target, who owns them (and they get information from licenses so the government is in on it). It is a well kept secret that gov-ernment gets their piece of the cake too. When this infor-mation is all in place, the pharmaceutical companies then need contacts so they go to the professional associations such as the AVMA and pick out a guy who is willing to ac-cept bribes and goodies in return for solicitation. They also look to government. When politicians wear out, they are not put to pasture, they are picked up by Pharma. They work as consultants so that Pharma has a government con-nection and they are impossible to convict because they are all glued together.

The WHO is also entwined into one group controlled by Pharma as they work together to create pandemics and then go to industrial sections such as food companies and tell them what to do and what to sell.

Marketing is the single highest cost for pharmaceutical companies, not research

DN: What can people do about it?

John Virapen: My aim is to get people to understand that

they need to take their own lives into account. I have been mislabelled as a conspiracy theorist but they will learn they are messing with the wrong guy because everything I say I have evidence for and the documents are safely in a vault.

Vets want to be accepted as doctors and they like the title and power. The title doesn’t make you God or an expert, it only depicts a level of education. Unfortunately, vets and doctors are behaving like Pharma trains them to behave.

Unless you are hospitalized you are not a patient. When you visit a Doctor or a Veterinarian you are a consumer and you pay for the medicine and you must remember they are not demi-gods.

If a car’s brakes don’t work every time, if the windshield falls out when it is driven over 40 kph, or if it’s exhaust fumes are channelled into the inside of the car, it wouldn’t make it onto the market. Medicines with equally dangerous side effects do. Why are consumers better protected against defective cars than against what happens to their bodies, to their health or to their lives?

Of course, not the entire pharmaceutical industry is bad. I can’t judge them all since I don’t know all of the compa-nies. But the search for an ethically pure company can be equated with searching for a needle in a haystack.

Eggs, Eggs, Wonderful Eggs Fresh eggs provide important brain, eye and body

nutrients in natural, unprocessed forms. They

should be a part of every dog's diet, especially preg-

nant bitches. There are four parts to an egg. Only 3

are necessary. Whites, yolks and the membranes on

the inside of the shell but not the shell itself. Egg

whites are an excellent source of protein and provide

riboflavin, magnesium, potassium, selenium and

Zinc. The yolk contains essential fats including:

conjugated linoleic acid, phospholipids, choline, lu-

tein, Vitamin D and (along with Sardines) a full

range of natural Vitamin E compounds, including

the cancer fighting gamma tocopheral and the to-

cotrienols. Egg membranes contain nutrients that

can help relieve joint pain. While eggshells provide a

source of calcium when properly prepared ( washed

and finely ground), we do not need to use the shells

with the ABC day plans. See what Steve's ABC plan

is in his book Unlocking the canine ancestral diet

available through Dogwise.


Bordatella or Kennel Cough is com-

monly required by boarding kennels

and veterinary hospitals. These vacci-

nations are delivered to a staggeringly

large percentage of dogs and the rea-

son is not to protect your dog: the rea-

son is to protect these facilities against

liability.

The proprietors who push for these

vaccines may be assuming more liabil-

ity than they can handle and the stakes

are very high. The truth is, the vac-

cines are not only ineffective but they

are far from safe. Yet they are rou-

tinely given to combat a self limiting

disease that amounts to as much dan-

ger to your dog as the common

cold does to you.

What is interesting is that when you

bring your dog to the vet for his Bor-

datella vaccination, he will have al-

ready been exposed to the natural

flora: all animals are exposed to both

Bordatella and Parainfluenza prior to

vaccination. It makes little sense to

vaccinate an animal for something he

has already been exposed to.

There are at least forty agents capable

of initiating Bordatella so vaccination

might appear to be prudent if it weren’t

for the fact that only two of these

agents are contained in the intranasal

vaccine. This poor percentage truly

makes the Bordatella vaccine a shot in

the dark. The lack of efficacy is well

summarized by noted immunologist

Dr. Ronald Schultz: “Kennel Cough is

not a vaccinatable disease”.

Despite the lack of any real effective-

ness, the Bordatella vaccine is rou-

tinely given and touted as safe, espe-

cially in the intranasal form. Make no

mistake however: the dangers and

misinformation surrounding this seem-

ingly innocuous spray are just as tangi-

ble and frightening as any other vacci-

nation.

A major problem with the Bordatella

vaccine is that it is part of a combina-

tion vaccine. Unbeknownst to most

pet owners, the Bordatella intranasal

spray also contains Parainfluenza (the

vaccine for which is not surprisingly,

just as ineffective as Bordatella). The

problems with the Parainfluenza por-

tion are threefold.

First, there is a real danger of danger-

ous immunological overload when vac-

cinations are offered in combination.

Second, like Bordatella, most dogs have

already been exposed to Parainfluenza,

making the necessity of vaccination

questionable.

Third, the Parainfluenza vaccine is just

as ineffective as the Bordatella vaccine

by Dr. Patricia Jordan DVM


because the vaccine does not provide

antibody against Parainfluenza where

it is most needed: on the mucosal sur-

faces.

Other dangers associated with the Bor-

datella vaccine are obviously not far

removed from the dangers associated

with any other vaccination. Although

Bordatella is a bacterial vaccine, we

now know that bacterial vaccines pre-

sent the same threat as Modified Live

Vaccines. Modified Live Viruses from

human vaccines are now known to be-

come incorporated in the genes of the

host and can shuffle, reassert, and reac-

tivate thirty or more years after vacci-

nation. Bacterial genes are capable of

the same activity, lurking in the genetic

makeup, waiting to replicate and

awaken.

The intranasal Bordatella vaccine has

been known to activate a previously

asymptomatic collapsing trachea and

disrupt phagocytic activity which can

progress to pneumonia. The toxins

from the vaccine will also kill the cili-

ated lining of the trachea, creating a

denuded area susceptible to anything

coming down the windpipe. Perhaps

collapsing trachea, irritable tracheas

and pneumonias are all complications

of Bordatella and the Bordatella vac-

cine.

Vaccination of any sort also elevates

histamine which can promote cancer,

chronic inflammation and loss of toler-

ance. In general, all vaccination creates

immune dysregulation and is responsi-

ble for a vast array of pathology.

The Bordatella vaccine can wreak

havoc outside the body as well. Bor-

datella will shed from a vaccinated host

for seven weeks while Parainfluenza

will shed for a week. This means that

every vaccinated dog is a walking dis-

penser of potentially damaging bacte-

ria. While the risk to other dogs is ob-

vious, it should be of little concern to

healthy dogs because Bordatella is gen-

erally a self limiting disease. What you

might find surprising is that the shed

bacteria is a risk to other animals…and

to people.

The reason we now have a feline Bor-

datella (and not surprisingly, a feline

Bordatella vaccine), is likely thanks to

the widespread use and subsequent

shedding of Bordatella from vaccinated

dogs to cats sharing the household.

If this seems hard to imagine, consider

how dogs first fell victim to Canine In-

fluenza. Canine Influenza was initially

documented in racing greyhounds. It is

worth noting that many of these dogs

shared tracks with race horses: race

horses who are routinely vaccinated

with Equine Influenza.

It is not a stretch to predict Bordatella

will infect gerbils, hamsters and rabbits

in the near future and it is with cer-

tainty that the vaccine manufacturers

will be well rewarded with the contin-

ued fruits of their canine Bordatella

vaccine.

Not surprisingly, humans are not left

out of the equation. Ruth Berkelman

MD (Former Assistant Surgeon Gen-

eral, US Public Health Service) writes:

“The potential for both exposure and

for adverse consequences secondary to

exposure to veterinary vaccines in hu-

mans is growing. Enhanced efforts are

needed to recognize and to prevent

human illness associated with the use

of veterinary vaccines”.

Dr. Berkelman noted that pertussis-

whooping cough-like complaints in

children followed exposure to Bor-

datella bronchiseptica from the Bor-

datella vaccine and it is no coincidence

that Bordatella bronchiseptica and

whooping cough pertussis are very

closely related. Interestingly, the rate

of whooping cough is highest in highly

vaccinated populations.

Immunocompromised humans and

animals are at an elevated risk of infec-

tion from these canine vaccines. There

is a recently reported case of Bor-

datella bronchiseptica pneumonia in a

kidney and pancreas transplant patient

who had to board and subsequently

vaccinate her dogs at a veterinary clinic

while she was hospitalized.

Vaccines contain contaminating agents

including mycoplasmas which are also

very communicable to humans and

other mammals.

In the end, vaccination for Bordatella is

at best fruitless and at worst, apathetic

fraudulence at the hands of veterinari-

ans and vaccine manufacturers. It is up

to you whether or not your dog re-

ceives this vaccination and that is not

overstating the obvious. Sadly, most

pet owners are aware of this but

choose vaccination because they feel

they are at the mercy of boarding ken-

nels, training schools and veterinari-

ans.

Patricia Monahan Jordan is a graduate

of the North Carolina College of Veteri-

nary Medicine. She practiced conven-

tional veterinary medicine for twenty

years and founded six different veteri-

nary facilities in North Carolina. Dr.

Jordan has traced the paths of im-

munopathology to vaccine administra-

tion and uncovered the cycle of disease

and the endless cycle of disease man-

agement that results from vaccine ad-

ministration.

Dr. Jordan can be reached at

www.dr-jordan.com

“Kennel Cough is not a vaccinatable disease”.


by: Tim O’Shea DC

Without further ado, here’s the kernel: ascorbic acid is not vitamin C. Alpha tocopherol is not vitamin E. Retinoic acid is not vitamin A. And so on through the other vitamins. Vast sums of money have been expended to make these myths part of Conventional Wisdom. If you have several college degrees and all this is news to you, don’t feel bad. Unless you think your education ended at Commencement. Which is generally true.

WHEELS WITHIN WHEELS

Vitamins are not individual molecular compounds. Vitamins are biological complexes. They are multi-step biochemical interactions whose action is dependent upon a number of variables within the biological terrain. Vitamin activity only takes place when all conditions are met within that environ-ment, and when all co-factors and components of the entire vitamin complex are present and working together. Vitamin activity is even more than the sum of all those parts; it also involves timing.

Vitamins cannot be isolated from their complexes and still perform their specific life functions within the cells. When isolated into artificial commercial forms, like ascorbic acid, these purified synthetics act as drugs in the body. They are no longer vitamins, and to call them such is inaccurate.

A vitamin is “a working process consisting of the nutrient, enzymes, coenzymes, antioxidants, and trace minerals acti-vators.”

FORGOTTEN TRAILBLAZER

Dr. Royal Lee was the pioneer researcher in the field of whole food vitamins. For decades he documented the basic facts summarized in this chapter. His work has never been scientifically refuted. Anyone who seriously undertakes the study of vitamins today corroborates Lee’s work. His story

is a fascinating study in itself, a study of indomitable perse-verance in the pursuit of true principles. Jensen tells us that Royal Lee’s work will not be appreciated until the next cen-tury.

Hasn’t happened yet.

Lee felt the full weight of organized drugs/medicine bearing down on him. Reading like something out of Schindler’s List, we learn that the FDA not only persecuted Lee for chal-lenging the economics of synthetic vitamins, produced by giant drug companies, but that he was actually ordered by a court to burn all his research of the past 20 years! Burn his research! When has that ever happened in this country? They didn’t even do that to Larry Flynt.

Going off on a tangent, ever wondered how the FDA at-tained its present position as attack dog for the drug com-panies and food manufacturers? It’s another whole story in itself. The precursor of the FDA was the Bureau of Chemis-try. Up until 1912 the Bureau of Chemistry was headed up by a man named Dr. Harvey W. Wiley. Here’s a quote from Dr. Wiley that illustrates where his interests lay:

“No food product in our country would have any trace of benzoic acid, sulfurous acid or sulfites or any alum or sac-charin, save for medical purposes. No soft drink would con-tain caffeine or theobromine. No bleached flour would enter interstate commerce. Our foods and drugs would be wholly without any form of adulteration and misbranding. The health of our people would be vastly improved and the life greatly extended. The manufacturers of our food supply, and especially the millers, would devote their energies to improving the public health and promoting happiness in every home by the production of whole ground, unbolted cereal flours and meals.” -The History of a Crime Against the Pure Food Law, 1912

Now obviously we can’t have a dangerous lunatic like this in charge of the public nutrition, can we? Dr. Wiley actually filed suit against the Coca-Cola company in an attempt to keep their artificial product out of interstate commerce, and off the market. Fortunately Wiley was eventually replaced


by a saner individual, more attuned to the real nutritional needs of the American people, as determined by the experts who knew what was best for us: the food manufacturers. This was Dr. Elmer Nelson, and in his words we get an idea of the change in philosophy that marked the transformation of the Bureau of Chemistry into the FDA:

“It is wholly unscientific to state that a well-fed body is more able to resist disease than a poorly-fed body. My over-all opinion is that there hasn’t been enough experimenta-tion to prove that dietary deficiencies make one susceptible to disease.” - Elmer Nelson MD Washington Post 26 Oct 49

Bernard Jensen illustrates how the tobacco industry and the food giants like Coke were indirectly behind the legal perse-cution of Royal Lee. Cigarette ads in the 40s and 50s showed medical doctors promoting the digestive benefits of smoking Camels. Or the advertising of Coke and other re-fined sugar foods stating that “science has shown how sugar can help keep your appetite and weight under con-trol.” (Empty Harvest)

During this same period, Royal Lee was kept in courts for years, fighting to keep the right to advertise his vitamin products, because he was a threat to the food manufactur-ers. Lee knew they were poisoning the American public. He proved that refined sugars and devitalized, bleached flours were destroying the arteries and the digestive system, caus-ing heart disease and cancer.

WHOLE VS. FRACTIONATED

OK, natural vs. synthetic. Let’s start with Vitamin C. Most sources equate vitamin C with ascorbic acid, as though they were the same thing. They’re not. Ascorbic acid is an isolate, a fraction, a distillate of naturally occurring vitamin C. In addition to ascorbic acid, vitamin C must include rutin, bioflavonoids, Factor K, Factor J, Factor P, Tyrosinase, Ascorbinogen, and other components as shown in the figure below:

_____________________A s c o r b i c A c i d______________________

ascorbinogen bioflavonoids rutin

tyrosinase

Factor J Factor K Factor P

__________________________________________________________________

In addition, mineral co-factors must be available in proper amounts.

If any of these parts are missing, there is no vitamin C, no vitamin activity. When some of them are present, the body

will draw on its own stores to make up the differences, so that the whole vitamin may be present. Only then will vita-min activity take place, provided that all other conditions and co-factors are present. Ascorbic acid is described merely as the “antioxidant wrapper” portion of vitamin C; ascorbic acid protects the functional parts of the vitamin from rapid oxidation or breakdown.

Over 90% of ascorbic acid in this country is manufactured at a facility in Nutley, New Jersey, owned by Hoffman-LaRoche, one of the world’s biggest drug manufacturers. Here ascorbic acid is made from a process involving corn-starch and volatile acids. Most U.S. vitamin companies then buy the bulk ascorbic acid from this single facility. After that, marketing takes over. Each company makes its own labels, its own claims, and its own formulations, each one claiming to have the superior form of vitamin C, even though it all came from the same place, and it’s really not vitamin C at all.

FRACTIONATED = SYNTHETIC = CRYSTALLINE = FAKE

The word synthetic means two things:

– manmade – occurs nowhere in nature

From the outset, it is crucial to understand the difference between vitamins and vitamin activity. The vitamin is the biochemical complex. Vitamin activity means the actual bio-logical and cellular changes that take place when the stage is set for the vitamin complex to act.

Think of it like gas and a car. Pumping the gas into the tank doesn’t necessarily mean the car is going anywhere. Other conditions and factors must be also present, in order for Activity to occur. The gas line to the carburetor must be clear, the carburetor jets must be set, there must be an ex-act mixture of air flow, the ignition must be turned on, the spark plugs must be clean, the exact amount of gas must reach each spark plug right before it fires, no gas must be left over in the cylinder after the plug fires. Getting the idea? If any of this stuff is missing, there’s no Activity: the car doesn’t run, or at least not very well.

Amazing as it may sound if you’re hearing this for the first time, vitamins are more than the synthetic fractions we are commonly taught they are. The ascorbic acid you buy at the grocery store every few weeks, thinking you are buying Vitamin C, is just a chemical copy of naturally occurring ascorbic acid, which itself is still only a fraction of the actual Vitamin C. Real vitamin C is part of something living, and as such, can impart life. Your synthetic, fractionated chemical ascorbic acid never grew in the ground, never saw the light of day, never was alive or part of anything alive. It’s a chemical, a cornstarch derivative, a sulfuric acid by-product. In your body it’s just another drug. Synthetic vita-mins have toxic effects from mega-doses and actually can


increase the white blood cell count. Vitamins are only neces-sary in minute quantities on a daily basis. Whole food vita-mins, by contrast, are not toxic since the vitamin is com-plexed in its integral working form, and requires nothing from the body, and triggers no immune response.

DEFICIENCY

Scurvy is a disease caused by vitamin C deficiency. Scurvy is characterized by bleeding gums, slow wound healing, soften-ing bones, loose teeth, ulcerations of the mouth and digestive tract, general weight loss and fatigue. From 1650 to 1850 half of all seamen on transoceanic voyages died of scurvy. It was discovered by ship surgeon Thomas Lind in the early 1800s that British sailors were spared the disease altogether simply by a diet rich in citrus fruits. Since limes travelled well, they were the common choice during the early years, and thus the expression “limeys” was coined to describe Brit-ish sailors. It was later found both at sea and in prison fare that potatoes were equally successful in preventing scurvy, and much cheaper to obtain. (Lancet. 1842)

We find that there is less than 20 mg of ascorbic acid in a potato. Yet this small amount, since it is complexed in a food source, is all the body needs not only to prevent scurvy, but also to cure it, even in its advanced state. Such a remedy is described in detail in Richard Dana’s amazing journal Two Years Before the Mast, written in 1840.

Whole food vitamin C as found in potatoes, onions, and citrus fruits is able to quickly cure any case of scurvy. By contrast, the fractionated chemical ascorbic acid has been shown to be insufficient in resolving a scurvy condition, simply because it does not act as a nutrient. (Lancet 1842)

Ascorbic acid simply cannot confer vitamin activity, as taught

by the discoverer of vitamin C himself, another Nobel Prize laureate, Dr. Albert Szent-Georgi.

Szent-Georgi discovered vitamin C in 1937. In all his re-search however, Szent-Georgi found that he could never cure scurvy with the isolated ascorbic acid itself. Realizing that he could always cure scurvy with the “impure” vitamin C found in simple foods, Szent-Georgi discovered that other factors had to be at work in order for vitamin activity to take place. So he returned to the laboratory and eventually made the discovery of another member of the vitamin C complex, as shown in the diagram above: rutin. All the factors in the com-plex, as Royal Lee and Dr. Szent-Georgi both came to under-stand, ascorbic acid, rutin, and the other factors, were syner-gists: co-factors which together sparked the “functional in-terdependence of biologically related nutrient factors.” The term “wheels within wheels” was used to describe the inter-play of co-factors.

Each of the other synergists in the C complex has a separate function:

�� P factors for blood vessel strength

�� J factors for oxygen-carrying capacity of red cells

�� tyrosinase as an essential enzyme for enhancing white blood cell effectiveness

Ascorbic acid is just the antioxidant outer shell – the protec-tor of all these other synergists so that they will be able to perform their individual functions.

Now I can hear you asking, what about Linus Pauling, double Nobel Prize laureate, and his lifetime espousal of megadosing on ascorbic acid – up to 10 grams per day. He lived to be 93. Are we saying that he took a synthetic vitamin all that time? Yes, that’s exactly right. Bernard Jensen suggests that ascor-bic acid has an acidifying effect in part of the digestive tract, making an unfriendly environment for viruses, Candida, and pathogenic bacteria. Pauling’s good health was not the result of synthetic vitamin activity. Good genetics and maintaining an internal bioterrain not conducive to inflammation are likely what brought longevity to Linus Pauling. He eventually died of cancer at 93, but then who wants to live forever?


Dr. Royal Lee’s phrase “biological wheels within wheels” al-ways comes up in any discussion of whole food vitamins. Essentially it means that individual synergists cannot func-tion as a vitamin in a chemically isolated form, like ascorbic acid. Vitamins are living complexes which contribute to other higher living complexes – like cell repair, collagen manufac-ture, and maintenance of blood circulation. Ascorbic acid is not a living complex. It is a copy of a part of a living complex known as vitamin C. Ascorbic acid is a fractionated, crystal-line isolate of vitamin C.

Why are you a high school graduate or a college graduate or a doctor, and you don’t know this? Because drug manufactur-ers like things clean and simple and cheap to produce. To this simple fact add the politics which always comes into play when anyone mentions the word “billions,” and you are be-ginning to get the idea about where to begin your investiga-tion. Burned his research???

DIETARY SOURCES

Most vitamins cannot be made by the body. They must be taken in as food. The best sources then are obviously whole foods, rich in vitamins. Because of soil depletion, mineral depletion, pesticides, air pollution, and erosion, it is common knowledge that foods grown in American soil today have only a fraction of the nutrient value of 50 years ago. That means a fraction of the vitamins and minerals necessary for normal human cell function. Royal Lee described the Ameri-can diet as the cultivation and production of “devitalized foods.” Dr. Weston Price describes these empty products as the “foods of commerce.” Think it’s gotten better or worse since their time? Thus the necessity for supplementation.

Vitamins and minerals are not functionally separable. They make each other work. Example: vitamin D is necessary for the body to absorb calcium. Copper is necessary for vitamin C activity. And so on. Mineral deficiencies can cause vitamin deficiencies, and vice versa. Epidemic mineral deficiency in America is a well-documented result of systematic soil deple-tion.

So that is the other prime difference between whole food vitamins and synthetics: whole food vitamins contain within them many essential trace minerals necessary for their syn-ergistic operation. Synthetic vitamins contain no trace min-erals, relying on, and depleting, the body’s own mineral re-serves.

FUNNY FARMS

Following the German agricultural methods of Von Leibig in the mid-1800s, American farmers found that NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium) was all that was necessary for crops to look good. As long as NPK is added to the soil, crops can be produced and sold year after year from the same soil.

They look OK. But the trace minerals vital for human nutri-tion are virtually absent from most American soil after all these years. Many of these minerals, such as zinc, copper, and magnesium, are necessary co-factors of vitamin activity. De-pleted topsoil is one simple, widespread mechanism of both vitamin and mineral deficiency in American produce today. This doesn’t even take into account the tons of poisonous herbicides and pesticides dumped on crops. According to the UN, two million tons of pesticides are used worldwide annu-ally.

American agri-business has one motive: profit. Such a focus has resulted in an output of empty produce and a nation of unhealthy people. The earth’s immune system is its soil. To be vital and capable of growing vital foods, soil must be rich in both minerals and soil-based organisms – life forms. Healthy produce naturally resists insects. Insects are like bad bacteria in the body: they are attracted to diseased tissue, though they do not cause it.

THE FOODS OF COMMERCE

And we’re still only talking about people who actually eat raw fruits and vegetables, which is a minority. Processed food composes the majority of what most Americans eat. The only nutrients in most processed foods are “enriched” and “fortified” as described below.

When a doctor says that food supplements are all unneces-sary because we can get everything we need from our food, that doctor is lacking basic information published and agreed upon by his own peers. Whether or not we need supplemen-tation is no longer an issue, except for one who is totally out of touch. The issue is what kind and how much. Vitamin and mineral deficiency can be tagged to practically ANY disease syndrome known to man. DW Cavanaugh, MD of Cornell Uni-versity actually concluded that “There is only one major dis-ease, and that is malnutrition.”

Malnutrition of the affluent is the natural result of the foods of commerce.

WEB SURFING

The best vitamins are called whole food vitamins. It will be difficult finding this out on the Internet, however, because the Web is dominated by mainstream nutritional theory, which means pharmaceutical underwriting. In the area of vitamins, the Internet is 99% marketing; 1% actual informa-tion.

But then again, this isn’t Mission Difficult. This is Mission Impossible, Mr Hunt.

There are about 110 companies who sell vitamins in the US. Less than 5 of them use whole food vitamins. The reason is


simple: whole food vitamins are expensive to make. A few of the largest pharmaceutical firms in the world mass pro-duce synthetic vitamins for the vast majority of these 110 “vitamin” companies, who then put their own label on them, and every company claims theirs is the best! It’s ridiculous! Americans spend over $9 billion per year for synthetic vita-mins.

Whole food vitamins are obtained by taking a vitamin-rich plant, removing the water and the fiber in a cold vacuum process, free of chemicals, and then packaging for stability. The entire vitamin complex in this way can be captured intact, retaining its “functional and nutritional integrity.” Upon ingestion, the body is not required to draw on its own reserves in order to complete any missing elements from the vitamin complex.

Mainstream marketing of vitamins and minerals has suc-cessfully created the myth that vitamins and minerals may be isolated from each other, that correct amounts may be measured out, and then we can derive total benefit from taking these fractionated chemical creations. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Vitamins and minerals, and also enzymes, work closely together as co-factors for each other’s efficacy. If one part is missing, or in the wrong form or the wrong amount, entire chains of metabolic processes will not proceed normally. Result: downward spiralling of

health, probably imperceptible for long periods of time.

MARKETING AND PROMOTION What is the marketing philosophy behind the prevalence of the type of synthetic vitamins available in the supermarket and mall vitamin stores? Simple: profit above all else. Once the public is shown that vitamin supplementation is neces-sary, the rest is marketing. Marketing is the art of persuad-ing by suspending logic and twisting data into junk science. Example: what’s the actual difference in composition be-tween Wheaties and Total, two cereals put out by the same company? Total is advertised as being much more nutrient-rich than “ordinary” Wheaties. Look at the labels. What jus-tifies the extra $1.30 for a box of Total? Answer: 1.5¢ worth of synthetic vitamins sprayed over the Wheaties. That’s it! That’s what “vitamin enriched” always means. The other trick word is “fortified.” Generally that means that the food itself is devoid of nutrients or enzymes, so they tried to pump it up a little with some “vitamins.” Cheap synthetic vitamin sprays are all that is required for the manufacturer to use labels like “enriched” and “fortified.” These words are red flags – if a food needs to be fortified or enriched, you can bet it was already dead.

The mega-vitamin theory doesn’t really hold when it comes to synthetics: If A Little Is Good, More Is Better. Macro doses of vitamin E, and also vitamin D have been shown to de-crease immune function significantly. It stands to reason. Vitamins by definition are necessary in phenomenally small doses. The discoverer of thiamine, a B vitamin, and the man who came up with the word vitamin, Dr. Casimir Funk, has this to say about synthetics:

“Synthetic vitamins: these are highly inferior to vitamins from natural sources, also the synthetic product is well known to be far more toxic.”

Nutrition authority DeCava describes it:

“Natural food-source vitamins are enzymatically alive. Man-made synthetic vitamins are dead chemicals.” - The Real Truth About Vitamins p 209

The marketing of fractionated crystalline synthetic vitamins has been so successful that most nutritionists and doctors are unaware that there is something missing from these “vitamins.” Vitamin manufacturers compete for customers with identical products – they all bought their synthetic vitamins from the same couple of drug companies. To dif-ferentiate their product, each makes claims of “high po-tency.” Our vitamins are higher potency than theirs, etc. The point is, the higher the potency, the more the drug like ef-fects are present. Natural whole food vitamins are very low potency. Remember the 20mg of vitamin C in a potato that was able to cure a patient of scurvy? That was low potency.

HOLISTIC HEALING AND SPIRIT TO SPIRIT COMMUNICATION

SERVICES FOR PEOPLE AND THEIR PETS. A NATURAL APPROACH

TO IMPROVED HEALTH, WELLNESS, AND EMOTIONAL BALANCE

IN OUR LIVES

ENERGY HEALING Healing Touch for animals

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SPIRIT TO SPIRIT COMMUNICATION Rose Readings

Past lives

Layers of the Aura

Animal Communication

www.enlightenedanimals.com


Low potency is all we need. Low potency is enough to bring about vitamin activity. High potency overshoots the mark – the chemical is very pure and refined, like the difference between white sugar and the type of sugar that’s in an ap-ple.

THE MILLIGRAM GAME

Generally speaking, if milligrams are being discussed at length, the author has no clue about vitamins. Synthetic vi-tamins are refined, high potency chemicals, and therefore may be accurately measured in milligrams, just like drugs. This has nothing to do with vitamin activity or nutrition, except in a negative way.

HALF THE STORY

The same type of incomplete action can be seen with any synthetic vitamin. Let’s take beta carotene for a minute, which the body can turn into vitamin A. Now you’ll remem-ber that vitamin A is necessary for good eyesight, DNA syn-thesis, and protects cells from free radicals. A study re-ported in Apr 94 in the NEJM of some 30,000 Finnish sub-jects showed conclusively that synthetic vitamin A had no antioxidant effect whatsoever. A true antioxidant helps to protect heart muscle, lungs, and artery surfaces from break-ing down prematurely. In this study, the subjects who re-ceived the synthetic beta carotene actually had an 8% higher incidence of fatal heart attacks, strokes, and lung cancer than those who got the placebo (sugar pill). Stands to reason: the synthetic brought no vitamin activity to the tissues that needed it. As a dead, purified chemical intro-duced into the body, the synthetic further stressed the im-mune system, the liver, and the kidneys which all had to try to break down this odd chemical and remove it from the body. It would be bad enough if they were harmless, but synthetic vitamins actually have a net negative effect.

VITAMIN A

was first discovered in 1919. By 1924, it had been broken down and separated from its natural whole food complex: “purified.” By 1931, LaRoche – one of the largest pharma-ceutical companies in the world, even today – had suc-ceeded in “synthesizing” vitamin A. That means they had created a purely chemical copy of a fraction of naturally

occurring vitamin A. Naturally occurring vitamin A is found associated with an entire group of other components:

– Retinols – Retinoids – Retinal – Carotenoids – Carotenes – Fatty acids - Vitamin C - Vitamin E - Vitamin B – Vitamin D – Enzymes – Minerals

Isolated from these other factors, vitamin A is a fraction which cannot perform its biological functions. Taken as a synthetic, it must then draw on this list of resources already in the body in order to complete its make-up. Whole food vitamin A, by contrast, is already complete and ready to go.

Most synthetic vitamin A consists only of retinal, retinol, or retinoic acid. The well-publicized potential for toxicity with mega doses of vitamin A involves one of these three. Vita-min A toxicity, known as hypervitaminosis, always results from an excess of synthetic, “purified” vitamin A, and never from whole food vitamin A. Effects of vitamin A toxicity include:

– tumor enhancement – joint disorders – osteoporosis – extreme dryness of eyes, mouth and skin, – enlargement of liver and spleen – immune depression – birth defects

BETA CAROTENE

is a precursor the body can convert to vitamin A. Unfortu-nately, as a supplement, synthetic beta carotene is usually “stabilized” in refined vegetable oils. In this trans fatty acid form, oxidation occurs and the chemically “pure” beta caro-tene can no longer act as a nutrient, because it was changed. Almost all synthetic beta carotene is produced by the Swiss drug giant Hoffman-LaRoche. This form can no longer be converted to vitamin A. The best it can be is worthless, and the worst is toxic.

Natural vitamin A and beta carotene are well known as im-mune boosters and cancer fighters, in their role as antioxi-dants. Synthetic vitamin A by contrast has actually brought about significant increases in cancer. The same Finnish study we saw above provided smokers with large doses of synthetic beta carotene. Lung cancer incidence increased 18%! (NEJM Apr 94 “The Alpha Tocopherol Beta Carotene Cancer Prevention Study Group”)


These findings were corroborated two years later in an-other study written up in Lancet. Pharmacologic doses of synthetic beta carotenes were found to block the antioxi-dant activity of the other 50 naturally occurring carotenoids in the diet. Anti-cancer activity was thus blocked by the syn-thetic. (Lancet 1996)

With the vast outpouring of wrong information about vita-mins A and C, the findings of a 1991 article in Health Coun-selor are no surprise: 50% of Americans are deficient in vitamin A and 41% are deficient in vitamin C.

Synthetic vitamins cannot prevent deficiencies.

FAKE VITAMIN B

In one experiment, synthetic vitamin B (thiamine) was shown to render 100% of a group of pigs sterile! 100% would be considered a significant finding. (Dr. Barnett Sure, Journ Natr 1939) Perhaps the fact that synthetic vitamin B comes from coal tar, maybe that has something to do with it, you think? Then there’s vitamin B12, which comes from activated sewage sludge. Been shooting blanks since you started on those multi’s?

For the licensed dieticians and clinical nutritionists reading this in disbelief because it is too “unscientific,” consider the way Theron Randolph MD delineated between natural and synthetic:

��


“A synthetically derived substance may cause a reaction in a chemically susceptible person when the same material of natural origin is tolerated, despite the two substances having identical chemical structures. The point is illustrated by the frequency of clinical reactions to synthetic vitamins – espe-cially vitamin B1 and C – when the [same] naturally occur-ring vitamins are tolerated.”

Always keep this idea in mind when confronted with the marketing hook “bio-identical.”

IRRADIATION

According to Los Angeles naturopath, Dr. Jack Singh, all com-mercial lecithins in supplements, as well as most vitamin D, comes from irradiated vegetable oils. That’s rancid, oxidizing trans fatty acids! A birthday party of free radicals. This is the precise mechanism for arterial wall breakdown prior to plaque deposits, then arteriosclerosis, then heart disease. I thought we were supposed to be taking vitamins to stay healthy!

LOST HORIZON

Why is this information so difficult to find? It’s in none of the “alternative” health ‘zines, or any of the mainstream media. Alternative-Lite guru Julian Whittaker, in his summer 1998 newsletter actually had the temerity to state outright “Synthetic vitamins and whole food vitamins are identical.” I’m sure his synthetic vitamin company and all its retailers were reassured by this incredibly arrogant and flagrantly inaccurate pronouncement. But who is objecting? Only those clients of the 5 companies who know enough to take whole food vitamins, because they have become educated to realize the difference. These are the vast minority, having no control of the media.

Royal Lee and Harvey Wiley lost. Nobody knows who they are today, except we few. This is no accident. What every-body does know is Pepsi and Viagra and Wonder Bread and prednisone and Double Whoppers with Cheese and Zantac and Baskin-Robbins and Long’s Drug Store. And grocery store vitamins: synthetic vitamins. That’s America, today as the product of yesterday. Control of information in America today is one of the most sophisticated systems of influence ever devised. The simple ideas contained in this chapter are simply not available to the mass consciousness. The docu-mentation is out there, but you really gotta dig.

100 years ago if a medical doctor saw a case of cancer he would call all his colleagues to come and have a look, telling them it was unlikely they would see another case, as cancer was so rare. People rarely died of heart attacks; in fact the term heart attack itself didn’t even exist. There was no inci-dence at all of atherosclerosis. Diabetes was practically un

heard of. What did they eat? Fruits, vegetables, meat, butter, and lard. But none of it was processed with drugs and chemi-cals.

Today one in three dies of cancer. One in two dies of heart disease. Diabetes is the seventh leading cause of death in the U.S. (Vital Statistics) For anyone born after 2003, there is a one in 3 chance of Type 2 diabetes. Is that progress? If you are a food manufacturer it is, and especially if you are a drug manufacturer. In 2007 the WHO ranked the US as #39 in the world in infant mortality. Male sperm count is less than 20% of what it was in 1929. (1981 University of Florida report, Natural vs. Synthetic) Infant mortality is up; birth defects are up. We spend $1.5 trillion per year for health care, most of which goes for administration and executive salaries. Who are the largest advertisers for TV and the printed media? Right: drug companies and food manufacturers. Do they want to keep the ball rolling? You bet. Will they kill you to do it? You bet. Do they want people to take charge of their own health by natural inexpensive foods and supplements? Nega-tive. A cure for cancer has been “right around the corner” since Nixon. People are starting to ask questions; they’re less inclined to believe the slick ads coming every 10 minutes on TV and in Newsweek.

Perhaps Hippocrates did not envision doctors as detail men or drug reps. He most likely thought like Henry Bieler, MD:

“Nature, if given the opportunity is always the greatest healer. It is the physician’s role to assist in this healing, to play a supporting role.”

– Finding the Right Cure for You

So what do you do? Well, you may now have some insight that your vitamin needs are not being met by the Walgreen’s generics. Wallach used to talk about expensive urine from these unmetabolized grocery store synthetic placebos.

The water soluble vitamins are best obtained through or-ganic produce grown in mineral-rich soil. The best supple-ments in this category are the top-shelf green foods, like David Sandoval’s Best of Greens, and its equivalents.

The fat soluble vitamins, A, E, and D are best obtained through fish, raw dairy, avocado, raw nuts, raw coconut, and clean meats. High end supplements like Udo’s Choice, MOR, and Nordic Naturals can round out your EFA requirements

Beyond this it’s MLM marketing roulette, and if you can’t spot the mark in the first 5 minutes, baby, it’s you.

Dr. Tim O'Shea is the author of the book The Sanctity of Human Blood : Vaccination is Not Immunization.


Two of the questions you have to ask before answering that one are:

Why would my dog want to dominate me? What's in it for her that she doesn't already have? These three questions are actually quite intertwined, so let's look at the situation with her - oops, I mean OUR pack: She gets 2 squares a day. And that doesn't count all the treats for doing tricks, coming back on recall and such. Would she somehow get MORE to eat if she were to win domination over me? Maybe a better quality? Are you inferring, that what she gets now is of inferior quality and that by dominating me, she would get better food? Or more? She gets all the water she can drink, both from her water dish, but also on walks from the various fountains and water troughs. Now if she were to dominate me, would she somehow demand and get more and better liquid refreshment? German white wine, French red wine? Maybe a real Czech Pilsner beer. Single-Malt Scotch (from my collection?)? If she were to win domination over me, would she then get to leave the house before me? Maybe. But it's very possible she wouldn't live very long, charging out the door in front of me into the street. But then I'd just have to get another dog to dominate me. And another. And another. And then where would she want to go? Can't go shopping with no money. She's not crazy about the movies unless they're animal films. If she were trying to dominate me, what would she have to gain by walking in front of me. Well, for one thing she would have to

STAY in front of me. What a drag, if there was a lovely piece of cow dung behind me or to the side of me. She'd have to make that hard choice between cementing her domination over me by staying out in front of me and perhaps losing her domination by falling behind to savor that dead bird. Choices, choices and the RESPONSIBILITIES attached to them. What's a dog to do? And of course, she'd have to choose the route to take, determin-ing where we are to go. Fine. And if there's no food or water there when we get there, is she supposed to force me to provide it for her wherever we end up? Now try this with your dog, just what I tried today. My dog was sniffing dominantly 10-20 yards in front of me. We came to a fork in the road. She headed down the right fork and I, being the rebellious soul I am, purposely took the left path. I would have thought, her being the dominant wanna-be, that she would have insisted, that I come to her, but no, low and behold, without me even calling to her, she not only was suddenly running past me up the left road, but when I then decided to go on the right road, she then bounded on by me and up the right road. Well, ok, I see your point. What a cunning little cur. She actually TRICKED me into thinking I was dominating her by going on the left road, when she knew, that I would eventu-ally see it her way and go on the right path, which she'd origi-nally been on. Sometime you don't have to dominate with force, you can do it by cunning and treachery. Now, when I come home, it's obvious who is the dominant one in the house. As soon as my key hits the door, she is at the door, demanding my attention. It's quite clear, that if my wife were actually the leader of the pack (for what husband is EVER the leader of the pack?), she would come right to the door, beating my dog by a nose to greet me at the door, I would then give her a big smacker, a bunch of roses and a bottle of champagne. Or

by: Leonard Cecil


something. But it's apparent, that my dog has banned my wife to the kitchen, in order that she can take over this dominant function. This has caused countless "discussions" between my wife and I - and tears. But we have been able to strike a com-promise. I will not kiss my dog on the mouth any more and will wash my hands and face before kissing my wife. I try ignoring my dog when I come home, but that simply doesn't work. She just follows me everywhere I go, sometimes running up ahead of me, for example on the stairs. The more I tried to keep her behind me, the more excited she becomes. And of course my wife hollers down "If you would ignore the dog, maybe she'd stop pestering you. And why should you deal with her before even saying hello to me?" So I had a choice. Either keep peace with my wife and ignore my dog in her attempt to dominate me or accept the fact that she'd already dominated my wife and ignore that in favor of trying to first greet my dominated wife, thus not allowing my dog to dominate me. These dogs can put you in an untenable position. I guess that's part of their plan.

One aspect where my dog has completed her move to take over domination of her humans is how she will lay down on our feet, taking over our space, claiming her rule-of-dog. Now she does-n't do this all the time, but does whenever the fancy strikes her, whether we want this or not. We've of course given in lock, stock and barrel to this overt domination, so much so that we do not wear slippers any more in the winter, knowing that may dog will claim her rightful spot on our feet. Frankly, this doesn't really bother us much, especially in the winter in the kitchen/dining area where we have stone floors. But it is of course the idea of allowing her to dominate us and claim a piece of our space that needs to be noticed here. I'm sure, if our furniture were more comfortable for her, she would try to show her dominance over us in this respect also, but she's never shown any inclination to get up on the sofa, my office chair, the dining room chairs or the junk-chair (I suppose you have one too, a chair that just seems to fill up with all sorts of junk that has no other place in the house) by the door. She also has never shown any inclination to counter-surf or beg at the table. I suppose that's because in order to fulfill her domi-nation over us, we see that she has her own place by the ta-

ble or the sofa near us at all times which she can use to keep a watchful eye on us. To appease her dominating character, we will occasionally give her a pig's ear or ostrich tendon while we're eating and that seems to give us a break from her iron-pawed rule of the house. Strangely enough, when we're on trips, she's never tried to claim a spot on the hotel bed. Maybe she'd prefer sheets and blankets to the usual Nordic bed cover-ings? We count ourselves lucky here. She has shown however some cracks and inconsistencies in her drive to take over the alpha of our pack. One such area is play-time. There seems to be no pattern to when she wants to play and when she doesn't. In fact, she's always up for a long game of tug. I suppose if we always gave in to her she'd try to expand this dominating behavior to Checkers, Monopoly (what would be more natural for practicing the domination of the world ex-cept for Sim City?) or even Chess. We did see a film of one lady who taught her dogs to play chess with her dogs, but we've been warned not to even entertain the idea of this, in as much as chess is THE game for aspiring socially upwardly mobile dogs, looking for any way to take over control. We've also only ever played poker, cribbage and (yes, I admit it) Masters of the Uni-verse when she's been asleep in her bed in her room (well, it's actually the stair well next to my office, but we call it her room). We have been able to hold her blatant dominating scheming in this area at bay. So it's a small price to pay, to play tug with her sock - used to be my sock, but she claims them, when they get holes in them. I wonder how the holes get in them …. As you can see, we're fighting an up-hill battle on all fronts with my dog. Her seemingly sweet demeanor and wagging Retriever tail is obviously just a ruse for a plotting, scheming canine ver-sion of the next military K9 junta, just waiting to lay claim to the leadership of our pack. We've been able to work out our com-promises, but we feel we need help to reclaim our house and family.

Born 1952, Swindon GB, raised in San Francisco, living in Swit-zerland since 1977. After escaping high school in San Francisco, he completed a Bachelors of Music Education. He's now an IT-Geek at the University of Zürich.

Although he grew up with dogs, the first dog he really trained (Luna, a Greater Swiss Mountain Dog mix) was in Switzerland, using "balanced" methods. His present dog, Vela (a Flat-Coated Retriever) changed his life due to her reactivity. After tossing everything he thought he knew about dog training and starting anew in order to help her, he is now enrolled at James O'Heare's CASI and is preparing to do dog training and behavior modifica-tion when he retires in 3-4 years.

“Her seemingly sweet demeanor and wag-

ging Retriever tail is obviously just a ruse for

a plotting, scheming canine version of the

next military K9 junta, just waiting to lay

claim to the leadership of our pack. “


Teacher Dogs

Teacher Dogs is dedicated to the dogs that have brought us to this point in our lives, the turning point to natural rearing and raising of our beloved pets. These pets may have been with us only a short period but the lessons they brought last a lifetime. We want your stories. We will feature a special story in each edition of our Dogs...Naturally!

Close Call by Vic Neumann

Prologue

My friends told me that my wife is eventually going to find out anyway (they always do) so I might as well get it out in the open. The last time something almost as serious as this happened with one of our Leos and myself while on one of our long hikes - aka "adventures" - was about fifteen years ago when Bogey and I together slid down a steep incline on an icy cliff face. Clinging to his tail as we picked up speed heading to a hundred foot drop off, the only way I got us to survive that one was by throwing out my leg and catching a well placed hemlock twenty feet from the edge. It took us about four hours to get back up to safe ground and five years to get up the nerve to tell Joan. Well, Saturday's ad-venture was witnessed by three of our friends and their dogs and already by Sunday morning emails were coming in asking how Cassie, Lincoln and I were doing...

The Close Call

It was an afternoon like any other when we set out Saturday for the Farmington River in the northwestern part of Con-necticut. It's almost a daily ritual to join up with friends and their canine companions about a mile from our house as we find shade and cool sparkling water to play in. This time however it had been raining felines and canines all week and the river was running brown, high and fast. That has never deterred us because Lincoln and Cassie are extremely strong swimmers and have been tested in all condi-tions. Their favorite game is fetching sticks that I throw in as they race to be the first one to retrieve it. Cassie knows that Lincoln feels it is his responsibility to always bring it back to me, which he usually does. She, however, enjoys aggravating her big brother and does so by taking the stick across the river to the other side, knowing that he will fol-low her every time to either grab the stick away from her or more often as is the case pull her all the way back through the hundred feet of water with her jaw firmly clenching her end. It is quite a spectacle that elicits cheers and encour-agement from the kids and adults that understand the game and often pick their favorite to win.

So on this day, Cassie had taken a stick across and as I watched her trying to elude Lincoln I was surprised that she had given up so quickly and was now preparing to swim back without the stick. However, she wasn't making any progress in her effort to return even though I could see her working her legs quite vigorously. "Oh, no!", I cried out, "she looks like she's stuck." As I watched her struggle, I realized her hind legs were caught up either in a vine or

Vic Neumann


roots that had been washed downstream. I did not want to wait to see if she could extricate herself, because if I waited too long she might go under. Throwing my cell phone and wallet up to my friend I headed into the rushing water de-termined to get to her before it was too late. It's been about a year since I had shoulder surgery to re-place my right joint with titanium and this was going to be my first test to see what kind of strength I really had - but I wasn't thinking about that at the time. I knew that my arms already felt like rubber from the brush cutting I had been doing all day, but I felt certain that I could get across with-out too much difficulty. Boy, was I mistaken. As soon as I got near the middle of the river I knew I was in big trouble, as I underestimated the strength and speed of the rushing water. My friend, Roger, heard me exclaim, "Oh, (expletive)!" Then he dove in after me. The combination of the work boots and jean shorts that I was wearing started to drag me down as the river carried me away from Cassie and the shouts of people from where I started in. I didn't panic, but I knew I wasn't going to stay afloat much longer, regardless of how hard I stroked and kicked. It was one of those moments when the realization that "this could be it" comes into focus. And then as I reached out feebly for another stroke, my hand brushed against wet fur - a lot of wet fur. I turned my head and there was Lincoln, snorting water and pushing up against my side. I wrapped my arm around his back and cried out, " swim, Lincoln, swim!" He threw himself into another gear and struggled against the

current with me grasping him for dear life. It felt like an eternity before we angled enough to reach some tree limbs that had fallen into the river from the oppo-site shore. Clutching the branches with my left arm and trying to help support Lincoln with the other I began to think about Cassie again. It was then, that Roger reached us and I grabbed his shirt before he was swept further down-stream. As he struggled to catch his breath, he told me that a teenager had dove into the water and Michael Phelps-like, made it across to Cassie. What a relief!

We had no idea how we were going to get back when sud-denly we heard shouts that two kayakers were headed our way. They dropped each of us a line and paddling with all the effort they could muster pulled us back across, Roger behind one kayak and Lincoln and myself in tow following the other. When we finally were pulled out by our friends waiting on the river bank, there was Cassie with a look of puzzlement on her face, as if to say, "why did you guys swim without me?" They both got extra treats Saturday night before they curled up for a much needed sleep. Well, okay, Lincoln got two extra treats and a long hug and thank you.

Vic Neumann

volume 1 for dogs without boundaries issue 4 · help you decide if crate training is for you. crate...

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