Slamaxx's Healthy Tips and Tricks
These tips are to be used at your own risk. consult your vet for their best practices.
1. Q: What to do when you're pup is down on their front pads?
A: When you have large dogs you may experience some sort of mild ricots or splayed feet or your dog may look flat footed, we have several breeder remedies that we use which are as follows: 1. Try adding calcium to there diet, some sort of powder substance used in calfs. 2. Try using cardboard and tape, making a splint, from the top of the pad up to the elbow in conjunction with 1000mg of vitamin C, vitamin C is good for joints in pups. Don't leave the splint on for more than 5 days, you want the pup to gain strength in that joint. 3. Look at the bottom of the pad to see if your dog has sore spots, in this case, your pup may look flat footed, but it's only favoring the foot due to the pain of a sore spot. 4. Glucosimine is a new remedy we're looking into, we've seen other breeders using glucosamine. 5. Try switching your dog food to a large breed puppy formula, as the large breed helps to control the growth rate of your pup.
2. Q: What to do when your whelping mother won't feed the pups?
A: Pray that you know someone who has a bitch that you can use as a nursing mother, but if not, you must buy a puppy formula that has the immune system added to the formula, and you should feed the pups every hour on the hour, or as much as possible. You can use this tip if your whelping mother has an infected milk supply. Don't forget to get a warm towel and rub the pup's stomach area to help the pup to urinate, it's like burping a newborn infant.
3. Q: What to do when your birthing bitch is too tired to clean the newborns up?
A: Some mothers don't know what to do or they get too tired to break the sack. What we do is during the first couple of pups, we grab them quickly, and tear the sack off of the newborn pups head, then we place the pup up to the mothers mouth, eventually she will start getting the newborns, and your work is done, but if she doesn't, and you must do the full delivery process, then follow these steps.
a.) Tear the sack off the pup. b.) get dental floss and tie the umbilical cord close to the pups stomach, and cut the cord 2 inches away from the stomach. c.) warm wet towel wipe the pup down. d.) we immediately place the pup on the mothers nipple to help stimulate the birthing process. e.) if a pup is not breathing, or you are a brave person, hold the pup firmly, and swing the pup over your head and between your legs to help clear out the fluids in their nose and throat, some breeders do this with every pup, I do it as a last resort. f.) don't be scared to slowly pull out a pup from the bitches shoot, they can get lodged or the bitch may think the pups out and stop pushing. g.) Once she starts delivering, make sure she's dropping a pup every hour, but not longer than two hours or you should call your vet, she may have complications. NOTE: Prime breeding time is twelve to fourteen days after you see blood, and 60 days after your first breeding, but never past 65 days, you should have pups. Past 65 days, take your dog to the vet for x-rays, even if you don't think she's pregnant. Oh yeah, they can have all the signs of being pregnant, and not have a single pup.....
4. Q: How to feed your AB raw meat?
A: Raw beef or chicken is a good source of protein, and remember, your dog's stomach is not human, they can safely eat raw meat. A good rule of thumb, if you would cook it and eat it, then your dog should be able to eat it raw. This is how you do it, unless you work you're dogs hard, mix the raw meat with dry dog food, as raw meat doesn't have the well balanced nutrition alone. People who work their dogs hard, and understand protein in dogs, (not too much) then this schedule works well, three days kibble, three days raw, and one day no food, basically every other day kibble, and raw, and Saturdays nothing, because if you're competing with your bulldog, most dog events take place on weekends. I recommend that you feed your dog everyday, but a little less on Saturdays if you're competing. I discussed both of these feeding methods because I hear other breeders, talking about the subject, and I'm trying to be non-biased.
5. Q: How to build a nice kennel base for your outside dogs.
A: The number one question, this is how we've built our kennels, we start with dirt, then a layer of crushed limestone, then three inches of gravel, then a thick layer of powdered lime, then playground cedar chips which are very large cedar chips, then we top it with soft compressed cedar from wallmart. The trick here is to keep it dry, so build a roof over the whole kennel, and you will never smell your kennel, even if your standing in it. If you can't keep it dry, then don't use the cedar and lay your powdered lime down over your crushed limestone then put your gravel.
6. Q: What if your dog won't go into his dog house despite the weather conditions?
A: Put cedar inside his dog house, dogs hate to sleep on cold hard plastic.
7. Q: When and how often do you give your pup shots?
A: We give our pups shots at six weeks, then every two weeks after that until they are five months old, if you prefer giving your pup shots longer, then give them a shot every three weeks until they are six months old, never and i mean never go beyond three weeks once you've started the shot process or you will have to start all the way over from the beginning. The shot only works in the routine sequence, it builds the immune system, and the trick is not how many shots you give them, its when you stop giving them the shot. At six months they will need their rabies shot, and once a year a booster shot. We call these shots five-in-ones or seven-in-ones depending on where you buy them. We also recommend keeping your pup in the house only until they had at minimum three shots.
8. Q: Worming your dog or pup.
A: We begin worming our pups at four weeks of age and continue worming them every week after for six weeks with a mild wormer. We use Nimex wormer for our pups. Some breeders start out with a heavier wormer for their pups, usually a horse wormer. De-wormer is a poison, so keep in mind that you're giving your dog a poison, and your best bet, is to give your vet a fecal sample, and worm your dog accordingly.
9. Q: What to do to get the smell out of my garage or basement?
A: Buy a broom, gain detergent and a bottle of clorox bleach, add water and not only does it keep your underwear white, it does miracles to concrete. Pour the clorox over the entire area, sprinkle gain add a little water and sweep up the smell. Your dog will not be able to find the order, and this will help you to get him housebroken. Note: If you're keeping the dog inside and cleaning up after him daily, try using stink stopper pills to help reduce the odor by at least fifty percent, they do work.
10. Q: Hives, hotspots sores and other skin irratations, what to do?
A: There is no one trick to get rid of these problems, but you may first need to figure out what's causing them. Number one FLEAS, one flea bite can irritate your dogs entire body. If you have skin problems keep the fleas off your dog. Second, wasn't fleas, try changing your dogs diet, dogs are often allergic to there dog food. Vets can give your dog an allergy test to try to find the allergy. Third, Try not to bath him to often and change his shampoo to a hypoallergenic brand. To much of a good thing, can strip your dog of it's natural body oils, you can condition your dog to help put back moisture.
11. Q: My dog is flaking, and his coat is dull, what do I do?
A: You can start by not bathing him so often. You also can condition his coat. You can start feeding him dog food with omega fatty acids, and you can add the omega fatty acids supplement to his diet. These tips can add luster and moisture to your dogs skin and coat, to help stimulate the oils, brush your dog regularly.
12: Q: My 6 - 10 month old American Bulldog is limping on one leg one day and another leg the next, what is wrong with him?
A: Chances are nothing. If you have a larger bulldog, and are not feeding your dog large breed puppy food to control his growth, then what may be happening to your dog is his bones are growing faster than his muscles, and causing his muscles to be sore. Cut back on his rations, use large breed food, and be patient, it will go away. Your dogs bones can grow faster than other tissues as well, such as cartilage, when this happens, it makes your dog look deformed, or crippled. We use vitamin C to help with this condition also, but you can goto the vet, and I think they give you an anti-inflammatory shot to help the dog out during these growing pains. You may also want to begin giving your dog a multivitamin, to help.
13. Q. I want to Artificial insemminate my female, how do I do this properly?
A. You must order the kit. The Kit usually includes a soft rubbery tube with holes on both ends, a large syringe, a semen collection cup, and KY jelly. The male dog: We use a teaser female, who is in heat, and make the male think he's mounting the female. Once the male strokes it, we grab the male's penis from behind in-between his rear legs, and apply pressure to the penis by pulling it up and down, once the male thinks he's inside the female you must hurry up and pull the penis back in-between his legs while simultaneously pulling the skin around the penis back behind the dogs tie. The tie looks like the dogs balls and you will know what it is once you pull the skin back behind the penis. You must be able to get the penis to expand so that you get the most semen out of the male. If the dog doesn't think he's tied, and you may not get semen, so remember, you must pulse your hand as if you are squeezing the semen out into the collection cup. Its a dirty job, so you may want to wear gloves. LOL
The Female dog: You must hurry, and get the semen into the syringe, put the Ky jelly on the rubber tube and insert the tube into the female. This process must be done correctly or you will not get the semen to the uterus. When putting the tube inside of the female, you must insert your finger, and find the hole that leads to the uterus. Once you find the hole inside of the female, leave your finger there, and insert the tube making sure the tube goes into the hole properly, remove your finger and slowly insert the tube until it stops, now you are on the bladder so be very careful, back the tube out an inch from the bladder, attach your syringe to the tube and insert the semen. Now comes the hard part, you must put the rear end of the female over your knee and hold her up for ten to twenty minutes. I like to hold her up for twenty minutes because that's when the semen comes back to life and start swimming again. After that, try not to let her take a piss for as long as you can.
14. Q. How do I take care of a litter of pups?
A. Newborn pups are very susceptible to everything as they do not have an immune system of their own. Newborn pups for at least the first two days of their life, must nurse off of the mother to get their immunes system from the mother. Every two hours newborn pups must nurse or be feed by hand. You must keep the pups extremely warm at all times. They have puppy warmers that you can buy, or you can setup heat lamps to keep the pups warm. Pups will only cry when they are too cold or too hot. They typically don't cry when they are hungry. You must listen to the pups to ensure they are breathing clearly, and you hear no wheezing. If you here weezing, you must take the pup to the vet as they may have pneumonia.
15. Q. How do I build a whelping pen for my pregnant female?
A. A Whelping pen is most important for nursing mothers, and must be designed to help keep the mother as close to the newborn pups as possible, but enough room to keep her from smashing the pups. I've seen whelping pens all shapes and sizes, from the size of a large crate up to the size of a outside storage shed. A good rule of thumb, give the mother enough room to stand in any direction without touching the sides. A four feet by four feet whelping box is ideal for most bulldog females. After you construct the box, you must also put whelping rails around the box, so that the pups can have a crawl space between the mother and the walls. Whelping rails are usually constructed out of 2 by 4's. mount the 2 by 4's on its side, and not flat, giving the crawl space more distance between the mother and the wall. I like making the crawl space about five inches off the floor. If you bought a puppy warmer, now is the time to install this, or begin mounting your heat lamps, to keep the pups warm. I like to use and indoor outdoor carpet for the flooring of the box. Now you're finish. Some of the advance whelping boxes, have electronic controlled heating elements that turn off once the desired temperature is reached.