Multi-media work by Vicki Fish

Art exhibit of miniatures at the Drawing Room 117 East Callender Street Livingston, Montana runs through May 11, 2012. Preview Work by Parks Reece, John Garre, DG House, Bob Spannring, Janie Camp, Christine Sutton, Suzanne Schneider, Lynn Chan, Stacey Herries, Lindsay Pichaske, Kelsey McDonnell, Linda Barnsley, Sarah Angst, Stephanie Cochran, Laurie Yarnell, Betsey Hurd, Gwen Strachan, Vicki Fish, Kammie Roberts and more. Bid on art at exhibit with a “buy now” price and all unsold work will be available at Stafford Animal Shelter’s Fur Ball May 18 at Chico Hot Springs. Visit http://staffordanimalshelter.org/category/events/  to see images, buy event and raffle tickets and learn more or call 406/222-1313.

Submitted by: Kristen

December 2010: Winter First Aid for Dogs

November 2010: Animal Hoarding

October 2010: Roaming Poopers

September 2010: Leave Wild Animals Wild

August 2010: Choosing a Vet

July 2010: Kennelitis

June 2010: Teaching your dog pulling sports

May 2010: Trail Safety

April 2010: Pet Friendly Rentals

March 2010: Rosie Fund

February 2010: Kitty Litter

January 2010: Cold Weather

December 2009: Pet Toxic Plants

November 2009: Pet Toxic Food

September 2009: Aggressive Dog Laws

August 2009: Dog Bites

May 2009: Secondhand Smoke and Pets

April 2009: Pet food nutrition.

March 2009: Dog yard repair.

February 2009: Household pet poisons.

January 2009: New Year resolutions.

November 2008: Preventable injury part 2.

October 2008: Spay/Neuter to prevent roaming.

September 2008: Preventable injury part 1.

August 2008: Rabies vaccinations.

July 2008: Pet parasites.

June 2008: Choosing a pup.

May 2007: What to do during rattlesnake season.

April 2007: Should I get a live Easter Bunny?

March 2007: Does your cat dislike their carrier?

February 2007: Are dog kisses hygienic?

January 2007: Is breeding your pet healthy for it?

December 2006: Busy over the Holidays? Pet activities.

October 2006: Caring for an aging pet.

September 2006: Teaching a puppy good manners.

August 2006: Grieving for a pet.

July 2006: Training your dog not to jump up on people.

June 2006: Animals who roam; advice for neighbors and the pet’s owner.

May 2006: Breaking an excessive barking habit.

March 2006: What happens to unclaimed animals who are injured or very ill.

February 2006: Dogs who pull on the leash.

January 2006: Alternatives to declawing. Stafford not affiliated with national organizations.

We had looked for a dog for nearly a year. We had developed a list of preferred behaviors, and likewise of things we couldn’t deal with – and our list was long! At the top though, was our first requirement that the dog be an older dog between 5-10. A few other things were: able to self-entertain, won’t return the ball and ask to keep throwing the ball….stuff like that. I had interviewed trainers about the characteristics of different breeds, called people who owned all the different types of dogs we were considering, and had narrowed it down to Australian or English Shepherd type mixed dog. We looked long and hard at all the characteristics which would tend to fit with our family and lifestyle and then we just waited and waited and didn’t budge on our list…. not even for one of the items we had listed. We had opportunities to take cute little cuddly puppies, and several other older dogs that came across our radar, but we held firm and fast to our list of traits! Finally, a friend from Stafford emailed us about a dog rescued from the town of Augusta. When we came to meet him he didn’t look at all the dog he is now. He was overweight, his eyes were swollen and red, and he was very arthritic, but when we showed him the green squeeky tennis ball his eyes lit up and he rolled on it with glee – happy as a little puppy! We knew within that one visit that he was meant for us.

That was nearly five years ago now. He has been the most amazingly, kind, soulful, and easy going dog imaginable! He has become a dear friend to our family, but especially to children, other dogs, and amazingly enough, all cats of the world! We have an only child, and at the time he came to live with us, she was just getting old enough to begin to play on her own for a bit while I got stuff done around the house, but often she just didn’t want to be her room by herself. That dog became the best babysitter money could buy! Suddenly she had the courage to stay occupied without me for a good 20-30 minutes! He gave me time to do dishes and make dinner and even have some time to just sit and have a cup of tea!!! She would dress him in all sorts of fairy and princess costumes or ‘harness’ him to her doll stroller like a pony cart. And he never complained, in fact strange as it may seem, he really seemed to love it!

When we adopted him we tried all sorts of food for him and he kept having itchy skin or some sneezing or some reaction and if we went even for a mild short walk he couldn’t get up the next day. At wits end, we consulted two people: one, a local Animal Communicator named Liz Harrison, and a Medical Intuitive named Denice Moffat who works over the phone in Idaho and is coincidentally also a veterinarian. They both agree on so many things and have been dead-on right about everything that they’ve left local vets scratching their heads trying to figure out how they’ve figured it all out! In one instance, they both separately told us that he had serious infections in his canines. After taking him to several vets who refused to remove them, we finally found one who went with it, and sure enough when she pulled them they popped out like butter and the infection was really evident, just all hidden up in his sinuses. Next Denice put him on a home-cooked diet, and wouldn’t you know it, within a several weeks his arthritis disappeared, his eyes became normal and less bulgey, he didn’t itch, and he slept through the night soundly and got up ready to go for anything! If you’re interested in Liz and Denice’s contact information or the diet recipes, they’re listed at the end of this article.

Doc gets homemade food twice a day with all good vitamins. I cook bones with lots of good connective tissue (like knee joints and whatnot) in lots of water to add to his meat. I cook it down until it’s a disgusting liquid goo and all the connective tissue is free from the bone (which takes about two days), then I mix that in with ground beef, a cooked until fork tender roast, and a cooked chicken (minus the bones of course!) Watch the very pointy small sharp bone in the chicken legs, it’s important to be extremely careful if you’re going to do this. Then he gets a mix of cooked veggies: broccoli, beans, carrots and a smaller portion of sweet potato not yam which is too sugary. Then the grains: barley, oats, and brown rice. Denice gave us three vitamins to supplement the food and he’s good to go! Since he’s been eating like this his allergies disappeared and he moves around like a little puppy! Meanwhile, we got a new English shepherd puppy named Dolly last year and he chases her around, raises up on his hind legs and bats her around and wrestles her along the ground like a he’s a puppy himself! To see him running a mile or two now with his new 1-year old girlfriend, you would never know he’s the same dog as when we picked him up.

Recipes and Denice Moffat’s contact information: The real key is the bone broth. It is dangerous to cook. If you want to try it, get a massively big soup pot. Put lots of water in there and the bones… maybe two knuckle joints and some other stuff. Get temperature going then let it simmer for the day. Add water as it goes along. Turn off at night, but when you begin to SLOWLY heat it up the next day, add lots of cold water and stir it from the bottom as it heats up. The problems arise when there are two dramatically different temperatures in the pot and it has boiled over a few times on me…. eoooouuuuwww. Messy. But once the knee joints fall apart and the connective tissue liquifies. Pour it into containers and freeze it so you can add it to your dog’s food. You could add it to any food or just put a 1/4 c. or so in a bowl and let him eat it. Note: don’t let dogs eat cooked bones. They’re brittle.
Meat: ground beef, a roast that I cook in the rock pot until it’s fork tender but not burnt, a chicken that I cook in the oven covered until it’s easy to pull the bones out. I mix all that together with a good dose of the bone broth, freeze it in glass containers. I usually try to make about six bread loaf sized containers full at once. That size is nice so that when you thaw it, it doesn’t go bad before you use it.
Veggie Mix: Then I make a big pot of veggies: 2 veggie bags of broccoli florets, two big healthy handfuls of green beans, three big thick carrots, 1 sweet potato (NOT YAM), the sweet potato is a pale almost white flesh. Yams have too much sugar. Slice the potato up and put a good amount of water in the pot, put the lid on and cook/steam until tender but not mushy. Grind up with a hand mulinex to a nice very thick soup consistency. Freeze that the same way.
Grains: barley, oats, and brown rice. Cook with more water than you would use for yourself to make kind of agruel. Freeze that up too.

Liz Harrison,Animal Communicator Bozeman, Montana
Mobile: 805-698-8109

Dr. Denice Moffat, Naturopath & Medical Intuitive Telephone Consultation Services
1069 Elk Meadow Lane
Deary, ID 83823 U.S.A
(208) 877-1222
http://NaturalHealthTechniques.com

We add vitamins per Denice. She has always been right on, so we go with it, but be careful because some of naturopaths just want to give them everything under the sun and then it’s hard to discern what’s working or not. Denice has always been extremely low impact for us. But, just because this worked for Doc, doesn’t mean it’s meant for everyone! It took us a good 6-7 months to sort through all of his health issues. Every dog is different just like people I suppose!

To end, here’s a funny story about Doc: Our relatively new friend Cowboy Pete was out at the barn one day and when he saw Doc he got a funny look on his face…. “Where’d you get that dog?” he asked. We told him the story we’d been told which was that the town of Augusta gave him up for adoption when Dr. Dan Butterfield came through town to do a spay-neuter clinic with folks from the Stafford Shelter. He immediately exclaimed, “That’s ‘DOG’!!!” Turns out Pete lived in Augusta for a while and remembered him from the town bar! We had changed his name to Doc since we felt he deserved a proper name.

Here are some pictures to prove the veracity of the details of this story! Doc and Dolly are in love and he is the best trainer for our puppy! She is now his ‘ears’ as his hearing is getting dim. We are so happy to have found him and to see him enjoying his well-deserved retirement!!!

Thank you Stafford!!!

Altered pets – male, female, dog, cat, pocket and exotic pets – are all less likely to mark, bite, fight, roam, or cause accidents in which they or people get hurt. Spayed and neutered pets bond better with people, are less destructive and aggressive, and make better pets when they are not focused on breeding. The surgery does not diminish their ability to be good working animals; whether herding cattle, hunting, guarding property or catching mice. As mentioned before, it is a myth that the surgery makes them fat or lazy – it’s too much food and too little exercise that does this, just like with people.

The types of problem behaviors unaltered pets have vary between species and genders. Dogs that aren’t spayed or neutered tend to be more hyperactive and have behavioral problems like chewing up household items and through fences, running away, and not bonding with family members and other pets. Perhaps most problematic is intact males’ unprovoked aggression and biting. Statistically, unneutered male dogs are responsible for over 90% of reported bites, and 60% of those bit are children.

It’s not surprising that unaltered males so often leave home on the trail of a female in heat – male dogs can smell a female dog in heat from three miles away and male cats can smell a female cat in heat a mile away. Males on the trail of females in heat often behave aggressively to anyone in their path, are destructively to property and hit by cars or cause traffic accidents that can be fatal to people. Having a pet at large can also cost you in other ways. It is against the law in the City of Livingston and many other areas for dogs to be at-large and fines can run between $45 and $500 at the Judge’s discretion.

Studies found that after dogs are neutered – a surgery also charmingly called a gonadectomy – aggression between male dogs was reduced in 60% of cases and aggression towards people saw a 50 to 90% level of improvement in a majority of cases. Interestingly, the same studies found that neither the age at which the gonadectomy was performed or the duration of the problem behavior diminished these improvements. Improvements in other problem behaviors was also high – as much as a 90% reduction – in urine marking in the house, embarrassing mounting and humping behavior, and roaming. 

Male cats saw even greater behavior improvements than dogs following neutering. A UC Davis study found that in 90% of male cats, gonadectomies greatly reduced or eliminated urine spraying, roaming and fighting with other male cats. Half of the cats improved dramatically in the first week, with the rest demonstrating more gradual improvements. Intact male cats’ urine has an extremely strong odor and they can spray large areas including drapes, furniture and carpeting. This is not just unsanitary but the stains and lasting odor are very difficult to remove. Interestingly, after neutering, cats are less distracted and tend to groom themselves better as well.

Many male pet owners don’t want their male pets neutered – wrongly believing that their pets have a similar sexual identification and attachment to their gonads that humans do – but this false projection instead undermines the pets’ chance at a long, social and healthy life.

Female pets’ behavior also improves following their spaying surgery. Not only do they stop attracting unwanted male animals to your property while in heat, but they do not leave messy and smelly stains around the home and yard while in heat. Hormones also affect a pet in heat’s behavior in a range of ways; from lethargy to aggression. Female cats in particular are famous for their disturbing howling – called caterwauling –and mating postures while in heat.

If a female has a litter they commonly protect their litters by lashing out at those who approach them – even if those people are well known and are trusted. It’s not uncommon for a mild, loving dog to bite a family member once she has puppies. The cost, mess and expense of a litter – not to mention responsibly finding homes for them – is major.

We discussed at length the health and behavior improvements from spaying and neutering pets and in the next issue we will cover the community costs of unplanned breeding and exciting new solutions planned in our community.

 Phone 406/222-2111 with pet behavior questions and for low-cost spaying and neutering call the Park and Sweetgrass County Spay Neuter Program at 406/222-2134.