Cavaliers of the Northeast

After that first firecracker pop, there are many pets that run and hide – and we won’t see them until after the Fourth of July. It can be a very upsetting time for animals who do not understand what is happening – they must feel like the country is being invaded! An older dog could spend 4 days in the closet if her owners didn’t take the right steps to deter her anxious response.

Here are some tips for keeping your pets calm during the explosive weekend:

• Keep them inside with music and stay calm around them. Yelling at them only reaffirms their thinking that bad things are happening.
• Deter their attention by giving them something they like. Find their favorite toy or distract them with a new one. This can keep them busy for hours and will get them through the booms and bangs that happen nightly.
• Using calming agents can also support your efforts. Doc Roy’s Docile Dog is naturally formulated to calm the anxious dog, and Comfort Zone with DAP for dogs or Feliway for cats are also popular calming products. You could double the dose for two days then give them the normal dose until July 6. These calming products help you avoid tranquilizing your pet, but they also help maintain your pet’s normal behavior.

It may seem like extra work, but keeping your dogs calm is worth the effort. Many dogs that are scared of fireworks will eventually transfer that anxiety to thunderstorms as well. Keep the positive associations, and if your dog becomes scared of storms, you can treat them the same way as above.

A dog may not like July 4th but with the above tips, she can survive. Despite the loud bangs, with proper reassurance she will go right back to getting the peanut butter out of her Kong toy. With a little planning, your dog will do the same.

Happy July 4th!

At some point, most of us with an interest in dogs will have to consider whether or not to spay / neuter our pet. Tradition holds that the benefits of doing so at an early age outweigh the risks. Often, tradition holds true in the decision-making process even after evidence to the contrary has been accumulated.

An objective reading of the veterinary medical literature reveals a complex situation with respect to the long-term health risks and benefits associated with spay/neuter in dogs. The evidence shows that spay/neuter correlates with both positive AND adverse health effects in dogs. It also suggests how much we really do not yet understand about this subject.

Male Dogs:

On balance, it appears that no compelling case can be made for neutering most male dogs, especially immature male dogs, 6-12 months, in order to prevent future health problems.

On the positive side, neutering male dogs

• eliminates the small risk (probably less than 1%) of dying from testicular cancer,
• reduces the risk of non-cancerous prostate disorders,
• reduces the risk of perianal fistulas,
• may possibly reduce the risk of diabetes (data inconclusive).

On the negative side, neutering male dogs

• if done before 1 year of age, significantly increases the risk of osteosarcoma (bone cancer); this is a common cancer in medium/large and larger breeds with a poor prognosis.increases the risk of cardiac hemangiosarcoma by a factor of 1.6;
• triples the risk of hypothyroidism;
• increases the risk of progressive geriatric cognitive impairment;
• triples the risk of obesity, a common health problem in dogs with many associated health problems;
• quadruples the small risk (<0.6%) of prostate cancer;
• doubles the small risk (<1%) of urinary tract cancers;
• increases the risk of orthopedic disorders;
• increases the risk of adverse reactions to vaccinations.

Female Dogs:

For female dogs, the situation is more complex. The number of health benefits associated with spaying may exceed the associated health problems in some (not all) cases. On balance, whether spaying improves the odds of overall good health or degrades them probably depends on the age of the female dog and the relative risk of various diseases in the different breeds.

On the positive side, spaying female dogs

• if done before 2.5 years of age, greatly reduces the risk of mammary tumors, the most common malignant tumors in female dogs;
• nearly eliminates the risk of pyometra, which otherwise would affect about 23% of intact female dogs; pyometra kills about 1% of intact female dogs;
• reduces the risk of perianal fistulas;
• removes the very small risk (less than 0.5%) from uterine, cervical, and ovarian tumors.

On the negative side, spaying female dogs

• if done before 1 year of age, significantly increases the risk of osteosarcoma (bone cancer); this is a common cancer in larger breeds with a poor prognosis;
• increases the risk of splenic hemangiosarcoma by a factor of 2.2 and cardiac hemangiosarcoma by a factor of >5; this is a common cancer and major cause of death in some breeds;
• triples the risk of hypothyroidism;
• increases the risk of obesity by a factor of 1.6-2, a common health problem in dogs with many associated health problems;
• causes urinary “spay incontinence” in 4-20% of female dogs;
• increases the risk of persistent or recurring urinary tract infections by a factor of 3-4;
• increases the risk of recessed vulva, vaginal dermatitis, and vaginitis, especially for female dogs spayed before puberty;
• doubles the small risk (<1%) of urinary tract tumors;
• increases the risk of orthopedic disorders;
• increases the risk of adverse reactions to vaccinations.

One cannot ignore the findings of increased risk in spayed and neutered dogs from osteosarcoma, hemangiosarcoma, hypothyroidism, and other less frequently occurring diseases.

The traditional spay/neuter age of six months as well as the modern practice of pediatric spay/neuter appear to predispose dogs to health risks that could otherwise be avoided by waiting until the dog is physically mature (12-24 months), or perhaps in the case of many male dogs, foregoing it altogether unless medically necessary.

Across-the-board recommendations for all pet dogs do not appear to be supportable from findings in the veterinary medical literature.

One thing is clear – much of the spay/neuter information that is available to the public is unbalanced and contains claims that are exaggerated or unsupported by evidence. Rather than helping to educate pet owners, much of it has contributed to common misunderstandings about the health risks and benefits associated of spay/neuter in dogs.

This important review will help pet owners as well as  veterinary medical care providers make informed decisions. Who could ask for more?

http://www.naiaonline.org/pdfs/longtermhealtheffectsofspayneuterindogs.pdf

Anne Eckersley, Chadwick Cavaliers

Ron Malloy rightly points out that we cannot afford to reduce the Cavalier gene pool any more than it is already.  And like everything in breeding, if you focus on correcting one fault (whether it be a health concern or gay tails, long backs, white in eye, etc.) you will find that everything else could fall apart.

In my opinion, you need to breed for the WHOLE dog.  So, if we discard, for example, all the MRI “D” dogs (that would be the majority of Cavaliers today), the gene pool will be so reduced that we are sure to come up with some other health issue.  We may end up with wonderful MRI on our dogs, but they could die of other things that we inadvertently bred by removing the D dogs.  For example, it may be that we inadvertently created the Syringomyelia (SM) issue in our breed by breeding for a certain head structure or breeding for a specific coat color or texture. 

There is value to out-crossing, line-breeding and even in-breeding.  With out-crossing, you will not get rid of disease because what you are doing is hiding what’s there.  By mixing up the genetic make up of the dogs, the health issues are not always expressed.  To truly get rid of any disease, it is necessary to test breed, cull and produce lines of clear dogs on which you would in-breed.  If you have lines of known clear dogs on all sides of the pedigree, then you are better to in-breed to solidify that good health.

The problem with in-breeding is that you need to be very sure, through genetic health testing, that the lines are indeed clean. Otherwise you will end up with litters of health disasters.  But at least you will know that the lines are not clean.

 Since I will not live long enough to know completely clear lines or to breed completely clear lines, I choose to out-cross or loosely line-breed. It takes more time to produce those illusive Champions but I can sleep at night knowing that I did my best for the pet owner who has my dog and who has to live with that dog for the next 12 years. 

Longevity is an issue but, truthfully, many of the breeders who health test their Cavaliers and remove those whose hearts come up with MVD under the age of five years, DO produce dogs that live 11 to 13 years, which is a good age for any breed.  When one takes into account all the puppy mill dogs, the percentage of long-lived Cavaliers is quite low.  But then again, one has to point an accusatory finger at the pet owner for choosing immediate gratification and buying from the Internet, without any research or effort into locating a good breeder.  Unfortunately, that same pet owner is quick to criticize the short life of that Cavalier, painting every Cavalier breeder with the same tainted brush. You just cannot win!!

Having said that, it is also possible that carefully bred Cavaliers come up with health issues too, despite the efforts of breeders to prevent this happening.  I suppose it all depends on percentages of how many of those breeders’ dogs have health issues.

In addition to health testing, environment also impacts the Cavalier. One must ask: how much stress (both positive and negative) is placed on the dog?  What is he/she fed?  What chemicals they are subjected to?  While none of these factors will produce MVD, they can cause other ailments and weakness so that the dog does not live as long a life as perhaps he/she might have in a different environment.  As a breeder, one cannot foresee this in the homes we select for our pups.

 Ron mentions the Cocker Spaniels and their nasty temperaments.  Again, in-breeding in itself did not produce those nasty temperaments.  A dog by the name of My Own Brucie won Westminster and virtually every Cocker Spaniel female in the country bred to him.  He had a very nasty temperament, which some breeders knew but bred to him anyway.  The dog ultimately died, and out of sight and mind, no one remembers the bad things about dead dogs!  All the very best show dogs are dead, after all!!  So they in-bred on him. Voila, that’s what happened in a nutshell to the sweet, happy Cocker Spaniel.  It has taken 20-30 years to breed out the bad temperament, not to mention the skin problems and hip dysplasia issues in that breed.

Another breed that has been ruined by in-breeding is the Golden Retriever.  While cancer is not in itself inherited, immune deficiencies are inherited.  In order to produce those cookie cutter puppies, the same dog is found in Golden pedigrees perhaps five to eight times in a five- to seven-generation pedigree.  That’s alarming.  Constant in breeding will reduce vigor, and lack of vigor can also mean weak immune systems.  Some Goldens are dying at six years of age of cancer.  That’s WAY too young for any dogs. 

So there is some blame to be placed on breeders too, as demonstrated with the Cockers and Goldens. 

Getting back to Cavaliers, what I see in our breed today is worse and worse temperaments: shy, nervous, aggressive and quirky.  None of these personality traits existed years ago.  As you may know, I judge Cavaliers and I have been bitten twice at two different shows and suspected that I might have been bitten by another Cavalier but was not, although the dog did go after the judge the following day.  There is no reason and no excuse for a Cavalier to growl or snap.  More than ever before, we breeders MUST be ever vigilant to breed Cavaliers with outgoing, happy personalities whose lineage is generally long lived and where the parents and grandparents and even further back than that, if possible, are all cleared over five years by a cardiologist, ophthalmologist and for hip dysplasia and patella luxation.  But especially for heart and eyes as a minimum.