All right, the Pet Chat team are here, ready to answer your call today. Cheryl Shaw, firstly, good afternoon to you. Good afternoon, Mark. Okay, we're on Cheryl Shaw Broach Watch. Yes, what can you see? It's a square, and is that like a cliff? No. It's a dog getting shampooed. Yeah. Okay. So we're going to be talking about bathing your dog. It still looks like a cliff for me, but that's way over there. Kimberley Earle's laughing, but you can see you're like a heartbeat away from that broach. I know, and I had to still get close to see it. It's lovely, though. And we're all wearing reading glasses. Yeah, that's that age. Dr. Kimberley Earle is here, as is Cheryl Shaw.
Yes, I'm here. It's your go. It's my go. Thank you, Mark. I'm going to be talking about how frequently should you bath your dog? Because I'm a companion animal hygienist and one of the things that I get asked regularly is when and how and what do I do? And it's a really interesting question because some dogs require a lot more bathing than others. So we've got to look at why we need to bathe them regularly. For me, I bath my dogs every week. So Monday, spa day, they just love it. And overnight when they go home after their bath, they're a lot more relaxed. They actually don't...
do what they sometimes do over nighttime, which is go after the possums because they hear the possums outside and they just want to go out and sort of, you know, do their little bit of trying to catch them or bark at them. So on spa night, they're a lot more relaxed. They come home from their bath and they're just really chilled out and they sleep a lot sounder. But for a lot of people, my dogs are inside, so they don't sleep on the bed. But for some people, their dogs are outside and come inside as well. Now, if you've got a dog that plays outside a lot, you'll have some dogs that are digging in the dirt, rolling their backs on the grass, playing in the mud or the rain, whatever it may be. And all of those things contract through the house with the dog. Now, that's fine for some people, but certainly you need to be looking.
That's not fine, Cheryl. No. You're giving people a pass on that. That's not fine. See, for me, this is why I need to bath dogs either weekly or fortnightly because they are coming inside and leaving that track behind them. And also, a lot of dogs that have odour on them, if they're sitting on your soft furnishings or laying on the rugs and things or the carpet, they're going to leave or transfer that odour onto the carpet. So the house can become quite smelly. But another really important aspect for bathing dogs frequently is that you've got to remember that some dogs get really itchy. And a lot of that itchiness is caused by, well, there's a few factors, but sometimes it's caused by the food that they eat. But it can also be environmentally.
So what happens when they're outside, they'll get grasses on them or dust or whatever it may be. And that can actually trigger some of the allergies in dogs and they'll start to scratch at themselves. The other thing is that dogs are shedding their coat and they're shedding their skin. So that dander that they're shedding all the time can make them itchy. But there's a second part of that. So if we wash the dog and we reduce those allergens that are on it, it's going to stop the dog from itching and scratching so much. And the other second part of this is that for the human or the people that the dog is living with, it's going to actually help them. So if you've got a person in the family that may have allergic symptoms, by bathing the dog regularly, you're going to reduce those triggers that are on the dog. So the saliva, the shedding dander and the coat as well. So that can help to reduce the problems that some people have. And another aspect of that too, talking of families, is if you've got a child with autism, some children with autism are super sensitive to smells. And so you can help reduce that sensitivity.
dogs being bathed properly particularly a lot of children like that do have a companion dog so a dog that's you know just for them for their therapy so keeping that dog really clean is important. And also I'm guessing Cheryl in terms of skin irritations or that can become more of a medical problem as well? Yeah because what happens with the skin obviously the skin is shedding but if you're bathing the dog regularly it's going to help to rehydrate that skin because skin will dry out just like us if we're not bathing frequently you know our skin gets quite clammy it can get quite yucky. Helping to keep that skin clean is really important you know hygiene for us as well as our dogs is important. The other thing is too, some dog breeds, and particularly the new designer dog breeds that we have, all our oodles and, you know, govoodles and whatever these oodles are, they have a more complex coat than a lot of breeds do. So they've got, you know, sort of often a thicker coat and they've got double coats and they need a lot more care. So not only are we bathing, but at the same time after we're bathing and drying, we're usually giving them a brush. So that's helping to keep their coats matte free. And again, like you said, Mark, it's helping to keep that skin a lot healthier because when dogs matte, that matting pulls on their skin and causes skin, you know, sort of...
It can tear if it's not healthy. And also it often develops because the dog will start chewing at those mats and it can develop hot spots or wet eczema because the saliva or where they've chewed can actually damage the skin. So it's really important to make sure that they are having regular baths. And also one of the bathing things is you must make sure you're using a product that is designed for dogs, not sort of grabbing your own shampoo and thinking that's fine because we have a different pH than the dog and we need to make sure we're keeping things for pets and us separate. Is this something that in your line of work we're seeing a lot of? People are like, well, I don't know, is that something that's more of a problem than you would think it would be?
We always have itchy dogs. People will have a dog that's itchy for whatever reason. Oh, I meant using our shampoo. Oh, sorry, Mark. Yes, I've seen that. So what happens? You often have these people that think just because it's good for them or their baby that they can then go and use it. But a lot of these products that we use on ourselves contain soap and detergents, and these things are going to alter the pH on the dog. So we need to make sure that we're just staying clear of anything that isn't designed for dogs. And look, there's so many products on the market. You don't have to go out and buy the dearest thing. You can go out and buy products that are designed for your dog and the skin type and coat type it has. And people say, can you bath the dog too often? Well, no. If we're talking about dog food,
that are really healthy. And, Kimberly, you don't often see a show dog that's going to have skin issues. And one of the reasons for that is because we know that show dogs are fed really well, but also, it depends on the breed, but say a poodle, for instance, or a bichon, they're going to be bathed two to three times a week because we want that coat to grow really nice and healthy and we want it to be long. So the more we're bathing and brushing and keeping that skin and coat healthy, the healthier the dog is going to be on the outside. Kimberly, I'll hand any examples you can recall of people who have ended up in the veterinary clinic. That's a yes, by the way, where they've been using certainly the wrong type of cleaning products on their dog. So, I mean, we get lots of people. Tea trees is like a really common thing. People always say, oh, I use some tea tree. I use it on my dog's sore skin. And I just think I cringe. I'm like, really? Your dog's skin is already sore. And you're putting this like quite, it's quite a strong chemical. And it actually is toxic to dogs if they are ingesting it. So we don't recommend tea tree. Lots of people will use human baby shampoo. And although that's better than using dish soap or human adult shampoo, we would still recommend finding something for your dog.
particularly if your dog is having a bit of issue with dry or itchy skin. There's a really good range of products on the market that will help to moisturise the skin and to settle down some of the itching, things like that. And as Cheryl said, it doesn't have to be the most expensive item out there. The dog can't read the expensive price tag. It's not like a present at Christmas time where you casually leave the price tag on it if you've spent a lot of money. The dog don't know. And you don't have to go to the vet for a lot of these products. They're often in the better quality pet shops. You can just sort of walk in there and go, okay, read the package. This sounds like what my dog has. Obviously, I would always recommend seeing a vet if your dog's having a skin issue. But as a starting point, sometimes a shampoo on a weekend makes a big difference. And I think, too, another thing is...
People don't usually read the label and it's so important to read the label. As a rule, we just don't do it with anything. And even with bathing, people sometimes don't realise just how you've got to do it right. There's things that you have to do. If you've got an itchy dog, you really need to be putting that shampoo in between the toes and making sure that their pads and their toes are clean because often people will just, I see it all the time, they'll just wash the dog really quickly and they haven't done the areas that are the problematic areas. So the feet for itchy dog, really important and making sure they're dry after you've shampooed them. And a lot of the medicated shampoos will specify that they need to have a contact time of at least five to ten minutes. So if you're not leaving your medicated shampoos on for that.
period of time. You're not getting the full action. And Philip at Stockton, your female poodle has got some car issues. What's happening there, Philip? Hello there. I hope you can help us out. We've got a little chocolate toy poodle, a miniature poodle, and she's very excitable. She gets the harness on. She's happy to jump in the car to sit in her little seat. As we could drive out of the driveway, she howls. When I say she howls, she howls and howls and howls. It can be a minute trip. When we go and return after where we've been, on the way back, she's as placid as can be.
It sounds like her excitement level is really, really heightened and that she's super exuberant about where she's going. So she knows she's worked out that going in the car means that something really, really fun is going to happen. So it's a little bit of a hard thing because obviously it's very distracting to try to drive when you've got a dog howling in the car. And so that's a safety issue for you. And at the same time, she's sort of trying to express her excitement about what's happening. So what would I do with this? I don't know. I would maybe think about what can we do to encourage her to be calm in the car. We might need to do, with dogs who are fearful of the car, we get them in the car.
When the car's not moving and we just sort of get them in and like sit them there and wait till their behavior sort of returns to calm and then we get them out without going anywhere because a lot of dogs will have a fear of the car moving or the motion sickness or whatever. So I would probably start doing the same sort of thing with her. She's obviously happy to get in. I'd get her in. I'd strap her in. I would turn on the car and maybe start rolling down the driveway and as the howling starts, I would stop.
Now, you can't do that if you're in the middle of the freeway, obviously. How long was your driveway, Philip? The last long one? Yeah, you know, like I would stop, you know, and hopefully she starts howling like early on so you can sort of say, okay, we've pulled down the driveway, we've started down the road, the howling starts, we're just going to pull over to the side and just stop and wait for her to calm down. And see whether or not she'll sort of go, okay, you know, like I need to calm down. So what we're trying to do is reward the good behavior, the calm behavior. I would also look at using something like an adaptal spray or, you know, dog appeasing pheromone, that sort of stuff to try to make it a calmer sort of environment. And you may find even that desensitizing her to get into the car. So she's not, she's obviously getting herself worked up. So you may even find that just getting her in, strapping her in, putting everything in motion, but then just sitting there with her in the car. Listen to the radio, you know, for 10 minutes until she's calm again. So that she's not associating every car, you know, every time I get in, something really exciting is going to happen. We just need to try to bring that level down.
We've kind of done that a little bit, stopping the car because we've got Elaine behind us and rewarding her. We've kind of driven down the road over and got her out and given her a walk around and then put up. But the thing is that if she's excited about getting the car, why isn't she excited on the way home? Well, I think she's run out all of her energy. So that's the other thing, right? She's been wherever she's gone and she's probably used up a lot of that energy howling the whole way. And so then the trip home, she already works out. She's like, well, it's not all the best is over. All the good stuff's done. Now I'm just going home again. So I mean, the other thing you could try to do would be to try to exercise her before you put her into the car. See if that helps. And when you pull over, I wouldn't necessarily get her out of the car. I would just make her sit there until she's calm because you don't actually want to reward her with, you know, getting out of the car and walking and things like that. I would just let her sit and like calm down, work it out on her own that, okay, actually I have to, if I want this car to be moving, I have to stay calm. You could try somebody sitting in the backseat with her.
offering her some little treats and just trying to keep her sort of calm and redirect your activity. You could also try putting her, she's a little dog, putting her in a little crate and putting her down below the level of the windows or covering her over so she can't see where she's going. It depends on whether or not the activity of the car, the motion of the car is what, you know, triggers her or whether or not it's the actual, you know, she can see what's going on around. We see lots of dogs that will get very excited by the car zipping past and the, you know, the trees coming past and things like that. So that might be helpful if you put a visual barrier. So it's a bit of a tricky one, Philip. Yeah, definitely. She's very active. She didn't.
She did, you know, younger days, she's only three, but she's still mad as a cut snake. But she did 19 zoomies around the backyard. Sounds pretty good. All right, one more gets 20, eh? Yep. All right, thanks. Best of luck with all of that, Philip. G'day, Jill at Walls and your 14-year-old Jack Russell. Not doing so well at the moment, Jill. No, no. He was savagely attacked about four months ago.
He did survive, fortunately. Physically, he survived. But mentally, he hasn't survived. We used to go for walks twice a day, and now I can barely get him out the front gate. Yeah, okay. He just goes out, doesn't worry, and wants to come back in again. Yeah, and does it make him nervous to see other dogs? Or he doesn't even have to see other dogs, it's just the fact that he's left a safe spot, and that makes him uncomfortable. No, he doesn't have to see any other dogs. He's got one little dog that he's friends with that comes to visit, and he's okay with him. But he wants to go out, that's the thing. He wants to go.
And when he gets out there, even if there's not a dog in the street, he still doesn't want to go any further. And is that where the attack happened? Is out front of your house? No, I'm about in the middle of the block and I'm in front of the house down on the next corner. Yeah, sure. Okay. So, I mean, this is obviously a complex problem because he's an older dog and we know that there's an increasing tendency towards anxiety as you get older anyway. So you've had a dog who's obviously got a little bit of like post-traumatic, you know, stress disorder type issues and that's going to be hard sort of to turn around. The first thing I would always say is we want to really make sure that as much as possible that he doesn't have any residual pain from that attack because little old dogs often have arthritis, things like that too. He starts out the door, he starts trotting down the driveway, he thinks about, oh my goodness, this happened and then he remembers that like,
his hip hurts now or his elbow hurts and his hip and elbow may have been hurting him beforehand, but now he's got the memory of, of, you know, that attack happening. And so some of the things that were probably not that traumatizing for him or painful for him in the past, maybe have more effect on it. So make sure you've seen your vet about that and make sure that even if it's unrelated to the attack, that we are addressing things like arthritis and things like that. I suspect that he may require some pharmaceutical help to try to help him, you know, sort of become, he doesn't need to run marathons or anything like that, but it would be nice for him to be able to get back to a point where he can, you know, go for a walk again. And so I would, you know, encourage you to speak to your vet about that.
the fact that his behaviour has really changed. Depending on who you see, they may feel comfortable to talk to you about using some anti-anxiety medications, not necessarily long-term ones, but maybe situational things. So you can sort of say, we're going to go for a walk in an hour. I'm going to give you this little tablet and see if that helps you to cope with us out on the walk. But there's some good behaviour vets in our local area. We're really, really fortunate to have some good behaviour vets around. And so don't hesitate to seek their help as well, because he's a small breed dog. He still potentially has a number of years left. It would be great if he could go back to be doing normal dog things, going for walks. Cheryl Shores here, Dr. Kimberley Earl as well. And ladies...
We are now giving somebody the chance to expand their family a little bit. And what you would probably say is the best way with our dog of the week. What do you reckon? Absolutely. Check this one out. Otis, 11-month-year-old male Jack Russell Cross, and his buyer says he's looking for the simple life. Aren't we all? He just enjoys having a cosy lap at a daily outing. That's enough for him. He's quiet, and I have a little play with some of the other dogs. Not really high energy, so he just wants to be with his human, slightly coming out of his shell a little bit. It's been really nice to watch. They're working with a few new things, such as toilet training, and apparently that is going well so far. So, ladies, Otis, Jack Russell Cross, still on that puppy stage. Some of the things that would be keen to note.
We're looking to pick him up today. Yeah, so they say that he's not a particularly high-energy dog, but the implication is that maybe he's got a little bit of an anxiety issue. It says, well, it shows no signs of anxiety, but, you know, they talk about him like he's taking a bit of time to adjust, which means that he may not always be as low-energy, that once he comes out of his shell, he might increase. But, you know, he's a little dog. They don't have super, super high exercise requirements, will fit nicely into a smaller yard. He looks bright-eyed and intelligent and, yeah, pretty cute, really.
Cheryl, a nice little puppy like that. I'm just reading Jack Russell, and the first thing that comes to my mind is high energy, but maybe whatever he's crossed with is keeping that other side down. But he's cute. All right. If adding a pet to your family, another dog, or maybe your first one, all you do is you head up to our website. You can check out the Pet Chat area, Dog of the Week, click right through, and Otis is there, and indeed some of the others as well, and add that addition to your family. 49216216 is the number to call. There's probably room for a couple more if you have a pet question today. Whether it's a dog, cat, snake, pet bird, pet husband, it is International Women's Day, ladies. It is. Pet husband. We don't know much.
You can fix the dogs and cats, but not them, right? Yes, that's right. All right. Tops today of 34, 35 degrees. Still into the 30s, ladies, for Thursday, Friday and Saturday. This summer heat, still not that great for our pets. So a couple of quick reminders on that, Kimberley. Yeah, well, we've had obviously really, really hot weather the last few days. And just a reminder that your pets are feeling the heat too. So really, really important that we are not walking our dogs through the middle of the day. Take them out in the morning or late in the evening. If it's been really hot through the day and the last few nights, it really hasn't been cooling off. So you need to make sure that your dogs can still develop heat stress late in the day if it's been hot all day and things haven't cooled down.
know be really cautious about taking them onto hot surfaces onto beaches beach sand is so hot um and their feet can can burn and blister and and that takes a really long time to heal we've definitely seen dogs where they've burnt their feet um and you know the whole bottoms of the feet sort of the pads slough off and then you're managing open wounds and stuff for long periods of time so just best not to do it the sand is really really hot um and remember always have really good access to some nice cool water If you think your dog is heat stressed, call your vet or the emergency center. And, you know, we want to start active cooling with cool but not icy water. OK, so if your dog will tolerate a garden hose in there. So I guess the other thing is some people don't know how to identify heat stress. So we all know that dogs pant when they get hot. But a dog who's experiencing heat stress is a dog who's often panting and frothing and they really can't settle down. So your dog who's, you know, generally hot but calm and quiet will probably be panting. But it'll still be a fairly calm panting. If you have a frantic panting dog and particularly if they're frothing or, you know, or if they just really look like they're gasping and they can't get.
a good breath of air, those dogs are often in heat stress. So you really want to be actively cooling them right away, getting them into a vet very quickly. The sad thing about heat stress is that we can often get the temperatures turned around and bring their body temperature back down. But if they have been hot for an extended period of time, unfortunately, their internal organs start to cook and we can't turn that around. If you've ever tried to uncook a hard boiled egg, it isn't possible. So sometimes with heat stress, you know, we think that we've gotten them over the immediate crisis and it's two to three days later when they've been at normal body temperature for the last 48 hours that we realize actually their kidneys are cooked, their liver is shut down.
That's the end of it. So, you know, making sure water, shade, if you can put a nice cooling fan on them, cool water, but not icy water. We don't want to cause any like frostbite. You can actually cause frostbite in animals that have been overheated from putting ice on them, things like that. So we don't want to do that. And I guess with the general out and about stuff as a general rule, if we wouldn't do it, like walk on the scent's too hot for us, the pavement's too hot, don't do it for them.
I know you say you see all this stuff, but it must be pretty hard not to give people that stern, judgy look. Cheryl, I'm not going to ask you because I can see it. Yes, I am judging you for being so bloody stupid. I'd like to think that we've perfected the poker phase. I mean, the important thing, accidents happen. They absolutely happen. And the important thing... They're going for a walk on it for an hour at four o'clock this afternoon. There's no accident. Totally foolish. But if you bring me a dog that's heat-stressed or has burnt their feet, I'm not going to...
You know, I'm not going to scold you for it because the important thing is that you're in front of me now with the dog and my goal is to try to help your dog. It's absolutely not what I would recommend doing, but, you know, poker face. I've got the poker face. And I think, too, with the breeds that we have around now that are really popular, a lot of those do suffer from heat stress. You know, anything with a little squishy face that looks cute, they're going to have trouble with this weather. Yeah, absolutely. So pugs, French Bulldogs, Boston Terriers, regular Bulldogs, Australian Staffies, some of them have very squashy faces, boxers. Those dogs should not be exercising at all because if you go and run, if you go outside and run a lap around the oval now and then you have to catch your breath breathing.
through a straw I would dare you to do that and see how comfortable that is and that's what these poor little dogs are really that's exactly what they're experiencing they're trying to catch their breath on a hot day breathing through a straw. It doesn't matter that their mouth is open wide and they're panting. A lot of these little dogs... Just about how the mechanics of it all work. That's right. A lot of their airways are so little. So you can see the fact that their faces are squashy and that their nostrils are tight. You can't see that their soft palate is hanging in front of their airway. And sometimes the airways are half the size that they should be. So if you take a French Bulldog and you put it beside a Jack Russell, they can be the same size and body weight, but the Jack Russell will often have an airway that's a third bigger than the French Bulldog's airway. So it's literally like breathing through a straw. So really important you protect your brachycephalic dog from hot weather and heat stress. All right. Just about out of time. Firstly, Cheryl, thank you for your insight as always.
My pleasure, yes. And Kimberly, who's had her family tuning in on the app from Hawaii as well. From Hawaii, yes. I hope you're having a lovely hot day. Not as hot as we are. Not as hot as we are. Ocean breeze, that sort of stuff. Nice work. Thanks, Kimberly. All right, Pet Chat, back next week. Thanks for listening to this podcast from 2NURFM at the University of Newcastle. You'll find them all at 2NURFM.com.