All right, back after their Easter break, the Pet Chat team, Dr. Kimberley Earle is here, ready to fire up with a million and one pet questions today. Absolutely. So we have a preference dog, cat, snake, pet husbands? Whatever, pet husbands. If you have a problem with your pet husband, Kimberley will give it a break. If not, Cheryl Shaw. Now, as always, we're on Broach Watch with you.
Broach, looks like it's a dog that might be in the Flintstones. Am I right? A little bit offbeat there. He's a bit of a hippie, and if we look at his eyes, he's got the dilated pupil, and he's really off his chops, this guy. All right, so you've got a dopey dog today. All right, and we'll get into that with Cheryl. 49216216, if you have a question for our Pet Chat team today on 2NURFM.
Our lovely pet chat ladies, who I'm sure had a pretty decent Easter. Dr. Kimberley, oh yeah, do anything exciting? I was all the way down at Threadbow in Kosciuszko. Pretty cold down there. It snowed for three mornings in a row. It was pretty cold. We were camping, but we had a fantastic time. Still did lots of good fun outdoor activities, biking, mountain biking, things like that. Sounds pretty good, except for the cold. And Cheryl, you had a nice time as well. Well...
Maybe not so nice. We were full of Easter surprises on Sunday. All right, tell us about them. Okay, I'll share this because I thought this was rather an interesting thing that happened. We went down to Swansea and we were about to sit down to have lunch and the people we were visiting have two fishlers. Now, they'd gone for a little hike on their canoes and then the dogs were let to run off on a little island. And while they were down on that island, there was a bushfire, not a bushfire, a little campfire that somebody had had the evening before. And the boys decided that they would collect the bottles that had been discarded and weren't really paying that much attention to the dogs. We got back, they got back, and as I said, we'd sit down to lunch and one of the dogs got off the lounge and had done a wee, which was really unusual.
seen this happen before, and then started staggering. So we knew that something was wrong, but we didn't know what actually was wrong. So I'm going, oh, you know, when you're on the island, was there any snakes? Did they wander around? What is it? And she was really ataxic, so I'm going, we need to get to the vet. So off we go, down to Sash. And when we got there, they said, oh.
Looked in her eyes and the description that I gave them, they said she's had marijuana. And we went, where from? But apparently she was sniffing. No, not me. Oh, me? Not surprised at all by that. Oh, come on, guys. Yeah, look at these eyes. But she had been sniffing around the campfire and obviously had picked something up there. And they then said, oh, yeah, she was chewing on something. But, you know, drop it, leave it. But it's swallowed and gone, as dogs do, as you try to take something from them. So we had quite an interesting wait to see what was going to happen. And, yeah, Kim, they actually said to me that it's quite a common occurrence. It is actually really, really common. And the peeing gives it a way.
way because it's really, really common to have a dog who will present with a little bit of wobbliness or drunkenness on the back end, but they're often just, particularly the male dogs, they're just squirting as they walk. And that's pretty well a telltale sign of it. And I guess there's a fair bit of marijuana around in the environment these days. Not in the environment, but it's obviously recreationally, and people aren't particularly careful with it because it's got a reputation for being not particularly harmful, I guess. But it can be in some of our pets, and it can certainly affect them pretty dramatically and for long periods of time.
I haven't ever myself, and I don't work in emergency practice, so I've never seen a dog myself who has died from it. But some of them get really, really sick, and they lose the ability to walk, some of them, and they can have problems with swallowing and things like that as well. Her body temperature had really dropped, and it was quite severe for her. But it was just such an eye-opener, and making sure that we are really paying attention when our dogs are off leash, no matter where you are. Because some dogs just do swallow really quickly, like, I'm not giving you this. Whatever it is I've got, I'm taking on board, and it can be dangerous. Yeah, that's right. And particularly, we often find the history with marijuana toxicity is that the dogs have been off leash.
in a bush area and like you said campfire somebody's obviously been having a bit of a drink and a smoke around a campfire enjoying themselves but not you know not paying attention to what they're leaving behind which isn't great the other thing is that if you are a recreational drug user we would always encourage you to be up front with your veterinarian if your dog has gotten into something because accidents happen we know that we would always prefer you to not give your dogs those sorts of things or your pets full stop on purpose but accidents happen and it's just going to be way better for the animal if you're really up front we're not going to make any judgment calls we're not going to do anything report you anything like that we just need to know how to help your pet and that's marijuana and all sorts of other things that we you know see So would that...
level of, shall we say, withholding some vital information, is that something that would present more often than you think as well? Because folks come in and go, well, hang on, well, has my recreational activity caused my dog to be in all sorts of problems? So I'm going to try and let them figure out how to fix without knowing what the problem is. Yeah, it just delays the treatment. I've certainly had consultations where you look at the dog and you think, this dog surely has had some marijuana, and the clients will swear left, right, and say, nope, the dog never left my house, nope, there's never drugs in my house, nope, nope. And then two and a half hours later, when we're now starting to talk about, well, we better start taking some high-level blood tests or lumbar punctures for CSF because maybe the dog's got meningitis.
And then somebody sort of says, oh, actually my friend was over and he does smoke a little bit. That's always the fun. And it's like, that's two hours we could have just been helping the dog. Like, just let us know because it's just faster and better for everybody. Of course, Sherry wouldn't have gone into this problem if you didn't start cleaning up other people's garbage for them. You wouldn't have gone anywhere. Well, the boys were doing the right thing because they thought, oh, you know, bottles left behind, clean it up, take it back off that, you know, pristine little lake and put it in the garbage. But, you know, there you go. Just something on the ground. The dog picks up and away we go to the after hours. Just a threat promise and a guarantee all in one. Ladies, Easter, a lot of talk before that about, you know, keeping the nasty.
away from particularly dogs, but probably still a few folks may have some leftover chocolates or, you know, past parts of chocolate have fallen down lounges and things like that. So it's a bit of a chocolate warning. Yeah, you know, if your kid's anything like my kid, the Easter chocolate seems to hang around the house for weeks. Weeks. And, like, just when you think it's all gone, you open up the bedroom door and pull out the drawer and it's like, where did that Easter chocolate just come from? So, yeah, be really mindful. Just because Easter's over doesn't mean your pets are safe yet. And everybody should remember that chocolate is toxic for dogs. The better quality of the chocolate, so if you've hidden some adult chocolate that you haven't given the kids, that's the stuff that will make your dog sick. And if your kids find your secret adult chocolate stash, that's the stuff that's going to be the bad for the dogs. I feel it's a very over-18s theme today. We've got Cheryl with the dope a couple of minutes back. You've got some sort of chocolate.
body stuff. Listen, I do. I'm sure there's other pairs. What are you doing? You buy the cheap and nasty chocolate for the kids and that way you don't feel so bad when you end up like throwing it out. But you buy yourself a couple of good pieces or good packets of chocolate and then you just sort of keep them away from the kids. Cheryl, did you notice how that Kimberley completely no sold the bounce back there on the adult chocolate? That's right. She just ignored it. Gone. Under the table. What happens under the table can stay there. Any other nasties that might just be prevalent around just the house generally? How about Easter lilies? Well, I don't know. Do people do Easter lilies in Australia? Yeah, I talked about it the week before. Yeah, because like in Canada, Easter is spring.
And so there's beautiful flowers and things like that. And Easter lilies are really big. And they're toxic for cats. Lily's obviously really toxic for cats. So you've got to be really, really careful. And in fact, I would say if you have cats, don't have lilies full stop ever in your house because they're really dangerous. You don't get any more concrete than that, Cheryl. It's a blighted bed. It's actually very difficult to buy a bunch of flowers these days that are prearranged without lilies in them. And, you know, you really do need to be vigilant when you're buying flowers. I've been on a few websites where, you know, you buy a mixed bouquet and there's a tick button that says, you know. Do they have cats? Yes. Yes. Do they have cats or, you know, exclude lilies, that sort of thing, which is really good. I think the flower floors, floral industry.
is becoming a bit more aware of that particular problem. So that's a good one. The other thing that's still around is the hot cross buns. So a lot of those have got the sultanas in them. Just be mindful of that because we get the hype before Easter, but then we become a little bit complacent. Yep, grapes, raisins, sultanas, cranberries. We want to be very careful with those and with the dogs. All right, so the hot cross buns are out. Even the chocolate hot cross buns are definitely out too. Anything tasty at Easter is not good for your dog. If you like it, the dog will end up in the veterinary clinic. Yeah, it's a bad plan. G'day, Jen at Woodville. You're a seven-year-old border collie. There might be a bit of a diabetic issue there, you reckon, Jen?
Yeah, well, I'm not entirely sure, but there's been a few behavioural changes this recently. Okay, what's she doing? Well, for a start, she's about three or four kilos overweight. She weighs 23. The local vet says she should be under 20. Most recently, and it hasn't been all that hot, she's been drinking a lot more water, and she's demanding food more frequently. We go for a walk. She used to go for a long walk. She's now turning around sort of, you know, about probably a third of the way and wanting to come back home. The reason I'm concerned is I did have a border collie blue heel across the same years ago, and he was overweight, and he finished up dying with the effects of, you know, multisystem organ failure from diabetes, unrecognized diabetes. Yep, yep, sure. And this is just coming up in the last few weeks, is it?
Yeah, probably the last month, yeah. Okay, yeah. I mean, it certainly could be. There are other things. You're referring to her as a she, so I gather she's a female. Is she desexed? Yes, she's a rescue dog. Okay, great, excellent. We've had her for about three years.
Yeah. So female dogs can develop urinary tract infections, and that will certainly sometimes cause them to drink more water, urinate more frequently. It should probably affect her appetite, though. But the thing to do is just to go in and ask your vet to have a look at a urine sample and have a look at a blood test and get that confirmed. Because the sooner we identify it and start looking at treating it, the better the outcome will be and the much reduced risk of her developing secondary complications like multisystem organ failure or diabetic cataracts or those sorts of things. And it is a complicated disease to treat. But we've got some really good new methods and techniques.
and new insulins and things available in the last, you know, even five to seven years. So it can really, you know, be managed in lots of dogs very well. So, yeah, I mean, I think a dog who's got an increased thirst, probably an increased urination, usually when they're diabetic, often they're hungry and they usually do start out overweight, but then they often, like they're hungry, but then they start to lose weight in the later stages. Not so dissimilar to adults. Yeah, so dogs get like a type 2 diabetes. It really mimics a human type 2 diabetes, whereas cats, when they become diabetic, is much more similar to a human type 1 diabetic. So it's not exactly the same, but yeah, very similar. All right, best of luck with that, Jen, and good luck with your seven-year-old border collie. Cheryl Shaw is here, Dr. Kimberley Earl as well, and g'day, Karen, at Gressford. How many chickens have you got there, Karen? I've got 20 hands and straight roosters. Oh, that's a lot. And you're just looking for a general guideline for how often to treat them?
Yeah, just for the lice and the chicks. I know a lot of them are molting at the moment. They molt at different times and different age birds. I've got some from Let the Ladies Go and also I've read some myself. The roosters don't seem to molt. I don't know why. But anyway. Different hormone systems, yeah. I usually put like a fluid in their water from time to time, but it's really hard to know if they're all getting it, you know, because they have three in the yard. Yeah, sure. It's quite a good full range area. Yeah.
So yeah, I mean, I think if you're treating them for external parasites, most of the time you're going to need to use an external product for them anyway, like a powder or something like that. And we need to keep in mind that the pests can be quite different. So like feather lice and lice will be on the birds. And so you'll need to treat the birds. But then some of the pests like red mite is not actually, they don't live on the bird. They go onto the bird, they suck the blood, but they spend the majority of their time actually outside or off the bird in the enclosure. And so for that, you're actually going to need to treat the coop. And we use things like diatomaceous earth and things like that to treat the coop. Make sure you don't have any moist litter and those sorts of things. They can be a bit of a...
pain to get rid of, really. For worms and things like that, it's usually the in-water medications that you use. And yeah, it is hard to know if everybody's getting it. But I guess we usually talk about, you know, removing the water overnight and then treating them sort of through the day. And I wouldn't do it on a day when there's a...
But I don't think we have to worry about that for the next little while, hopefully. So general guidelines, I guess I would say if you can see an external parasite, you need to treat them because there isn't really a long lasting effect for them. And you may need to treat them, you know, sort of every 10, 14 days for a number of times to get rid of them. Certainly red mites can be very persistent and you might have to do, you know, weekly treatments and weekly clean outs of the coop for a period of time. If you're just looking for a, you know, you don't think they have anything and you're just looking for a preventative, I would sort of go in the every three to four month mark, probably if you want to be really conservative. And there's certainly some people who would do it, you know, less often, maybe twice.
the year if they don't see an actual infestation. So yeah, the guidelines are quite wide. All right, Caroline, so cracking up a little bit there, but best of luck with the chickens there, all seven, and the roosters as well. Quick one up on the roads before we keep moving, a friend of the valley today, Golden Highway at Jerry's Plains. There is a nasty couple of car accident there with a couple of cars towing caravans, so the Golden Highway affected in the Jerry's Plains area. 49216216 if you'd like to be on with the Pet Chat. Dog of the Week, ladies, we'll find out what that's all about shortly. He's a kitty. He is. So see if you'd like to have an addition to your family on Pet Chat right here at 2NURFM 103.7. Mate, if you're looking to add a little fun to your family, if you're looking to adopt a dog, of course, we've got the Dog of the Week for you up on our webpage at 2NURFM.
Just find the pet chat area and you can go through there. Ladies, a chance today to adopt a teddy who looks pretty cute, doesn't he? A 12-year-old pug cross. 12 weeks. He's a puppy. He's a puppy. He's just a baby. Not seeing a lot of pug, just a lot of cross. He's very cute. He looks like a little terrier cross. He doesn't have a puggly face at all. He is 12 weeks old and it says he is low energy, loves going for walks and doing well on the lead. He is...
crate trained overnight. I think my glasses are going to work better than yours. I lost my spot. He's crate trained at night, sleeping well, and in the process of daytime toilet training. They've described him as low energy, very cute and cuddly. Now, I would say as a 12-week-old puppy, he probably just still sleeps a lot, so I wouldn't guarantee that he will stay low energy for that long, but it's a good start, I guess. Loves his foster family, kids. Will make a perfect little buddy for some older children, I think, that he needs some older kids. And they said that he may be a little bit of an escape artist, and he's small, so he needs a really secure yard, so no holes that he can slip out from underneath the fence or gate. What do you reckon, Cheryl? Teddy's a little cutie.
So cute, so cute. And I love the little photo of him in the bath. Look at him. What a cute little dog. All right, if you would like to have a look at Teddy, because we still have some of the other Dog of the Weeks that are still there, you can check it out over the webpage, Dog of the Week. That's at the Pet Chat Area Lifestyle Programs at 2NURFM.com.au. Grant from East Maitland. Grant, we're going to the back end of the dog today, aren't we? How's it going, Grant? Well, I think my dog's back end is going well now. Excellent, excellent. So your question is about how often should the anal glands of your dog need to be expressed? Is that correct?
Correct. Yeah. So it's an interesting question because there are plenty of dogs in the world who never need their anal glands expressed ever in their life and they just manage to carry on without any trouble. But the other end of the spectrum is dogs like mine who started having problems with her anal glands from the time she was about a 12-week-old puppy. And it really is a multifactorial issue. So some dogs never have problems. Other dogs start to have real chronic issues where the glandular secretions become very thick and toothpaste-like and can be very difficult to express. And then the gland doesn't realize that the little duct is blocked. And so the gland keeps producing material over and over and over again. And then the whole...
situation gets very big and swollen and painful for the dog and that's when they start to scoot their bum on the ground and lick at themselves and things like that they can be very irritated um so my general rule is we do it as often as it's required but only as often as it's required because it's obviously not a very pleasant experience for the dog as well and if we don't need to do it then there isn't you know it's not a necessity but if your dog has started scooting i usually tell people if you see a single scoot and then you don't see anything else i'm not going to jump up and down about that because the actual act of scooting in some dogs will unblock the duct and then the gland can be released and it's all good um but if you start to notice your dog is scooting um you know frequently over the course of a few days then that's the time to get there in and for some dogs that's going to be monthly um or every six or eight weeks and for some dogs it's going to be once or twice a year and other dogs it'll be never in their life um It's very, very individual. I would always tell people if your dog has a history of anal gland abscess, so this is where the gland becomes infected. And a lot of times those glands will rupture out the backside. So instead of the release of pressure coming out from the normal pathway through the duct, it actually breaks out through the skin. If your dog has a history of doing that, you know, they get one freebie and the next time it happens, we really should strongly consider taking those anal glands out of there because they're actually a non-functioning gland these days. They don't need them. It's not like our pet dogs need to mark their territory with their, you know, their scent glands to keep, you know, competing.
dogs away and things like that so um that's the route that i went with my poor pup was that um she was having troubles i was having to express her anal glands almost on a weekly to fortnightly basis um they were giving her lots of grief and um so i have gone down the road of having a veterinary surgeon remove them i did not do that procedure myself because i don't like surgery but um i've had them done and she hasn't had a problem since it's been um it is a bit of a unpleasant surgery for them i think the um you know the first two to three days post-surgery is uncomfortable but um you know now she's two years old and hasn't had a problem since she was six seven months of age so that's good well it's really odd because um i have Yep. And he's 15 years old. Yep. And, you know, as you say, occasionally you might see a bit of a tail slide along the floor and don't pay much attention to it. My wife has a particular sensitive sense of smell. Yes, yes. And, you know, she kept on saying, and believe me, we have put him through torture in brushing his teeth, in washing him almost weekly, checking his ears to make sure that the hairs in his ears haven't sort of gone yucky in that. And I was really out of frustration thinking, what the heck?
And it was only on the weekend that I actually attempted for the first time to actually get salt. And as you say, that toothpaste-y extraction. So using the nine and three position next to the actual rectum. And, you know, sort of squeezing and seeing what was actually coming out. And that's it. The smell factor has disappeared. My wife is like, Eureka! The only problem is I now have this indignant look from my dog.
start walking towards you. Yes, yeah. And it can be unpleasant for the dog as well. So, I mean, you can continue to do it as required or you can pay somebody else to do it and then the dog can hate them and not you. That's a nice idea, isn't it? All right, Grant, best of luck with all of that. As we wrap up a very almost skirting on the edge of an adults-only pet chat today, I know this, Kimberly, you covered everything from the back end. You were talking water-based lubricant, the adults-only chocolate. Cheryl Shaw, you weren't so innocent either. You started off with marijuana consumption. So, ladies, well done. That's it. All right, well, I'll catch you all next time. Thanks for your input as always. Have a great week. Thank you. Thanks, I'll see you again.