Author archives: Brian Lynn

Cranial cruciate ligaments in dogs perform the same task as the anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, in humans. They both act as important stabilizers inside the knee and both can be damaged during exercise. In dogs, the ligament and related damage can be more complex than in humans, resulting in varying degrees of lameness and tearing.

While at the Purina Sporting Dog Summit, Dr. James L. Cook, DVM, PhD, DACVS, DACVSMR, discussed several topics, one of which was the importance of warming your dog up prior to exercise and competition.

“Never take a dog straight from a crate to the performance realm,” said Cook, referring equally to the conformation ring, agility course, hunt-test or field-trial line, etc. “If you’re going straight from the crate to performance, you’re an idiot.”

Now, that might sound harsh to those of us who pull our dog out of the box and get in line for competition, but the truth is: he’s right. Would an elite human athlete get out of bed and immediately strap on the skis, run a marathon or get on the court of competition without so much as stretching? Would you get off the couch and undergo physical exercise ...

While attending the Purina Sporting Dog Summit, several experts gave advice on ways to keep your dogs healthy and injury free. Jennell Appel, DVM, CCRT; James L. Cook, DVM, PhD, DACVS, DACVSMR Purina’s Arleigh Reynolds, DVM, PhD, DACVN all stressed the importance of warming a dog up prior to competition/hunting/exercise and then cooling down afterwards. They also stressed cross-training conditioning – swimming, running, strength training, balance and more – with the thought that a well-rounded and conditioned dog is less likely to undergo a serious injury.

During Dr. Cook’s seminar, he mentioned core conditioning. Puppy Pilates, if you will. Like humans, a strong provides a strong foundation for the rest of the body and keeps in aligned. A few simple daily exercises with your dog can help your dog maintain flexibility and strengthen its core, which can reduce the chance of injury. These are exercises that can be done from puppyhood throughout life.

Nose to butt: With your dog sitting, use a treat to get him to twist his head towards his seated back end on each side. The dog must remain seated during this exercise. The goal is to turn the trunk of the body, stretching the ...

As humans, we gesture, talk, yell, squeal, use sarcasm and other means of communication to get our point across to other people. Unfortunately, we also use some of these communication vehicles when relating to and training our dogs. Which doesn’t work.

In this great article, the author points out 11 things humans do that dogs hate. Among those things: using words more than body language, hugging your dog, petting a dog’s face/head, walking up to a strange dog and looking it in the eye, lack of structure and rules, forcing a dog to interact with dogs or people they don’t like and keeping a tight leash on walks, among others.

The author does a good job of explaining how dogs perceive the world and why these things can interfere with your communication and relationship with a dog (in general, of course). To this general list of physical and psychological actions, I’d add smiling at a dog. In humans, smiling conveys happiness, but in the animal kingdom, even among many other primates, baring of teeth can be an aggressive action (used from either the dominant or submissive role).

Here are a couple of things I thought about that could also ...

Last week I attended the Purina Sporting Dog Summit in Gray Summit, Mo., at the Purina Event Center, which is part of the larger Purina Farms that is open to the public year-round and provides free family entertainment and education. The theme of the summit was “achieving a performance edge” and it featured some of the best trainers and handlers of high-performance sporting dogs from across the country, as well as media representatives.

Just to be in the same room with these trainers and handlers was an honor. The sheer amount of dog knowledge in that room, across all venues, was astounding. As a hunter and hunt-test fan, to meet and talk with the biggest names in the retriever and pointing-dog worlds was overwhelming – trying not to sound like a star-struck idiot was even more of a challenge. Here’s just a glimpse of the people in attendance:

Tom Dokken: Owner of Dokken’s Oak Ridge Kennels, the largest gun dog training kennel in the upper half of the US, and Dokken Dog Supply, Tom invented the popular Dokken Deadfowl Trainer and has been training gundogs for more than 30 years.

Danny Farmer: Elected to the Retriever Hall of Fame in ...

Research has shown that owners often choose dogs that look similar to them. Data also suggests that the dogs we choose to share our life with tend to have similar personalities.

One study asked owners to rank themselves and their dogs in five personality traits – neuroticism, extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness.

Owners ranked themselves and their dogs as having similar personalities in all five categories. To help combat the errors of self-reported data and projection by the owners, family members familiar with both the owner and dog were asked to rank each independently. In the third-person ranking, dogs and their owners were similar in four out of five categories.

The strongest association between dogs and their owners took place in neuroticism and extraversion. Neuroticism compared how sensitive and nervous a person was versus secure and confident. Extraversion looked at how outgoing, sociable and energetic a person/dog was versus solitary and reserved. The weakest association was in the openness category – or how inventive and curios versus consistent and cautious.

Another study compared personality type to the likelihood of owning certain breeds – traits displayed by the owners were generally found in the dog and increased the likelihood that ...

Socialization of your dog is an important step in raising a healthy, psychologically balanced dog. The critical socialization phase however, lasts only until about 16 weeks of age. This has presented people with a bit of a quandary when it comes to successfully introducing puppies to the world but maintaining their health safety.

Popular wisdom says to wait until a puppy has received all of its vaccinations before introducing it to the world. However, the final round of shots for a dog doesn’t happen until around six months of age – well beyond the important socialization period when puppies are less fearful and more curious about things. Postponing socialization – introduction to various stimuli such as automobiles, various environments, different types of people and other dogs – until six months could cause your pup to be fearful of numerous things.

According to recommendations from the American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior, if your dog has had its first vaccinations, get them out into the world to explore and meet new friends. Prior to their first round of shots, and even afterward, maternal antibodies help protect your new pup from diseases. When those maternal antibodies begin to wear off and the pup’s ...

When we breed to better a line of purebred dogs, many intangible or subjective variables come into play – conformation, athleticism, intelligence, trainability and more. Mentoring and experience, even the gut instinct borne from these teachings, can make assessing those variables easier. As we learn more and develop an eye for evaluating and reading dogs, the standards for what constitutes a ‘better’ dog, one worthy of breeding, usually rise. The comparative knowledge experience brings allows us to differentiate a ‘great dog’ from a ‘good’ one; what might have been an acceptable to us a decade ago, might not make the cut today. And therein creates the economic correlation of supply and demand among top breeders.

As we eliminate potential breeding partners in favor of ‘better’ dogs, those that will truly improve a line and therefore breed, fewer and fewer potential partners exist. That makes the remaining pool of dogs more desirable and valuable.

When the qualities that elevated a dog to the top of the gene pool are combined with the objective results of canine genetic screening, a breeder is truly ‘bettering the breed’ by passing along the best physical and mental qualities the dog possesses while reducing or eliminating detrimental ...

Nearly everyone espouses the belief that we should produce puppies that better a breed. However, ‘better’ is a subjective term; what it means to one person is completely different than what it means to another. ‘Better’ is something that’s often based in our ultimate goals, the end results of which are sometimes dictated by success in the dog game we play.

What isn’t subjective is sound genetic health. Science seeks objective and discernable answers regardless of the subjective nature of an issue. Genetic screening therefor is the cornerstone of bettering a breed, regardless of the game being played. While we should always strive for proper and acceptable form and function, the perfect dog does not exist – we do the best we can with the sires and dams available to us.

When deciding pairings, we should seek dogs that complement each other in form and function so as to produce consistent puppies. We should also seek to strengthen weaknesses in both parents' conformation by pairing them with a dog that offers a contrast to the flaws in each. With the randomness of how genes combine in all aspects of puppy's physical, mental and psychological attributes, it’s a tough order ...

In part one of our summer heat post, I wrote about the dangers of leaving dogs in a hot car, recognizing signs of heat stress and how to save a heat-stressed dog. Give it a read if you haven't yet. But heat-related issues are usually completely avoidable with a little foresight, precaution and knowledge on your part.

To keep your pup comfortable, cool and safe from the heat this summer, check out these tips ... is there anything you would add? 

Commonsense Rules

Like most everything, commonsense can keep your dog safe. A few simple steps can keep your dog from overheating in most situations.

• Exercise: Don’t do it in the middle of the day when temperatures are hottest. While early evening provides a cooler time to work, mornings are the coolest, and best, times to exercise. At no other time will the earth’s surface be as cool as at first light. An added benefit of morning is dew – it can help cool your dog by wetting his paws and perhaps his skin.
• Water: Always have fresh cool water on hand for your dog. If you’re training or exercising, stop more frequently than normal and offer her a ...

Summer has officially started, but temperatures that make for great beach-going time for you pose a deadly risk to your dog.

You have to remember: dogs are physically adapted to conserve and recycle heat. They don’t cool by sweating; heat generated by exercise (even just the physiology of body functions) is trapped inside. Their fur coats insulate them further. Brachycephalic (short face) dogs such as the bulldog, pug, boxer and Pekingese have it even harder because they can’t pant as sufficiently as other dogs, which compounds heat-related issues. However, if you trap any dog in a hot area with no way for them to release or escape that heat, their body will become so stressed that it can cause death – and it can happen very quickly, too.

To keep your dog safe and cool this summer, keep these tips in mind.

Cars are Coffins

If it’s been said once, it’s been said a thousand times: don’t leave your dog in a car during the summer. Even with the windows cracked, it can turn deadly in minutes.

I wrote about summer heat and cars last year here on Paw Print Genetics (read it here), and linked to this video that ...