Breeder Arrogance regarding Shumie's death

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 1:52 pm

Read the study Jeff, you might actually learn something about bloat. It's not just that the dog ate too much or too fast, there are many factors involved.

Jeff&Peks · Post by **Jeff&Peks** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 1:58 pm

I don't need a study to tell me there's to many fat humans and kids running around with stomach problems and gas. Nothing like a fat relative visiting for the holidays, complains he ate to much then stinks up the whole house.

Layla · Post by **Layla** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:04 pm

Yes I've read. What I'm interested in is what you experienced Sam. Like, the food, the bowls, the symptoms you saw. Where you following the 'prevention' at the time or wasn't that around then?

Kiwani- You feel this study is flawed. I can see why after reading all the other links. It's seems more complicated than they make out.

Editied as I'd read more

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:26 pm

Jeff, you are a fool, if you keep large breed dogs the rest of your life you may experience the horror of bloat, and the sad part about it is that it could probably have been avoided if you would have know the signs.

Layla, so you want the prescription for death in a Chow? Well here is what happened, and this is before I had ever really studied anything about dogs.

I went on a camping trip and took one of my Chows, and as usual she got scraps from the meals, along with her other food. What probably made her sick was a piece of Bratwurst. Anyway, the next day I noticed she was not feeling well and I suspected it was because of the sausage, but didn't rule out all the creek water she had drank, so off to the vet we went. The vet said she was healthy and didn't find anything wrong, but she wanted to put her on prescription Eukanuba to clean out her system. She had horrible gas on the food and I told the vet, but she did not seem concerned, so she was left on it. Three weeks later she bloated and I had to put her to sleep. Do I think it was the food alone, no! It was a combination, she was a very high strung and aggressive dog. She also had elevated food bowls. Chows in general including her are stressed easily. She was aggressive at the food bowl, I had a male at the time also.

So if you read that study you will see she had a recipe for disaster. I have talked to a lot of people that have had Chows bloat, in my opinion the two most deadly combinations are gas, and a dog that stresses easily. Breeding is very important in the case of stress, you can breed a Chow that is very confident, and that helps eliminate one of the elements that cause bloat.

You all can critisize the food I feed, but I do not have gas in any of my dogs, and as long as there is no signs of an upset stomach I will never change. Once you have gone through a case of bloat you will understand what I am telling you.

Jeff&Peks · Post by **Jeff&Peks** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:28 pm

Where's the study at? where is the link

Layla · Post by **Layla** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:32 pm

First page of this thread Jeff. There's actually alot of links about bloat as well as the purdue study. It's all interesting reading, especially why the study is thought flawed IMO

debraschow · Post by **debraschow** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 2:52 pm

Sam, what are you feeding your chows? I am like Layla, this is really scary to me. So I am listening to everyone right now, I would prefer to go to my quiet place at this time, but that is not possible right now.

Jeff&Peks · Post by **Jeff&Peks** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:02 pm

"I went on a camping trip and took one of my Chows, and as usual she got scraps from the meals, along with her other food. What probably made her sick was a piece of Bratwurst".

You call me a fool and you needed a vet to tell you that you don't feed that crap to a Chow/dog. Hell I would have been to embarrassed to tell people I fed my Chow that.

Dog food, table scraps and brautwurst. Gee I bet your Chow took its time and chewed thoroughly between each bite. and took it's time eating. What's worse is you supposedly breed and raise Chows. Yep I'm the fool.

Stressed out Chow being feed crap, wonder who was the blame on that one. Pekoe is temperamental as hell but not once in her life have I seen her stressed. A chow being stressed and what it eats is my job if I'm dumb enough to feed table scraps and brautwurst to a Chow stressed or not then I would be a fool.

I'm not saying pro-plan or any type of food causes bloat, what I'm saying is the amount and how fast the food being consumed, by adding supplements such as table scraps and brautwurst to get them to eat to me is force feeding. If my Chow is stressed its my job to find out why and to end it fast.

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:07 pm

I feed a mix of ProPlan Lamb & Rice, Chicken & Rice, and ProPlan Selects Turkey and Barley to my adult Chows. My Seniors get Selects Turkey & Barley for Seniors. My puppies get a mix of ProPlan Chicken & Rice for Puppies (regular) and Selects Turkey & Barley for puppies. I very rarely give table scraps. I give them some Selects canned food every so often for a treat. I give them ProPlan biscuits for treats. Once a week or so I will give them a Dentley's rawhide chewstick to keep their teeth clean. That is all they get, all of my dogs are healthy, and I don't have problems with loose stool or gas. If they do have gas there is no odor, and I have never heard one pass gas. They all live in my home with me too. I wish I could say all of that was true in the past with other foods and other dogs.

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:15 pm

Jeff, this was years ago, even before most of the bloat study from Purdue. People feed their dogs table scraps all the time, in fact that is what most dogs survived on until the commercial dog food was available. Was I stupid for what I was giving my dog, absolutely. Back then Eukanuba was considered a premium dog food, people didn't know any better, in fact people still think that to this day. Just like Science Diet. What I am telling you is that I have been there and done that, and have the dead dog to prove it. You are still a fool in my opinion if you don't read that study, from the sounds of it you don't really understand what bloat is either.

Jeff&Peks · Post by **Jeff&Peks** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:30 pm

No one understands bloat, if they did they would stop it. All a person can do is try to avoid it. to me it What they eat, how fast they eat and how much they eat.

I don't come from a family or a background based on Love revolves around the food table, the more I feed you the more I love you, thats called loving someone to death.

I don't read dog books or dog studies I treat Pekoe the same as I treat my daughter and my self a gain of a 1 lb is panic time, bloat is a coming to the three of us.

Why do you feed your Chows all that food and mixtures of food, Pekoe gets 3 cups of food a day, same thing she has been eating for 10 years, just recently I switched her to senior. 3 cups of food aday and one dental bone, she weighs 63 lbs and hasn't gone up or down in weight in 6 years,

You should know this by now but Chow/Dogs don't eat from tastes they eat from smell ever noticed how fast they run for their food bowls when your cooking spaghetti or something they like.

kiwani · Post by **kiwani** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:34 pm

Re: "Kiwani- You feel this study is flawed. I can see why after reading all the other links. It's seems more complicated than they make out."

It's not uncommon for 'scientific studies' to be considered flawed.
Here's another link below.

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm ... cleid=1237

debraschow · Post by **debraschow** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:43 pm

Kiwani is the first post of this thread really the Purdue Study?

I don't see them referenced anywhere on it. Then I tried to do search and can't find a link. I would like to read Purdue Study.

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:52 pm

Jeff, my dogs don't run over and scarf their food down. I feed the same as you, they get 3 cups a day and they generally eat all of it. LuLu eats a little more than that, but she is a big dog. I free feed and they do a good job of regulating themselves and how much they eat. All of my dogs are very tone, LuLu has a little flab on her belly, not much. Lucy is a bit over weight, but that is just Lucy.

I mix the food for two reason, a variety of meats and other ingredients. I also use the Selects to mix in, but it's very expensive and I can't afford to feed all Selects to a bunch of dogs. The Selects cost more than the Nutro Ultra for comparison.

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:55 pm

Debra, that link is not the Purdue study, but if you look at the bottom I believe there were a bunch of links, you will see the Purdue study. I believe the last time I looked there were 8 documents in that study.

debraschow · Post by **debraschow** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:56 pm

Thank you Sam!

Post by **Zhuyos mom** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 3:56 pm

Debra and Layla, do not be alarmed. My Zhuyo survived bloat twice. After the first episode, he got the surgery that held his stomach in place so it wouldn't twist. Then a month later he got it again. Just have the signs in the back of your mind, and know where your closest vet office is located that can perform emergency surgery. I was familiar with the symptoms from a conversation my at the time teen nephew's friend had almost 12 years ago when his boxer suddenly died of bloat. So, in the back of my mind, when Zhu was experiencing and showing these odd signs, I called the ER vet and they instructed me to take him in asap since what I suspect (that he was experiencing bloat symptoms) was what they thought was happening. You know this is something that occurs with chows and it is fatal, so just keep the knowledge in the back of your mind and you will know what to do if you ever are comfronted with the situation.

debraschow · Post by **debraschow** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 4:07 pm

I am not truly freaking out, only partially! We live 45 minutes from the closest vet so even reading what Kiwani has posted may or may not work. You know we will always do the best for our family members, and glad to know that dog's do survive. Guess I am a little gun shy after Hobo, and now a smiling husband. But there are things obviously we could do better, Milo drinking out of the hose sounds like an accident waiting to happen seeing as the water comes at at 42 degrees all year long, because we have the "deep well", really nice if you want cold water, but it sounds like cold water and air is bad. Now that we have a "seeing" chow, we have Zoomies, something new for us!!!! In a lot a ways, we have a totally different breed of dog!

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 5:14 pm

I went and read some of the threads on Shumie. There you have a shy puppy that is fearful of people, that equals stress. The puppy sounds like it had a UTI, more stress. A boyfriend that was being too rough with a young puppy, and from the sounds of it she was stressed and getting aggressive. Then you have gas from the treats or her food. Perfect recipe for bloat.

Jeff&Peks · Post by **Jeff&Peks** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 5:56 pm

Red Dragon wrote:I went and read some of the threads on Shumie. There you have a shy puppy that is fearful of people, that equals stress. The puppy sounds like it had a UTI, more stress. A boyfriend that was being too rough with a young puppy, and from the sounds of it she was stressed and getting aggressive. Then you have gas from the treats or her food. Perfect recipe for bloat.

Boy even I Mr Cynical will give it a week or two before I start accusing, at least not the next day.

Red Dragon · Post by **Red Dragon** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 6:34 pm

If somebody else can learn from what happened it may save a Chow down the road. Not blaming anyone either, just saying those conditions are the likely cause of what happened. There is no way someone without experience could see that coming either.

Layla · Post by **Layla** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 7:29 pm

I know Lou, thanks. I always think of your boy when I read about bloat. I just want to make sure I do the best for my fluffies. Loosing Milo broke my heart, I can't have that again.

I happy with what I'm doing, just need to make sure I'm on top of all the current research (old habits die hard:D)

bettybloop · Post by **bettybloop** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 7:54 pm

I haven't really slept since shumie has left us and so i've been reading articles after articles on bloating. although bloat is still somewhat of a mystery, there seems to be a lot of helpful information out there, albeit certain sources contradict other findings. I wish I could say that there was nothing I could have done to know that she would get bloat, but I keep blaming myself that I didn't research every little thing that could go wrong with shumie. i hid all the wires, got her marble tiles to sleep on, got her so many different toys, bought her the best food I thought was available, and read as many books as I could. All of this seemed sufficient at the time but little did I know that everything that I was doing for shumie was detrimental for her health. I feel that I caused shumie's death.

I have read the perdue study on bloat and everything that was on the list of not to do was exactly what I did.

- I fed shumie a strictly dry diet

- Raised her bowl because she didn't like eating from a low bowl. she would just look at the kibble, and sometimes ate a little bit from the bowl and then walked away from it. So, I started to feed her from my hand. she loved eating from my hand and I loved her eating the kibbles from my hand as well. So, I thought maybe she likes eating from my hand because I raise it up to her mouth. So, I raised up her bowl to her chest level because I had read that it caused less stress on shumie's little joints. She ate from the raised bowl and so I thought great. but i still preferred feeding her from my hand. I loved the way she gently licked the kibbles from my hand. But she ate everything from my hand and I didn't want to over feed her. So I left the recommended amount of food on her raised bowl and let her eat as she liked, three times a day. She always had a little bit of kibble left and that made me happy that she knew when to stop.

- Gave her unlimited water right next to her food bowl. She was always so thirsty and always drank so furiously ever since day one. I asked several breeders if I should limit her water at all and they all said that I should leave her all the water she wants and to refill whenever needed. I asked my breeder about water and she told me to always leave her water as well. I guess I didn't ask specifically about whether this included feeding time.

* Do you think that there was a problem that she always drank so furiously every time? She would drink water so furiously and quite often. I didn't think anything of this since she was a puppy and I thought she just got thirsty very easily.

- As you all know she was extremely stressed a lot of the time. I don't know if this caused her to be in a constant state of anxiety. I tried to keep her calm at all times and this meant a lot of arguing with my bf but he got a lot better with being gentile with her after all your posts advising against his behavior.

- I also brought her out to relieve herself half an hour after every meal. I wanted to follow all the advise I had gotten on potty training her. Was I supposed to carry her out each time? I always let her walk down the hall and across the grass to pee and poop after each meal. Sometimes she would want to walk to the grass field around the block to poo poo and I would let her walk. Was this too far for her to walk after eating a meal? I didn't think much of it because she never ran after a meal, she just walked slowly.

If you add up all these factors, it was a recipe for disaster. I was pretty much killing my baby unknowingly all along. I feel so unbelievably guilty for everything that has happened to shumie. I guess I didn't deserve her, so God took her back.

I just wish that somehow this bloat thread had been bumped up during the period that I was reading all the topics in this forum. It just broke my heart that I was the cause of shumie's death and that I was just doing everything wrong.

Everything just came at us so fast. Late Monday afternoon she peed on the deck and I noticed that the pee was a very strange color and I walked over to her and I was so horrified that she was peeing blood. I looked it up immediately and was concerned that she may have UTI. I wanted to schedule an appointment for her right away but I knew we wouldn't be able to get shumie to the vet that day before the close of the vet's office. so, I made a note to bring her in immediately the next morning. that night at around 12:00 am she threw up on her tiles and tooted once or twice. I knew immediately that we needed to definitely bring her to the vet. So, that morning at 9:00 am I called up the vet and tried to schedule an appointment. I told them about shumie's symptoms and they asked me if this has only been going on since last night and if she had throw up again since then. I told them no. They asked me if she is eating and I looked over at shumie and she was eating from her raised bowl. And so I told them yes. So they told me she probably has an upset stomach and to bring her in on wednesday and give her a thorough check up. Shumie was feeling a lot better and was following me around as usual. She didn't play with her toys that day though. I felt so sad for her and just assumed that she still had upset stomach from the new treats we gave her a couple days ago. I told her everything is ok and that her tummy will feel better once I bring her to the vet.

I had an appointment to get shots that day at the doctors and would only be gone for an hour. So while I was at the doctors, it was around 4:30 pm and my boyfriend called me to tell me shumie threw up again. I got pretty worried and he told me he cleaned it up and cleaned her up. and let her dry on the deck. shumie was barking afterwards a lot. and my boyfriend got really worried because she was just barking at the air. so he put the phone to her air and i talked to shumie. i called her name over the phone and told her i missed her and I would be back in half an hour. her barking stopped and andrew told me her tail was wagging. this made me so happy. shumie was calmed down. so, I hung up with my boyfriend and went in to get my shot. After I got my shot my boyfriend called me and told me That shumie was going crazy and barking like crazy. Shumie wasn't even barking at my boyfriend. She was barking at the air, not even noticing him. I tried to get home as fast as possible. it was 6:00 and there was just so much traffic and every cab seemed to be occupied. I was getting frantic trying to get a cab back. and so my boyfriend calls me back and he screams to me that shumie had stopped barking and had just collapsed. I immediately started crying and he told me he was going to rush her to the hospital. I ran around the streets trying to get a cab just to meet her at the hospital in time. There was just so much traffic during the time, rush hour. My boyfriend called me again and he was in a cab rushing to the animal hospital as well, and he had told me that shumie had stopped moving and seemed to not be breathing, her head had gone limp. I started to cry even more and I didn't even know what to say. I asked him so many times if he was sure that she had stopped breathing and I didn't even know what to do. We both eventually met at the hospital and I help shumie and her head went limp in my arms, I cried so hard. I felt her paws and they were so cold. I had always loved how warm shumie's paws were and now they were just so cold. We ran into the entrance which had coincidentally moved all the way to the back. When we got in they immediately put her on a cart and rolled her away and tried to bring her back. I hoped for all i was worth that she was going to be ok. The doctor came out ten minutes later and told us that she was unresponsive to the resuscitation and that she advised that they stopped because it was too late. We told them to try some more and after a while after she came back and told us that she was still unresponsive and so we just agreed and they walked us over to shumie. we pet her and her stomach was so bloated and hard like a drum. we said our goodbyes to shumie and we told the doctor we would call in to tell her what we wanted to do with shumie.

i hope that others will not make the mistakes I have. I wish I had read so much more and prepared for this. I knew nothing about bloat and I only now know about it when it was too late.

Layla · Post by **Layla** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 8:21 pm

Sweetheart, It was NOT your fault that Shumie died. It was tragic, but not your fault. You had spoken to your vet & they didn't get it. They are trained to deal with this kind of call, you are not.

As for what you did wrong, many people do EXACTLY this & have no issues. Please don't feel that you are responsible here. The Purdue studie is flawed.... if you read other links you can see that it's just a collection of case studies.

You were NOT the cause of your baby's death. Bloat is a bit of a mystery even to vets. Please don't think you are.

PM me if you want my phone number to chat.

Layla

Post by **Auddymay** » Wed Oct 24, 2007 8:25 pm

Just to give you some perspective- I do almost all the things on that list. I don't have a raised bowl, nor do I feed dry food with risk factors listed, but I keep water down all the time, and dry food is what I feed them, all the time. I put ice cubes in the water dish on really hot days. I don't exercise the girls after eating, but allowing them to go outside a half hour after eating would not be exercise in my book. I allow Pip to drink from the hose. Stop beating yourself up. You had a tragic turn of events, and but by the grace of God, go I. Again, I am sorry for your loss.