I’ve not posted here in FAR too long, and I’m not going to post now What this post is, is to echo a message put up on the forum by a user called bill. And here it is:

My dog had to have a hernia operation. He developed an eye infection afterwards that caused him to lose his right eye,which had to be removed. Then his left eye developed a similar ulcer. Luckily we found the right specialist who managed to save the remaining eye through a corneal graft. The specialist explained that dogs stop producing tears when they are under anesthesia. The eye becomes dry, and very vulnerable to small injuries leading to infection. According to the specialist, the likely explanation for the problem was that the anesthesia for the hernia triggered the problem with the right eye, and the anesthesia to remove that damaged eye led to the problem in the other eye. Has anyone experienced a similar problem with their dog? I’m trying to put together material for an article in a national newspaper on the subject. Many thanks.

If anyone has anything useful to help Bill, then post it as a comment here. If you don’t want to make it public, then post a comment to that effect and I’ll contact you via email to put you in touch with Bill.

For experience of our dogs and others we’ve walked every dog is different to how it prefers to sleep. Our Australian shepherd, Blue, prefers to sleep on the cold stone slabs in the unlit fireplace whereas Ollie (our Border Collie) would sleep on a bed of a thousand pillows if he could – under a warm duvet with a hot water bottle! So with that in mind, you need to choose carefully when choosing a bed for your dog. Get the one that is best suited.

Things to bear in mind would be the size, more importantly than the actual area within the bed is the height of the side. It’s good to see a lot of the ones for sale at BarkSlope.com have a lower front portion for this very purpose. In fact, they’ve got dog beds in all shapes and sizes! From traditional, to chunky floor pillows and even a range for doggy sofas that made me smile.

If your dog sleeps and/or travels in a crate or cage then a sensible thing to do would be to get a dog bed that can fit inside the cage – so your dog has somewhere both comfortable and familiar when away from home or when he’s locked in.

Swicki: Dog Beds

Watching the movie “Shawn of the Dead” and one of the running jokes is the question whether or not dogs can look up. One of those absurb urban things that hang around. Instinct tells me yes! I’m sure my two dogs look up at me when I’m stood above them, both in standing and sitting positions.

The question comes up on the Yahoo! Answers site, the reaction is a yes.

I’ll end this short silly post with a quote from Churchill:

“I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.”

Swicki: Can dogs look up

Update:

I’ve seen my dogs watch aeroplanes go over several times… so that certainly answers that then

Our Blue Merle Aussie Shepherd, Blue, is almost a year old now. The past year has gone so quickly! The article that follows does a good job of describing the character. He IS a funny prankster, and is alway encouraging Ollie (our Border Collie) to chase him around in the garden to cause havoc. Well, it used to be a garden, it’s a dog pit now! But the darker side also comes out, as described, too. He isn’t keen on strangers and is nervious of anyone unfamiliar - the opposite of Ollie who likes to love everyone that comes in a 100 yard radius!

He’s a very tidy dog, always arranging his bones and toys into a pile that is his. If only we could train his to tidy out stuff in the house…

Australian Shepherd: As Good As Its German Variety

Australian Shepherd is every bit as graceful as its more famous German variety. And like German Shepherd, these too, are bred as herd dogs, trained and nourished to take care of cattle. Also referred to as “Aussie”, they first appeared in Australia in the early 1800s and come in colors ranging from near black to blue merle. The original purpose of this breed was to serve as guardians for sheep and cattle herds, but it did not take very long for them to build a reputation for sharp intelligence and unfailing loyalty.

They also come in a number of sizes from sleek and gangling to short and stout. They weight from 35 to 65, and some of them have now the famous one-blue-one-brown-eye combination. Quite a prankster, the Aussies’ capacity for ‘humor’ is matchless among dogs. Read the rest of this entry »

Now I hope you’ll excuse the blatant promotional nature of this post. But it may interest a whole host of pet bloggers that I know pass through here.

Hot on the tails of the successful Text Link Ads (which actually makes me a fair amount of money), Patrick Gavin has launched a new service. Essentially is it a way to match up advertisers and bloggers. Bloggers benefit from a few extra quid in their pockets buy writing a short post, and the Advertisers get to place their products and services right in the face of potential buyers. The prices alway make it a reasonable method of garnering links to their sites and products right in the content of a site (rather than tucked away at the sides).

I actually think this site will do really well. It’s the sort of service that I know advertisers are screaming out for… and not just people hawking affiliate links. There’s some big players out there with even bigger pockets if the advertisers on my sites from TLA are anything to go by.

So if you’re a keen blogger looking to earn a few extra quid, the you should definitely get yourself over to ReviewMe.com and get your site listed!

I had to laugh when asked if Germans love this breed of dog (also known as Alsatian or natively Deutscher Schaferhund). So I thought I’d better look into the issue. I never used to be sure what the difference between an Alsatian and a German shepherd is, ask anyone and you’ll get a different answer each time. I’ve finally settled on the idea that they are one and the same.

Anyway, a quick search on Google.de for native German pages and native German language pages reveals a TONNE of pages on the subject. None of which I can understand… so that’s a “yes” in answer to the question

Swicki: German Shepherd