Pet Naturals Hip + Joint Review and Offer

When I was contacted by Pet Naturals about doing a review of their joint supplement Hip + Joint I was very excited.  It could not have come at a better time!  I actually was looking into getting that exact product to use for Copley.  He has been on some sort of glucosamine/chondroitin/MSM for several years now and it has been really helping him.  He does not have terrible joints, but his hips are not great and he does see a chiropractor because of poor posture.  Occasionally when he over does it his knees bother him as well, and a good joint supplement has really helped him out.  For the past 6 months or so I have been using three different individual supplements (one each for the chondroitin, MSM and glucosamine).  They are marketed at humans so I open up the gell caps and split them into his meals.  That was working ok for us except that we are traveling a lot this summer both with and without the dogs.  Splitting up pills is both complicated for our dog sitter and cumbersome on the road.  I am already doing so much with carrying raw food and preparing individual servings for dog sitters I wanted a simple supplement.  After some research I settled on Pet Naturals Hip + Joint for a few reasons-

• It is one chewable for Copley.  Nothing to break up or count or mess with, just hand it to him with his dinner.  He also loves it so that's a plus.
• It has all three things I am looking for (MSM, chondroitin and glucosamine) in good amounts!  It is very hard to find a single chewable that has all three of those in high enough doses to be effective.  One of these chewables is nearly exactly the dosage I was measuring out myself, unlike many supplements that have a lot of one supplement, or no MSM.
• It is not so expensive that I feel like I need a second job to pay for it!
• It includes Manganese.  I have had a lot of luck with Nova using a manganese supplement from her vet for her LP.  I like including it in Copley's diet too.

In conclusion I love this stuff!  Copley has been on it for a few days now and it is working just great.  I plan to stick with Pet Naturals Hip + Joint even after summer traveling season is over.  It is giving me everything I need and is super convenient.

The folks over at Pet Naturals are also offering a great offer to my readers!  The first 100 people who visit www.petnaturals.com/hipandjoint-offer/ get a FREE BAG of Hip + Joint AND a valuable coupon.  After the first 100 people you will still get a coupon, just no free bag.

P.S.-  If you are looking for a good calming supplement I have used and had luck with Pet Naturals Calming chews.  I am a big believer in L-theanine since my vet recommended trying it and Nova responds very well to it.

I was given a free product to use myself in exchange for my honest review.  As always my opinions are my own and I am always honest with my readers, particularly when it comes to things going INSIDE my dogs.  I would never recommend something I don't trust completely with my own animals.

Nova Update!

Since I am stuck on the cell phone for blogging right now (ya know- sitting backstage at the theatre waiting for one of Kerri's cues) I thought it might be time for a little Nova update.

It has been almost 8 months since Nova was trapped behind the tire store, 9 months since her puppies died, and about 7 since she came here.  When I put it like that it is actually pretty amazing how far she has come.  Lets start with her health status right now.  For starters she finally has a full set of straight whiskers.  When she came here her whiskers were very curly and brittle.  If you pulled on them too hard they fell right out.  My personal theory on this is that she robbed her body of all fatty acids in order to develop the brains of her puppies.  She was eating mostly cockroaches and trash as far as I can tell.  In the last few months, for her pregnancy and maybe a bit before she was being thrown occasional food from the workers at the tire store.  I assume this meant dog food, but actually I am not entirely sure.  Even if it was dog food I am confident it was just the cheap stuff you can buy at the gas station.  No matter I bet it was not really enough to sustain healthy puppy growth.  A few months on a good diet of mostly local, mostly grass fed cattle and other critters, with a good dose of green lipped muscle oil for Omega 3s and she is like a different dog.  Smooth, soft coat just like Kerri, straight long whiskers and a healthy weight.  She is also now on a supplement for tendon support to help with her luxating patellas and poor structure.  The theory is that her joints did not form the best because of a combination of genetics and poor nutrition.  The good news is that now with this diet and supplements she is much more stable.  When before she was skipping once every 20 or so steps, now she goes whole days without me seeing a limp at all.  I am confident that there is no need for any surgical fixes in the near future.

As far as her behavior goes things keep going in a generally positive direction, or at least not going backwards.  She continues to excel at clicker training.  We have mastered sit, down, high five, touch and crawl.  She LOVES the clicker because it is something that is predictable, consistent and she has control over it.

Her relationships with people seems to be improving- but she still has trouble with Ben.  We are working on it, and it has been slow going.  I don't worry that she will bite him anymore, but every time he talks or moves around the house she starts barking/growling and goes on the defense.  I control this by crating her a good bit when we know it is going to happen and we can't deal with it.  When Ben is able to deal with it we have had to resort to the spray bottle.  First I tried spraying her for barking/attacking him but that made her very nervous.  We have settled on Ben spraying her.  I am not entirely sure how much good it is doing for her love of him- but she was getting to the point of actually attacking him and we needed to stop that at pretty much all costs.  It is impossible to live in a house with a dog trying to rip your legs up.  The more confident she gets about the house the more defensive she started getting with him, luckily the spray bottle has put that to an end here.

If anyone has any suggestions about dealing with selective human agression like this please let me know.  The answer however IS NOT "she hates men."  For some reason everyone I talk to is just *convinced* that I need to socialize her to more men.  If that is true explain our neighbors who she takes treats from, or her favorite person on the planet (a man).  The problem is not men, the problem is Ben.

Ben is really the last big hurdle we need to solve.  Other than trying to attack my husband at every turn Nova is a really fun dog to have around.  She is smart, cunning, funny, playful, smart, fun to teach and did I mention smart?  Her and Kerri are practically twins, sleeping together, playing together, acting the same- those two just crack me up.  I am hoping that once a year comes around we will be in a decent place.  The next big decision is when to start obedience class... would be good for her to get out but I don't want her to totally freak.

That bring us to our last issue.  Nova is getting bored and we all know what happens when smart dogs get bored.  It is extremely hot out and Copley and Kerri have been getting walks at higher elevations and on the treadmill.  Neither of those things are options for Nova because she is intensely scared of the treadmill and walks... well...  Before it got super hot out we worked on going on short walks  but I really can't get her much farther than the little park down the street right now.  I am happy with that- she is going a little farther every week and her level of comfort outside has gone up a lot, but it isn't exactly satisfying her need for stimulation.  In better weather we would be making a lot more progress but in 110+ degree weather we can only do so much.

If anyone has made it this far thanks for listening to my trials and tribulations as the owner of a feral dog.  Perhaps once this whole thing is done I should write a book about it. 

(Did I just say done?  That's funny.)

The Odds Caught Up With Us

"You mean despite our adorable domed foreheads, giant ears, cunning smarts and conveniently portable size chihuahuas are not perfect?"

According to the Orthapedic Foundation for Animals (commonly known as OFA) 5.7% of chihuahuas in their database have luxating patellas.  Lets consider for a moment that people who spend the time and money to send in their dogs info to OFA tend to be responsible people, trying to better their breed and get rid of these defects.  These people are also probably more likely than the general population to provide proper nutrition and exercise for puppies.  They also (being that a lot of shown dogs are in here) are less likely to have overweight dogs.  I am not saying that all people who participate in the OFA database or responsible but being realistic I think a greater number of them are than the whole rest of the chihuahua breeding population.  Then think about the irresponsible people participating in OFA who don't send in bad results and I think it is fair to say that 5.7% is probably low when it concerns the chi population as a whole. 

Why do I tell you all that?  Well I knew rescuing chihuahuas from the pound (or the street) it was more likely than not that eventually we would end up getting a dog effected by LP.  I am f***ing pissed off that this dog ended up being Nova.  Has not the poor thing been through enough????????????????

Here is the deal.  Nova started skipping when walking and we noticed she was only weight bearing on three legs.  I could see when she was standing on the carpet that three legs were down and her back right one was just pretending to be down.  Of course we called the vet and one thing leads to another and Nova is diagnosed with luxating patellas.  Her weight bearing improved over the week, so maybe it was just aggravated by her knee luxating- that's what we are hoping for.  Her case is hopefully mild enough that on a variety of supplements as directed by our vet (glucosamine, chondroitin, MSM and a special supplement that helps tendons) she will improve and not have any symptoms.  If that does not work then I guess I muzzle her, throw her in the travel carrier and drag her screaming and kicking to the orthopedic surgeon.  But no one wants that now do we?

A lot of dogs seem to live with grade 1/2 LP and never need surgery.  As long as they stay fit, active, a healthy weight and on joint supplements it seems like things can go pretty easy from here on out.  That's what we are hoping for around here.

Want to learn more about LP?  You can read about it here- http://www.offa.org/pl_overview.html