Dogs, cats even birds have dental health problems - And poor dental health can lead to shorter lives and many life-threatening diseases.

Did you know you can brush a dog or cat's teeth? - It's true... just ask your vet to show you how.

Dr Barbara Fougere from All Natural Vet in Sydney tells us some of the signs to watch for with your pet's teeth.

It seems Australia's 'Long Hot Summers' are becoming even longer - especially with the El Niño effect.

The result? - S N A K E S ! - And unfortunately the snake bite is not always the end of it. If your pet survives there are often other even even more costly side-effects that need to be treated.

Prevention is better than cure according to Nadia Crighton who has some simple yet often forgotten tips in the short podcast courtesy of Pet Insurance Australia..

Is a Poodle healthier than say a Chihuahua?. What about a Cavalier King Charles Spaniel compared to a Beagle or a Boxer?

Dogs are not 'dogs' when it comes to health issues. Sometimes it's just genetics -eg; "in the breed" - at other times it could be poor breeding generally or even cross-breeding.

So which breeds are generally more expensive to insure?

Nadia Crighton from Pet Insurance Australia explains more

For many reasons some people only have one dog or one cat...
And we hear a lot of animal behaviourists say that dogs in particular crave company - the old 'pack mentality'

But is this true?... we thought we'd ask Dr Jo Sillince what she thought about 'solo dogs'!

*** RADIO 2SM PET SEGMENT #27 WITH KAYE BROWNE ***
Full transcript below... 

THIS WEEK...
With all the wet weather lately, it's been a bit 'tricky' for dogs to just go outside to relieve themselves right?

Accidents happen right? So is there a way to help fix 'the smell' and stop future 'accidents'?
And with the rising cost of living, research has shown people are starting to prefer cats to dogs.
But there is a surprising breed preference which differs across the country!

PLUS:
Do You Sleep With Your Dog? Ok many of us do, but what's their favourite position?
And finally this week... another talking Parrot, but this one - Mango - got the owner into trouble with the Police just for saying "2 For 25?... 2 For 25? - Wanna Buy Some?" but was the owner actually selling anything?

CHAPTERS:
00'00" - Welcome Tim Webster and Kaye Browne
00'11" - Oh Noo!.. My Dog Just Weed Inside!!
03'16" - People Now Preferring Cats... Why??
05'03" - Do You Sleep With Your Dog?
07'09" - 2 For 25?... 2 For 25? - Wanna Buy Some?

TRANSCRIPT:

TIM:
Yes, time to talk about our pets with our renowned pet expert Kay Brown. Hi. Good morning.   I don't know about renowned. Oh, you're renowned. Well, look, I haven't experienced this of late, but I did have it with a dog I had some years ago, and there's been a lot of wet weather and there's going to be for the next little while, and the hazards of your dogs, I suppose, especially your dogs, because you'd have a of weeing inside yeah?   KAYE: Yes, it's a real problem. And, you know, we can joke about it, call it a ‘pee-dickerment’ if you like. It really can affect a lot of us really, really badly.   And in fact, sometimes animals get surrendered because of that. In fact, I heard from long time friends actually who have two beautiful King Charles Spaniels who normally love to go walkies. But when it's wet outside, they suddenly forget how to go to the toilet outside and they pee on a particular spot on the rug.   And they've tried sprays, didn't know what to do. So they put their hand up and said, help! And I'm sure they're not alone.   So some of the latest things as to what can be used. And I've got a couple of ideas, but they're all based around enzymes. But there are a couple of other things that we can look at as well.   But first of all, to help with the actual urine smell or the poo smell, if they've done another accident. Years ago, it used to be, they'd say, put some bleach on it, well, that's the wrong thing to do because the ammonia attracts dogs back to that spot.   So definitely don't use that. You can make a homemade mix of peroxides and baking soda and a little bit of dish detergent. But really, why do that when a lot of scientists have actually looked into making products that actually work to provide natural substances to eliminate the uric acid crystals that dogs deposit.   And basically they digest those smells and gets rid of them altogether. And there's one called Pet Lab that I can certainly tell you about. Very, very good.   TIM: Yeah. I wonder if that's an issue with smaller dogs in particular. My son's got a little Pomeranian and she's got some health issues and he puts out those little pee pads, which she uses and they can be trained to do that, can't they?

KAYE: Absolutely. And in fact, any dog can be trained to go on anything. And you can get those sort of artificial toilets, which came out a couple of years ago, where they actually are inside a plastic tray and then the artificial turf can be washed. Mind you, you do have to make sure you're using some kind of enzymatic to wash it out.   But the pee pads do it and they're often used as temporary toilet training. But it's really handy if you can actually persuade your animal to toilet on command. And mine, we came up with the phrase, ‘empty the dog’, which we do whenever we were about to go in the car so that they would rush out, empty on the grass, ready to go in the car or whatever or overnight.   And that was really handy because when they got older and we needed to get a urine sample at the vets, I remember this vet being absolutely amazed when I simply said, empty the dog, and quickly put the little container underneath and voila, we had a perfect fresh specimen.

TIM: There you go. That's fascinating.   Now, this is very interesting. New data suggests we're gravitating more towards having a pussycat rather than a puppy dog, and it could be for an economic reason. And I get that, yeah?

KAYE: Yeah, definitely. This information has come out in the study by one of the big insurance companies, Petsy, where they actually looked at the type of cats that are being insured and the numbers that are being insured around the country. And they found that, yeah, the numbers are growing. Now, more Australians are choosing pets that suit compact living, tighter budgets, flexible working arrangements.   And so, of the 5.3 million pet cats, basically a third of all households now actually have a cat, and that started during the pandemic.

TIM: Ah, yes, of course. Of course, yeah.   KAYE: A lot of rescues were there. But what's absolutely fascinating is the actual breed of cat. Now, we've seen all the designer dogs, what about designer cats? Well, they're increasing in popularity. But right around the country, all the states and territories, bar one, it's the domestic short-haired cat that's the most popular. And it's the most hardy, to be perfectly honest, except in the Northern Territory.   And this is amazing to me because it's really hot up there, but in the Territory, they really love their ragdolls.

TIM: Are they the ones that just pretty much sleep all the time? They sit on your lap?

KAYE: Well they have a habit of wanting to sit on your lap. They're very affectionate.   They don't talk a lot, which is handy for some people who don't like meowing. But they have this habit of going, oh, I'm so relaxed. And that's why they're called ragdolls.   TIM: Yeah, never had a ragdoll cat. We had Freddy the Burmese, and he was a chocolate Burmese. He was a beautiful cat.   Now, speaking of Freddy the Burmese, he used to sleep at the end of the bed. I had a chihuahua, little ‘Peppy’, who used to sleep down at my feet. You wouldn't even know he was there.   But sleeping with the dog and the big dogs I've had might get up on the bed to say hello, then they get too hot and get off. But there's surprising stats about how many people actually do have the dog on or in the bed.

KAYE: It is quite amazing. I was surprised because I've seen a couple of studies over the years. I saw one that was way back in 2018. And then I thought, oh, I wonder if the same people have done more studies.   And indeed, they have. Canisius College, which is in Buffalo in the US, did a study based on stuff they'd done earlier just to see what the impact is of sleeping with a dog, or more than one. And they actually got more than 1,000 Australian dog owners between 18 to 78 and asked them, does your dog sleep in the bed? And if so, where does it sleep and what impact? So 49% of those 1,000 dog owners said, yep.   20% said it sleeps in the same bedroom. But the 49% said it sleeps in their bed. Wow. It thought that was pretty interesting.

TIM: That's more than interesting. That's staggering to me. Half. Goodness me. Wow.   KAYE: Exactly. And it's quite interesting. The author of the study, Christy Hoffman, said it's one of the few studies that really looks into the overnight habits, I guess, of our cohabiting with our dogs.   And they used previously just a record where they asked people to remember or they tracked their activity. But this time around, they used heat map images. So they determined that in most cases, when there were two people in the bed, if it was a double, a queen or a king-size bed, the dog tended to sleep at their feet or in the middle of the bed.   Whereas one person, one dog sharing a bed, the dog mostly slept at human chest level where a human partner might sleep. Goodness me.

TIM: Yeah, that's surprising research. It really is. Wow. More than half. That's a bit staggering to me. Yeah. All right.   Now this one, just about everybody who watched television last night saw those hilarious pictures of the dancing parrots doing a very good impression of Elaine on Seinfeld. But this little story you've got is not so cute and cuddly, hey?

KAYE: Well, in some ways, but not for the owner of this particular little bird, Mango. Mango was videotaped by his proud owner doing a little dance as well, where he was saying, two for 25, two for 25.   And I'm not quite sure what Mango was referring to, but cops that actually saw the video certainly knew what it was and they staged a raid. And they found that Mango's owner was a drug dealer.

TIM: There you go. Two for 25. So that's what, 12.50 - I wonder what he's trying to flog?

KAYE:  I don't know. But now he'll be selling the bird. No, I'm not going to tell you.

TIM: Now the bird will be for sale for sure yeah.

KAYE: I think so. Hopefully he has a new owner that actually stays within the law.   TIM: That's the one. Naughty Mango. Lovely to talk to you, Kaye. Talk to you next week.

KAYE: Absolutely. Kaye Browne and your pets.

So many 'old wives tales' get muddled up with 21st century science. Maybe you've been told this? "Are you pregnant? Then you MUST get rid of the cat as soon as possible!"

It still seems to be a common thought among pregnant women around the world - one which sadly means cats being 'dumped' for no reason whatsoever. So who better to find out more about this controversial topic than the very colourful Dr Jo Sillince from Pets Australia "true or false - having a cat is dangerous for pregnant women?

More Reading:
http://www.vettalktv.com/audio/cats/Cats_and_Pregnancy-Pets_Australia.pdf

THIS WEEK...
Well it's August and that means it's Dental Health Month - have you had your pets teeth checked yet? Most vets also offer discounts during August/September to help ensure your pets health stays on the good side!

Also this week:
A listener question from Anna in Sydney asking "why does my cat push stuff of the table or kitchen bench"? Kaye explains some of the reasons.

PLUS:
When dogs bark or whine or even groan, what are they actually trying to say to us?
And we've all heard of talking Parrots, but did you know 'Nigel' - got lost and was found years later actually speaking Spanish!

CHAPTERS:
00'00" - Welcome Tim Webster and Kaye Browne
00'16" - Dental Health Month - August
01'44" - Why Do Cats Push Stuff Off?
03'49" - Dog Speak... What Are They Saying?
06'52" - A Parrot That Speaks Spanish!!

THIS WEEK...
A proposed 'law' in the ACT would require all dogs to have a minimum of three hours of human contact daily! But how would it be monitored?

Plus...
Remember the movie '101 Dalmatians? Well 'Krypto The Superdog' has re-ignighted dog adoptions!

Also this week... It's coming up to Pawgust 2025. Find out how you can help Guide Dogs AU raise some more valuable funds for future traing.. 
And... 
Imagine a parrot chatting with Alexa... What could possibly go wrong!!?

Full transcript below...

CHAPTERS:
00'00" - Welcome Tim Webster and Kaye Browne
00'09" - Proposed Law Re Minimum Time To Spend With Dogs!
02'05" - Dog Adoptions Increase Due to Krypto The 'Super-dog'
03'53" - Guide Dogs - PawGust 2025 - How To Get Involved
05'28" - Rocco The Parrot Loves Using Alexa!

TRANSCRIPT:

TIM: Time for our regular chat about our best friends, our pets, our pets. Here's Kaye Browne. Hi Kaye.   KAYE: Good morning Tim.

TIM: Now I had to ask you about this because I thought, really? How much is enough time to spend with your dog on a daily basis? Now is that three hours? A new law, yes I said law, being proposed by authorities in the ACT, and I don't mind being authoritarian, often we follow that in the other states and territories. So really? That's extraordinary.   KAYE: That's the proposal. The ACT has always been a little bit out there in terms of its animal welfare laws, and in fact in the ACT they consider that dogs are sentient animals, and this draft bill recognises that dogs can experience pleasure and pain, and that these feelings actually matter a lot. 

So the aim of it is to encourage people who perhaps aren't spending as much time as they should be with their dog, perhaps leaving them alone for too long, that they actually think about what they're doing so that the dog doesn't get stressed.   Now there's a lady called Associate Professor Susan Hazel from the School of Animal Veterinary Science at the University of Adelaide, who's really right across this kind of thing, who says, three hours when you factor in walks, pats, feeding time, some attention time, you know, maybe three hours would be enough.

TIM: Well, yeah. But a law, I mean for goodness sake, who's going to police a law of how much time you spend with your dog? I mean, I'm going to say as much as you can, and in some days at our house it's a lot more than three hours, and some days it's less.   Anyway, that's bizarre.

KAYE: Absolutely true. It's quite bizarre because right around the world, countries are taking more notice of the needs of dogs.   You know, we've been genetically breeding dogs to want to be around us more, and of course now they are around us more. So in places like Germany, for example, they actually have a law that requires owners to walk their dogs twice a day for at least an hour each time. Goodness me.   I don't know how they police that one either.

TIM: No, of course, yeah. I mean, talk about government in your life. Heavens above. Okay, now I haven't seen the new Superman movie yet. It looks interesting to me, but it's prompted this increase in people wanting to adopt a pooch, which is what we've done, a rescue pooch, just like Krypto.   Sounds like a good thing, but is there a downside to that?

KAYE: There could be. If we go back a step, if you think way back to 101 Dalmatians, and I'm sure your listeners remember that, everyone wanted a Dalmatian, not realizing that they stay teenagers for most of their life. So unfortunately, a lot of people that jumped on that bandwagon ended up returning the Dalmatians.  

But in that case, they're actually looking at it very seriously because the director and writer of the Superman movie, he actually based Krypto, the adorable mutt in the movie who saved Superman's life, he actually based it on his own rescue dog. You know, he was beginning to regret it when his rescue dog, when he started writing the movie, started eating his shoes, even chewing up his laptop, his furniture. And he apparently said, this is James Gunn, the director, oh, how awful would it be if Ozu had superpowers? So then he started writing the part of Krypto.  

So Krypto in the movie is actually CGI, but based on a terrier cross schnauzer. And apparently, that's the kind of breed that people are asking for. You know, this is happening all around the world, not just Australia but also in the United States, a huge amount of interest in people wanting to get a little dog, just like Krypto.

TIM: Just like Krypto. I was saying the other day, I don't think I've watched a Superman movie after the first one, which had Christopher Reeve, and I think Marlon Brando was in that, or he might have been in the second one.   But this one sounds interesting. So I'm going to have a look at that. Now, we should say to our beautiful guide dogs of Australia, their annual fundraiser is on next month.   And it is next month, Pawgust. Lovely way to put it. 2025, yeah?

KAYE: It is indeed. And this is a great one, because Guide Dogs Australia do wonderful things for people that otherwise would be basically trapped at home. So there's lots of puns on their website, and I'll give you the name of the site shortly, and people can go there and sign up. You don't have to wait till next month to get started.   But the whole idea is that it's a free thing to enter. You don't even need to have a paw.. sorry a dog to participate.

You literally sign up, register online, and choose to walk or run your target distance.   50 Kilometres 100, 125, share your fundraising page, and ask your friends and family to help sponsor you. The idea is that it helps with the cost. It costs $50,000 and more for each individual guide dog.   And they have hundreds of them that not churn out, but they get out and about each year. So if you're particularly interested, I'd suggest you go there because you can also win prizes. They've got three lucky participants who will win a year's worth of Blackhawk dog food.   That's about $1,500 each.

And there are other bonus things like beanies, t-shirts, drink bottles, things like that. So it's a good place to go, and all you have to do is go to pawgust.com.au.   TIM: pawgust.com.au Now, this is a funny story.   Tell us about Rocco the parrot that listened very carefully to his parents and was able to copy their voices completely, because they're very clever parrots.

KAYE: African grey parrots are amongst the cleverest in the world. I think there was a YouTube video of a parrot that really had a vocabulary of a young child.   This particular one called Rocco was listening to his owners who happened to be carers from a sanctuary where Rocco was banned from because he had choice language. What Rocco did in his new home was he went, I can see what they're doing. So he started calling up Alexa.  

And the owners didn't know that this was happening until packages started turning up at their doorstep. Oh, fantastic. You know, we haven't been buying all these things.   And they said, yes, you have. Yes, you know, we have the voice recording.

TIM: That's great. That's priceless. Rocco, God bless you. By the way, where did Rocco pick up the bad language from his parents?

KAYE: Well, presumably the parents who then rented him to the sanctuary in the first place.   But, you know, he got his snacks coming along very nicely. He had favourite strawberries, broccoli, watermelon, even ice cream. He was ordering through Alexa.   TIM: That's just fantastic. Oh, Rocco. God bless you, son.   We should we should do it. Do you want to do the Alexa voice?

KAYE: Okay. Okay.   TIM: Let's do it. Hello, Alexa.

KAYE: Yes, Rocco. How can I help you?

TIM: It's snack time. The usual.

KAYE: Okay, Rocco. Will, you have your usual snacks of strawberries and broccoli. What about raisins this week?

TIM: How about pate and yes, truffles? Let's really rack this bill up. I think that, okay, I just think that's one of the most priceless things I've ever heard. That's brilliant.

KAYE: Well, the owners now have a pin code and they're just hoping and praying.

TIM: For God's sake, don't mention the pin code at home because you'll learn that too.   That's that's just fantastic. Lovely to talk to you. Now, if you'd like Kaye to solve a pet problem for you, by all means to send it to us, send it on the, you can send it to me if you like, [email protected] or just 2sm.com.au and we'll discuss it with you next week.   That was lovely, Kaye. Thank you. Great fun as always.   KAYE: Thank you.

TIM: Kaye Browne.

THIS WEEK...
Recently a 5 year old child was bitten while she and her mum were visiting friends. The child’s ok but authorities are considering whether the dog should be put down? Should they?

Plus... Imagine being fined $100,000 because YOUR dog injured another - what happened?
Also this week...
Imagine taking your dog with you on an aeroplane... not in the cargo hold but NEXT to you!

CHAPTERS:
00'00" - Welcome Tim Webster and Kaye Browne
04'38" - Kids & Dog Bites - How Can We Keep Them Safe?
02'53" - Dog Owner Fined $100,000 for Injury To a ShiTzu
04'27" - Flying With Dogs – Fancy Sitting Next To A Rottie?

FULL TRANSCRIPT:
TIM: Time for one of our regular chats about our beloved friends, our pets, and here is of course Kaye Browne. Hi Kaye!

KAYE: Good morning Tim. 

TIM: Look, I'm pleased you're bringing this up. We actually mentioned it on the air ourselves, the five-year-old child bitten while she and her mum were visiting friends. Now, child's okay, but then you say, authorities are considering whether the dog should be put down, and my point that I'm,  always prone to make is, it's hardly ever the dog, it's usually the owner, but these situations are difficult.

KAYE: Every situation is difficult like this, and just to put it in perspective, for the last 25 years that I've been talking about dog bites, the number of bites hasn't decreased or increased, so it's still, around the same. Now, they brought in breed-specific legislation saying they will cut down dog bites, it hasn't, so what you're saying is absolutely true, that usually it is something to do with supervision.

Now, even the nicest dog can bite if their warning signs aren't picked up. A chihuahua can bite, unsupervised children. Now, I'm not saying this child was unsupervised, but they can accidentally hurt a dog. I've known of a dog that had a pencil poked in its ear and it turned around and went ouch, and kids act in a way that dogs find quite threatening. They're erratic, they have jerky movements, and they tend to squeal and run, and that activates the prey drive.

So, there's actually some door-cam vision of the aftermath of this bite, and you can actually see there's two dogs, and the second dog's also being held quite forcibly by an adult because it looked like it wanted to get in on the action. Now, that can happen because dogs, if they've also been,  playing with each other and they normally do have a bit of a rough tumble, if one of them doesn't want to keep playing and tries to pull away, well, the other dog can sometimes have what's called a redirected aggression, and that could have happened in this case.

We don't know, but just very briefly, most of the hospitalizations are bites to kids under the age of five and the elderly.  unfortunately, the kids, they put them in hospital just in case for a lot of the time, but elderly, it can be they're knocked over by dogs. So, I guess the key in this instance is to supervise, supervise, supervise, and if in doubt, move out of the way. 

TIM: Exactly. Let's make the point again because we should make it often. All dogs, as you say, can and will bite if the situation occurs. They just will, you know. 

KAYE: They will, but you'll be pleased to know that GSDs, German Shepherds.

TIM: Ahh yes. Little Ellie, yeah. 

KAYE: Very rarely get shown in dog bite stats. Now, in the old movies, they used to be, an aggressive looking German Shepherd, but in fact, barely 4% of dog bites come from German Shepherds. 

TIM: Well, when I look at that little dog of ours face, I mean, you wouldn't think she would. However, going to say it again, all dogs can and will bite. And listen, just supplementary to that, it's cost this dog owner a lot of money. They've been convicted and required to pay $100,000 to a Sydney Shih Tzu owner whose pet, god, lost a leg and only just survived after attacked by another dog off leash. Is that fair? 

KAYE: Well, what do you think? 

TIM: $100,000 is a lot.

KAYE: It's a lot of money, but we're not just talking payment for, vet bills and things like that. This went to the New South Wales District Court, which looked into the circumstances of this attack five years ago, and then at the effect that it's had on both the dog and the owner in resulting years. And in this case, the owner of the little Shih Tzu has suffered severe psychological trauma. She hasn't been able to work as much.

She doesn't like going out of the house because she's terrified that another large dog will come barreling up and knock her over and bite her like this other one did. So, the judge ruled that, this poor woman is undergoing continuing PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder, and well, the owner of the other dog didn't have it under control. And all dogs have to be under control, whether they're off leash or not, and have to pay. 

TIM: Right. Well, there’s consequences. I mean, everyone should realise that, shouldn't they? 

KAYE: They certainly should. And that's what I guess the councils have been trying to say, progressively the fines have been going up. And I’m hoping that we will eventually see a decrease as more and more people do the responsible thing and actually supervise their dogs.

TIM: All right. Now, this one's actually funny. If you want to have your dog or your pet sitting next to you, not down in, and I watch, I saw that Seinfeld episode. So I tend to watch that if I'm looking for something else, where Jerry meets that guy on the plane and he's drunk, and they get him to get Jerry to look after the dog called Farfel. And it's just one of the most hilarious episodes of all time. But the Italians might let you have your dog sitting up with you yeah?

KAYE: Yeah. Prego, prego. Mamma mia. This is a world first. Now, earlier this year, we heard that Virgin Airlines is considering allowing small dogs and cats under eight kilos to be allowed to come onto planes in soft-sided crates and travel under the seat in front. But the Italians have gone one step further and they're allowing dogs bigger than 18 kilos to actually go in a crate in the seat next door.

TIM: Unbelievable. Really? 

KAYE: This is a wonderful thing, because sadly, over the years, I've had to report on dogs freezing in the cargo hold. Yeah. Or accidentally strangling themselves or, their water bowl got knocked over or they've been offloaded somewhere. So, there are a lot of people who would love to have their dog travel next to them.

TIM: I'm just wondering how I'd go with sitting in the aisle seat, sitting with a Rottie next to me. 

KAYE: Jessie's dog!

TIM: Yeah Jessie's dog. Just a quick one, too. Don't want listeners to think we're ignoring pussycats. This is interesting. Pets' emotions. What happens when they lose a lifetime best friend and how we can help them cope with that? This is interesting.

KAYE: This is a very interesting one. And it's not the first time I've heard about this kind of thing. There was a little cat called Smokey, whose lifelong partner, Felix, passed away. And the owners noticed that Smokey wasn't really eating, moping about, looking really unhappy, looking at the door, constantly looking as though he wanted to dash outside to look for his friend because he was missing his dog.

After about a month of this, the mother was away on a work trip and when she got back, she walked inside and found that her husband had come up with a possible solution. She found a chap online who did cat portraits, not at the height you'd expect for humans, but at cat level. There were a whole lot of photos. There's a cat bed in the hallway, there's a beautiful fishbowl scene by his food dish, and there's even an amazing piece of a cat lounging on a vintage car.

TIM: (Laughing!!)

KAYE: And Smokey's been walking around his own personal art gallery. 

TIM: Happy as Larry, or happy as Smokey.

KAYE: Yeah. Yeah. That is so cool. He started purring again. 

TIM: That's so cool. I love it. I love it. All right. Now, if you would like Kaye to help solve your pet issue, very simple, send me an email if you like, [email protected]  or simply 2SM.com.au. And where can the listeners find you, Kaye? 

KAYE: They can find me at www.VETtalkOnLine.com.au

*** RADIO 2SM PET SEGMENT #23 WITH KAYE BROWNE ***
THIS WEEK...
Dogs love to smell don't they?... But what motivates them and can you train your dog to do 'Scent-Work'?

PLUS...
Some people think they just have to fill a bowl with kibble or a can of dog food – and think - that’s enough?  Dog’s fed, he/she will be fine… really? So what about bones, are they actually ok for our dogs?

00'00" - Welcome Tim Webster and Kaye Browne
00'40" - How Smells (Scents) Affect Our Dogs!
04'10" - Chewing Bones... Are They Ok For Our Dogs?

TRANSCRIPT:
TIM: Well, with all of the drama going on in the world, of course, there’s one thing you can rely on, and that's your pet. Well, you know, just on that, our new rescue, Ellie, who's adorable, and you get home and you've had a long day, and down she comes down the stairs, tail wagging, and wants to give you a lick, and, you know, welcome home, Dad.

I mean, it's a very comforting thing, and we love them, don't we? The world begins and ends with us, with them, and so how do we make life better for them? And it's something I suppose we all think about doing as much as we can. Well, we promised you last week the latest, best scientific stuff on bones and chewing. We'll do that.

They're all good, but they're all kinds of chews that you can use with your pets. So let's have a yarn to Kaye Browne, from VETtalk Online, whose company provides the latest and the best helpful hints on your pets and for your vets as well. G'day.

KAYE: Good morning to you.   TIM: Good morning to you. Now, I think this is a fascinating one when you talk about scent work. I mean, how good is your nose? We're not talking about determining a Shiraz from a Pinot, but rather we lucked out compared to our canine friends. But haven't they got a fairly acute sense of smell, canines in particular?

KAYE: Oh, absolutely, their sense of smell is like 300 million times better than ours. Yeah, right.

And I always think it's amusing when people say, put your hand out so the dog can smell you. The dog smelt you the minute you entered the room.

TIM: Yeah, that's interesting, isn't it? Because when we do put our hand out so the dog knows who you are. Yeah, they know you are already.

KAYE: They do and do. But we can actually take advantage of that smell-ability, if you like, by actually doing scent work.   And if you haven't heard about this, you can do it at the Northern Suburbs Dog Training Organization. They do it regularly and it's a great thing because you know how we try and counter condition our dogs towards not being fearful of things and don't worry if you see another dog, but their brain isn't really always on the job. Whereas if we rewire their reactive behaviour through their nose work or through their nose, through scent work, then they'll actually feel a lot happier.   Now, what happens is that they are trained to find initially pieces of food, but then it progresses to finding particular scents on cotton buds. I know this sounds weird. They feel a sense of success when they actually find the right thing and get told, yes, you've got this.   You've got the most amazing sense of smell because they basically are running the game. It's a very, very good tool. A lot of people say that the dogs that are doing scent work actually sleep better, they're calmer and they feel very confident instead of very anxious because they know they can do something really well and it's fun for them.   TIM: Yeah, right. By the way, is that dog training centre, the one up at St. Ives, is that still there? Same one in Sydney?

KAYE: Yes, that's still there, the St. Ives one. I used to do MC, the Doggy Days there with my husband. But yes, the NorthernSuburbsdogtraining.org.au is the place where people can go and check out when they're doing the scent work classes. But it really is a good thing to do.

TIM: Yeah, interesting, we bought, actually not for Ellie, our rescue, but for my son's dog, one of those little devices and you put their biscuits in it and they have to figure out how to knock the thing over so the biscuits come out the little hole. And I would imagine that's based on scent too, wouldn't it be?

KAYE: It's based on scent and it also activates part of their brain that says, okay, I've got a problem here, I need to solve it. And like all of us, we like to solve things, so it's the scent that's also working out how they can push the button to get the treats out.

TIM: Yeah, clever, isn't it? I mean, and their noses, aren't they, I'm thinking, are always going. And it's the first thing they do when they approach anything, that nose goes and they have a sniff and try and figure out what it is, I guess is what they're doing, is it? Yeah?

KAYE: They are indeed. They're solving problems and when they're solving problems, they're not getting into trouble!

TIM: Now, and this is an issue that I'm sure all listeners have had with their pets, their dogs in particular, chewing. So, I mean, chewing in a healthy way to eat their food, but there's a lot of dogs who chew, is that a nervous thing they do when they pick up your shoe and chew that up and pick up anything and give it a chew?

KAYE: It's almost an innate thing. You see, dogs have evolved in the wild to be able to survive by grabbing onto things with their teeth, chomping down and then ripping it apart so they can actually eat. So, you know, millions of years, I guess, probably that's an exaggeration, but the dog's innate desire to chew is so strong that a number of research papers have actually found that they'll invariably find something to chew on.

Now, there's been a group of seven veterinarians have actually gone to the trouble of actually checking through the existing research papers and there are 205 of them that they looked at, so, that took a lot of research to look into why dogs chew and is it really good for them?

In a nutshell, you don't have to read it because there's 21 pages in this report I've done it for you, is that yes, it does bring huge health risks but also some potential problems, so, you know, part of the thing is choosing the right thing for them to chew on and supervising them. And it's really important particularly for very young animals to chew because when they get to about six months, their adult teeth are going to come through and they need to be chewing on something hard otherwise they're going to pick your beautiful Louboutin shoes.

TIM: Yes, we've had a couple of pooches who did exactly that. And that thing, and Ellie does it, where she grabs a ball that's got a squeak in it, like a squeaky toy, and to hear that squeak they'll just, yes, go and get it when you throw it and then really give it a good chew, are they hearing for the squeak or they just like chewing the ball?

KAYE: That's actually activating the prey drive. And I had just one of my dogs had a really, really great fondness for a Tickle Me Elmo, I got it second hand somewhere, and he would make Tickle Me Elmo giggle, giggle, giggle, he loved that sound. And he loved any of the squeaky toys with a chew in it and he would actually chew it until he could get the squeaky out and then it wasn't any interest anymore.

However, the research that's just been done into the, you know, it's got a complicated name, the Functional Significance and Welfare Implications of Chewing in Dogs, but they actually found that giving bones, particularly bones that still have some cartilage or meat on them, not only satisfies dogs' sense of smell, but they actually really like chewing on something.

You've probably seen this with your own dog they love to hang on to the bone between their paws and then they can actually get their teeth into that sort of knobby, rounded bit at the ends, which is really good as they try and chew and to get a little bit of that marrow. And the trick is don't let them eat all the marrow or they might get the runs because it's very fatty.

TIM: That’s right, Kaye's VETtalk Online and provides the latest and best advice as you just got then for pet owners and for vets. Always lovely to talk to you, Kaye thank you.   KAYE: No worries, Tim, same!

TIM: Kaye Browne