6 Month Old--Weak Rear - Page 8

The only pictures I have of him with his brothers are at a month old. When I picked him up, his brothers were there, but they all looked the same to me. He's miles and miles away from his brother now. I've just seen photographs. 

His brother now: 

Parvo shouldn't affect them for that long afterwards, though. 


Above, the day he started eating after parvo. Below, 12 days later. The OP's pup has something else going on. 

   Diamond is the company I have preached for two years...do not buy anything made by diamond.

read other thread about the inspections reports and this is not a new thing.. I think this pup has an absorption problem number 1..

 Look at the huge difference in Litter mates....but also lets wait for the HIP reports...

 I know you are weary and worried..and so are we.
 
  This is not a normal  pup nor is it a normal way he should be progressing..

 Just keep him fed but do not push too much in him too fast...DOES he have a good appetite right now??

   You made a statement about us RAW people saying or thinking  Raw is a cure all...WELL , I am confident it  is.

  I had a male pup go home to Dallas...Son bought him for himself, left for college...before he left the dog was scratching, had hot spots every 6 months so he went to vet and vet said....change your dog food...but did not say  Raw...son went to internet and did some research and by himself changed to a raw diet..His dog was 100 %  a totally different dog in 3 months... Son left a freezer full of made up meals for his parents to feed.  After a year at college, parents got transferred to CANADA.. they said cannot take the dog..

  THEY  brought him to me , with a freezer full of frozen meat and son emailed me his diet..HIS TEETH were shiny white, ears clean, coat shining and he had more energy , than a whirly bird on saturday night..

 That dog is in Caddo Mills now with a rancher and he thanks me every 7 months or so because of the excellent condition of this dog..

  He still feeds him raw as he also raises cattle and fowl..

  It does matter and it does supply your dog with  NATURAL  vit C , and other minerals you do not get in KIBBLE>

   RAW is great but has same responsibility as dog kibble. MY boarding dog just came last week with a bag of stinky dog food...& you know why?   It WAS RANSID...STUNK AND THE DATE WAS OUT.

  Well known dog food from Petsmart....so you have to feed with your EYES WIDE OPEN  no matter what you feed.

yr

 There are several things that contain calcium and not pills.

fish, salmon, cottage cheese, yougurt. juice off of mustard greens and some veggies you eat., bones (raw)

to get the three kinds of calcium you have to feed FOOD not supplements.

SPREAD  powdered milk on food,  Knox gellatin on food...

All I can think of right this minute.

YR

Hi CMGSD, I agree with those that said your pup is extremely angulated.  I can see that in the 2.5 month pic.  I don't believe it is what you are feeding, although, yes, he looks thin to me.
All I've ever had is GSD's and have fed poor to good quality kibble, and have never had a dog look like that.  IMHO it is genetic, and your pup got the short straw in that department.

Smiley and Rik pretty much said everything I was thinking.

All the best with him, I love the long coats!  Keep us updated on his progress, I always love to see how these pups turn out when mature, we can all learn something from it. :)

I know dozens of dogs that get sick and have a ton of problems with raw. It is NOT a cure-all. 

His brother is being fed TotW. Viking is being fed CN. 

I am going to repeat myself here... he was being UNDERFED. Stop assuming malabsorption problems when he was only eating half the amount he was supposed to. Let me keep upping the food before that. Yeah, malnutrition does show, because he wasn't eating enough, NOT because he has some sort of internal digestive illness. I think he really did get the short end of the straw genetically and I'm going to try to counter that with PT and lots of dog sports. 

CMGSD  (and Ibrahim)

Yes that current photo of the brother was enough;  nice normal looking youngster.
Please don't jump down my throat and I'm really hesitant to suggest you spend even more money on this pup - but something I don't think you have mentioned so far, your Vet has not tested his PITUITARY output ?
I think you may have a dwarf on your hands.
I realise he's not a 'textbook' case;  but occasionally dogs are suffering from under or over production of some hormone(s)
which gives them A DEGREE of the symptoms rather than the full-blown syndrome.  If your improved feeding regime does not show some solid results, then certainly that would be the next thing I would look at if he were my puppy.


Swingfield - I really don't think this is Ricketts;  we had an affected puppy, he was on Euk Puppy & Junior and it didn't suit him for some reason - littermates were fine;  but he looked very different from this one.

Hundmutter that's very interesting and an important suggestion. It's something I will definitely look into. I'm grateful for any ideas that might help or give insight into what the problem could be, I just don't like when people get convinced it's a digestive issue after I specifically said I had been underfeeding him. 

Upping food takes a long time. We might be at 4 cups by the end of this week. Might. It will take at least a couple of weeks after he hits 4 cups to see any major difference or improvements. I think it'd be safe to say that, if by the end of June he hasn't started looking more his age or began improving, it would be worth another trip to the vet. This gives a lot of time for his development and a lot of time for the food to help with that. If nothing is determined I might just keep swimming him and re-visit the issue when he hits 1 year. 

Good luck, I have my fingers crossed for you however this turns out.
Linda.

To discuss some other stuff, I am appalled with what breeders in my area (including my breeder) are doing. The WGSLs all have steeper than average croups. I compared the croups of my dog's parents to the croupes of a reputable breeder else where in the US and they are very close/similar (used photoshops protractor tool). The dogs look different though. Why? Because my breeder likes to have a very slopey topline in her dogs. The bitch is straighter, but the sire is just... too slopey. It gives a different look. I wonder if it's the slope causing it and not the croup. I also noticed there's a drastic difference between Viking's stack-like photos and the pictures where the problem is apparent. When he's not arching his spine, his croup is in the average range for showlines. When he is, his croup shoots up to around 40-45 degrees.   She is one of several breeders in the area who are apparently trying to incorporate this guy into their breeding program:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnchKTjfw-A   It's hard to watch, he moves so loosely. :(