6 Month Old--Weak Rear - Page 7

You must have noticed that I refrained from giving opinion and or advice on your puppy as this is a serious thing and still I'm not giving opinion or advice but I thought I should mention this case as the way your puppy looks reminds me of a male puppy which was imported from Germany at 2 months age and was very healthy and of very good conformation/ no over angulation, after two weeks he lost appetite and had bloody diaherea and vomiting and was diagnosed with Parvo, he was hospitalized for a week and when he came out he was so skinny and looked extremely angulated and roached. I think something was damaged in his intestines and he was never able to digest and absorb the contents of food he was given like a normal pup would and did not grow in a normal rate and his movement was awkward. This is how he looked at 4.5 months.

Poor baby Ibrahim..! gosh Parvo is such a cruel disease and always leaves them almost worse than before.. ! I hate seeing the positive tests that come through the clinic I work at.. it is heartbreaking.. there is nothing going on upstairs anymore.. the lights are on but no one is home.. Some seem to be 'fine' on the outside.. but...

CMgsd:

Do you have the puppies VET records before you bought him. IF not get the vets name who saw this pup for shots or anything ,,, CHeck TO SEE  if this pup was treated for anything other than worms and shots before you picked him up.

YOU are entitled to vet records on a dog you bought..JUST ask the breeder for the vets name to get his first records sent to your now vet...reasonable request with no  accusations..that will clear up one question for sure.

YR

Spine was viewed by an expert, not the vet. 

Breeder was feeding TotW and Nature's Variety I believe, mixed with other stuff. She's very anti-supplementing. I have all of my dog's vet records (I got him at 8 weeks and he only saw one vet before mine). The one thing that ever happened to him was coccidia. I'm going through old photos right now.

2 Months:



2.5 Months


3 Months



4 Months


5 months is when people started noticing problems. 

Now, I have copies of the x-rays and they look find to me. The description of the dog with parvo hints that this could just be because of him not eating enough (nutrition etc). I think what needs to be done is I need to wait on the PennHIP and give his new diet a chance. 

For now, anyone have any input on the pictures of him when he was 2-4 months?

I'd love to know which ToTW formula, as that's exactly what the similar case was eating, which is why I started ranting about people not looking at what is in the food they are feeding! You can't feed ToTW adult to large breed puppies. Even their own vet states that! The fact that it's a lower quality grain-free, made by Diamond, infused with many artificial and synthetic vitamins/minerals doesn't help. A dog's body (or a human's, for that matter) simply canNOT metabolize these the same way they can in their natural form. There have been studies showing that certain breeds have different capabilities for metabolizing/utilizing them as well. This is why some breeds might be fine on a food containing inappropriate levels of crucial minerals and some won't. Is the resulting skeletal abnormality genetic? Well, sure, in a way, BUT it's the environment that is causing the manifestation of the problem. I think it's easier to change the way you feed a dog than change the way an entire breed metabolizes calcium, for example. JMO. 

If the breeder hasn't been feeding that for too long and she keeps at it, I'll bet your pup won't be the only one like this. Obviously, there's a genetic predisposition to these issues, coupled with her feeding plan...recipe for disaster. I wonder what the bitch was fed during pregnancy. Thankfully she doesn't believe in supplementation! 

Ibrihim, GSD at 8 weeks or so are still fairly uniform in body proportions and have not yet become "stagie", as show people put it. This is just referring to how different parts of the pup may develop at differing rates. You see pups with ears you think they will never grow into, they may go high in the rear and the rear is often the biggest area of concern and look the most out of whack.

I guess I said that to say parvo, no doubt caused weakening and muscle loss in the puppy. While that can affect the puppy's ability to control it's body, it did not contribute to over angled or roach or length of bones in rear.

cmgsd  - re input on these 'new' pics of him when younger - don't laugh, but can you post a picture of him with his litter brother, please - either then or now ?  For comparison.  I've recalled something about where I've seen that 'look' before, but don't want to say anything firmer until I can be sure.  Thanks. 

Please bear with me on this line of thought.. I am old Vet tech back from the day of being an Animal Health technician.. when I lived in California .. I worked for a very prestigious clinic and saw and gorgeous show line Shepherd (import) around the age of 6 months old, came in with similar clinical symptoms, and after a lengthy exam.. blood and stool work up, xrays.. the vet had sent this pup to Davis where it was diagnoses with "Rickets".. wow!! I had only seen 2 cases in my whole life and.. there was a 'strange' look about them both.. Some sort of auto immune disorder along with a certain lack of nutrition and a salmonella introduced dog food.. Poof.. the dog went down hill from there.. I feel sorry for this little fella.. please dont take this wrong.. I just wanted to help and hopefully he will start getting better soon and all is for naught on this post!! regards..Sherry

this from the Merck Vet Manual ..

---

Rickets is a disease of young, growing animals. The most common causes are dietary insufficiencies of phosphorus or vitamin D. Calcium deficiencies can also cause rickets, and while this rarely occurs naturally, poor balanced diets that are deficient in calcium have been said to cause the disease. As in most diets causing osteodystrophies, the abnormal calcium:phosphorus ratio is most likely the cause.

The characteristic lesions of rickets are failure of both vascular invasion and mineralization in the area of provisional calcification of the physis. This pathology is most obvious in the metaphyses of the long bones. There may be a wide variety of clinical signs, including bone pain, stiff gait, swelling in the area of the metaphyses, difficulty in rising, bowed limbs, and pathologic fractures. On radiographic examination, the width of the physes is increased, and the nonmineralized physeal area is distorted. In advanced cases, angular limb deformity can be seen due to asynchronous bone growth.

Sherry, thanks for sharing your knowledge with us, keep it up please.
Rik, thanks for the info, actually I was just sharing what I thought might be somewhat a similar case, I mean something wrong in the intestines, as a matter of fact I don't feel good at commenting on a serious request for advice, it's different than giving opinion on structure, in the latter no harm could be done to the dog or owner.

Ibrahim

Hundmutter,

I'm curious what's on your mind, this puppy puzzles me