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Yes, conditionally-- do the additional (non-genetic) testing done, especially temperament. Try to get his registration sorted-out, but be aware, it might not be possible if one or both parents has a limited registration. That said, registration isn't everything. I believe there's kind of a...

It's a testament to the skill of the chefs in their household! There were an absurd number of amazing dishes that even taking a single helping of most of them was too much to consider dessert until the following day. The lady of the house is extremely talented at preparing vegetarian dishes, and...

I'm hoping this was a one-off thing and does not cause any long-term behavioral setbacks. She is normally much better behaved than their dogs (not a high bar), and we head over to visit pretty often. It seriously was like she was possessed on this occasion. I was correcting her and redirecting...

So, Kaiya and I went across the road to visit friends for Thanksgiving, and things got a bit ridiculous. It's like she became possessed by a cat spirit, as my title says. Fairly quickly, she annoyed all but one of their 5 dogs, who are all lower-energy, senior, or crippled. The only one she...

That's a great article, and yes, it's just another thing that seems to support the thought that idiopathic SCD (I think I'll call the variety that doesn't appear to be a symptom of diagnosed DCM) is something different. I think it also underscores how little is really known about the condition...

You're talking about extremes of weak temperament. A stable Dobe should invariably have much stronger nerves than a typical horse. It takes an absolute wreck of a high-strung Dobe to have such poor temperament that it cannot be desensitized. It's that gap between "stable" and "may be effectively...

That's an excellent point, biofeedback is very much a thing, so that makes perfect sense for human patients. Bored patients who have monitors connected have a way of staring at the graphs and messing with their heart rate, sometimes setting-off the alarms. This was a pretty common pastime when...

I've never had a gun dog or any interest in that sort of activity, but I'd guess maybe they might also need to have nerves of steel when it comes to gunshots, too? The aggressive stranger is definitely protection-specific. When I speak of "cheating," I mean systematic desensitization in...

It's not a bad idea if he's possibly trending towards enlargement, that is one of the indications that a Holter is useful to diagnose risk of SCD. Has his heart changed appreciably since previous Echos, or has he only had one so far, and it came back with borderline-normal concerns? The...

Correct, it's somewhat of a different disease. Technically, an identified SCD risk in a normal heart would not be DCM, just some other defect in the heart muscle. I think the most important thing is to pursue genetic tests to better identify SCD, since it's less predictable, less manageable...

I can absolutely make that statement with a high level of confidence, because the research points to it. My more detailed explanation above, and the additional research I want to see, would probably yield conclusive results in the value of proactive Holter monitoring. In a much more concise...

The whole issue with largely pointless diagnostics is that they're unlikely to find anything. Statistically speaking, what percentage of the time does a proactive Holter actually identify a concerning arrhytmia in a Doberman with an otherwise normal-appearing heart? That's what I'm wanting to...

It depends on the severity. There are medications that can slow progression of DCM, but the prognosis after any confirmed diagnosis of DCM is anywhere from a couple of weeks from when there's onset of clinical symptoms of CHF, to a couple of years, if pre-clinical diagnosis of DCM catches it in...

I've looked through a lot of veterinary recommendations and research, and don't see a whole lot to support this approach unless a dog is known to be at elevated risk due to familial history. Most of what I see is that Holters are useful to diagnose the underlying issue when specific types of...

Do you have reason to believe he's suffering from heart issues? I hold the unpopular opinion that Holters are all but useless as a proactive diagnostic, and that seems to be what vets are saying. They're used in research, and they're used to pin-down a diagnosis if there are symptoms, such as...

^^^^^ THIS. The thing about e-collars is that they're effective at enforcing commands by getting a dog's attention, when it wants to do other things, but if the dog is red-zoning, things have already progressed too far. With fearful dogs, the last thing you want to do is add to the...

I'd definitely pick the protection dog guy's brain as much as you can as Flint grows, it's a big topic, but arguably the most important in a working breed. To be fair, I think the WAC is a good, simple temperament evaluation, and I think it's largely graded objectively, judging from the volume...

I don't know how I missed your update on Flint, @StateOfMine, thanks for sharing. I looked back through some of your posts for background on him, from what you mentioned of his parents, I'd say 32% COI is fantastic, especially being from what sounds like a high-effort breeder who does the...

Realistically, nobody who isn't a breeder is likely to bother with the DPCA. It's a bit elitist and I think you'll find that the overwhelming majority are not just breeders, but specifically conformation show breeders. Not that there are even all that many working-Dobe breeders left in the USA...

She's being a terror as always! I posted a thread for her Embark shortly after I got the results back, it's at: Kaiya's Embark results