Four absolute Darling's

The black eared one is RJ (after her mum Ruby Junior), the little Brindle one Little Em but in her new home she will be called Hettie, the white one with the dot in her ear is Dottie at the moment but will soon be Phoebe and the other white one is Crystal. They were bred by Jane Foster and they are PROUDLY fed by Darling's. Sigh. Aren't they beautiful?

Raw Dolphins!!!!

I don't really take holidays. Some days I work 18 hours, other days one hour (recently it has been more the former than the latter) and as I love the different things I do this suits me well. But - or rather BUT - if I was going to take a holiday I think I might be jolly tempted to sign up for a Raw Dolphins holiday. Raw Dolphins? Well, yes. Run by a darling Darling customer called Yemaya (who is also a pal of a pal) they offer an opportunity to swim with dolphins in locations that look (to my jaded northern European eyes) pretty close to paradise. Think gorgeous, empty, sunny, sandy beaches. It is also possible to take a yoga class every day on the beach. Yemaya is a huge proponent of raw food and eats an entirely raw vegan diet. Having tried this myself I can vouch for just how great one feels not eating meat and not eating anything cooked. Anyway, the 'raw' bit of Raw Dolphins refers to the food on offer. Whether you treat the holiday as an opportunity to detox or whether you end up changing to a raw diet on a permanent basis if my experience is anything to go by you won't regret it. Hey ho. Marianne and I are just back from four days on Culebra which, as you know, but I didn't, is off Puerto Rica (I relied on the pilots to find it for us...and they did) and so I am rather overflowing with enthusiasm for exactly the sort of place that Raw Dolphins will take you. Also, I note from their website that they do food demonstrations as part of the holiday. As I say, if holidays were my style I'd be booking now. Yemaya can be reached on 07884 438758 or email rawdolphins@live.com

This always makes me laugh, too!

This advertisement reputedly appeared in the Atlanta Journal. Maybe it did. Maybe it didn't!

SINGLE BLACK FEMALE seeks male companionship, ethnicity unimportant. I'm a very good girl who LOVES to play. I love long walks in the woods, riding in your pickup truck, hunting, camping and fishing trips, cozy winter nights lying by the fire. Candlelight dinners will have me eating out of your hand. I'll be at the front door when you get home from work, wearing only what nature gave me... Call (404) 875-6420 and ask for Annie, I'll be waiting.....

Callers supposedly found themselves connected to the Atlanta Humane Society who were looking to re-home a black Labrador. I would love to think the story is true!

This always makes me laugh...

My colleague Ruth just sent me this photograph and although I have seen it half a dozen times IT always makes me laugh. HAPPY EASTER!

Why we were over the moon when Banrigh won at Crufts...

Vicky, Ruth and I were THRILLED when Banrigh (or Ch Drawing Down the Moon to Cusidh) won 1st Open Bitch, Bitch Championship Certificate and Best of Breed at Crufts this year. Why? Because Banrigh is one of our canine customers. It happened by accident, really. My wife, Marianne, and I both have a bad Internet habit. She spends hours online looking at sites with names like HorseDeals.com and I spend hours online looking at dogs. I have a huge yearning for a hound (actually, I have a huge yearning for almost any dog you care to mention) and several months ago I had become obsessed with Scottish Deerhounds, as one does. More by accident than design I came across a site (www.scottish-deerhound.com) devoted to the breed run by Elise and Rob Horsfield. So taken was I by the site that I wrote and offered them a sample box of Darling's for no other reason than...well...I could. Anyway, one thing led to another and the Horsfields have become much valued customers. So, as I say, their win thrilled us.

If you don't know anything about Scottish Deerhounds they repay study. This is what it says on Wikipedia about them: "The Scottish Deerhound is believed by some to have existed back to a time before recorded history. Its antecedents may have been kept by the Scots and Picts, and would have been used to help in providing part of their dietary requirements, namely from hoofed game (archaeological evidence supports this in the form of Roman pottery from around 1st Century AD found in Argyll which depicts the deerhunt using large rough hounds (these can be viewed at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh). Other evidence can be found on standing stones from around the 7th century AD reflecting a hunt using hounds, such as the Hilton of Cadboll Stone. In outward appearance, the Scottish Deerhound is similar to the Greyhound, but larger and more heavily boned. However Deerhounds have a number of characteristics that set them apart. While not as fast as a Greyhound on a smooth, firm surface, once the going gets rough or heavy they can out run a Greyhound. The environment in which they worked, the cool, often wet, and hilly Scottish Highland Glens, contributed to the larger, rough-coated appearance of the breed. The Deerhound is closely related to the Irish Wolfhound and was the main contributor to the recovery of that breed when it was re-created at the end of the 19th century."

Heartiest congratulations to the Horsfields and to Banrigh, too, of course.

The use of drugs to control aggression in dogs

One of the most interesting conversations I had at Crufts was with a behaviourist with a canine customer (patient?) on medication to control aggressive behaviour. She spoke airily of the Amino Acid Manipulation Diet as if everyone knew what that was. I didn’t and so the first thing I did that night was look it up online. Nothing. Not a sausage. I wrote to our vet, Tom, about it and in a moment I will explain what he said.

Dog on Prozac

First, an interesting study relating to behaviour and drugs that I found in a site dedicated to English Springer Spaniels. In it the author explains that Ilana Riesner DVM, formerly of Cornell University (NY), did quite a bit of research into aggressive dogs and discovered that many of the dogs studied by Dr. Reisner had abnormally low amounts of serotonin metabolites in their urine and cerebral spinal fluid. This suggested that the dominance aggression was associated with abnormally low levels of serotonin in the brain which corresponded with findings in violent mental patients and prison inmates!

Serotonin is one of the neurotransmitters or brain chemicals that has a calming effect. In most mammals, it seems to decrease the amount of aggression associated with dominance. While it doesn’t necessarily change the social status of an animal, higher serotonin levels decrease the likelihood aggressive displays will be used to maintain that social position. Based on these findings, Dr. Riesner used drugs that increase serotonin levels to treat dominance aggression in dogs. We’re talking here of drugs such as Prozac!

Anyway, about 50% of the dominant aggressive dogs respond to these drugs, with a decrease in aggressive displays. The drugs don’t solve the problem, but they made it safer and easier for owners to use behaviour modification techniques to change the dog’s social status in the home. This indicates that dominance aggression may, at least in some individuals, result from a brain abnormality on the chemical level.

So what about the Amino Acid Manipulation Diet?

So, where does this diet come in? Here are the key points Tom made:

“It is believed that some behavioural problems in dogs are due to genetics that lead to low serotonin levels. However, these may well be 'normal' dogs who are getting the wrong diet which is inadequate in serotonin's precursor tryptophan, due to cooking.”

“The highest sources of tryptophan are what dogs eat in the wild red meat, eggs, chicken &c”.

“If you want more serotonin and a calmer dog feed a raw meat diet - you couldn't get a better Amino Acid Manipulation Diet except that there is no manipulation.”

I am still not 100% sure

I am still not quite sure what the Amino Acid Manipulation Diet actually is. Does it only mean a change of diet? Or is it achieved by using processed foods? All help gratefully received. In the meantime I have to say that I do think drugging dogs with behaviour issues is madness when there may well be a much more natural and effective solution viz. a raw food diet. There has been quite a bit written on the connection between raw food and better behaviour and I will return to it again in the future.

From wolf to wealth

How old is the dog? Where do they come from? The latest evidence, reported in the NY Times last week in an article entitled New Finding Puts Origins of Dogs in Middle East, suggests that the dog became domesticated at the same time human settlement occurred, some 15,000 years ago, and that it took place not in Asia (as previously claimed) but in the Middle East. The theory is the result of a massive new DNA testing programme undertaken by Bridgett M. vonHoldt and Dr. Robert Wayne of the University of California. Dr. Wayne believes that wolves began following hunter-gatherer bands to feed on the wounded prey, carcasses or other refuse. At some stage a group of wolves, who happened to be smaller and less threatening than most, developed a dependency on human groups, and may in return have provided a warning system. Supporting this theory Dr. Carlos Driscoll of the National Cancer Institute (what they have to do with dogs is a bit of a mystery) suggested that dogs could have been the sentries that let hunter gatherers settle without fear of surprise attack. They may also have been the first major item of inherited wealth, preceding cattle, and so could have laid the foundations for the gradations of wealth and social hierarchy that differentiated settled groups from the egalitarianism of their hunter-gatherer predecessors. 'Notions of inheritance and ownership,' Dr. Driscoll said, 'may have been prompted by the first dogs to permeate human society, laying an unexpected track from wolf to wealth.'