Update #1

It’s lucky I am a fairly positive sort of a character really. Most of the time. Otherwise I feel sure by now I would have just about been contemplating some serious drug usage or other potentially high risk escapism behaviours. It seems Raven is a bit of a dramatic attention seeker. Either that or she is just really one of the unluckiest Border Collies in the world. She had her final weekly blood test around two or three weeks ago. She only needs to visit Murdoch once a month for blood tests now. So quite clearly Raven felt like life was a little dull, or distinctly lacking in some veterinary attention.

On Saturday Raven managed to dislocate her right hip whilst running in a Masters Agility course. Albeit the ring and the grass surface in general was a bit wet and soggy but well over a hundred dogs ran in that ring and NONE of them managed to dislocate a hip. She had done her usual running contact on the dog walk gone over the next jump and turned the less desirable way around (it was a 180 degree turn back to a tunnel under the dog walk) so I stepped in to shape her line to the tunnel which it turns out she didn’t see till she was running flat tack and realised it was there at the last possible split second and tried to throw her little body in said tunnel. Most sane dogs would have probably just gone past it realising what a futile exercise it would have been by that stage. Her ass end went out from under, she hit the ground and landed on her right hip let out an almighty yelp and then peered round the tunnel at me as I turned back to her with her right back leg well off the ground.

I think at this point all the blood drained from my face as we soon established this wasn’t something she was going to walk off. We had no idea if it was a foot, hock, knee or hip issue at this stage so I carried her back to the car and started icing that leg and rang home for Tim to bring the 25mg tab of Rimadyl I had left over from her BMT. I gave her some food and some Rimadyl and we gave her a half hour lying down to see if that helped. She initially kept the leg tucked up fairly close to her body and were concerned that it was cruciate damage.

Within an hour and a half of the accident I got her into the local VetWest where the Vet had a look, by this stage she had stopped her intermittent shaking and her leg was dangling. She showed no signs of pain on the cranial draw test of the cruciate ligament and none on palpation of the hip but she would not let the vet extend her leg back behind her at all.

The vet suspected dislocated hip and wanted to do a GA asap in order to xray and replace it if indeed her suspicions were correct. Once a hip is dislocated the quicker it gets replaced the better and it’s virtually impossible after 12 hours. She explained what she would do and that she would strap it and that the strapping would be on for 10 to 14 days etc. She topped up Raven’s Rimadyl dose with an injection and then gave an injection of Temgesic (Sp?) which is a more powerful painkiller drug.

Then the Nurse is there getting me to sign the form and waiver and they are working up an estimate of the cost and I’m trying not to laugh hysterically as I explain to them exactly what Raven has been through in the last year and after sixteen thousand dollars worth of treatments for lymphoma I really don’t think an extra few hundred is going to make a difference somehow. I must admit I was pretty upset by this stage and worried about her going under another GA as it was less than 2 months since her last one plus she had eaten that morning, but with a friend’s help I managed to pull it together, give them my mobile number, leave Raven in a cage out the back (by this stage she is looking somewhat pissed about the change in environment) and drive back to the trial grounds.

They would call me as soon as they knew what was what. So I get a call around 2.15 explaining that all has gone well, Raven is awake from the GA, they x-rayed and it was a dislocated hip and it was put back in without too much trouble, can I come pick her up at 5.15. Of course I asked if it could be any earlier but that was a no go. So I was there at 5.15 on the dot and saw the vet who had treated Raven. She took me through and showed me the x rays. I have included them below, the last image is obviously after the hip has been replaced. The vet informed me that this was a rather unusual dislocation as rather than up and above the pelvis the ball had been pushed down out of the socket.

Typical Raven always does things her own way! So we looked at the x rays and she told me that it went back in easily and didn’t cause any problems with popping back out. This is the risk apparently with dislocated hips. That they can pop back out at any time during recovery period. Usually the dogs are strapped to the point that it can’t physically pop out (so they are on three legs) and everyone holds their breath at the end of the two weeks when the strapping comes off but because Raven’s was different she has all four legs on the ground and is weight bearing. Right now completely normally weight bearing I might add. The dog wants to trot everywhere and the hobbles don’t stop her from doing that! She can still cock that leg on that hip when she wants to pee as well! So I am going to try and get a referral to an Ortho specialist and try and confirm whether this strapping is doing the job or if it needs modifying. Also to enquire about her recovery therapy and what I can do to make sure it’s the best she can get. It’s a little different when you are talking about a sports performance dog as compared to your average pet dog I think. Long story not so short I don’t know at this stage if she will be going to the Nationals. Looking at her right now I feel 70% confident that she will be sound by then but you just never know. I will not be making any decisions at this stage. So that was my drama for the weekend. And now Raven is bored out of her skull and wondering what all the fuss is about. Below is one of the xray images they took.

Great NEWS for Border Collie Owners/Breeders

TNS Research Update Report
21 May 2007
The donations in 2006 to TNS research from the Border Collie Clubs of NSW, Vic and Qld and several generous breeders from Australia and US came at a critical time and has allowed us to continue the work which has identified the TNS gene and found what appears to be the mutation responsible for the disease. This work was not possible without the samples from litters with affected pups that were provided by breeders. The enthusiastic work of breeders to spread the word about the problem and the research has led to the attraction of funds from the UK Pastoral Breed Health Foundation which had set aside funds to support genetic research in working dogs. Together these funds have allowed us to make rapid progress toward our main aim, which was to identify the TNS mutation, and to examine its distribution in Border Collies around the world.The funding has provided the consumables we need to do the lab work and the PBHF funds provide a PhD Scholarship for Jeremy Shearman, which now allows him to work full time on the project. The support has allowed him to examine nearly all of the TNS gene in 2 TNS affected dogs and 2 carriers and several controls in just 6 months. He has tested about 30,000 DNA bases that make up the functional part of the TNS gene and has found what appears to be the mutation that causes the disease. We need to confirm this by showing that the mutation exists in the large number of affecteds and carriers that we have already tested, and not in unrelated unaffected dogs. To do this we need to develop acost effective, efficient test for the mutation. Once we have shown that this DNA difference is the cause of TNS in all known carriers, we will check that all of the dogs predicted to carry the mutated TNS gene by our previous test examining segregation of chromosomes in TNS related animals is 100% accurate.
We will also screen samples that showed no sign of TNS to confirm that no other chromosome types also carry the TNS mutation.The identification of what is very likely the TNS mutation means that we can now test any dog for TNS. Dogs to be tested no longer have to be related to knownTNS carriers. Information on samples submitted for testing and test results are kept confidential by us and owners are encouraged to publish their resultson the Border Collie Health web site. This means that not all of the test results are generally available yet.This good news of identifying the TNS mutation is well timed as it balances the bad news that the application for funding of this research through an ARCLinkage Grant was not successful.
We will continue to rely on donations and funds raised from our DNA testing to fund further research in Border Collies andother breeds.Since February, we have typed 800 samples to reveal 180 carriers and 2affecteds. Twenty-one of the carriers were from recent litters. We haveidentified 7 carriers from English ISDS lines to date. This supports theunconfirmed TNS cases from ISDS lines on the Border Collie Health Website astrue TNS. It also indicates the mutation is very old and has been around in thebreed for a very long time.Testing has been difficult on a small proportion of samples. This has led to asmall number of revisions of preliminary test results. Some buccal swabs do notprovide enough DNA for testing and so blood samples are preferred. Poor qualityof sample leads to delays in results and are much more likely to produce errors.It is hoped that the new test being developed will allow testing of even thepoor samples that have been submitted.Any samples will now be accepted for TNS testing at UNSW. Forms are availableon the Border Collie Health website, htttp://bordercolliehealth.com , on theTNS page. Once samples arrive in the lab it takes two to three weeks to enterdetails into the database, run tests, and send out results by email, so plantesting accordingly. The preferred sample locally is blood in EDTA tubes whichmust be packaged properly to send in the mail. Blood on FTA cards is moreconvenient for international samples. Mouth swabs can be sent from puppies atjust a few days old but a proportion (~10%) of swabs do not work so resultscannot be guaranteed and duplicate swabs are recommended.
DNA testing of genetic diseases such as TNS, allows breeders to continue to usecarrier animals in matings (if mated to TNS clear animals) and test the progenyfor carrier status. This means no desired breeding lines need be lost andbreeders can still select the best puppies to keep for breeding without anyfurther risk of producing TNS affected animals. Over a period of severalgenerations the disease can be eliminated from the breed by testing and selectedbreeding. Then testing will be no longer necessary. TNS is inherited as arecessive disorder like CL and CEA. If both parents are tested clear of TNSthen their progeny must be also free of the TNS mutation. In matings where oneparent is a TNS carrier, about half of the pups, on average, can be expected tobe carriers. In some litters all pups will be carriers and in others none willbe, but each pup has a 50:50 chance of being a carrier if one parent is. Foreach puppy from matings between two carriers, there is a 1 in 4 chance it willbe affected, a 1 in 4 chance it will be clear of TNS, and a 1 in 2 chance itwill be a carrier. But such matings can result in any combination of affected,carrier and normal pups. For example, one litter had 4 affected, 3 carriers and1 clear puppy.

TNS has most likely been in the Border Collie breed since it originated as itoccurs in several lines that are only distantly related. It occurs in show dogsoriginating from Australia/New Zealand, in pure English working dogs and inAustralian working dogs that are unrelated to the show dogs. The disease canpresent as very different symptoms from one affected litter to another which hasmade it difficult to recognise as a genetic problem. It is probably the majorcause of "fading" or "failing" puppies. Now a DNA test exists there shouldnever be another puppy affected by TNS and eventually TNS can be eliminatedfrom the breed. The purpose of this research, undertaken at University of NewSouth Wales in Sydney, has been to assist breeders improve the health andwelfare of the dogs. A side benefit is that the research could also assist inthe knowledge and treatment of the disease in human patients.Testing is currently only available at UNSW where the TNS and CL tests have beendeveloped. The research into developing a more widely available TNS test anddetermining the prevalence of TNS in the breeding population continues to bedone by PhD student, Jeremy Shearman. Without the support of the breeders andowners, the amazing progress Jeremy has made in a short time would not have beenpossible and his work could not continue.
Alan Wilton,
PhDSenior Lecturer in Genetics
Head of Canine Research Lab

Early Days

Well so far so good. It's Thursday, 4 days after Raven's first treatment last Monday. So far the only side effects I have noticed is on Monday night her increased frequency of urination and pooping. All outside thankfully, though I did not get much sleep that night! I am sleeping in our lounge at the moment so that if she needs to go it's not far for me to stumble out of bed still half a sleep to let her out. Monday night that was about 5 times. Tuesday night only once and then last night we slept the whole night through. She is still eating and drinking well, no signs of vomiting at all. She was semi off her food a bit on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning - but she was back to demolishing a chicken frame Wednesday afternoon. She is experiencing a some soft stools at the moment but nothing too excessive. We go back in on Monday and work has decided to be flexible, I can take her between teaching classes. She will have a repeat blood test every time before they do the chemo.
As for her activity she is still running to the door each time one of us arrives home, insisting on being at the door before I left for training both nights and was even feeling up to doing some light training over a simple course and a few jumps. Feeling good enough to have her usual barking at me over jumps happening. She's lapping up the attention though I have to say....I'm thinking she'll be milking it too very soon! She's not silly, she'll figure out pretty quick that if she looks attentive enough and nudges a pocket insistently then she's pretty much got it in the bag treats wise. Diet wise she's still enjoying her raw BARF patties, veggie mash, yogurt and chicken frames, turkey wings are on the menu in the next couple of days too. I do have to say though, in the way of training treats for dogs there's really not a whole heap of 'healthy' options out there that still gets the kind of 'will do handstands to have' kind of mentality. There is such a lot of garbage in frankfurts, chicken roll, chunkers, pre cooked sausages of ANY kind. Four Legs is not bad ingredient wise but that coconut gets everywhere and plus pasta is one of the main ingredients and I can't use carbs on Raven, not a whole heap anyway. I'd like to keep the raw meat for dinner time rather than training. Anyone else know of a really quick convenient healthy but tasty option for training treats (not counting cheese) that doesn't involve a whole heap of chemicals or carbs??? Yes I can cook up liver and chop that up, and I do on occasion but even that is time consuming and smelly for the kitchen I have to say!

Raven's BIG Day

Raven goes in for chemo and a marrow aspirate today. It's 7am right now and I am wondering what exactly her day will be like when I take her into Murdoch and leave her there. It sounds horrible "leave her there", but according to a number of sources and basic logic really it would be unreasonable for me to expect to be able to hold her paw through this one. Even if I did go out and purchase all my own HAZMAT gear and turn up in it. Not sure Murdoch is big on allowing it's patients' owners' run that chemo drug exposure risk.
She came to the trial yesterday and was most vocal when I was running Cypher, I think she thought he must have been doing it all wrong. Either way people told her she could bark as much as she liked and that I shouldn't be telling her off! She got her walks round the grounds and enough pats and cuddles to see her through to next year even. Spoilt with polony and sausage treats all day she was very pleased with herself and her beseeching talents that appeared to work so effectively for her all day.
Cypher was certainly enjoying himself after a full week off from training. First run up was the Open Agility and I worked him through his weaves all the way to then end (instead of just trusting him like I should of) causing him to pull off the aframe after he'd put two paws on it in the distance challenge. He was flying though and very responsive. Next was Masters Jumping and his handler needed some ginseng or something because she managed to get lost a few times and caused him to run clear but over time for the first time in his career, 3 seconds of faffing around cost us! Good boy though for being polite and waiting for me to point him the right direction. Then it was Open Jumping and on this one he ran clear for 4th place, I actually remembered the course and he was switched on. Masters Agility was a lovely course, my boy was the only dog to come out the bendy tunnel and look back to see an off course tyre that he just had to take. Grrrrr....oh well he was just making things even since I stuffed him completely on the Masters Jumping.
In the afternoon we faired much better, Open Agility clear and 6th, Masters Jumping clear and 5th (after a very desperate and loud COME as he thought the course should go one way whilst I was going another) and then Open Jumping clear and 9th. Masters Agility again brought home to me how much we really need to work the tunnel under aframe scenario, he always sees the tunnel NEVER the a frame, even when he is virtually standing on the bottom of the aframe he still tried to do the bendy tunnel. Definitely one for training!
So here we are Monday. The Monday where I'd just like us to have two wins, two very big wins I guess. Win One: Her marrow is clear of cancer Win Two: She tolerates the chemo with flying colours. Raven loves to run fast and win, hopefully she'll fight for these wins today.

My Worst Nightmare

Raven’s Journey with Lymphoma
Monday May 7th 2007
We flew back from Adelaide today after competing at the ANKC Agility Nationals. Raven has ended up as the Runner Up Masters Agility Champion and I am absolutely thrilled with our whole Nationals experience, she had more than proved she was amongst the best dogs in the country when it came to our favourite sport.
I had not been without some concern though the last couple of days. On Saturday or Friday morning I had spoken to a friend about some lumps on her neck, wondering if it was the lymph nodes. As there were no other enlarged nodes we put it down to her recent pyoderma on her tail which had been quite big and required her to be on a course of antibiotics which had finished just under a week ago. Nothing else about her told me she was ill. She still had her usual voracious appetite, was drinking well and toileting was normal.

By Sunday when I spoke to another vet about her, this was at lunchtime and she seemed a bit more tired than was normal for her, Penny told me all her lymph nodes were now enlarged (I could feel them myself with her help – her neck ones, chest ones, armpit ones and rear thigh ones were all enlarged). Raven had one more run to do that day – the finals Master Agility run and Penny advised me to make sure I saw a vet as soon after as I could. When we got on that start line I was just very grateful to be there and so proud of my little Raven with the shaved tail, it didn’t matter what we did, I just hoped she was ok. She ran well and she ran clean, but I knew she was not running at her usual speed, some things you can just feel. Regardless the smile and feeling that came from finishing that run is simply beyond description, but definitely a once in a life time feeling. We arrived at Perth Airport at 3pm on the dot and were out of there by 3.20 to go and collect her. We had a 6pm appointment with Brendon Kay at Applecross Vet, we drove straight there. It was a whirlwind visit, Brendon feeling the nodes and taking her temperature and asking that she be returned the next morning as they needed to do a biopsy of those nodes, his gut feeling right then and there was lymphoma. Of course this totally freaked me out immediately but I had no choice other than to bring her back the next day.

Tuesday May 8th 2007
I drove Raven into Applecross for around 8.30am and spoke to Brendon again just mentioning about the cracked molar at the back of her mouth and whether that should come out and what things they would do while she was under. He basically told me they would take two samples of the nodes for histopathology and draw blood to get the full work up. I also indicated to them that they should feel free to do a chest x ray as I had noticed that when I went to pick her up once she yelped slightly when I placed my hand under her ribcage to lift her. I also asked that her teeth be cleaned as well. At 2.30pm I went back and picked her up. Her x ray had shown nothing, and the blood tests would be back that afternoon but that we would not hear about the biopsy results till Friday. Raven had her neck partially shaved in the throat area and her right thigh at the back was shaved. She received three stitches in each where they had taken some samples. Other than being a little unsteady on her feet she was fine plus her teeth were nice and clean. Brendon’s gut instinct was still telling him strongly that it was Lymphoma. I went home and started to browse the internet reading as much as I could.
6.45pm that night Brendon rang back with the blood results, elevated white blood cell count and low red blood cell count was detected but all other levels normal. This is typical of Lymphoma and again there was nothing to do now except wait.
Cost so far: $740.00

Wednesday May 9th
I made concrete steps towards changing Raven over to a BARF diet, purchasing a variety of veges and some good quality chicken mince I made up a mash of the vegetables, cooked the chicken mince up and served Raven a dinner of vegetable mash, chicken mince, yogurt, omegamagic, sasha’s blend and a small amount of Advance Chicken kibble. I plan on reading up on this more and slowly changing her diet over. I had planned on doing this anyway when I got back from Adelaide because I wanted to see if I could lessen her allergies through her diet, this new medical challenge urged me on to get it done.

Thursday May 10th
Still no results and still no discernible changes in Raven’s condition, she still eats well, drinks well and toilets well, Is feeling her usual self, enough to bark at the birds and knocks at the door, still feels the need to boss Spryte and assert her position as top dog. Wants to go out the back yard and do stuff, except for that damn lymph nodes she looks to be as normal as ever!

Friday May 11th
This day will be forever etched into my memory and for no good reason. Steve Metcalfe of Applecross vet rang Tim at home (I was at work with my Mobile out waiting) and told him the news. High Grade Lymphoma aggressive. Steve said he would send all the paperwork and details over to Ken Wyatt at Murdoch Uni Vet’s Oncology department and that we should try and get her in as soon as possible, these tumours were aggressive, could double in size in a day and that without treatment she was looking at three weeks maximum. He said also that high grade lymphoma’s often responded better to treatment than low grade ones, with remission rate much higher although long term survival was shorter. Tim rang me at work and thanks to some understanding staff I came home straight away. During that journey Tim had rung Murdoch to try and get Raven in straight away. He got told by the nurse on reception that 3pm was the earliest and that treatment probably wouldn’t start till Monday. When I heard this I of course, freaked out asking if they realised that she has an aggressive form that needed treatment straight away and that she was basically dying at the moment. I rang Applecross asking to speak to Steve, turns out he had rung us from home. The nurse there was very receptive obviously to my underlying emotions and Steve rang me back quite quickly to clarify things for me. Getting into Murdoch at 3pm was absolutely fantastic he said and that it was good that they could get her in so soon. I spoke to him at length about things and he actually did make sense to me and explained things the best he could whilst still letting me know that Ken Wyatt is the best here and that he will be going through everything I need to know or want to know. I had several concerns, was it a B-cell or T-cell lymphoma (B-cell being the better one to have), what stage did he put her at, would she have to have bone marrow taken etc etc. He answered them all very patiently and made me feel that I was certainly asking the right things. So then we waited till it was time to go to Murdoch University Veterinary Hospital (MUVH).

2.30pm rolled around and we left then in case we had any traffic or any forms to fill in. They had Raven on their records from the dermatological consults so they didn’t need any more updates other than her current weight.

Just after 3pm Ken Wyatt came in along with 3 final year vet students and showed us to the Oncology consult room. First thing he asked for was a report on how I first noticed anything was wrong. I went through the above story with him. Explained that Penny the other vet friend at the Nationals had asked how many more runs she needed to do, at that stage it was the finals run. He even asked how she did! I guess more so he could hear that I felt our run was not our usual speedy manic runs, and that she had felt slow to me. He asked if I was good friends with Ann (a senior nurse at MUVH who also was at the Nationals) and that she’d had a word with him about Raven’s performance life. Our consult lasted over an hour during which he thoroughly checked her out, palpated her liver and spleen and declared that there were no abnormal enlargements of those organs. For that I was very relieved. He noted that one of the very excellent aspects in this case was the simple fact that Raven was not sick or symptomatic in any way which meant it had been caught early. He stated that even a month ago there would probably have been no discernable way of diagnosing the cancer and that it may have been there for between 1 and 2 years without any effects. Even testing blood a month ago would not have shown anything. He talked at length about the different types of lymphoma and their results with treatment and about how we go about determining how far the cancer had progressed and so on. There was much to take in and I only started to take notes when he started to talk about treatment options. He was in general very optimistic, he told us that most of his positive results eventuate from dogs that are presented to him still well and Raven is indeed healthy apart from the enlarged lymph nodes and slight tiredness. When he asked how Raven had gone at that last run I explained that she had done well with a 2nd place but certainly felt slower. He smiled and said that it was a good indicator of her ‘heart’ for life which bodes well for a good response to treatment.

He placed the numbers 1 to 5 on the whiteboard on a vertical line. He told us about 5 first. This is Prednisolone which is basically a palliative care protocol for dogs who already are sick and for whom recovery is not expected. We crossed this option off straight away. He then went to option number 2. This was called the CHOP protocol by him initially however he also said it was a modified version of the Madison Wisconsin protocol. The C stands for cyclophosphamide, the H stands for Doxorubicin (adriamycin or Doxorubicin Hydrochloride), the O stands for Oncovin or Vincristine and the P stands for Prednisone (the reason why it is modified is because we won’t be using the Prednisone). This protocol was the one they had used the most on these types of lymphomas and the one which they had experienced the most success rate with in terms of placing patients into remission. Initially the treatment went for 3 years it now goes for 19 weeks. It has a 1 in 6 cure rate and extended patients lives on average 17 months. He reminded us that the average number can be deceptive and to remember that half experience longer life expectancy and half experienced lesser life expectancy. The protocol involved 16 visits over 19 weeks. Once a week treatments for four weeks in a row then two weeks off. Approximate cost barring any complications (ie reactions to the drugs) around $5,500.

He then went into Option 3.This treatment was less expensive, did not have a cure rate and only involved 1 visit every 3 weeks and simply used the Adriamycin in high doses. Expected extension of life expectancy 6 to 12 months.

Option 4 was next, it was no set protocol, it used oral agents, once a month visits while you waited, and used Lomustin and Cyclophosphamide and basically you told him your budget and he would work out the most effective treatment with the funds you gave him.

Option 1 was left till the end. Ken said that it was the least used option and I never asked him why that was (the reasons could be two fold – cost plus prognosis of success for patients presenting as symptomatic) I will ask him next time though. The cost of this was somewhere between 5,000 and 10,000 dollars. The protocol starts off exactly the same as Option two for the first 8 weeks and then they take 160ml of the patients bone marrow. Next they give the patient a marrow destroying dose of the Cyclophosphamide that does destroy the rest of the marrow and therefore the cancer cells, then after a couple of blood transfusions the patients bone marrow is re-inserted and with a bit of luck the patient is cancer free. The cure rate for this is 2 in 6. And life extension expectancy is longer. It is a much bigger deal in terms of the patients recuperation and hospital visits and to me it sounds like a much more invasive protocol. But I like that cure rate! I believe that it is effected though by the marrow results initially to see if the marrow is clear. There would be no point in harvesting cancer ridden marrow and reinserting that back!

Tim and I don’t know which one to do yet (1 or 2). However she will start on Option 2 on Monday, as well as have a marrow test done to see if the cancer cells are present there yet. There is much to read and discuss and no doubt by Monday I will have another whole raft of questions for Ken. I am writing everything down, it helps me keep rational as well helps me feel like I am being proactive rather than passive in her treatment and care. If I think about it long term I get teary very easily but I think for now I will focus on her positive points for the treatment and enjoy every second of every day that I am with her. I’m wondering if I can somehow take her to work with me between treatment days. We will go to the trial on Sunday, Cypher and I will have a bash at a few courses and Raven will have fun barking her head off at him and revelling in the sympathy attention she will be accruing no doubt. She is healthy and happy within herself so I couldn’t deny her the opportunity.

CAWA State Titles Wrap Up

So last weekend (Friday night and Saturday) was the CAWA State Agility titles. For such a small state we had a good entry of over 500 runs across the two trials. Friday evening went well for me. I had Cypher in Open Jumping first up and he did a nice run for a 9th place out of 17 qualifiers. Next up I ran Dexter in Excellent Jumping, he dropped a couple of bars so we withdrew. Then I had Raven in Open Jumping – she was well on track for a placement when I stuffed her up not being certain enough with indicating a jump to do (already thinking about the tunnel after it!) and I caused her a refusal. Other than that it was a great run. Next was Raven in Masters Agility, I didn’t make my call sound firm enough or give it early enough for the seesaw and she came off it early. This was our only fault on a challenging course. Next up was Rumour in open jumping and she gave me a great run and handled everything really well. She liked the cool air I think! She ended up in around 12th spot. Next was Cypher in Masters Agility, I didn’t hold much hope as this course was tough for a boy who likes to pick his own way sometimes. However with much holding of contacts and keeping right on him the whole way round we made it home clear! That gave us our sixth masters pass in agility so one more to go for his ADM. He came in at 13th spot (which didn’t surprise me I handled very conservatively and with extra time on the contacts).
Next it was onto Masters Jumping and Open Agility. I ran Rumour first up in Open Agility and with one tiny blip she was happy and running on beautifully and we came in clear and seventh! Which meant she had made it into a final for Saturday afternoon, both her owner Andrea and I were very pleased. Raven was first up in Open Agility. We ran a cracker of a run and she held her contacts (she wasn’t feeling her usual self) and gave me time on the seesaw to get into a good position. We ended up winning the class and she had a spot in the final. Cypher was next in Masters Jumping, and I think I had a suspicion when I did my lead out that things would go pear shaped. He lay down and started being really interested in the grass in front of his paws. I tried to get him to sit but he just looked at me. I talked to him though to get his focus and when I had it I released him. We got halfway round the course and up to a box up the top of the course when he decided not to rear cross when I crossed behind him telling him “Turn” and ran out towards a tyre, a good 6 meters away. At which point I yelled “Come” and he kind of hesitated slightly and then literally looked like he thought “Ahh well I’m here now may as well do this tyre” and jumped through it! I didn’t yell or call him names or even stamp my feet. I stopped dead, looked at him and walked off towards the exit. I said thanks to the judge to let her know I was withdrawing and left with Cypher on lead with no tugging. We went just about straight from that ring into Open Agility where he was completely switched on and didn’t put a paw wrong and we came out and had the best tug game going. He went clear for a fifth place which put him in the final as well! Weird how these young male BC minds work I tell ya! Next was Raven in Masters Jumping, again we were going great guns and I failed to realise that a call was required to get her to take a jump. One of the few occasions when I should have *not* kept my mouth shut. She ran past it, we got a refusal and the rest was fine. *Sigh*
So at the end of the night Cypher had three passes, in both Opens and Masters Agility, Raven had a first in Open Agility and Rumour had two passes in both Opens plus a spot in a final! Very pleased also very proud of how Raven ran considering she was feeling somewhat distracted.
Why? Well Raven as you may have read before is an atopic dog. She sleeps with a bucket on at night and whenever we cannot watch her or have her in the same room as us. She has a special home made extenda-bucket which lengthens the depth of the bucket otherwise we find she can get round the normal size bucket. In a bid to find a better solution we ordered in two Bite-Not collars from the US. They came last week on Tuesday. We trialled the collar on her for 4 hours on Tuesday while we went out, Tuesday night, Wednesday, Wednesday night, Thursday during the day and it would seem that it was working. We knew if she wanted to she could still get to her tail but it seemed like she was not bothered enough by it to try. I was wrong. She spent all Thursday night and Friday morning chewing on her tail and I woke up to her on Friday morning with just this huge mass of hair all knotted up and chewed away from the skin and a sticky weeping, hotspot just about the length of her tail on the underside. I put her straight in the tub, clipped away the knotty hair and pyohexed it clean. Needless to say she was not too happy Friday night, but when we had our runs she forgot about her troubles for a while. It was still sticky on Saturday but I had kept it clean and she was on antibiotics for it, I knew it was starting to heal.
Saturday had more hard luck stories than I knew what to do with! First run up was Cypher and he was really switched on and we ran a nice smooth course for a clear round, our JDO2 and a seventh place which gave us a spot in the final. Next up was Dexter in Excellent Jumping and we made it through just about the whole course when he knocked the bar of the spread on the second last obstacle home. Bugger! It would have been fun to run him in the final! Next up was Raven in Masters Agility, it was a testing course and stuffed it near the beginning, think I took my eyes off her for half a millisecond and she was putting her paws on a wrong obstacle. From there she went into Open Jumping and I thought we had nailed this course but it seemed that I didn’t run on to finish strong enough because she did the last obstacle (the broad jump) and the judge was calling “Clear” when she looked across and saw the first plank of the broad had been tipped. Double Bugger!!! Next up was Rumour and she did a funny weird Rumour moment, she refused the first jump…she does that from time to time. We’re not sure why but Andrea said she was definitely feeling hormonal with a phantom pregnancy going on. Then I had Cypher in Masters Agility and this I handled even more conservatively than Friday night! This would have been his title pass! So we get to the end of the dogwalk, he is in his contact position four on the floor, I’m telling him to wait, we only have about 6 obstacles to go. I go over to the tunnel entry (there were three possible tunnel entries to take) I release him to the tunnel entry and he goes straight past it into the next tunnel entry….ARGH!!!! I could’ve cried! All the time holding the contact just so I can make doubly sure of the tunnel entry and we still get it wrong. Triple double bugger!
As a friend said “We need to put those moments in a ball and just throw it away!” She’s right but my problem is my ball isn’t big enough!!!
So onto the next two courses Open Agility and Masters Jumping. Cypher runs in Open Agility and does quite well but missed the distance challenge which I wasn’t too worried about, I worked his contacts really well and got some good weaving out of him. In Masters Jumping I again have a ball throwing moment when I just let go of Raven’s focus a touch too early releasing her into a wrong tunnel entry…everything else perfect and she hasn’t yet dropped a bar all weekend. *Sigh*. Cypher’s in Masters Jumping next and apparently I left my “Come” call way too late and he went into the *same* wrong tunnel entry. I’m absolutely convinced if I had run a third dog on that course I would have got it spot on! Then the last run before the finals was Raven in Open Agility. Virtually the last dog to compete. You know I wish I could just record some feelings and moods completely onto my ipod and just replay them back over me at trials, letting them wash into me so to speak. I went to that line with absolutely no expectations, she had qualified for the final already, she had won it last night and right then she felt a bit flat (no doubt due to the highly irritating hotspot) I wouldn’t have been surprised if she had knocked a couple of bars. I got on the line, judge said “Go when you’re ready” I lead out, turned back to her when I got to my spot and then just grinned for the sheer hell of it and released her and we were off. She again held her contacts and I ran like I meant it (which is not to say flat out fast as I could but with absolute determined purpose) and we finished clear and in second place. Our run from the night before was obviously better but I remember this one more simply because of that feeling I had before the run. I remember thinking as we finished and I ran back to the car with her to jackpot her that I really wish I could recreate that feeling every time I was on the line with her at a trial. I definitely will try, it will take complete practice and many, many repeated attempts but I’m sure I can get to that ‘place’ again in my head if I really tried. It shall be a goal of mine for the next couple of weekends and not one that I will necessarily talk about with others as I don’t think it needs voicing. Not sure if that makes any sense.
Anyway onto the afternoon’s finals – Cypher was first in Open Jumping, it was a nice course and a couple of our top dogs had run clear on it, there were no qualifying certificates to go for so I decided to run flat out with him and see where it got me. With it being the accepted understanding that all dogs run faster if you run with them I decided to try and push him a bit for speed. We were doing great until a slight miscommunication about a tunnel entry but other than that he was a good boy and quite switched on for a Saturday afternoon after so many runs. He responded well to the challenge of me handling him like he was a super fast dog and was not too far behind at all. He also did a great set of weaves facing straight into the sun so I was very pleased with that. Next final was the Open Agility – this got a bit tricky as I had Rumour, Raven and Cypher in it! With only 14 dogs in the whole class there wasn’t a lot of room to separate them with! Rumour went a bit funny on me again and refused the first jump. I started again because I don’t want her thinking she can bail on me like this and then go running to Mum or Dad for sooky hugs. We made it round to the weave poles where she shut down again so then we left, I put her lead back on and gave her quick rump massage (she loves it when I dig my fingers into her fur and give her good rub with my fingers). She didn’t think she was in trouble but she would have also noticed the absence of her jackpot at the end!
Raven was looking more flat than late morning by then (it was around 5pm – she’d been up since 6am and without a good night’s sleep!) so I wasn’t expecting her usual speed so I got a bit caught out when she hit the dogwalk and decided to blast through and do her usual speedy running contact! It caused us to have a very wide turn to the next jump and then the aframe which then flummoxed me enough to forget my plan and I moved in on her aframe contact way too much which caused us to stuff up the distance challenge part. She then dropped a couple of bars. We kept going though because I knew she was tired and pissed off and distracted and I didn’t want to add the downer of not finishing a course to her mood. She nailed the seesaw and did the last three jumps very nicely to finish the course. She got her treats and went back to the car pretty chuffed with herself. I didn’t disenchant her of this and told her she was a pretty fantastic dog who was an absolute star for me this weekend. So all in all the only real major bummer of the weekend was her tail and the fact that she was bothered by it bigtime. There was really only a few things I could do for her, make sure she got antibiotics into her for the pyoderma, keep the hotspot clean and when we were not out and about have her lie down with the desk fan on it cooling it off and drying it out and applying neocort cream. I was really impressed however with the fact that even feeling a bit flat she was still racking up very competitive times.
So it has totally dried out by now (Tuesday night) and she is not as bothered by it now as she was. It’s scabbing over nicely and there is no sign of infection. However the vet did end up clipping the hair off properly. I know these things heal better without any stupid hair sticking to them but I still think he went a bit OTT with the clipper. He left the white tip on but the rest is shaved virtually to the base. To be frank it looks ridiculous and I think (being totally anthropomorphic here probably) she is slightly embarrassed by it. Although it is healing and ok to touch now and you can handle the tail she still insists on wrapping it around her back legs (either left or right) and keeping it well and truly clamped to her butt. Poor little girl. It is going to take a while before it looks even slightly normal…and I doubt that will be by Nationals! I’d show pics of it but I have this vague sense of feeling like a betrayer to her if I did that…weird I know but she really does have an expression of horror on her face when she catches a glimpse of it in her peripheral vision. She even jumped slightly in fright once when it swung round on her. I think the sight was an unexpected one. She has started to wave it around a bit more lately as she felt better – she now employs it again in her bossing of Spryte and in the chasing away of the cat next door or any errant birds that happen to land in our backyard. So she is coming to grips with her near naked tail look. Either way I am grateful that it is something that is external and can heal relatively fast and she can still do everything she usually does. We leave in a few days now, still a heap to sort out and try and organise. Sounds like it is going to be huge – there are over 3,200 runs scheduled not including the finals and the teams events. This weekend coming up there is 600 runs Saturday and 800 runs Sunday. I like the sounds of those numbers. It means plenty of space between the dogs so I can really warm them up and cool them down properly. It will be great to catch up with all those from the last two nationals, I’m looking forward to getting my annual agility fix overload bigtime!

The Atopic Question

Having a dog that is atopic is not a light hearted matter. Raven was diagnosed around the age of 2 years old by Murdoch's dermatology department. She has been 'managed' all her life. I found this website today which gives a very complete and detailed analysis and coverage of treatments available. It's always good to read up on other possible ways to make her itchy life a little less itchy.

Cypher's Health Stats Update

Good news received today, Cypher’s TNS test results came through on the email. Turns out he’s clear and not a carrier, so that’s good to know. TNS stands for Trapped Neutrophil Syndrome and it is a fatal disease for those affected. Now the test is available breeders will be able to start to eliminate the disease from their lines as it can cause much heartbreak. The following is an extract taken from the Border Collie Health website
"TNS stands for Trapped Neutrophil Syndrome, an hereditary disease where the bone marrow produces neutrophils (white cells) but is unable to effectively release them into the bloodstream. Affected puppies have an impaired immune system and will eventually die from infections they cannot fight. Once thought to be rare, it is now believed that the disease goes undiagnosed for several reasons. First, not very many veterinarians know about the disease to look for it. Second, even when looking, blood counts do not always show lower than normal neutrophil (white blood cell) counts. Finally, because it is an autoimmune-deficiency disease, young puppies present a variety of symptoms depending upon what infections they fall prone to. Thus many cases are not properly diagnosed and have just been thought to be "fading puppies". Making the diagnosis even more difficult is the fact that age of onset varies depending on which infection is involved at the time. Most puppies become ill before leaving the breeder but some do not have symptoms until later. The oldest known survivor was 2 years 8 months. Most affected puppies die or are euthanized by about 4 months of age. TNS cases have been identified in New Zealand, Australia, United States and Great Britain. The most recent case positively diagnosed as TNS was born in the US, but the pedigree contained lines from the US, NZ, Australia and Great Britain. Research now suggests that the gene is widespread throughout the Border Collie breed. It is autosomal recessive, which means that both parents have to be carriers to produce an affected puppy. "
To read more about TNS click on this link.
So it was good news to read his results...so far his health tests have all come back positively: Hips 1:4 - Elbows 0:0, DNA CEA/CH - Clear/Normal, CL - Clear/Normal and now TNS - Clear/Normal. This is good to know for any future puppy plans!