kennel cough again?

Penny has a cough. Again...

I had a look at a clip that shows the difference between a heart-related cough and kennel cough and I'm glad to say her cough seems more like the latter.



It's not a bad cough, so we're not going to the vet yet, but if it's worse tomorrow we'll get her checked. In the meantime, we're going for only short strolls, aiming to stay away from other dogs in case Penny's contagious, and also to let her rest and recover.

I'm trying a remedy suggested to us by a tradesman who was here today, and who is a dog lover. (BTW, we do wonder whether the cough is a result of months of home renovations and the consequent dust.)

After he suggested honey and vinegar, I looked at America's Blue Lacy Dog Blog, which has an article on natural remedies for kennel cough. We're giving Penny a little bit of - super expensive! - Manuka honey and putting a touch of apple cider vinegar in her water. The woman in the health food shop said the vinegar is better than most, because it has 'the mother' in the bottom of the bottle.

A site called Authority Nutrition (now there's an impressive title for a site, lol) says:

Organic, unfiltered apple cider vinegar...also contains "mother,", strands of proteins, enzymes and friendly bacteria that give the product a murky, cobweb-like appearance.

On reading more, I gather that there's some thought that we shouldn't give too much honey to dogs, so I guess we'll only try it for a couple of days, and assess her stools and her general health. After all, it's wonderful stuff for humans, so it won't go to waste.

There's a great deal of information about honey and about its benefits and dangers for dogs here.

solution to the free acrostic puzzle

I've realised I forgot to tell you the solution to the free acrostic I posted on January 30. Apologies for taking so long!

By the way, we're not sure whether to  call this a crostic, an anacrostic, or even an acrostic. But who cares? The puzzle's the thing, not the terminology. (I hope you agree.)

Here it is:

The novel was Curse of the Scarab, by H Y Hanna.

The short extract from this enjoyable book was:

The grey tabby disappeared into a towering bush, which seemed to have grown straight into the back wall of the house. Looking closer, Honey realised that it in fact concealed a huge gap where the crumbling wall had fallen away.

And the details:

A - homologue

B - yew

C - hedgehog

D - Australian silky terrier

E - nymph

F - neglect

G - a cheetah

H - cavalier King Charles spaniel

I - upbeat

J - Rin Tin Tin

K - show

L - ebb

M - ohh

N - flew

O - To Say Nothing of the Dog

P - hatch

Q - etude

R - swab

S - chat

T - a watt

U - Red Wolf

V - a wag

W - bearded collie

You'll notice that the first letters of the solutions, reading down, spell out the name of the author and the title of the novel.

I hope you had fun if you did it!

simply gorgeous pottery dog

How lovely this is! I just received this photo from The Cup and Mug Polish pottery shop. I have to go over and have a closer look.

I wonder how big it is? And what it costs?

dogs are so patient

I loved this  clip of a - presumably domesticated - squirrel hiding a nut in the fur of a Bernese Mountain Dog.

dogs and coffee grounds

Because I'm a keen gardener, I was thrilled yesterday to find a cafe that allowed me to take home a big bag of coffee grounds after I ate there. I intended to put them around my blueberries, azaleas and camellias. I've read that they're really good for the soil in general, but that it can also be good to put them through a composting process first.

But...

I put the bag on the back patio and soon afterwards Penny got up from her snoozing mat in the house and went out to investigate the nice smell.

Hmmm... This might need a bit of investigating...
I decided to look on the Net for info about dogs and coffee grounds.

And it looks like it would not be a good idea to lay them on the garden beds out the back where Penny can wander at will. I'll have to mix them into the compost pile, or the wormeries (three of them) or put some in the Bokashi bins (five of them), before adding them to my soil.

Here's a site with info about dogs and coffee grounds. And this is what PetPoisonHelpline says:

Pets are more sensitive to the effects of caffeine than people are. While 1-2 laps of coffee, tea or soda will not contain enough caffeine to cause poisoning in most pets, the ingestion of moderate amounts of coffee grounds, tea bags or 1-2 diet pills can easily cause death in small dogs or cats.

I'll use the grounds neat on the camellias and azaleas, because Penny doesn't have free access to the front yard.

a dog sees the changeover from cricket to footy

Penny and I strolled down to the Yarra River at Warringal today, for her usual swim...

...a beautiful walk in the cool of a summer evening.

Then we headed back, towards the sports oval, and found a scene of exciting change. It's time for the footy season!

Go Hawks!

It was amusing to see the cricketers were sticking to their guns - or wickets - and continued to practise bowling and batting in the cricket nets, ignoring the hordes of footballers running around beside them.

Three cricketers - but dozens of footballers, from lots of different clubs. I think the footy is going to win the battle for space. Seeing the news cameras were there in force, I guess it was some special introduction to the start of the 2015 football season.

dogs and chocolate

I thought this article about the dangers of chocolate was helpful and informative.

I've blogged previously about chocolate, because I'll have to admit this substance plays a big part in the diet of our household, despite any resolutions to the contrary.

I recall I was horrified to learn that even a little bit of cocoa would harm Penny. Some of her humans - me included - wouldn't think the day was complete without two cups of strong, dark Dutch cocoa. So the jar stays high up in a cupboard when not in use, with the lid tightly screwed on.