AnamCara Retrievers

01/11/2025

01/11/2025

🚨 HAPPENING NOW 🚨

Our team in Los Angeles is currently at a local shelter pulling dogs for a transport happening tomorrow morning. We are also coordinating more transports to help get pets out of Los Angeles and away from the fires, but we need YOUR help to make that happen!

We are in desperate need of large airline crates to help us safely transport dogs. This size crate is almost impossible to find in the LA area as stores are completely out. Here’s how you can help: 👇

• If you have a large size airline crate you are willing to donate (preferably 40"L x 27"W x 30"H) and are local to the LA area, please drop it off at our Pet Adoption Center TODAY. These will be used for tomorrow’s transport. The address is: 1845 Pontius Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90025
• If you are NOT local to the area to drop off a crate you are wanting to donate, you can purchase one on Amazon to send to our team for future transports. https://www.amazon.com/Aspen-Porter-Travel-Kennel-pounds/dp/B000MT5AR2/ref=sr_1_6?crid=MR4RDBLCKUZZ&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.3cpLdengW3Azw0mG9btPAgz_MoDh5_qBMPds0Q5VtTZxuXYIOx4FS_oIQV-TqNmGceZHay3RCN1wMG_l-Ev_z04MdhTOWh7NXTFiZaqlyoL3ahCU2ju5i1c8Ptqgvf_XiXIgB91kNAtr5HHb5_LS1C-G3RaewnqCr_8rImBgFcNzdUNRyIyPuyLCMUZKW0u3PpdlpzhRdAmIqDRBEVLO5zjvXoburdooAwOZvMMx0alVDavD3xFFzz-XAp2KbDoV9yxxPfPnCoWQXgGVONlqzN2rUhj4s-rwpOzhwuahB3Kr7CKONwM61wG0UV8QBDxmov218tiAL4NK1W5eipxoi56CDs-E5BzlZ_HMxOAyGmI.tbcqJRCWu-gFEUKc7BxNB6ksRqLkbkI0sT4pUAoVlyk&dib_tag=se&keywords=airline%2Bcrate%2BDog%2BKennel%2B40%22&qid=1736536421&s=pet-supplies&sprefix=airline%2Bcrate%2Bdog%2Bkennel%2B40%2B%2Cpets%2C146

Thank you for helping pets find refuge from the fires. 🐾 -katheryn

01/11/2025

Join us for a celebration of Karen Pryor's life on Friday, January 17, from 12:00 pm - 1:30 pm (PT). This celebration will be an opportunity for friends and colleagues to share stories about Karen and the impact she has had on so many of us and reflect on her immense legacy.

If you want to join us on Zoom, get access to the recording, and/or share a story during this celebration, kindly visit our website: https://bit.ly/4gOgXsi.

Registration is free but required as space is limited.

10/16/2024

CTSMA Annual State Educational Conference Registration Page.

10/16/2024

In the state of Maine, we call our licensed technicians, LVT or Licensed Veterinary Technicians. They are required to go to 2 to 4 years of college level classes and pass a national licensing exam. They must maintain their license and are upheld to a certain standard of knowledge. They are required to have both book knowledge and technical skills to do their job.

Across the country, they can be called other things such as Registered Veterinary Technician or Certified Veterinary Technician. State laws vary from state to state as well as requirements.

Veterinary technicians can also go on to specialize in certain areas like emergency critical care or internal medicine. This requires additional hours of training with board certified individuals, papers, and testing.

Although they do things that their human counterparts ( RN or registered nurses) they are often compensated a lot less for their skill. Many of them are in this profession due to compassion and love for animals.

Some cool things are LVTs can do:
-draw blood from a kitten that's less than 1 lbs
- do anesthesia and use a ventilator on a 200 lbs Great Dane and a 2 lbs chihuahua
-take x-rays by positioning animals such as English Bulldog vs a Greyhound in the right orientation to get the correct view for our doctors.
-harvest blood from cats and dogs to give blood transfusions
-calculate pain drips for our patients using multiple drugs in our most critical patients.
-check chest tubes so patients can survive traumatic chest injuries
-help maintain a trach tube in patients who can't get air into their lungs past their larynx or upper airway
-assist with puppy and kitten care after c-section
-blood type cats and dogs

They are pretty spectacular and our team could not provide medical care to your pets without them. Happy Vet Tech Week!

10/16/2024

10/16/2024

AnamCara has a beautiful black female lab puppy available!
She is strong intelligent independent fearless and birdy.
She will need a working home she could do agility tracking SAR hunting scent work
Will have a great on and off button but needs to be in the hands that will truly appreciate her potential
Pm Kathy for details

10/08/2024

10/01/2024

As promised, today's post is about vomiting in cats. Some of you might be thinking... why... cats just vomit. Nope, this is a myth. Did you know that almost 98% of cats who have chronic vomiting, changes in weight, diarrhea, or changes in appetite or any combination those symptoms have a diagnosable disease?! Mind blown right!? Cats don't vomit all the time. It's not normal for them!

Vomiting in cats can be triggered by a lot of things. Similar to dogs, things INSIDE the GI tract vs OUTSIDE the GI tract are good broad categories to start with. Younger cats tend to eat or chew things they are not suppose to. So things like string, foreign material, chewing on plants that can cause stomach irritation could trigger a bout of vomiting. If your cat has fleas... even one flea... and they groom it and eat it... they will be incubating tape worms! Tape worms look like dried white rice around their hind end... and all it takes is grooming that ONE flea.

In one study, almost half the cats with chronic GI symptoms were diagnosed with inflammatory bowel disease. These cats stopped having GI signs with changes in their diet and in some cases oral medication. If you could stop stepping in cold, old, yucky cat vomit with a change in diet.... isn't it worth the check up?

Your regular veterinarian may start with routine diagnostics such as x-rays, blood work, urine test, and f***l analysis. If those results are normal, they may recommend advanced testing such as abdominal ultrasound, biopsies, or a GI panel blood test. The blood test checks for pancreatitis and the body's ability to absorb certain things like folate and cobalamin.

In middle aged to older cats, we worry more about things OUTSIDE of the GI tract causing nausea and vomiting. Kidney disease, liver disease, pancreatitis, hyperthyroidism. Annual wellness blood work and urine screening can help catch early kidney disease. It takes about 75% of kidney function LOSS to see symptoms and outwards signs of this disease.If you could catch it when they only lost 25% of function with a blood test, you might be able to keep your cat out of kidney failure with a diet change alone! We think it's totally worth it!

The other special things about cats, (we all know that they DON'T like to be the same as dogs) is that they can develop fatty liver syndrome or hepatic lipidosis. This condition occurs from chronic anorexia or not eating. However overweight cats are more sensitive to this and even 24 to 48 hours of not eating can lead to elevated liver values. When cats stop eating, their liver responds by mobilizing fats. Sometimes, it can over react or be dramatic, and mobilize TOO many fats. It essentially floods the liver with fat and puts it into liver failure. Sometimes, the reason why your cat is STILL not eating and vomiting is not due the origianl insult, it's now because the liver is not working and they are in liver failure.

Most cats can recover from this situation IF the underlying cause of anorexia/not eating is treatable. However it can require ICU care and a temporary feeding tube.

If your cat is a chronic vomiter, ie has been vomiting 2 to 3 times a week for 3 month but is otherwise fine and eating... do not panic and bring them to the ER. Go to your regular vet for the work up.

If your cat vomits 2 to 3 times in one day and stops eating for 24 hours... then maybe we need to be a little bit more aggressive and make sure our liver is happy and that the original trigger is treated.

Kittens and eldery cats with chronic conditions should be seen for even 1 or 2 episodes of vomiting. They have less reserved and can run into trouble even with 1 or 2 episodes.

If it sounds like your cat is bringing up a hairball but doesn't bring anything up... this might not be vomiting but a feline asthma cough. If they are breathing fine and acting normally, this ca wait until your regular vet can see you. If they are breathing hard and having a lot of these events in one day, we might need to see them before they have a bad episode.

When in doubt, you can always call us to trouble shoot!

10/01/2024

This is something everyone should see. This xray is of a 2 week old puppy.

When you get your 8/10 week old puppies, please keep this image in mind. Their bones do not even touch yet. They plod around so cutely with big floppy paws and wobbly movement because their joints are entirely made up of muscle, tendons, ligaments with skin covering. Nothing is fitting tightly together or has a true socket yet.

When you run them excessively or don't restrict their exercise to stop them from overdoing it during this period you don't give them a chance to grow properly. Every big jump or excited bouncing run causes impacts between the bones. In reasonable amounts this is not problematic and is the normal wear and tear that every animal will engage in.

But when you're letting puppy jump up and down off the lounge or bed, take them for long walks/hikes, you are damaging that forming joint. When you let the puppy scramble on tile with no traction you are damaging the joint.

You only get the chance to grow them once. A well built body is something that comes from excellent breeding and a great upbringing-BOTH, not just one.

Once grown - around 12-18 months depending on their breed, you will have the rest of their life to spend playing and engaging in higher impact exercise. So keep it calm while they're still little baby puppies and give the gift that can only be given once.

09/28/2024

In New Zealand, Sunday the 29th September, clocks go forward one hour ⏰️
Clocks move from 2am to 3am.

09/28/2024

It is often easier for us to deal with the dog end of the leash than the human end. We may be quite thorough in our exploration of why a dog behaves in certain ways, examining environment, handler interactions, genetic tendencies, nutrition, equipment, veterinary issues and more.

But when it comes to the other end of the leash, we may not have as much experience or even skill in thinking about human behavior. We might blame our clients, end up frustrated by what we see as their lack of compliance, or be puzzled by their inability to accept what we are telling them.

Or worse still, we can find ourselves in danger of burn-out. We give so much to each dog and client, pouring our hearts into trying to be helpful, only to watch a client opt to use old fashioned methods to get the quick fix.

“Why?” We wonder. “Why do they do that?”

Each being in the relationship has needs that motivate their behavior. It is no surprise that a dog’s needs might be different from the handler’s. But it is easy to forget that human behavior is also motivated by needs.

Using a compassionate approach that applies Maslow’s Hierachies to both dog and human, we can find a path to helping clients and their dogs.

In this thought-provoking webinar, Joe and Suzanne combine their collective experience using Maslow’s work for understanding both ends of the leash. This unique take on understanding needs and behavior was a hit when Joe & Suzanne first presented at her 2024 Trainers’ Workshop.

Register here: https://relationshipcenteredtraining.thinkific.com/courses/compassion-for-both-ends

You can join live or watch the recording afterwards. You will have a year access to the recording.

09/28/2024

Today's post is about "hospital parking lot" or "hospital lobby" etiquette and not so much dog park etiquette... but the images were great and helpful to illustrate some of the things that happen in our clinic too.

Unlike dog parks, we ask that all dogs be leashed in our parking lot and lobby. This is not because we don't believe in letting dogs run around off leash. This is for the safety of your pet, the other pets, and our staff. We have all types of dogs visit our hospital. Those that only like humans. This that only like small dogs. Those that like to bite small dogs. Those who don't like all humans. We have to accommodate for all of them and having YOUR dog on a leash matters.

We may also ask that your dog not leave your car until we are ready for you. This could be due to a variety of reasons. We could have an aggressive dog coming into the building. We could be disinfecting an area from a potentially contagious disease. Your DOG may have a potentially contagious disease that is harmful to other dogs.

If you elect to wait in our lobby with your dog, we ask that you have good control of them. They should not run up to other clients coming in with their pets. We have some dog bite wound patients who come into our clinic and are already feeling the adrenaline from the attack. Another dog rushing at them can be triggering. A cat in a carrier, may already be having major medical issues and doesn't need to add "frightening to death" to their problem list when your dog jumps up to sniff the carrier.

We also ask that all cats are in carriers. We don't want to lose a cat. We don't want a cat to be bitten by a dog, on a leash. Let's just say not all leashes are created equally ( another topic for another day) and your cat be bitten.

These rules are not there to make your life more complicated at a stressful time. It's there to help keep everyone ( 2 legged and 4 legged) safe in our clinic.

09/21/2024

09/21/2024

09/10/2024