The Dogs: Remy

And so to the dogs.

Remy was my first dog. He's a dobermann, but not as we know it: Remy is a fawn, or Isabella, to use the correct term. Genetically, he's a diluted brown/chocolate/red (choose your preference - I prefer redhead myself, it sums them up well). He's badly bred; his sire was a fawn also, and his dam a blue.

Four words: NEVER BREED FROM DILUTES. The result is Remy; he started to lose his hair at less than 2 years old and now, at nearly 7, he's almost entirely bald. He has colour dilute alopecia - very common in the blues and fawns, it's a genetic problem exacerbated by poor breeding. He also has terrible problems with pimples on his back, again due to breeding. Anyone who deliberately breeds for these colours is not breeding in the interest of the dogs: mark my words, they are breeding for the money.

That said, his temperament is fab; he's loving, soppy, everything a dobe should be. He is, however, the laziest dog I have ever met in my life, and there the typical dobe nature ends! They should be like Soli: boundless energy, always ready for the next adventure. Remy... well, to put it simply, Remy can't be bothered.

There is a medical issue at play as well; although what it is, we have yet to figure out. He has symptoms of Cushing's disease - his hair loss is increasing now (he's started to lose his fluffy undercoat (which blacks and reds don't have), which he never has before); hair regrowth is very slow - I had to shave a patch on April 12th after he got bitten, and it's still obvious now. His weight is almost impossible to shift - he's been overweight for years now, and what a normal dog could lose in months it's taken my 3 years to get off him (and 2/3 of that went back on in 2 weeks of slightly increased rations to try and curb his insane appetite - another symptom); he drinks too much; he is badly lethargic. But all tests so far say no to Cushing's.

He has hypothyroidism; we are seeing if an increased dose of his meds helps before the next diagnostic attempts but so far, no joy. Next will maybe be x-rays to check for sinister things; possibly a referral to a vet college to scan his adrenal glands (I know of someone whose dog has gone through everything the same as Remy, all negative results, only to have a massive, inoperable tumour on her adrenal gland causing Cushing's). Maybe an ultrasound. We shall see.

In his more healthy past Remy was doing quite well at agility - but following bad trainers, and then a shoulder injury in Nov 06 that took 6 months to get over (and the weight gain from that is still our battle today), it's something he's unlikely to do again. He now has a touch of arthritis in that shoulder, and a hint of hip dysplasia and arthritis in his left hip.