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Nathan Foster

Guys, this is just a very rough and ready post. I would like to create a full web page later but in the mean time, I just want to quickly pass this on as a matter of caution.

My buddy Sarge is ill at the moment. Its our fault, we gave him supermarket dog biscuits as a nightly supplement for a couple of years. We did not know that the biscuits were so heavily loaded with flour and that this would overload his high functioning brain. He developed epilepsy. Vizsla forums would have you believe that epilepsy is a common genetic problem in this breed. But I tend to disagree with this (predisposition yes, but inevitability no) thanks to an older and very well written book (Betyar the Hungarian Vizsla) I was given by a Hungarian client. The book helped save Sarge's life (for now). The information caused me to ask what had changed since that book was written and now. I looked up the ingredients of the biscuits, noted how high the flour content was, then looked for links between gluten and epilepsy (in humans), then it all came together. We fixed the epiliepsy in just three weeks by changing his diet back to meat only, but the damage was done. In one final seizure, he lost his memory, his sense of self. There was about an hour or so where he had no idea of who he was, who we were or where he was. Following this, his immunity system attacked his own body, it destroyed his entire front end. He is currently on steroids in an attempt to suppress his immunity system and reboot it. He is covered in bed sores and has not been able to walk for more than a few minutes since November.

I had a client turn up here a few weeks ago, said he liked the Vizsla because they are a small compact breed. This may be a more recent myth caused by a failure to understand the old breed and feeding protocols. But then how was my client to know this? He was doing the best he could with the information he had. But the fact remains, a small Vizsla is a starved Vizsla.

The Vizsla is supposed to be large and robust, it takes three to four feeds per day for at least two years for the dogs to reach this size. Sarge normally weighs around 33-34kg (73lb). In the old Hungarian book, the author wrote - If the dog is not large, he will not be bold. He will become afraid to take a throat hold on wounded deer and will be timid in his general behavior. As you can see, this (throat hold) is not exactly a PC statement, less than palatable for show breeders. But the fact remains, the author was describing a correlation he noticed between size and general confidence within the breed.

Anyway, the poor guy is on the mend but its slow going and we do not yet know if his immune system will back off as he is still on steroids for the next two months.

I will try to write up a web page about this later in the hope that it will help others but am waiting for a conclusion. It is still early days. He could slip back if his immune system flares up again. He will be pretty scarred up after this, having so many sores and secondary infections without an immune system.

Anyway, I had better go give him his morning feed as I am currently getting the stare and the tail wag when I look at him.

I have to admit, all of this really pisses me off when you have a number of over-educated people (if you can call citing other people education) talking about this or that being good or bad for us and the environment, yet our most basic foods are in some ways more dangerous to some humans and animals than heavy metals.