? reguarding jumping and stair climbing

[Triptych Trinary's mom]

I had a beautiful dog named Christina for 13 years and lost her too paralysis after three surgeries. I adopted a 4 year old male named Trip. he seems obese but it is only lots of excess skin I worry about the strain on his back. His ribs are also excessively prominent and huge. He climbs and descends stairs. He jumps on and off the couch. He also rolls around on his back. I've heard all of this leads to back problems. He hates being picked up. If I yell at him he wags his tail. What should I do. I don't want him to get paralysised I don't have the money for surgeries.

[dutchman]

You will get many different answers I don't think anyone knows one correct answer. Personally I believe excluding some accidental injuries, genetics play a much larger role in back problems than any of the activities you have described.

There are dogs who have never been allowed to climb a stair or jump up and down off of furniture who develop back problems and those who are allowed to do what ever they like and never suffer any back problems. I know the little girl I lost this spring to neurological complications following emergency back surgery never jumped up or down on the furniture. To get her to go up and down the front stoop was a major undertaking. She was very afraid of the basement stairs and always insisted on being carried up or down even after I built a ramp along one side of the stairs. Despite all that she had multiple calcified disk prior to turning four. Two of the disk ruptured. She had been a mill mother with various genetic defects that should have preventer her from ever having been breed but she had a pretty face. I grew up with three dachshunds only one of whom ever had a back problem and she was able to be nursed back w/o surgery. Those dogs always tore up and down full flights of stairs and were allowed free access to much of the furniture and people beds. I would restrict jumping and climbing if there are any signs of back problems but otherwise life is too short (bad unintentional pun) to restrict the activities that make my boys happy.

Good luck,

Tom and the boys (Frank and Tanner)

[Mark]

Hi TTm,

I agree with Tom. The cause of IDD in Dachsies is more genetic than allowing or excluding activities. That is not to say that we should allow them to traverse flights of stairs and jump to or from furniture/beds. A genetic problem which otherwise may never surface can be triggered by these activities. So if we don't want to "roll the dice" by letting them do it . . . we must limit or eliminate these activities.

The only steps that our 2 Dachsies are allowed (or try to traverse) are the 2 steps that lead from the deck to the ground. They are not allowed on the 2nd story steps or the basement steps. They never attempt the bed, since they have their own - and the furniture . . . sometimes yes, sometimes no. We can't be everywhere at once.

As for training them not to do any of these things, I don't know a sure fire method to tell you. We have never allowed any of the 3 upstairs because I work there and they all seem afraid of the basement stairs. Other members here probably have a lot more experience than I regarding breaking bad habits. And perhaps there are some threads in the Training forum which apply.

Good luck and keep us posted,

Mark

[OwnedByChaucer]

I tend to think alot of it is bad genetics--after all, these dogs are intended to fight BADGERS which suggests to me they aren't really all that fragile.

Both mine are "leapers" Gidget won't do stairs (she can, she'd just rather be carried), but she has this scary tendency to take sudden flying leaps from your arms, furniture....

Chaucer, who at this point is more of a small standard than anything else, on the other hand bounds up the stairs like there is no tomorrow--though he won't go down, and the vet tells us down is worse than up, so we carry him down. Chaucer does a little up and down off the furniture, but he's not too bad...but he jumps...ALL THE TIME...in the middle of the room, for no apparent reason he just jumps up and down like his legs are a pogo stick! What a wierdo.

Both of them are constantly rolling around --I didn't realize that was bad for the back, as I think most dogs roll...

Both are still young, so we'll see...I worry about Chaucer b/c he's a pet store dog, but we just hope for the best.

[SandyLynn]

I agree with what everyone else has said, that back problems have their root cause in genetics. Of the 8 dachsies that my family and I have had, only 2 had back problems resulting in paralysis. One had ascending paralysis and had to be euthanized.. The second was our Schnitzel, who was paralyzed at 6 years, received acupuncture treatments and recovered 95%, and lived to be nearly 14, getting treatments periodically. One of our current rescue dachsies has a bad disc in his lower back that the vet thinks is due to abuse, since it's not at the "classic" location for this. He had one incident of pain and difficulty walking. A couple of acupuncture treatments cleared it up, and it hasn't recurred (knock wood).

We don't "allow" any of our dogs to jump on and off furniture, but since they like to ignore the rules, we lift them down if we catch them, and have a raised bed for our big dogs nearby that serves as a step. If your dogs insists on being on the couch, maybe you could get a ramp or intermediate step so the distance would be shorter. Check the ads in Dog Fancy and Dog World magazines, or you could improvise, as we do. Jumping down is the dangerous part, and the higher they are, the worse it is. Because of their short legs, a lot of the shock is transmitted through the shoulders into the spine. The only steps in our house are the 4 concrete steps to the back yard. Except when it's icy out, we let the dogs go up and down, but I wouldn't let them use a longer stairway. As for rolling, I've never heard that this was bad. I would think this massages the back and relieves tight muscles.

One bit of advice I can give is this: ANY time you notice possible symptoms of back trouble (such as reluctance to move, impaired coordination when walking, crying in pain when touched or being picked up, refusal to raise the head), get your dog to a vet ASAP. Don't wait a day or two to see if it clears up. A shot of cortisone followed by cage rest may clear the problem up before it worsens. Also, when you pick the dog up, support both front and back legs and keep the spine as straight as possible. You probably already know this, having had a paralyzed dog, but there may be new dachsie owners reading this who aren't yet aware of it.