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sallypickup22@gma
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23-09-2016, 05:26 PM

Limping Bernese!

Hi everyone!

I have a 1 year old Bernese Mountain Dog who has recently started limping on his front leg. Just on his right side. I have moved his leg around, pulled at it, put a little pressure in different places etc to see if he whimpers, pulls away or shows any signs of pain... Nothing! But he's still limping! It seems to be worse when he's been lay down for 5 minutes plus on his right side. He's seen the vet several times but each time we've been told a different thing. Obviously the next step will to be to xray his leg. Just wondering if anyone else with a large breed dog has noticed something similar?

Thank you!
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Lynn
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23-09-2016, 08:53 PM
I also have a Bernese my 2nd. All large breed dogs while growing can have limping issues, this could be pano (growing pains) with restricted exercise and watching what he/she eats may be all it needs to right it. By trying this first you should see after a while some improvement.
Tawneywolf is going through this at the moment with one of her youngsters. A Utonagan.

If it keeps persisting and does not improve with restricted exercise then having the leg x-rayed would be a good move. You do need to give the first suggestion a little while though.

How often do you walk the dog daily and for how long ?
What are you feeding and how much ?
How much does your dog weigh ?

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tawneywolf
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23-09-2016, 10:06 PM
I was thinking the same Lynn, as it sounds like exactly what Zen did, she was just about one year old (by some miracle she's made it without my murdering her) and she started limping on the way back from a walk. Rested her, still the same. Zen had managed to put her Nana Lona's neck out by larking about, so the chiropractor came over to see Lona and had a look at Zen after putting Lona back into shape. First of all thought she had twisted her back doing barrel rolls and back flips, after 3 visits and no real improvement she said it must be an underlying problem. At that time she had had a tremendous growth spurt, which I didn't connect with what was going on. Lucky we have some very experienced people on here and Brenda recognised it for what it is, Panosteitis. I am very careful on exercise and food and she still got it. I do know if you feed commercial food (I feed raw) it can be too high protein for a puppy, one thing I did was cut out everything with calcium, including eggs, yogurt, cheese and bones. Cut her food down and she is very skinny now, which I hate. Only one short onlead walk a day (lovely with a youngster) I grate white root veg and steam it and mix it with a small amount of pet mince, and another thing recommended to me on here from Gordon Mac was baked potatoes (or mashed) as a filler, and white cabbage, which I include in her steamed veg. Brenda also recommended Vit C and E. I already give E every day but have now included C. Instead of bones Zen has an apple, pear, banana or carrot. Recently got her back to training classes, after 3/4 months of this, and now doing a bit of free running with the others. Sometimes she does come back limping, as she did having run the Wall Of Death with a Vizla the other day for instance. Then it was a short onlead walk with the older girls, offlead on her own so no one to leap about with. She is back sound again. Very experienced GSD breeder at training recommended 75g asprin twice a day in food as it stops the joints swelling whilst everything settles down.
Pano won't always show up on an Xray either. I was very averse to giving painkillers like Tramadol, Rimadyl, Metacam etc with her being so young, I was advised by a friend to start making Golden Paste (which Lynn uses on her Bernese) to help with the pain. Hope this helps, it takes ages to work through, it is self limiting and they do grow out of it. I wouldn't say Zen was overweight or over exercised, but she came down with it. Have had large dogs and bred for many many years and never ever had it before, so all new to me. We've made it through the worst, and am being careful on the exercise, have started to up her food again, but no eggs, cheese etc at present.
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Lynn
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brenda1
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24-09-2016, 07:01 AM
Might be a touch of osteochondrosis. Try not to exercise to much and no running up stairs or hills.
What is his pedigree? The breeder should be able to advise you.

http://www.willows.uk.net/specialist...steochondrosis

We have found at dog training classes a lot of the larger breeds lay down on walking. This is because they have been over exercised as young pups and the joints get painful.
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sallypickup22@gma
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24-09-2016, 09:41 PM
Thanks everyone!

A few different things to look into there I think! I am considering booking him in for an xray and see if that shows anything. Its strange because I would expect him to yelp or at least show some signs (other than limping) that he was in pain, but absolutely nothing.
I usually take him to my local park where there are lots if dogs for him to play with, usually off lead which I suppose isn't helping him. But a one year old is hard to tire on the lead! I don't know whether to give it a few more weeks and see if it kind of passes and if not book him in, or just get him booked in at the vets...again but this time for an xray. He's been on metacam and it made absolutely no difference to him what so ever. He's one years old and weighs 38kg last time I weighed him which was about 2 weeks back now. He's restricted to what he can eat as his stomach is unbelievable sensitive so he has no dry food, as he's unable to tolerate it. Along with him being intollerent to dry food, he's also intollerent to most wet foods aswell! Hard work! So he tends to have Chappie (not brilliant, I know) mixed in with a tin of butchers. He also has (depending on what we have) left overs from tea and many treats throughout the day as he's one spoilt pup! His diet isn't ideal, but it's difficult as his belly is superrrrrr sensitive!

Thanks again all!
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tawneywolf
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24-09-2016, 10:10 PM
Like I found, it didn't matter what I tried I couldn't find the cause of the lameness, the chiropractor thought she had,but it came back almost immediately.The lameness is usually on the diagonal, so if you check the rear diagonal leg along the back down towards the hock you may find he is very sensitive and my girl yelped every time touched her around the dock as well, so much so I found it impossible to groom her, she was also rubbing herself on the sore areas, and her coat became pretty matted as she whizzed round on me whenever I tried to sort it.I ended up clipping all the hair away. Keep exercising your dog offlead is asking for trouble, its not going to go away, you are actually going to possibly cripple him for life by persisting in this. Have a look at his weight as the main thing is that a dog with Pano needs to be very lean, broke my heart seeing my baby girl skinny and taking her for a short walk onlead every day, but it worked, we are now back at training and I am allowing her some free exercise, but not every day. Today I took her on the small park near to us, let her offlead and did a bit of training with a ball as reward. I didn't throw the ball but rolled it along the ground for her to run after it, but not tempt her to try the barrel rolls she is so fond of. She is 16 months tomorrow so it has taken 4 months of patient slow work, careful feeding and focus on the problem and its solution.
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