You are right, in can, and does, happen. I always tell my potential owners this, all I can do is everything to ensure they get a healthy puppy and weight the odds against their puppy having a preventable condition.

Not knocking you at all TW, just saying that my preference is mutts, it would have to be a really special pedigree dog to persuade me to buy it, haven't found one that has done that for nearly 20 years

I understand that, at the same time you have more chance of getting a dog with health problems if it comes from non tested parents, as most 'mutts' do.
This 'healthy mutt' has actually been proven to be a bit of a fallacy from what I have read.

Oh I fully understand that and go into mutt ownership with my eyes wide open. I wouldn't buy a mutt from a breeder anyway but those in rescue need a good home as much as the pedigrees do and if they have health problems then the OH just has to do overtime On a serious note it's not something any pet owner wants to have to go through but if I do then I just have to deal with it when it happens.

I would disagree with you on that one June. Most "mutts" ARE healthy - if they are a real mix of the gene pool, then the cards are well and truly shuffled and the chances of problems is dramatically reduced.

However, if the mix is not random, then I agree there can and probably will be problems.

You mean like I have had to do with Pereg. Not a mutt bought from a breeder but a rescue puppy from a Shelter. Would you be prepared to pay nearly £16 every 15 days for basic medication, plus twice as much for supplements to support the damage the medication can and does do to the liver?

Or would you say oh, she is only a rescue mutt, get rid of her because you can always get another one.

If I had a pound for everyone who said that to me over the last few years, I would be stinking rich.

I'd not only be prepared but already do pay nearly £90 a month for medication for my old girl who suffers from arthritis, not caused by being a crossbreed but by the bar steward that owned her before me kicking her so hard that she shattered her hip.

Her medication also has the capacity to damage her liver, the Denamarin that she is on to prevent this is £115 a month.

So you see, no, I do not see them as a disposable commodity to be cast away and replaced with a new model just because they are a rescued crossbreed, Willow is 14 next month, been on medication for in excess of 7 years and I will continue to pay it until such a time that she passes to the bridge.

I think once we have mutts or pedigrees with health problems most of us pay what is needed to keep them happy, but would I do it again ? Personally not unless I knew the medication was not going to kill them in the end. We had a nightmare end to Duncan's life due to the medication he had to take each day looking back I wonder would we have been treating him more kindly to have PTS when the allergies and infections had been rife because the extra years don't seem to me to balance with the awful time at the end.

What is this, Chellie - an "I pay more than you do" competition? I quoted the price I have to pay for Pereg's Phenobarbitone. I did not mention how much I have to pay for her Milk Thistle, SAMe, Taurine etc that helps to support her liver, the Pb being known to cause liver failure.

Nor the other supplements and vitamins she needs to help keep her liver and kidneys functioning.

Nor the six-monthly full blood work-ups.

So your £90 a month for medication for your elderly dog makes you a better dog owner than I am with a dog who is not yet five years old? And instead of spending what you do on Denmarin, paying through the nose for a brand [and I have never come across Denmarin costing what you say you pay] try looking for Milk Thistle and SAMe separately.

And much as I hate the thought, my dog will not live to be 14 years old like yours, however much I pay. And as it is now I have to go without medication for myself in order to pay for hers.

So if you want a competition "I pay more for my dog than you do", please try to pick an even playing field.

It doesn't have to come down to a competition surely we are all adult enough to know we don't all have the same incomes so what is fine for one person may mean another going without to pay for the treatment needed.