Dr. Gayle Watkins & Dr. Chris Zink - Get Your Dog Fit to Breed

Watch our webinar featuring Dr. Gayle Watkins and Dr. Chris Zink:

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Transcription

Cat Matloub [0:01] Welcome, everyone! We’re so incredibly excited to have you all joining us today and are absolutely thrilled to welcome back two of our absolute favorite webinar guests—two of our advisors and partners and just experts in everything—here to talk about such an incredibly important topic: how to keep your dogs fit to breed. Couldn’t be talking to two better experts for this incredibly important topic for dog breeders, so I’m very excited to kick off this conversation, which will be an ongoing one. Welcome! 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [0:54] You bringing everybody in, Cat? Or should we start? 

Cat Matloub [1:01] I think we can kick things off. You want to take it away?

Dr. Gayle Watkins [1:10] I will. Hi, everybody! I’m Gayle Watkins. I’m so glad to see you guys here this afternoon. I’m a long-time Retriever breeder. I’ve been breeding for over 40 years. Along the way, I have done a lot of sports, but mostly I’ve been focused on producing healthy, mentally stable dogs. That’s always been my passion. I’m a scientist by training, so taking a scientific approach to breeding has been really important to me. I’m sure you guys have heard this, too. I’m going to go back and tell you the history of how Chris and I hooked up, and then I’ll let Chris introduce herself and tell you why we hooked up. 

I started breeding long ago. We didn’t know much about dog breeding back then. Every veterinarian I went to said, “You need to make sure that your dogs are really fit before you breed them.” I’d say, “Okay. What do I do?” They’re like, “Longer walks.” We would be out there hoofing it, doing longer walks, and I have Golden Retrievers so they’re really athletic, so it would be longer walks. I was younger then, so it wasn’t that big a deal. I was jogging and biking and things like that. But that wasn’t actually the right answer. I had met Chris Zink—who is an amazing veterinarian and sports medicine and rehab specialist—years ago. Chris also had Golden Retrievers. I was sitting there, thinking there’s no way that taking my dog for longer walks is actually preparing her to have puppies. We know what fitness during human pregnancy is about, and it’s not about going jogging. About—gosh, was it five years ago, Chris?—I called Chris, and I said, “We have got to do something better than this.” Chris—I don’t think; I shouldn’t say this—had never thought about breeding dogs before. 

Dr. Chris Zink [3:30] No, not on my radar! 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [3:33] So Chris and I sat down and spent a lot of time going through the research on pregnancy and livestock and all kinds of different species and created fitness programs for breeding dogs, because it really was compelling when you look at the research on why our dogs need to be fit prior to breeding. I’ll turn it over to Chris. She can introduce herself further and tell you what it was like from her perspective to get that call from me. 

Dr. Chris Zink [4:09] I wasn’t prepared for this, but here we go. I am a veterinarian. I have been fascinated by the concept of sports medicine and rehabilitation for many, many years and actually helped it to become a specialty in veterinary medicine. I had known Gayle for a long, long time—even before I got a dog from her—because I had seen her advertisements in magazines, and I had known many of the dogs that she had produced, and I competed against many of the dogs that she had produced. In fact, many veterinarians happened to own dogs from Gayle. That was always a good recommendation right there. I ended up getting a dog from Gayle in about 2012. He’s an amazing dog. Gayle contacted me about five years ago with the concept, and I was thinking to myself: well, this should be easy. Because she knows about breeding, and I know about fitness! We can get together, and we can make a little program. Maybe a hand-out. Like, a little pamphlet. That grew into much, much more than just a pamphlet, because it turns out that there are many misconceptions about what fitness is for dogs. As Gayle mentioned, one of them is that going for walks is such a great thing. The other thing is that the whole concept of breeding, which I never knew very much about (I confess—guilty as charged), is much more complicated than I realized: the various stages of the breeding cycle, and then getting a bitch or a stud back into condition, and what are all the pros and cons of the things that have to be done? It’s a very complex story. It’s a much more complex story of what happens to particularly a bitch, but also a stud dog, physically during the various stages of the breeding and then, for the bitch, pregnancy and whelping and bringing up the puppies. The more we talked, the more we realized how well our two areas of knowledge interdigitated, and we started to build a program that was much more comprehensive than I had originally conceived of. But it’s important because, as Gayle said, the data are really compelling about the effects of fitness and conditioning on the whole process of the breeding cycle. Gayle, maybe you could tell us some of those data, because I think that’s really important for people to know. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [7:10] This is the part that convinced me that we needed to do something different. If we look across all species that have been studied (and that includes human beings, livestock, wildlife, reptiles—all kinds of animals), the fitter the parents are, the better their fertility, the better their reproductive success and the healthier and more mentally stable the offspring. So fit parents bring out all of these positives into a breeding program. Let’s just look at stud dogs for a second. Stud dogs that are out of shape have fewer breedings. They have poorer semen quality. When I say breedings, I mean both natural breedings and artificial breedings; they’ll accomplish fewer breedings. And they have different sperm. If they’re out of shape, their sperm tends to have a problem called DNA fragmentation index, a higher fragmentation index. DNA fragmentation indices—the higher they are, the more likely puppies are to be reabsorbed, the more likely puppies are to be stillborn, the fewer live puppies the stud will have. We may be blaming a bitch for reabsorptions and losing puppies during pregnancy when, in reality, it may go back to the semen, the sperm, that were produced by the stud dog. We want our stud dogs fit so that they are going to be more reproductively successful longer in their lives and produce more healthy puppies. Bitches—it’s even more complicated because obviously reproduction takes more out of a bitch than it does a stud dog. One reminder, though: there’s good research showing that breeding and producing litters and puppies does not decrease the lifespan of a bitch. It does not increase the risk of disease in a bitch. There’s really no difference between bitches that are bred and bitches that aren’t bred. But bitches that are fitter during pregnancy will end up being more fertile, releasing more eggs, having more milk, having faster whelpings (less dystocia, both primary and secondary so lower rates of whelping problems), lower risk of hypoxia (which is oxygen deprivation during the birthing process, which as many of you probably know, means that they’re more likely to be stillborn or have problems after birth), produce more milk, and what’s super important to me is that she’s going to be a better mother. Better mothering has lifelong effects on puppies. The better a mother she is, the healthier the puppies are, the better their stress management system is over a lifetime. They’ll learn better under stress. It’s this amazing complex of benefits to having fitter dogs. 

Now, I see Sally just popped a question in there: What is the definition of fit? Should I lob that one to you, Chris? 

Dr. Chris Zink [10:57] I was actually wondering the same thing. What do they say in those studies? How do they define fitness? Frankly, Sally’s right in the sense that we have a very difficult time defining fitness in a dog, and there are many, many definitions. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [11:15] Breeding fitness is a combination of body condition—we typically talk about weight when we talk about body condition. Chris and I tend to define it slightly differently. We’ll just use weight. It is musculature and how strong the muscles are. It is nutritional status, so a bitch can be at a good weight but have poor nutrition. Studs can be at a good weight but have poor nutrition. They will be less fertile. It typically includes an exercise component. There is a genetic piece to dogs muscling. Some dogs can maintain the muscle mass without exercising, and other dogs cannot. But we have good evidence that regular exercise matters to a dog’s fitness. Does that make sense, Chris? Did I cover everything? 

Dr. Chris Zink [12:25] Yes. I will just add to that that this is made a little more complex by the fact that—I’m on a panel right now of working dog people who are trying to actually define what fitness is for a working dog. Let’s say a military or a police dog. What do they have to be able to do to be considered to be in condition for their job? It is a really complex question, as it turns out. We’ll just leave it at that. But it combines many of these aspects—nutritional level, muscularity (that’s both muscle size and muscle tone), as well as how much extra fat the dog is carrying. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [13:15] If you have ever interacted with Chris or seen her speak, you know that Chris likes her dogs really lean. Leaner than many, many, many people. But in breeding dogs, that thinness actually decreases their fertility. We want our breeding dogs to be slightly heavier than one of these working dogs or performance dogs. We can share with Judi and Cat a way to tell if your dog is at the right breeding weight or not. It isn’t just scales. As often as we use the Purina Body Condition Score or one of the other images. If you’ve ever seen 1-7 or 1-8—oh, it’s 1-9? I never look at the bottom piece. We typically are looking for a dog in a 4 or 5, but the problem with those images is if you have a Pekingese, you can’t take that image of a Labrador and figure out if your Pekingese is at the right weight or not, or a Newfoundland or a heavily-coated dog. Using what we call the tissue tent test, we’ve got a Youtube video on that that is much more beneficial; we’ll share that with you, where you can watch the video. 

Dr. Chris Zink [15:00] The essence of it is: Is what we’re feeling is subcutaneous fat? How much fat is there under the skin? If you just weigh a dog, it could be muscle that they’re gaining. How do you differentiate that? You really want to know more specifically that the bitch has sufficient subcutaneous fat to be in a plane of nutrition where they’re going to ovulate more eggs, etc. That’s what we want to know—not how much it weighs. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [15:30] Darlene has a really good question: Can a bitch be too fit? Could this cause her to not come in season as often? A bitch can be too thin. 

Dr. Chris Zink [15:44] Not too fit!

Dr. Gayle Watkins [15:43] Not too fit, but too thin. Similar to human athletes, say marathoners or ultramarathoners, they can weigh so little that their body does not come into season, because the body is basically saying that they’re not prepared to reproduce. I want you to look at the tissue temp test and listen to the standard there. You want a little bit more subcutaneous fat. If you have a young bitch who hasn’t come in season by 20 months, 24 months, put some weight on her. Increase how much you’re feeding her. We don’t often say that, but definitely give that a try as well as the other things we can do with bitches: put them with other bitches in season and things like that. 

As Erin says, reproduction is absolutely a luxury to the body. The body needs to be in condition to recognize that it’s prepared to reproduce. We were going through and looking at these aspects of fitness. One of the things that we realized is that when we look at the kind of fitness or exercises our breeding dogs should be able to do, they need flexibility, they need balance, they need what’s called proprioception (which is an awareness of where their body is in space), and in particular, our bitches need core and rear strength. Our stud dogs, if they breed naturally, need front, core, and rear strength. They need front to be able to hang onto the bitch. They need core to be able to get a tie. They need rear to be able to hold themselves up. They need flexibility to do a tie so that they can actually turn and tie. One of my students long ago had a giant breed dog, and he could only get a single tie from each bitch. After that, the bitches would not allow them to breed them again. He was so unfit that he would never turn. So they would do the entire tie with him basically draped over the bitch. All the bitches said, “That’s going to happen to me once but that is not happening to me again!” Went through a fitness program with him and after that, he could tie and turn and have multiple breedings on bitches. Bitches aren’t dumb. They do a lot of the work; they don’t want to do all the work in this case. So, ensuring that your stud dog is fit. The other thing is, if you think about balance and proprioception in our stud dogs, proprioception is really important—this awareness of where their bodies are in space—because they can’t see where they’re aiming when they’re breeding. The tip of the penis is really important. It’s trying to find the vulva. The dog is trying to process this without any visibility whatsoever while he’s breeding. If we increase proprioception, we’re going to improve natural breedings. Honestly, balance is pretty important because they spend a lot of time on one foot, one leg, while they’re doing the breedings. We want all of those things in our stud dogs—and we want all of them in our bitches. If you think about flexibility in our bitches, they have to be able to clean themselves, clean their vulvas (for one thing), and they have to be able to turn to assist in the birth of the puppies. For some of our bitches, especially if they have a large litter, it’s a long way to bend around to get back to assist the puppies in their birth, get them cleaned up, remove the placenta, all of those things. The better balance and proprioception she has, the less likely she’s going to lie on a puppy or step on a puppy and injure the puppy. The more we improve balance and proprioception in our puppies and in our bitches, the more puppies we’re going to end up having weaned, because they’re still going to be healthy. If you’ve never lost a puppy to a bitch lying on them, it’s just a very sad way to lose a puppy, because they were healthy and sound and fine, and mom was just really tired and couldn’t respond appropriately. A lot of people say, “My bitch is just a clod.” Chris, can you tell your story about the girl athletes and how you convinced me that we can improve balance and proprioception? 

Dr. Chris Zink [20:40] I can’t remember what story.

Dr. Gayle Watkins [20:45] The gymnasts. So, I used to say dogs are either athletic or they’re not athletic. Chris is like, “Well, take a look at little girl gymnasts who, when they start gymnastics, they can’t do a balance beam to save their lives. By the time they’re 13, they’re doing triple flips and landing on 4-inch wide balance beams. That’s all neurodevelopment. That’s all developing the nervous system in their kids.” 

Dr. Chris Zink [21:24] And the cool thing about proprioception is there are very specific neurological pathways just for that that go from all the parts of the body up to the spinal cord, and then these specific tracks along the spinal cord are just for that. If it’s neurological, just like everything else neurological, it can be trained. That’s really cool. Think about it. If any of you have children, think about your 2 or 3-year-old and asking them to put their hand on their head. They can’t do it. Their hand goes up in the air. They don’t know. They haven’t developed their proprioception yet. It’s why little toddlers stomp when they walk. They don’t have proprioception yet. All of those things are trained over time. And then it’s also losable. You can also lose it. Think about yourself. If you’re older, like me, and I look at—say there’s a 4 by 4 piece of wood on the ground—and I would like to walk along it, just have some fun. When I was a kid, I could do that no problem. The other day, I tried doing that, and I was like hey! I can’t do this so well. Because I haven’t been practicing! It’s trainable and losable. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [22:47] And trainable in our dogs. And losable in our dogs, if we don’t develop them. Finally, with our bitches, we want to develop their strength. Their core strength is critical to quick whelpings and getting those puppies out safely. It isn’t a hundred percent of the answer. It’s not like if you get your bitch’s core really strong, she’s never going to have a C-section. But I’ll give you just a couple of examples. Bitches that have worked really hard or whose owners have worked really hard on their core—I had a bitch that had seven puppies in an hour and ten minutes. We just had a litter of 18 born—those 18 were born in seven and a half hours. That very much decreases the risk of still-borns and hypoxia, or that oxygen deprivation in the puppies. It’s much easier on the bitch, and frankly, it’s much easier on us. There’s nothing like a 24-hour whelping to just kill most of us because we’re so sleep-deprived at that point. So, we want to work on core, we want to work on rear, we want to work on front. Front is a little less important in bitches, except in breeding, when they have to hold up the stud dog. 

We’ll give you just a couple of exercises that you can do. When you think about your bitch’s flexibility, you can teach her to do what we call downward dog, which is really a play bow in a dog. You bring their front end down, with their elbows on the ground, and the rear end is in the air. Fifteen seconds. Do that three times, do it every couple of days. You’re going to increase your bitch’s flexibility. The balance— somebody was asking about how we work on balance and proprioception. The one that I like the best is the ladder. Do you want to walk us through the ladder, Chris?

Dr. Chris Zink [25:07] Basically, you could have a PVC ladder or you could have a regular extension ladder or one of the old wooden ladders that has two parallel sides with rungs. It doesn’t really matter what size they are, the distances between the rungs. You basically just lay it on the ground, and you have the dog really slowly step through each of the rungs. I suggest leaving each foot for a full second in the rung before you go through. You can lure them by food—by dropping food in between all the rungs; that works great. The idea is to go slowly. Once the dog can go forward, probably through eight rungs or whatever, without touching the fronts or the sides, then you can have them go first forward, followed by stepping backwards. As they go forward, they have to memorize those distances, and then as they come backwards, they use what they remembered about those distances to step back accurately. And then you can do them on hills, you can do them sideways, etc. The thing is that it’s really important that it’s a ladder, not just cavaletti. Many people try to use this with poles. You can, but you’re missing half of the proprioceptive experience because the dog is only learning about forward and backward movement but not realizing that sideways movement, too, which is really so important in the whelping box to prevent dogs from stepping on puppies, in all of the movements that are required as they’re playing with puppies, etc., not to hurt them—that proprioception in all dimensions is really important, and that’s why the ladder is such a great tool. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [27:05] For core strength in both males and females, the exercise that is our go-to is beg or what we call rocket dog, which is when the dog is sitting on its haunches with its rear end on the ground but its front feet up, as if it’s begging. I can’t think of another descriptor for it. You feed them the whole time. You can have them licking peanut butter off a spoon, or yogurt or something like that, and they have to stay up for 15 seconds, and then you can let them down for 5 seconds, up for 15, down for 5, up for 15. When your bitch or your stud dog can do those three 15-second sessions in short order, they’re going to have a reasonably good core. Don’t worry: the first time you do this with your dog, they may literally go over like a tree. Or they can’t get their front feet off the ground. I want the yogurt, but I can’t get up there! That’s a great core strength exercise, even for Dachshunds. 

Dr. Chris Zink [28:19] Don’t worry. There’s a whole bunch of stuff on the web that says this is bad for dogs. Honestly, it’s been studied scientifically. It’s actually more pressure on the spine for the dogs who walk up and down the stairs than it is for the beg. So, you don’t have to worry that you’re going to injure the dog. In fact, if any of you own long-backed dogs like Dachshunds, you know they’re doing it all the time anyway. The whole dinner, the whole meal, you look over and they’re still sitting up, you know? Don’t have to worry about it being dangerous. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [28:50] I think my childhood Dachshund could do that for five minutes easily—easily!—while we were eating dinner. It’s pretty funny. So, what would you say on front leg strength, Chris? The wave? 

Dr. Chris Zink [29:04] Yeah, the wave is a good one. That’s an exercise in which you train the dog to paw the air. The paw should be above its head. Even if you do this yourself—hold your hand up like this while you’re listening and think about how that feels. Now put your hand up above your head, and you’ll feel that—much more engagement of your shoulder muscles, your pecs, etc. That’s the exercise. We’d like the dog to hold their paw up in the air for 30 seconds. Usually they will not hold it stationary, but they will be pawing the air. That’s fine; actually, it’s even a little bit better exercise. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [29:41] Perfectly fine. Rear length strength, I haven’t thought about those. I should have prepped beforehand. 

Dr. Chris Zink [29:52] A great one is to take a food dish and turn it upside-down, like a Golden Retriever-size food dish. Turn it upside-down. Have the dog put their front paws up on the food dish. Or you could use any kind of elevated—like a storage box, whatever, as long as it’ll stay stationary. Maybe elevate it to carpus height, okay? Where your dog’s wrist is, about that high. You have it so the dog’s front feet are on that, and then you have them circling around with their back feet, stepping in a big circle. You can have them circle three times in one direction, circle three times in the other direction, and then you can repeat that twice more. Then you can start doing all kinds of fun stuff, like going slowly, speeding up, turning around and going back, changing direction. And then you can elevate the height of that perch that the front feet are on. Elevate that a little bit at a time. That puts more weight onto the rear legs and makes the rear work a little bit harder. That’s a fun one for lots of dogs. They love to do that. (Because there’s food involved!) 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [31:05] All of this is with food. It’s not a “trick,” as in, we don’t put a command on it and have them do it. We feed them the whole time. Let me tell you: I’d probably work out more if somebody had chocolate or wine involved in the process. It might defeat it, but… Those are a couple of exercises. One of the things that I do want to say about bitches is we should have them fit before we breed them. While you’re breeding them, if you can keep doing exercises with them, that would be great. First trimester (first three weeks of pregnancy), you can continue to do just about everything. We don’t want to do mushing with them and dock diving, but everything else, they can do. As they approach the second trimester (or once they’re in the second trimester), we want to begin to wind down on what we’re doing with them. In particular, anything that might injure the abdomen. In the third trimester and the first three weeks after whelping, we should do no exercises. We could do what we call “good for soul,” which is walks and things like that. But we’re not going to do any strength training with them. We do need to be cautious with anything they could fall off of. If you’re doing other balance work that might be at a greater height, don’t be doing it with your second and third trimester bitches, as they become more ungainly. Once their puppies are born, for those first three weeks, we should be doing little or nothing and letting them put all of their energy into lactation, in particular—raising those puppies and lactating. Once we get to recovery, which is going to be after you’ve sent the puppies home, now you can go back into a pretty strong strength training program with them. I think that’s a good summary. Chris, can you think of anything else? 

Dr. Chris Zink [33:23] Let’s go to questions. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [33:25] Sounds good! Should I just go through them, Judi? 

Cat Matloub [33:32] Whatever your preference! We can read them, or I think you can see them as well, so by all means! The one other thing I’ll flag is we did get a couple via email, so I’ll chime in with those at the end. Don’t worry, folks. We’ll get to those as well!

Dr. Chris Zink [33:50] One of the first ones is: If a dog’s semen is analyzed prior to breeding (for example, in chilled semen for a TCI), would you be able to tell the fitness of the dog?

Dr. Gayle Watkins [34:05] Unfortunately not. You can see good semen or bad semen. We can have bad semen in a fit dog, because there are other things that go into semen quality. In particular, stress has a tremendous impact. Dogs that are out, particularly specialing—if you have a conformation specialist, if you have a very high-end performance dog, or just a dog that’s very sensitive to stress and happens to be in a stressful environment, that can have a tremendously negative impact on sperm quality. There are environmental factors that can affect sperm quality, in particular: heat. You can get very poor semen quality in the heat of the summer. That’s also true of dogs that happen to be either lying on hot surfaces or performance dogs that happen to be on a field trial truck or in a conformation vehicle that’s warm. Sperm don’t like heat. It can be really problematic. Cold can have an effect as well, but that’s typically going to be either the dog is lying on a very cold surface or swimming in very cold water. You can’t necessarily tell fitness from sperm. It is possible to do DNA fragmentation studies, but they are not commonly done in dogs. They’re only going to be done at vet schools. I don’t even know if Hutch’s office does them. It’s a pretty significant stretch, to do DNA fragmentation studies on sperm. It’s possible, but it’s just not something that you’re routinely going to see done. I would reserve that for the most extraordinary dog of the breed ever done. It’s just something that you’re going to reserve for really, really important stud dogs. 

Dr. Chris Zink [36:13] Karen Kennedy is asking: Are there exercises to help teach your dog? I think this would be a great time for you to tell them about Fit To Be Tied. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [36:20] Great comment, Chris. We have a program called Fit To Be Tied. It’s in AvidogZink.com. It is this entire program with now 35 exercises, 36 exercises, and they are presented to you. There are videos. We do live coaching with you. Say you just can’t get your dog rolling over—it’s one that people always have trouble teaching their dogs—in particular bitches; some bitches just say, “I am not rolling over,” and we coach you with live calls and a Facebook group. And then we give you the exercises you should be doing with your dog during each step of the breeding process. Fit To Be Tied is just a wonderful program with many, many breeders in it to make sure that their dogs are fit. You can put all your dogs in it. If you’ve got 10 dogs, one monthly price, and you can put all your dogs in it. 

Cat Matloub [37:33] We have some very exciting stuff. Keep it on the DL, but we have these monthly canine health initiatives. We’re really excited to be announcing an upcoming one that is going to be able to be applied to Fit To Be Tied, so stay tuned because we’re excited to have that as part of our kick-off for getting you guys all the support and education you need to have healthy breeding dogs. 

Dr. Chris Zink [38:00] Gayle, why don’t you put the URL in the chat? 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [38:08] You’re stretching it here! I got it! 

Dr. Chris Zink [38:14] There’s some more questions coming up, too. Alexandra Bullock is asking: How soon before breeding or how long before the due date can you do these exercises for the bitch? The bottom line is there are exercises for the entire cycle. Those exercises differ. You can start at any point of the cycle, and you’ll get the effect of how much you put into it. The ideal thing would be to start several months before the bitch is being planned to be bred. And any time you start after that, you’ll reap the ongoing benefits. You just won’t have the accumulated benefits from the past. It can be started at any part of the cycle. As Gayle already mentioned, there are some we don’t do in the second and third trimester, etc. But that’s all explained in detail. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [39:12] One of the things you’ve probably noticed is at no point did we talk about longer walks. All of our focus is on exercises that you can do at home, in your home, with a yoga mat and some treats and really very little equipment. It’s fun to get equipment. If you’re a performance person and you love to get the purple ball and the blue pods, that’s all well and good. There’s really just one piece of equipment that we think is really beneficial, and that’s an exercise peanut or oval ball for dogs. Other than that, you can use your bed, your couch, couch cushions, food dishes. 

Dr. Chris Zink [40:05] And it can all be done in your living room with the television on, if you would like. That can be really, really fun. The focus here is on non-concussive exercises that target the specific areas of the dog that you know need to be strengthened. Of course, going for a walk is neither non-concussive, nor does it target any one part of the dog’s body. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [40:37] For many dogs—Chris talks about this a lot—they don’t tell us when we’re walking or doing those concussive exercises when they’re reaching overload. They’ll run forever. Or, they’ll quit because they’re bored. They’re not really telling us, “Yeah, I’m at that fitness point” that we want them to be at. We have trouble discerning when we’re running or walking whether the dog has actually gotten the exercise that we’re looking for. We love walks. We think walks are wonderful. But they really are more for being a dog and sniffing the world and things like that. It really isn’t for fitness.

Dr. Chris Zink [41:20] I always say, “Go for a saunter. Don’t do the Bataan Death March.” 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [41:26] We have a blog. I’ll try to find it and stick it in the chat.

Dr. Chris Zink [41:31] I’ll find it, Gayle, if you answer the next question, which is a little bit off the subject: Do you recommend Baytril for 10 days at the beginning of heat to clean the bitch out before she’s bred? In the meantime, I’ll find the link.

Dr. Gayle Watkins [41:43] I don’t, Tammy. I’m not a veterinarian, but Baytril is a really, really powerful antibiotic that we need to treasure and use for diseases, infections, illnesses. If it requires our bitches to be on an antibiotic of that power to get bred, I really question whether we have the right to be doing that. Dog breeders should not be hurting the world. Our goal is to bring joy to the world, to bring these amazing dogs into the world. We should not be increasing the risk of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and pathogens while we do our breeding. I am not a fan of using antibiotics in order to get our bitches bred. If you know your bitch has an infection, that’s different—should be under treatment and should have a culture to make sure the antibiotic we’re using is appropriate, but otherwise, I’m not a fan. 

Dr. Chris Zink [42:52] We’ve got a lot of people agreeing—don’t want to take longer walks. I have four Labs. It’s really hard just to walk, let alone do longer ones. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [43:02] Yeah, if they can’t be walked together, ugh. Chris and I walk our dogs a lot, but not for fitness. I think Tammy had a question up above about her conformation male that has dead sperm but he’s really fit. I’m so sorry, Tammy. That is so frustrating. It probably isn’t fitness. It’s probably an infection, stress, heat. Unfortunately, in some breeds, in some lines, infertility is common. In some individuals, it is as well. It can just be a fluke that it happens, but it also can be passed on. There are some breeds where you need to breed the dogs early—the males—because chances of infertility as they age is pretty high. I highly recommend you do a full work-up with him, Tammy, and work with a reproductive vet to see if you can figure out what the problem is because it is so frustrating.

Dr. Chris Zink [44:18] She was wondering whether the products that are used in grooming for showing might have something to do with that. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [44:25] Probably not the products if you’re using reasonable-quality products, but bathing can and blow drying can. Don’t blow dry testicles! That just has to not be. I sit there and I watch people—especially Poodles—where there’s no coat, there’s no protection. We just run that dryer. If it’s a completely cool dryer, probably not a problem. But if there’s any heat involved, if you’re using cage dryers or something like that, it can be problematic for males. The one reminder (this is off-topic, because we’re walking fitness): it takes 63 days for new sperm to be produced and to end up in the testicles. If you've got all dead sperm or no sperm in the collection, then you have several months before that is likely to be regenerated. If your dog has an accident—if your dog has to go on antibiotics—some antibiotics like Doxy are bad for sperm, but other antibiotics will just kill it off. Fevers. As you’re looking at your breedings, you want to make sure you’re paying attention to what happens and when those breedings are because there might not be sperm available. 

Dr. Chris Zink [45:56] That’s really interesting. It takes 63 days to make new sperm, and it takes 63 days for gestation. Isn’t that interesting? 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [46:02] Isn’t that amazing? It’s really pretty remarkable. 

Dr. Chris Zink [46:05] I never knew that. Jenny Stricland is asking about a PVC ladder that she used for the AKC TT test—

Dr. Gayle Watkins [46:15] That’s the temperament test. I think that should work, yeah. The only challenge with the ladder is if you do Search and Rescue and if you teach your dogs to step on the rungs. I used to do Search and Rescue, so I taught all my dogs to climb a ladder. I met Chris, and now I’m trying to convince my dogs to step between the rungs, but they figured it out, because the cookie wasn’t coming when they got on the rungs, only when they’re off the rungs, and they’re like, “Okay. Message received. Two different commands.” 

Dr. Chris Zink [46:54] What does Jenny mean: The Cardigans aren’t doing that. Aren’t doing what? 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [47:06] They’re probably not stepping on the rungs. Search and Rescue! Yeah, maybe not. They can find things low to the ground. 

Cat Matloub [47:20] We also had one of our emailed questions. It is off-topic, but it is related to two of the questions we’ve gotten here about nutrition. We have a question that Julianna emailed: If there’s any food that makes for better food for dams? Any specific ingredients. And then there was a message here from Kathy, saying diet, perspective (there’s a lot of talk of no peas and soy)—is that your experience? 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [47:54] How do you pick nutrition for your dam? The most important thing for dams (and actually studs) is protein levels and quality and fat levels and qualities. Those are key. I usually recommend 29% or higher of protein and 18% or higher of fat. That means you may have to cut back on quantity, but that should be our standard. When we’re breeding our bitches, they actually do better with carbohydrates. When I say carbohydrates, I mean starches, so that would be grains or something else. They don’t need it before. If you feed kibble, they get carbohydrates, but if you happen to feed raw, then they may not be getting enough carbs, so you may need to supplement that. That definitely optimizes milk production, and it helps with fertility. Aside from that, the best quality food you can feed and the one your dogs do well on. That’s what I find—people go with the food that their buddies feed or something else but their dogs aren’t thriving on it. It is really important that your dog thrives on the food that you’re feeding. Chris and I are big proponents of a couple of supplements that are absolutely for breeding dogs. The most important one is fish oil, Omega-3 fatty acids, specifically one called DHA (Docosahexaenoic acid)—really, really critical for fertility and really critical for brain development in utero and during the first year of a puppy’s life. I feed it all the time. I’m assuming you feed it the dog’s entire life, Chris. 

Dr. Chris Zink [50:00] I do. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [50:01] You want to try and get 15mg of DHA specifically into your dogs for each pound of body weight that they have. You can do that calculation. But you do have to read the label, because it may say 1000mg of fish oil on the bottle, but that’s not a thousand mg of DHA. You look on the label to see how much DHA is in the product. Was that good, Cat? Did I answer the question? I think that I was blabbing on.

Cat Matloub [50:30] Yes, thank you so much! Quick follow-up: Can you give too much DHA?

Dr. Gayle Watkins [50:35] It is really incredibly hard to give too much DHA. The minimum is 14mg per pound of body weight, which is why we round it to 15, because it’s just easier for people. The maximum is 158mg per pound of body weight. That’s actually the dose for serious cardiac disease and things like that. That is a lot of DHA. I don’t think many of us can afford to feed that much. 

Cat Matloub [51:05] I just have to say I find it astounding that you’re able to just know these numbers off the top of your head! It is incredible, both of you. It’s amazing. We’re so lucky to have you here to answer these questions. I’m wanting to write down the statistics. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [51:25] Folic acid! Tina asked about folic acid. Absolutely, for bitches. I’m a great believer in folic acid. I know there are bitches that have perfectly healthy puppies without getting folic acid supplementation, but just as many end up with cleft palates. Cleft palate puppies are just difficult for us. They’re difficult to raise, they’re difficult to decide if it’s just too much and we should euthanize them. If it’s moderate or severe, they’re going to have to have surgery. Either you have to do the surgery later or the owners have to do it. There is a genetic form of cleft palates in Tollers and Labradors, but in the vast majority of breeds, if we supplement with folic acid, we will reduce the number of cleft palates. We don’t need to give folic acid prior to them coming in season. Typically you’re told if you’re thinking about getting pregnant, take folic acid. That’s not the case in dogs, because we know when they’re going to ovulate. If you start giving folic acid when they come in season, you can stop it at day 42 of pregnancy if you want. The spinal cord has been completed, and those are all center-line defects so typically for those, we only have to give it for the first two trimesters. But folic acid offers a couple of other benefits. It helps with milk production; so if you want to increase milk production, folic acid helps. If you want to assist in the removal of a toxin called BPA—or a chemical called BPA—BPA is what is in plastic water bottles or was in water bottles. It is in almost all canned dog food. Folic acid helps the bitch and the puppies and stud dogs remove that in their bodies. If you feed AAFCO dog food (the food that is approved by AAFCO), regardless of what food you feed, if it’s Maintenance or Reproductive or Puppy, there will be enough folic acid in there for stud dogs. Where they may not be enough is for pregnancy and development of puppies, so that’s when and why we supplement. 

Dr. Chris Zink [54:15] Heather is asking a question. Before it disappears, I’d like to answer. It says: I stink at walking. Can I stress out my bitch by starting a new routine just prior to a new heat? And the answer is no. Not if you just start it and be nice and do what she can and work to overload and not past that. It’s great. She’ll be like, “Holy cow! I really like this.” 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [54:37] Yeah! Make it fun! My dogs beg! BEG! “Please, can we just go take 10 minutes?” That’s all we’re talking about, 10 maybe 15 minutes. The biggest hassle is moving the ladder. But my dogs love that ladder so much. They love that game. And they’re all just games to dogs. 

Dr. Chris Zink [55:03] It’s fun time spent with you. And it really builds your relationship. We have quite a few members who said that they really didn’t think their relationship with their dog could get any better until they started doing these exercises. It strengthened and deepened their bond, which was pretty fun to see as well. 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [55:25] Yeah, it’s pretty cool. I know we’re almost at time. Karen asked about probiotics. You can start a good probiotic during pregnancy. That won’t be a problem at all. You should be fine. As always, start with a little. Give a pinch, and then go up to the right dosage. 

Cat Matloub [55:47] Maybe one last one, and then we’ll have a record of these, so I know we didn’t get to all of the ones in the Q&A. I really apologize. We’ll pull those questions out, and we’ll circle them back around. One last quick question from Kelly: Most folic acid supplements are 400-800mcg. Is there a product you are familiar with at a higher dose? 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [56:12] You can get 1mg and 5mg on Amazon, which is the easiest place to get the larger dosing. There is no good research showing us exactly what a dog should get or a bitch should get. All of the research done within the last 20 years was at 5 milligrams—not micrograms—for toy dogs, once a day. That’s a really high dose, well beyond what women take. This is a really good place where we can’t say people are bigger and therefore we should give less to dogs. If 400 is the right dose for women, then less than that should be right for dogs? That’s not, in this case, accurate. The research has been done on Frenchies, Chihuahuas—I’m trying to think of the other small dogs—and they all got 5mg a day. My recommendation is always 800mcg (two 400s or an 800 a day) up to 5mg. If you have a brachycephalic breed with the pushed-in face (a Frenchie, a toy breed), you want to give higher doses of it, so up to 5mg a day. Just a note: folic acid can make bitches nauseous so if you find that your bitch is nauseous (she may get nauseous at implantation anyway) and she won’t start eating again, you can cut back on your folic acid. 

Cat Matloub [57:58] Awesome. Thank you so much! This was amazing. Don’t worry, everyone; there will be more of these webinars to come. We’ll also be adding this to our Good Breeder Center and circulating it so you can go back and rewatch any part of it. We’ll follow up with answers to your unanswered questions in the Q&A box. We’ll include those in an email to you as well. Stay tuned for our announcement coming up just before the beginning of September with our exciting discount that will be able to be applied to Fit To Be Tied. Good stuff! 

Dr. Gayle Watkins [58:37] Go exercise your dog! It’s fun! 

Cat Matloub [58:40] Go get a ladder! Thank you so, so much, as always, Chris and Gayle. And thank you all so much for joining us and for your awesome questions and participation. We’ll talk to y’all soon.