Only Natural Pet Store Blog

Allergies are becoming more and more common and troublesome in cats and dogs. The most common symptoms we see are excessive scratching, licking and paw chewing. If you have ruled out other causes of your companion’s itchiness such as mange, ringworm or infection, then the following guidelines can help you alleviate the allergy itch.

Other allergy symptoms (typically from inhalant allergies):

• chronic ear infections
• respiratory symptoms
• eye discharge

such as coughing or nasal congestion

Additional symptoms of food allergies:

• vomiting
• diarrhea
• inflammatory bowel disease

Some holistic veterinarians also believe that seizures, arthritis, asthma and chronic urinary tract infections can be caused or complicated by food allergies.

Keep in mind that any secondary bacterial or yeast infections must be treated before much progress can be seen in remediation of the underlying cause of the itchy skin. Hot spots occur from self-inflicted trauma that results when the pet attempts to relieve a pain or itch by excessive scratching, biting and rubbing. These must be controlled with topical treatments while the animal’s immune system is recovering.

Itchy skin and allergy symptoms such as paw chewing have also been linked to over-vaccination in a large number of cases. See The Truth About Pet Vaccinations for more details.

One of the most common causes of itchy skin is fleas and flea allergies. If you suspect fleas, please see our article, The Natural Approach to Flea Control.  Flea control is an essential step in the treatment plan for any animal with allergies.

Essential Steps:  Diet, Digestive Enzymes, EFAs

Diet: Many dogs with food sensitivities and allergies have seen dramatic improvement on a raw food diet. If not raw, consider home-prepared cooked meals along with a very high quality canned food or dehydrated food as at least 50% of the diet. Basically, the fresher the diet, the better it is for your companion’s health & immune system. If you feed kibble as part of the diet, try to use the best quality you can afford and choose a hypoallergenic variety without the most common allergens such as wheat, corn, soy and chicken. For more information, read What You Need to Know About Your Pet’s Food and All About Raw Food.

Digestive Enzymes: Supplement the diet with Digestive Enzymes & Probiotics. The probiotics are especially important for an animal that has been on steroids and antibiotics as they kill the healthy gut flora and set up conditions for the allergies to worsen. Continue to supplement with this whenever you feed processed food to aid digestion and assimilation of the nutrients in processed foods: Digestive Enzymes

Essential Fatty Acids (EFAs): Supplement with Essential Fatty Acids (preferably fish oil) to nourish your companion’s skin and coat and help reduce inflammation. You can increase the dosage above what is recommended on the bottle, but if you see loose stools, then reduce the dosage a bit.

Immune Modulation

Supplements to help modulate the immune system are very helpful in treating allergies. Only Natural Pet Immune Balance is an excellent supplement for immune modulation during the initial treatment of allergies.

Detoxification/Elimination Support

Detoxification is essential for any animal that has been treated with multiple courses of medications such as steroids, antibiotics or antihistamines. Steroids are particularly taxing on the animal’s liver.

• Quercenol by Seven Forests
• Only Natural Pet Blood and System Herbal Formula
• Animals’ Apawthecary Constitutional Blend
• Animals’ Apawthecary Detox Blend
• Newton Homeopathics Detoxifer

The length of time these supplements may be necessary will vary with the severity of the problem and the response of the individual animal. Natural supplements, herbs and remedies are not like prescription medications – they may vary in effectiveness from one animal to the next, and in many instances take time to reach full effectiveness, up to several weeks or more.

Relieving the Itch

Herbs and supplements designed to relieve the itchy skin and support skin health are another step in the treatment program for chronic allergies. This can help relieve the stress caused by the discomfort, which is supportive of immune function and healing. In addition, reducing the itch helps in the reduction of secondary infections and allows the skin to heal.

Skin Balance by Health Concerns is an excellent herbal complex for the treatment of itchy skin in dogs (the tablets are too big for cats and need to be crushed to adminster them to cats). The herbs in Skin Balance reduce inflammation and itching as well as boost skin health and assist in the cleansing of the blood.
HomeoPet Skin and Itch Relief, a homeopathic remedy, may be helpful for some animals. This will be more effective once any residual steroids or medications have been cleared from the system. HomeoPet Hot Spots is similar to the Skin and Itch Relief formula, but contains additional remedies to address the red, inflamed or oozing hot spot areas.

Topical Treatments

If your dog or cat has been itching for awhile, they may have created bare, red patches in places that can become infected, so you need to address these areas right away. Here are some products offered at Only Natural Pet Store that can help.

For Cats:

• Only Natural Pet Herbal Skin Ointment
• FidoDerm Herbal Spray
• Doc Ackerman’s Instant Hot Spot Relief Spray

For Dogs:

• Only Natural Pet Herbal Skin Ointment
• FidoDerm Herbal Spray
• Doc Ackerman’s Instant Hot Spot Relief Spray
• Liquid Hot Spot Remedy (essential oils)
• Oatmeal Baths followed by conditioner to seal in moisture

If more potent topical treatment is necessary, your veterinarian can prescribe topical treatments and shampoos to help curb the itchiness.

Every pet has three basic needs: a safe place to live, a healthy diet and lots of love. Sounds simple – especially the lots of love part, but it takes some careful thought to provide the first two. June is pet safety month and we would like to offer some helpful hints to keep in mind when caring for your companion. Only Natural Pet Store is the perfect place to find information about animal safety for your cat or dog!

Keeping our companions safe is typically common sense, but also requires being informed about how many household items or substances may pose potential dangers to our furry friends. Here are a few things all pet guardians should know:

Indoor Cleaning and Air Pollution
We don’t often think about the air in our homes as a source of toxins, but for our companions’ sake it is important to examine our home from a “nose to the ground” point of view. Chemicals in many cleaning products can be highly toxic, especially floor cleaners. Since your companion’s nose is continually close to the floor along with all four paws coming in contact with any residue, then their body is likely having to detoxify every time you clean the floor – which places a strain on their organ systems. Natural alternatives are readily available, and simple home-made products with inexpensive ingredients like baking soda, vinegar and borax clean as well as most commercial products (see links below for more information). Plug-in air fresheners are popular with some folks to help cover up that “pet” smell–but they are a constant source of petrochemicals in the air our companions breathe. Choosing more natural cleaning products and air fresheners will go a long way to limiting the toxins your companion has to deal with on a daily basis. See our Non-toxic Stain and Odor Control products.

Foods
Many a dog owner has been known to affectionately refer to their companion as “the four-legged garbage disposal” as they will happily eat most anything we are eating. (Most cats tend to be a bit more discriminating, thankfully). Some of our favorite foods, however, can be toxic to our companions. It is important to keep these foods in places that are inaccessible to your pet. Following is a partial list of fare that can be toxic to your companion and should be kept out of reach:

• chocolate
• onions
• grapes & raisins
• coffee grounds
• yeast dough
• macadamia nuts
• xylitol – a sweetener found in chewing gum, candy and breath fresheners

Don’t forget to throw away meat wrappers and packaging immediately – and keep the trash in a latched cabinet or container with a pet-proof lid.  Keep in mind that it takes a lot less to make a little dog sick, so those with smaller companions must be most attentive to safety.

Medications & Vitamins
Pills dropped on the floor are fair game for the cat – they move like prey when you bat at them! Keep medications and vitamins safely stored – especially your companion’s vitamins since they are likely flavored and smell enticing. Our customer service department receives a call or two a month about pets that have eaten more than their daily allowance of a vitamin or supplement that was left out on the counter or in a lower cabinet that the animal could open. If your dog or cat does ingest human medication or supplements, contact your veterinarian or the ASPCA poison control center right away at the number listed below. Many human medications can be highly toxic to animals even in small doses. If your companion manages to consume more than the usual dose of their own vitamins or supplements, you will want to determine just how much they ate. If just a few extra vitamins or joint support tablets are missing, they may just have a bit of a stomach ache and be a little extra thirsty – so keep an eye on them and provide lots of fresh water. If, however, they manage to eat the whole container; contact your veterinarian.

Houseplants
Plants provide beauty and fresh air to our indoor spaces. Your puppy or kitten may see houseplants as toys or an extra snack, but this can prove dangerous depending on the plant. Learn which plants are potentially toxic and keep them high out of reach. Some toxic houseplants include;

• Amaryllis
• Azalea
• Caladium
• Creeping Charlie
• Dracaena
• Dieffenbachia
• Easter Lily
• Golden Pothos
• Mistletoe
• Philodendron
• Peace Lily

(See links at the bottom of the page for a more complete list and further information)

For those companions who like to graze try the Kitty’s Garden.

Pest Control
Insecticides and rodenticides must be used with extreme caution in or around a household with pets. Baits or traps must be located in areas totally inaccessible to your companion. Bug sprays and baits should be used with extreme caution and the area treated should be off limits to your pet for at least several days. Read product labels carefully for toxicity information. Cats, and some dogs, love to hunt and eat bugs and rodents, so be sure they cannot come into contact with bugs or mice that have been poisoned.

Mothballs are very toxic to dogs and cats (and people for that matter). Cats love to jump in open drawers or storage boxes, so use cedar paper or other moth deterrents instead.

Flea control products, even those designed to use on and around animals, can be toxic to our companions over time.  There are natural alternatives that work as well or better than conventional chemical pesticide based products.  Please see the article The Natural Approach to Flea Control.

Garage
Many of us tend to store a variety of chemicals and yard products in the garage. One of the most dangerous of those is antifreeze. Antifreeze tastes sweet and is attractive to pets, but is highly toxic even in small amounts. With warmer temperatures approaching, be sure to watch for leaks from overheated cars. If you see a bright green liquid dripping from the car, clean it up immediately. Better yet, use the safer alternative antifreeze containing propylene glycol (instead of ethylene glycol as in traditional antifreeze).

If you keep yard and garden products in the garage, be sure they are up high on the shelves or in plastic bins with lids. Bins help keep the fumes from fertilizers and other products contained as well. Paints, paint thinners, glues and solvents stored in the garage should be kept away from pets as well – especially when being used. Spills must be addressed immediately to insure a dog or cat does not step in a paint or solvent – many solvents will burn the skin and paws very quickly, and paints will surely be licked off and ingested.

Yard
The yard is another place to focus on the elimination of toxic exposure for our companions. The ingredients in herbicides, insecticides and soil amendments can be toxic to both pets and children. Chemical fertilizers and other lawn products should be eliminated. There are abundant alternatives available now that are organic and natural and will not add to the burden on our companions’ overtaxed systems. Even organic alternatives need to be used carefully, however. Bone meal, for instance, is a natural source of phosphorus and can be appealing to some dogs. They won’t necessarily lick enough off the ground to make themselves sick, but the box or bag needs to be stored safely out of Fido’s reach. Always read labels carefully, even on more natural products, to make sure you understand exactly what is in the product and if any precautions are necessary around children or pets. Cats are fastidious groomers and after walking across a treated lawn or yard area will surely lick their paws. It may be necessary to limit access to areas of the yard that need to be treated with products that can pose a risk to their health.

Many dogs love to dig in and investigate new mulch and garden areas. Choose your mulch carefully: cocoa bean mulch is a byproduct of chocolate manufacturing and contains the same substances as chocolate that are dangerous for dogs: caffeine and theobromine. Cocoa bean mulch has a lovely rich color and smells great when spreading it around the garden, but it’s not the right choice for a yard with a pooch that likes to dig and sample her surroundings.

The plants in your yard may also pose a threat to a dog or cat who likes to “graze” and taste everything – typically more of a problem with puppies and kittens than older animals. A few landscape plants that are toxic to animals include yew, wild black cherry, azalea, rhododendron, hydrangea, daphne, nandina, oleander, English ivy, daffodil, tulip, lily of the valley, foxglove, hyacinth, rhubarb and castor bean. (See links below for further information). If these are already a part of your yard and you are bringing home a new companion, it is best to fence them off until those tasting and chewing urges subside.

Compost piles and worm bins are quite popular with eco-minded gardeners, but be sure they are inaccessible to your dog who might find the decaying leftovers tantalizing. Dogs who sample the compost pile will likely vomit and/or have diarrhea and can become dehydrated. If your companion is prone to “sampling” garbage, compost or anything else he finds on the ground, we recommend keeping a remedy or two handy to help him recover.  Here are a few of our favorites: Fast Balance, Quick Relief, HomeoPet Digestive Upsets, or Love My Pet Tummy-Ease.

Heat
Heat stroke is an emergency that requires immediate care. With summer fast approaching and temperatures rising take all precautions to prevent heat stroke and know the signs so you can treat it quickly.

The best precaution is to leave your dog home on sunny or hot days. On an 85 degree day, the temperature inside your car, even with the windows open a bit, will climb to 102 degrees in 10 minutes! After half an hour, it will go up to 120 degrees or even higher! On a 90 degree day, temps in that car can top 160 degrees faster than you can walk around the block. Even if your dog has separation anxiety when you leave her at home, she is still safer there than in your car. Give her some calming herbs or remedies and leave her where she will be cool.

Symptoms of heat stroke:

• Rapid panting
• Bright red tongue
• Gums will be red at first, then pale as heat stroke progresses
• Thick, sticky saliva, followed by a dry mouth as heat stroke progresses
• Exhaustion OR agitation
• Vomiting
• Dizziness
• Shock

What to do:

1. Get the animal in the shade immediately – or into an air conditioned building.
2. Wet him with cool water (not too cold – you don’t want to lower the body temperature too rapidly or too far). Lower his body temperature gradually using cool water and a fan.
3. Dry him and wrap in towels while you drive to the nearest emergency veterinary clinic – even if he appears to be recovering he may need subcutaneous fluids to prevent further complications such as shock, respiratory distress, kidney failure or heart problems.

The Car
When it is cool enough to take your friend with you in the car, be sure to buckle her up! You may be a very safe driver, but can you say the same about everyone else on the road?  Pets left unrestrained can be tossed across the car, or worse, out of the car. Pets are safer in seat belts or crates.

Safe & Healthy Food
Only Natural Pet Store specializes in top quality pet food.  Please see our articles about Evaluating Canned and Dry Food and What You Need to Know About Your Pet’s Food.
Following are some additional resources for keeping your pets safe and happy:

Eco-cycle.org for Home-made Cleaning Product Recipes

Safer yard and garden supplies: Gardens Alive Online and Catalog Store

ASPCA – poisonous plant information:  10 Most Common Poisonous Plants and Toxic Plants

ASPCA Animal Poison Control Center 1-888-426-4435; As the premier animal poison control center in North America, the APCC is your best resource for any animal poison-related emergency, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. If you think that your pet may have ingested a potentially poisonous substance, make the call that can make all the difference: (888) 426-4435. A $55 consultation fee may be applied to your credit card. Be prepared to state your pet’s breed, age, weight and any symptoms. Keep the product container or plant sample with you to assist in identification so the appropriate treatment recommendations can be made.

AVMA Household Hazards Brochure

Article about pet first aid: When is it Time to See the Vet?

By Guest Author, Dr. Tom Farrington, MVB MRCVS VetMFHom

Phobias are excessive, unreasonable and intense fears of objects or situations that usually pose little or no actual danger. In the case of storm phobias, pets display both nervous and behavioral signs that may worsen as a storm intensifies. Nervous phobia signs include one or more of panting, shaking, dilated pupils, excessive salivation, and loss of bladder control, bowel control, or both (see Table). Behavioral signs can be as simple as whining or crying, and can also include obsessive seeking of human companionship for comfort and reassurance or just to be in the vicinity of the owner. Hiding is common in storm phobic dogs and is the most common sign seen in cats. Selected hiding places are often dark and den-like (for instance a kennel, closet, or behind furniture). For reasons not fully understood, some dogs favor hiding in a bathroom, perhaps because ionized bathroom air is more calming. Frantic barking, destruction, and attempts to escape, are also described in storm phobic dogs.

Behavioral and nervous signs that dogs and cats may show when storms threaten or are in process:

 It is more accurate to describe the condition as storm, rather than thunderstorm, phobia because the phobia can develop in the absence of thunder, arising in response to one or more of a combination of rain, sleet, strong wind, changes in illumination from lightning flashes, and even snow. Some dogs may begin to show behavioral signs of storm phobia well before a storm actually arrives, or even when there is a nearby storm of which the owner is unaware. These signs may be restlessness, pacing or whining and could be a response to a sudden drop in barometric (air) pressure or change in the electrical charge of the air.

The more frequently a pet reacts to the anxiety-provoking stimulus, the worse and more rapid the response may become, so the owner is faced with a growing problem with no easy solution. These fear behaviors can escalate to panic, causing dogs to be seriously injured in their attempts to escape what they perceive to be severe danger. Phobic dogs have been known to break through screened or glass doors or windows. Household damage also results from the pet biting and scratching doors, carpets, drapes, furniture and other items.

Dogs rescued from shelters may be at greater risk than non-rescue dogs for developing storm phobias. Herding dogs, particularly German shepherds, Labrador retrievers and golden retrievers appear to be over-represented among dogs with various phobias, perhaps linked to their inherently anxious temperaments. Although many dogs with storm phobias do not have any other anxiety-related problems, it is quite common for storm phobia to be accompanied by separation anxiety, and there may also be a phobia of loud noises. Dogs with fearful personalities are predisposed to storm phobias which can result from genetics, from early aversive experiences or from inadequate socialization as puppies. Dogs with well adjusted temperaments and no history of early changes in home or aversive experiences can also be affected. Phobic signs are typically first seen in dogs between 1 and 5 years of age, although many dogs may be less than 12 months old at the time the problem begins.

Obviously upsetting for the pet, storm phobias are a problem from an animal welfare perspective. Additionally, the behavior shown by the pet, especially dogs, is extremely upsetting for owners, who are distressed by their pet’s anxiety and by the resulting damage inflicted on their homes. Failure to effectively manage these phobias can have an unfortunate effect on the owner-pet bond and lead to pet abandonment, placement in a shelter or alternate home or even, in the severest cases, to euthanasia.

Storm phobia is considered a particularly difficult fear to treat. Typically in behavioral problems, desensitization is very helpful. Desensitization involves repeatedly exposing the pet to the threatening stimulus at a controlled level that is below the threshold that initiates the phobia. As the pet becomes accustomed to the low-level threat, exposure is repeated at gradually increasing levels in a manner that does not produce the signs of phobia. However, owners who live in areas where storms are common may be unable to isolate their pet from storms during the desensitization period, and so desensitization alone is not adequate.

There are no pharmacologic treatments registered to treat storm phobias. Some drugs have been tried off-label, including benzodiapines and acepromazine, although the latter may sometimes make the signs worse. Anti-anxiety drugs such as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (eg fluoxetine) and tricyclic antidepressants (clomipramine) have also been used, but have a drawback in that treatment must begin 2 or more weeks before the phobia-initiating stimulus. All drugs carry a risk of side effects, typically excessive sedation, and some may cause vomiting and other problems. 

In treating storm phobia, drug adverse effects may be avoided by using alternative therapies, such as homeopathic remedies or dog appeasing pheromone (DAP).

DAP is a synthetic mixture of compounds that match post-partum secretions of the sebaceous glands, and are delivered by an electronic diffuser. Homeopathy involves giving very small doses of remedies that would produce the same or similar symptoms of illness in healthy pets if they were given in larger doses. A recent survey of owners using a homeopathic product (HomeoPet Anxiety) found a positive response in 34 of 36 (94.4%) dogs treated for storm phobia (see Figure 1). An important benefit that emerged in the survey was that there were no adverse reactions to the homeopathic remedy. This safety profile, combined with the favorable post treatment alleviation in signs of phobia, may account for the high level of client satisfaction that has been reported with HomeoPet Anxiety.

Figure 1. Percentage of storm phobic dogs in levels of improvement after treatment with HomeoPet Anxiety. Grading was completed by each dog’s owner on a scale of -5 (much worse) to 0 (no change) to +5 (much better or completely cured).

Please Note: Since the writing of this article, HomeoPet has developed HomeoPet Pro Storm Stress, a faster-acting product designed specifically for storm phobia in pets.

References and Additional Reading:

Crowell-Davis SL, Seibert LM, Sung W, Parthasarathy V, Curtis TM. Use of clomipramine, alprazolam, and behavior modification for treatment of storm phobia in dogs. J Am Vet Med Assoc. 2003 Mar 15;222(6):744-8.

McCobb EC, Brown EA, Damiani K, Dodman NH. Thunderstorm phobia in dogs: an Internet survey of 69 cases. J Am Anim Hosp Assoc. 2001 Jul-Aug;37(4):319-24.

Overall KL, Dunham AE, Frank D. Frequency of nonspecific clinical signs in dogs with separation anxiety, thunderstorm phobia, and noise phobia, alone or in combination. J Am Vet Med Assoc. 2001 Aug 15;219(4):467-73.

Simpson BS, Papich MG.Pharmacologic management in veterinary behavioral medicine. Vet Clin North Am Small Anim Pract. 2003 Mar;33(2):365-404, vii.

Thunderstorms, hurricanes, windstorms and tornados are not always predictable, making storm phobia a particularly difficult fear to treat in pets, and for owners whose pets exhibit these fears, it can be equally distressing. Not only
do the pets show signs of nervousness (pacing, panting, chewing and drooling), they will also display behavioral signs (hiding, owner seeking, trembling, vocalizing, trying to escape, and destruction), which can be even more
upsetting, and even dangerous, as phobic dogs have been known to break through screen doors or windows in an attempt to escape, causing serious injury to themselves.

Here are a few tips provided by our friends at HomeoPet to keep your pet calm and safe during storms:

1. Leave your pets at home and indoors. Most pets are afraid of storms and may try to run away.

2. Close all doors and windows and put on background music to muffle the sound.

3. Close curtains and blinds to block the lightning.

4. Be sure that your pets are wearing identification tags or have microchips in case they do run away or get lost.

5. Try to distract your pet with chew toys and games, or play with another pet that does not share his fear.

6. If you have time, desensitization techniques with appropriate sound CDs, such as thunder, fireworks, trains, sirens, etc. may help pets get used to the sounds at a lower volume, then as they become more comfortable, gradually increase the volume.

7. If your pet has storm phobias, speak to your veterinary clinic staff about a veterinary-only, non-sedating remedy such as HomeoPet Pro Storm Stress to keep your pet calm during storm seasons.