Frontier Rottweilers Darla Fund & SAS info page

Here is the special diet and supplements (developed through conversations with many herbal, holistic and natural nutrition educated people) we fed my Darla. She lived more than twice the length of time the vets gave her when she was diagnosed at 7 1/2 weeks old with grade III SAS by a board certified Cardiologist using dopplar echocardiogram.

Darla was supposed to be dead by 6 months of age, she lived to be 14 months old.

We are not veterinarians and we strongly encourage you to work with a veterinarian who is open minded to natural and holistic methods.

We do not make any representation that following Darla's Diet will cure your dog- there is NO cure. What I do not want to say, but I must, Is that SAS WILL eventually kill your dog. Your dog may live weeks, months or even years post diagnosis- but the sad reality is that SAS WILL end your dog's life one day.

We DO NOT promise that following Darla's Diet WILL definitely extend your SAS dog's life. NO ONE, not even veterinarian's , can make that guarantee.

What we do feel, is that by following Darla's Diet:

You MAY extend your dogs life,
You MAY enhance your dog's quality of life,
You MAY improve your dog's overall health-aside from the SAS,
You MAY slow the progression of SAS in your dog.

This diet and supplement schedule DID (in our opinion) extend Darla's life , and certainly improved it's quality. Darla had a VERY fun and interesting life!

(only CHANGES are listed, if an item is not listed then it stayed the SAME as above)

(again the only ones shown are those that changed from the original)

I also fed her about a mostly raw diet and I think that made almost as big a difference as the supplements did. If we ran out of meat OR supplements you could really see a difference in her energy level and behavior.

We make our own raw diet and I will tell you how below, BUT you can buy a premade raw diet like Oma's Pride, Halshan's, Purely Primitive, Victory, Primal, or Bravo, etc.
The important thing is few or no grains and fruits and mostly red meat with some veggies

For one dog the prepackage, premade raw diets are the easiest. They are a bit pricey but it takes quite a bit of work to make your own.

You'll have to decide for yourself which will work best for you.

To hand make your own version of Darla's Diet, you will need either a good juicer or a good food processor.
These are to grind the veggies. If you use a juicer you mix the juice and pulp back together after grinding.

Below is the Darla's Diet recipe.

(Sometimes I fed Darla this solely and sometimes I fed her 50/50 raw and high quality puppy kibble. (Healthwise is the brand we used. During rapid growth spurts is usually when I fed her any kibble, just to keep up with her caloric demands easier)

I make this in a large container and mix it really well. Then I scoop it out into semi packed 1 cup portions and make patties out of it and freeze 4 patties together in ziplock quart size freezer bags. As you will see it makes quite a bit.

Usually dogs eat approximately 1/2 to 1 cup of THIS raw ground diet for every 1/2 cup of dry they were eating. BUT you have to watch your individual dog's weight because, some don't need anywhere near this much!! Raw is much, much more digestible than kibble, so some dogs utilize it MUCH better :)

As an example my old dog with bladder cancer, ate just 2 cups of raw a day when she used to eat 3-4 cups of dry! So she actually ate less cups but the same weight of food (2 cups of raw = about 1 lb, 4 cups of dry Healthwise kibble= about 1 lb)

I mix together:

Plus an assortment of any of the below veggies (ground to a pulp or they won't digest at all) to equal 4-5 lbs- I used whichever I could find, not all at once- just make sure you have green and either carrot , an orange fleshed squash or sweet potato mixed the majority of the time (greens + a carotene producing veggie)

As you feed this to your dog add one 400 mg Calcium Citrate tablet per every one cup/1 patty of the raw mix, plus 1 spoonful whole milk yogurt.
DO NOT mix these in with the food ahead of time

Add the other supplements listed in the beginning of this page as you prepare each meal.

As you can see it's a good bit of work to do it right

If you choose to feed a prepared raw diet (like Halshan's, Aunt Jeni's, Oma's Pride, Bravo, Purely Primitive, etc), instead of making your own, check the labels. If the mix contains ground bone then do not add Calcium Citrate to it.

BREEDING RECOMMENDATIONS

Doppler echo by a board certified cardiologist is the GOLD STANDARD and best screening tool we CURRENTLY have

NOTE: there are currently two sets of velocity (LVOT) guidelines.
The stricter version is directly below and IS the one I believe in and provides the best level of breeding confidence AT THIS TIME (until a DNA test is developed).
The other is the newer ACVIM/ARCH version which is less strict and which I and the cardiologists I have used over the years, believe allows FAR too many high velocity dogs to be bred. That newer/less strict version is listed after the below better/stricter version.

There are basically two categories of Rottweilers

Category 1
***************************************

For dogs without KNOWN SAS in their background and whose parents (and better yet siblings too) are cardiologist cleared; then a cardiologist (or 2nd best- a specialist) auscultation is generally considered "acceptable".

HOWEVER, a cardiologist performed echo will allow you to evaluate velocities (LVOT) and risks better and dogs "should" only be used for breeding if LVOT is 1.7 m/s and below giving you the "best confidence level" possible and dogs 1.71-1.89 m/s giving you an "element of risk"

Category 2
(FOUR different sub categories: read close)
***************************************

Dogs who are either Imports themselves (and thus have no cardiac testing background since the vast majority of overseas breeders do no cardiac screening),

OR

are the offspring of an Import (even if the import is cardiac cleared)

OR

are the offspring of non imports that are not screened OR the offspring of dogs who have any type of Practitioner cardiac clearance

OR

whom have a relative with either a velocity 1.9 m/s and above OR a relative is affected with SAS, OR a relative that died of SAS

Those dogs that fall into this category should have a Doppler echo done by a cardiologist (or second best- specialist) and should ONLY be added to a breeding program if their velocity (LVOT) is 1.7 m/s or below

At NO POINT is a Practitioner certification EVER acceptable. (IF looking at an OFA cardiac certificate the last letters tell you who did them C-ECHO = cardiologist echo, S-ECHO = specialist echo, C= cardiologist auscultation, S = specialist auscultation, P-ECHO = practitioner echo, P = practitioner auscultation)

MY current practice is to bring BOTH the OFA and ARCH cardiac forms with me to the cardiac exam and submit to BOTH organizations.
The OFA form will allow your evaulation to be seen in a searchable database along with all your dog's other health tests and the ARCH form will provide you with more detailed information and will also add statistical data to a semi searchable database of ONLY cardiologist performed cardiac evaluations (you get a certificate from both groups). See Annie's page for links to both certifications

I base all of my above recommendations on conversations with Researchers from 2000 - 2006, extensive reading of the current and past research, and conversations with the cardiologists I have personally used over the past years since 1995.

Here are the "Less strict" ACVIM/ARCH Standards (current 2011)

In dogs without structural changes and with no murmur (except innocent functional murmurs)

LVOT Velocities of less than 1.9 m/s - deemed clear
LVOT Velocities of 1.9 - 2.4 m/s - deemed equivocal; breeder assumes a risk level
LVOT velocities above 2.4 m/s - breeding not recommended

Our Rottweilers	Rottweiler Info
Raising Rottweilers	Rottweiler Art
Our Shiba Inu	Shiba Inu Info

Home Next Page

The Darla Fund was started in memory of our beloved Rottweiler Darla
(VP rated Frontier Justagenius Darla).

Darla died as a direct result of the Sub Aortic Stenosis she was born with.

MANY THANKS to all for helping Darla's death to help other Rottweilers in the future.

Darla's Diet

Our Rottweilers

Rottweiler Info

Raising Rottweilers

Rottweiler Art

Our Shiba Inu

Shiba Inu Info