2004

Gradually Ida re-grew a coat. It was a wirehaired coat without wool, but a coat nontheless. Ida started to get happy and lively again. It was still expensive and a difficult task to keep a balance with medications too neither under-dose nor overdose her.We hated the bathing. Regardless of vast amounts of chemical products meant to keep the hairs strong and flexible, water seemed to make the coat so brittle it simply broke and fell off. The break mostly were half way up the hair, making it look like something had chewed off a part of it.

Spring 2005

In 2005 I tried a new approach. I stopped all medical treatment of Ida with the exception of levaxin for the thyroid. Instead I developed an oilmethod that revolutioned Ida’s and my lives. I began marinating her in oliveoil. No baths at all. At first there seemed no end to how much fat Ida’s body needed, but gradually the periods before her skin and coat dried out got longer and longer. Now things started to happen for the better. The coat grew strong and the hairs elastic. After a year of it she even developed a good compact layer of wool. The number of infections decreased considerably and could even be stopped at times with re-newed packings of oil.

She recovered a healthy weight and the skin and coat ceased to be a problem for her. The outbreaks of SA followed her allergy so when the system was affected by for example grass-pollen I had to increase the oilings.

My SA-treatment

Simply put: I pour a bottle of oliv-oil all over her, rub it thoroughly in everywhere, put a coat on and let her soak that up. Or let her lie near the warm stove which speeds up the drying. No washing it off – no water near her at all.

With this simple but efficient method all skabbs is softened and removed, all skin is cleansed and the coat rejuvinated. With the oil soaked up the coat would look as shiny and clean as if bathed and brushed. It has made Ida’s coat and skin function similar to what it once used to; selfcleaning and resistent.

To this I also add a large amount of oils in her food.

In the beginning even the heaviest oilsoak had gone into the skin and coat within one or two days. With time it has been enough to only fill a waterbottle with oil and spray a thin layer of it over her to keep the coat in condition.