Harvey's and Flora's Ist Birthday, and Aunt Maddie sniffs out danger

Last week saw 1st Birthday greetings from litter siblings Kayla and Mollie. Tonight we have greetings from two more of their litter siblings Harvey and Flora. Harvey and Flora are from Smudge's litter born 24th February 2014 with the dad being our Reggie. The first update is from Harvey.

Handsome Harvey

"Hi Jane 
I hope you are all well. I can't believe it has been a year already. Harvey enjoyed his 1st Birthday ..we shared the blueberry muffin cake..I ate most of it and he also had some fresh chicken livers for his dinner. Harvey is a total foodie so this was his present ..his whole day is all about food. He always has his head in the bins at work, rummaging in empty packages to the point of falling in them quite a few times, where all we can see is his little back legs. There is nothing he won't eat - he even loves bananas, blueberries, carrots, all green veg. Today he was so happy and wagging his tail at a man on the platform at Liverpool St Station. At first I thought he must have dogs but Harvey was way too excited ..smelling the air and crying to go to him, jumping in the air, everyone was staring and for a moment it spooked me as Harvey was behaving like this man was the real love of his life. The man came over laughing and said …I'm a Butcher!  Every day he makes me laugh. He is absolutely adorable and really lovely natured  - thank you all again it has been an amazing year. Liza x"

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Thanks Liza for letting me know how Harvey is and the appetite is from his Mum, Smudge. Smudge loves her food and from time to time, she gets a bit wide in the girth, so we have to restrict her diet a little, but last time we did that, we kept noticing her looking very full for the amount of food she was eating. We discovered that Smudge had figured out how to get in the composting box, just flipping the lid enough to get in, eat loads of vegetable peelings and get out, with us none the wiser, until one day I caught her making her exit from the composting box. We now have a brick on the lid which seems to of stopped her. His very keen sense of smell as you read on in this blog, you will also read is a family trait. 

Next update is Harvey's litter sister Flora.

Fair Flora

"Dear Jane,
Just thought I would send a couple of photos now that Flora is a whole one year old. She is such a happy little dog! And of course we must send belated birthday greetings to her litter mates - Kayla, Mollie, Chester, Harvey and Jake. All is going well, and she is due to take her bronze award for " good companionship" on Thursday evening.
As ever Jane, thank you so much for her.Best wishes to you all , and all the best for the breeding plans for this year
Love from Lucy and Alan and 100 wags from Flora"

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Thanks Lucy for the update on Flora and that all is going well. Good luck Thursday with getting her bronze medal.

The next update is a bit special and you will soon read why. Maddie is Smudge's litter sibling, so is Aunt Maddie to Harvey and Flora. I asked Alison's permission to use this email, as I felt such a personal email. Thankfully Alison was happy for me to share this.

Aunt Maddie

"Dear Jane,

Sorry it has been awhile not being in touch.

Life has been a bit frought.

In November I was diagnosed with breast cancer and I had to have a mastectomy, so a week before Christmas I had the operation. Thank God I was given the all clear after Christmas and at the moment receiving radiotherapy.

But I just wanted to tell you I truly believe that dogs can smell and know when a person is unwell. I remember you and I discussing this subject a few years ago and I wanted you to know what Maddie did.

Maddie has always been a "daddies" girl, she follows him everywhere and only ever has eyes for him, but back in April she started following me and when she sat on my lap of an evening she would cuddle up to my right breast, which for me was a bit uncomfortable, and even pushing her down she would creep back up. I had been telling Ray that I didn't "feel right" but couldn't put  my finger on it. Even the doctor couldn't find much wrong with me, apart from the ailments I have anyway.
Ray noticed that Maddie was becoming a "Mummies" girl and put it down to me not feeling 100%.

Since having the operation she still sits on my lap but never attempts to go further up, and has gone back to being a "daddies" girl.

I am sorry this email is so long but I just had to tell you and that I firmly believe dogs can diagnose poor health and definitely cancer.

You bred a very clever dog. Thank you.

I was delighted to read you are going to have a litter of Cavaliers. They are sooo my favourite dog.

Hope all of you are well and mum of course.

Love to you all,

Alison, Ray and Maddie x"

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Thank you so much Alison for sharing the above and wish you a full and speedy full recovery. It has been thought for some time now that dogs can smell cancer in the very early stages. Oncologists say they can smell cancer in the latter stages, so it stands to reason that a dog could smell it at a lot earlier stage. This article from the Daily Mail about Dr Claire Guest work  here in the UK  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2700561/Daisy-dog-whos-sniffed-500-cases-cancer-She-saved-woman-research-revealed-uncanny-skill.html#ixzz3TGESltxI pretty much confirms that dogs do smell cancer. 


This website address  www.dogsdetectcancer.org is an American website that is training dogs to detect cancer and you can find lots of information on this site about studies done and ones that are being done and they are involved in.

For me the amazing thing is not that they can smell cancer, but like Maddie they seem to know it is not a good thing for you and want to make you aware of it, that is truly amazing.