David, LOL! Didn't we have fun in Tennessse! I miss you and would love to see you soon. I really wanted the front seat! I am telling all of you, it was so exciting to share snow with my Maggie. DH took a test tube of snow and froze it so Maggie would always have her "first snow" (rolling eyes). You guys, it really is a big deal that we got snow!! May (lowspark), I thought of you during the day ;-) Annie, I like our "dusting" of snow. I am not prepared for 30 inches. We would be land locked and not know what to do with ourselves.

The stiffness when walking could be a lot of things but degenerative joint disease of the hips or spine comes to mind immediately. My old Rottie K'Ehleyr has lumbar-sacral spondylosis, which is the body's way of correcting lax joints- basically building up excessive bone around the weaker joints. Because of her L-S disease, she walks very slowly, puts as much weight on her front legs as possible, has difficulty going up and down stairs, and doesn't move around more than she has to. She is on a lot of pain control which helps a bit- she no longer cries when going up or down stairs and she is somewhat more active but certainly still less active than even an old rottie should be. Animals in pain display their symptoms differently. Nothing besides personal death would keep K'Ehleyr from eating her food, but I have seen dogs that are in pain not eat because of that, especially if their pain is in the cervical or thoracic spine. On her bad days before I had her on all the meds, she would try to be clingy but that was too painful. Some dogs shiver when in pain. Considering her history with a slow progression of signs, I would be very suspicious of pain especially in the spine. A thorough physical exam should localize the pain, and radiographs may show what the problem is. Sometimes neurogenic pain such as with compressed disks and other soft tissue spinal cord injuries cannot be seen on radiographs but there are other imaging modalities that may help. Not to scare you too much because the appetite changes could be related to bad pain days, but my Aleksander had gastric adenocarcinoma. His first signs were a picky appetite. Like your dog, Aleks had always been one to skip meals every once in a while, but it became more frequent when he was sick. He didn't have any other signs- was still as active as ever- and he had always vomited 1-2 times a month. But when it started being that his appetite was more picky and he was vomiting 1-2 times a week, I knew something was wrong. These kinds of vague symptoms are really hard to sort out. Almost any disease in any system could cause them, so it really takes a lot of effort and searching (and money unfortunately) finding out what is going on. The stiffness may be a clue to the other problems, and getting her pain treated may resolve everything else, which would be wonderful. But that may not be the case, and you have to be prepared for possibly a bunch of tests that show nothing. Well, not actually nothing; having normal bloodwork is good since it means that the liver, kidney, pancreas, adrenals, etc are all ok. But it leaves you searching even more. I hope you can get to the bottom of her problems soon. Good luck.

Thanks everyone. When she has managed to escape the collar, the collar is open, so the clasp is somehow coming undone. This has happened a couple times when our daughter has been watching her, and I just assumed she hadn't done the closure properly. But I did the buckle this morning myself. And, after she escaped the first time, I am certain I did it properly the second time, with no hair getting caught, etc. So it's either defective, or she's doing it with her paws which is very hard to believe. I've tried pulling it apart myself and it won't pop open--but I guess I'm not as strong as a determined 7-lb puppy. I have a call in to the manufacturer to find out if it's a break away. Luckily this has only happened while we're in the house and not on a walk. Thanks for your help!

Thanks, I am looking at that and also for Metarhizium anisopliae Strain F52 The EPA has approved M. anisopliae for residential outdoor grub and tick control (Tick-Ex, an oil formulation, and Taenure, a granular formulation; Earth BioSciences, Glastonbury, CT).