I would just like know can you detect early hip problems,Having a large breed would like to keep my eye open for this problem appearing.

Patricia

The best thing you can probably do is get his/her hip's x-rayed at the vets once over 12 months old.

Feeding and exercising sensibly may help problems occuring even is those dogs with a heriditary disposition for hip problems.

Christine

Quite frankly, unless the puppy is a cripple there is usually nothing to show the condition of the hips. As the pelvis is really just cartilage in the early days anyway even an ex-ray would not show the condition. The earliest a dog can be scored is 12 months but it is better to wait even longer. Plates can only be submitted once so to submit them too soon and get a poor score would be very inadvisable. I tried to avoid "The Flower" doing any jumping until I had the results of her plates at around 18 months. Had they been bad I would have known not to push her too hard but as she has a very good score I know I can work her hard with no ill effects.

Regards, John