Health
Pembrokes have an average life expectancy of 11-12 years. Like people, every animal can be susceptible to certain physical problems as they get older. Pembroke owners must not indulge their dogs by feeding them too much, which can be a hard task to accomplish. Other health problems may include degenerative myelopathy, hip dysplasia, and Von Willebrand's disease if their parents suffered from the same problems. Other top genetic disorders are progressive retinal atrophy, retinal folds, persistent pupillary membranes, cataracts, cancer and autoimmune system problems, uterine inertia during whelping, and sterility in males. A responsible breeder will have tested the parents for hips, eyes and vWD, all of which can be verified by checking the parents on the Orthopedic Foundation for Animals (OFA) site at www.offa.org.
Many domestic Pembrokes are prone to obesity and gradual weight gain, and some have problems with chronic seizures.
Pembrokes descend from the line that is the northern spitz-type dog (examples include that of the Siberian Husky).
Read more about this topic: Pembroke Welsh Corgi
Famous quotes containing the word health:
“Every violation of truth is not only a sort of suicide in the liar, but is a stab at the health of human society.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“... work is only part of a man’s life; play, family, church, individual and group contacts, educational opportunities, the intelligent exercise of citizenship, all play a part in a well-rounded life. Workers are men and women with potentialities for mental and spiritual development as well as for physical health. We are paying the price today of having too long sidestepped all that this means to the mental, moral, and spiritual health of our nation.”
—Mary Barnett Gilson (1877–?)
“Some fear that if parents start listening to their own wants and needs they will neglect their children. It is our belief that children are in fact far less likely to be neglected when their parents’ needs—for support, for friendship, for decent work, for health care, for learning, for play, for time alone—are being met.”
—Wendy Coppedge Sanford. Ourselves and Our Children, by Boston Women’s Health Book Collective, introduction (1978)