I learned something from my dog....

So a lot of you know that I'm really curious and interested in herbs and such. So interested. Perhaps obsessive. Well, I've consistently been reprimanding my older dog. Every time we walked past this tree that smelled HORRID - she would eat the nuts and flesh at the bottom. I'm like great, my dog is going to barf now and why would she eat this. It is OBVIOUSLY poisonous from its potent smell. My poor dog...turns out the tree was ginkgo biloba.

Buhner, the herbalist, talks about how plants 'talk to you' and you will know if you need it. Similar principals to muscle testing etc. It is really frustrating given my nature of science, academic science - to believe in this stuff but I'm learning so much everyday.

And absinthe - that alcohol that was banned in the US until recently...named from artemesia absinthium - the drink was given to soldiers to prevent malaria.

This herbal stuff is amazing! I am learning to listen to what my body is craving whether it is lemons, meat, fat - yes sometimes I just want to eat straight up animal lard from a piece of meat. Just thought I would share a random thought of mine.

lol- and yes to be fair my dog did used to eat cat poop. LOL. I don't crave cats claw either...but maybe in its plant form you would - who knows! It tastes similar to cinnamon for me.

LOL! Send some of that over here! I'm still taking ginko!

I've noticed many times that my serious cravings (not just the 'wants' like for a chocoholic!) were due to something lacking in my body. I had a serious craving for salt when my adrenals were failing.

But please, Opugirl, don't follow your dog in all things - cat poo would not be good!

Hi Opugirl, dogs are smart indeed. My son recently acquired a new dog and I noticed that his dog would come and sniff my left leg every time she would see me. because this leg is the one that is giving me the most problems with bartonella, I am convinced that she can smell it (the Bartonella, not my stinky feet).

I also suffer from pain at the arch of the same leg. I was barefoot a few days ago and this dog came sniffing and after a minute or so, it started to lick the spot that hurted. When I am herxing badly, the dog will not leave my side.

We also have an older Yellow Lab and he doesn't seem to have the same instincts. He can walk by me and not give a hoot if I am in pain or not. But boy, don't let me go to the kitchen or by the pantry because then I am the center of his attention!

Traveler, love the story of your dogs rallying around you. I love animals too and had a 3 cats in my life that knew when I was sad or sick and would not leave my side.

We have two cats and a puppy know, neither cat is as attentive but I still hope the puppy becomes my buddy. She is very sweet and always has to have her body touching mine.

As for Gingko we have the stinky tree! lots of berries everywhere in the fall. The first year it happened I thought an animal had died under the house the smell was so bad. The flesh of the berries can make you sick but the nuts/seeds inside are good. The tree and the leaves are beautiful,and one of the oldest types of trees as they have found ginkgo leaves back in the dinosaur days.

I sure miss having a dog around. I lost our last one 2 or 3 years ago and I miss her silliness. I think she knew my daughter and I were ill. She would often lay at our feet or on our feet. She knew how to get my daughter to laugh. If she was sitting on the couch, Kiara would quietly go near her and then lick her between her toes and my daughter is very ticklish and would react instantly and then start laughing. Kiara would back away and get a grin on her face, quite proud of herself. She only did that to my daughter. With me, she would come up and lay her head on my lap and look me in the eye, looking very serious. I think she knew I was going through a rough time with my mother declining and my daughter ill.

After losing her, I joined a forum for the breed she was and enjoyed other peoples dogs. Some day I'll get another one. We have 3 cats, one of which showed up a few years ago, during an early cold snap, so I had to put out some food and a shelter for her. Then I tried to find her owner, with no luck. A friend thinks she's a purebred and I looked it up and think she's right. She is declawed too, so somebody put a lot of money into her. She is a very different cat and is so sweet. She will look me in the eye so seriously sometimes, like she's worried about me.


One of our cats needs to be in a home as an only pet. After having a bunch of seizures one day, she wouldn't tolerate our other cat any more. He misses having her around, but she will hiss and spit and growl if he just looks at her from 10 ft. away. I wonder if she associates the seizures with him, thinking he did something. She's a demanding girl too.

Our male cat is just plain silly. He loves to be vacuumed, which is handy since it keeps the fur down. He's still a kitten at heart.

Yes animals are the best. My husband got me a puppy in February of this year when I was pretty much at my worst. Puppy gave me a purpose to get up, even just to let her out. lol Some days that was my biggest accomplishment. It is kind of sad because I don't remember her as a puppy at all anymore. Apparently I was in bad shape then!

@Trav my older dog is larger and so smart. She will lay down next to me and not bother me all day if I'm feeling bad. She has always had amazing instincts. She is a shepard/pit mix and quite large. She can hunt without being trained too. When we were moving - she knew something was up and she refused to leave the moving truck. She almost always obeys but flat out refused then. Like I would leave my dog behind! We were so scared when a toddler came over that she would be rough with it because she is rough with us when she plays (not bad) and she played chase with the toddler but wouldn't touch the toddler or really let the toddler get very close to her but it was clear she was playing. So weird.

My younger dog is smaller - will maybe get to 40 lbs but most likely will stay 35 lbs. She is smart but in a different way. She is very inquisitive but 100% dog. My other dog seems very keen on emotions and perceptive but the younger one will just smack you in the face if you aren't feeling well. Its still kinda cute though lol.

@Garden - a cat that likes to be vacuumed??? Wow - I need to train my dogs to tolerate that!

I'm with Tera!!! Chocolate Cake would be great right now!!! Beth...I see your future girl. When you become and herbalist let me know so I can be your first client!

I in no way meant to knock larger dogs - I used to be one of those people who only had large dogs - like my wolf who was @ 165 lbs in his prime. He liked to be vacuumed too!! LOL!!! Very helpful with his super thick under coat!! He was a Giant Northern Timber Wolf and looked it. Man he was the best dog I've ever had!!

But life took a turn for me and my hubby, so we transitioned into having small dogs, as I just couldn't imagine a world where I was without my critters! Also, I used to get quite depressed without at least one critter around.

Healing - don't forget that dogs are used to detect not only the start of a seizure, but even things like cancer.....and they are very accurate! So them sniffing and finding where the infections we have are 'concentrated' so-to-speak, should be almost expected....but I find it soo interesting still!

Garden Peace, it is good to have OT threads going - not too many, but some. We are so much more than our infections!! I'm just not real good at getting those OT threads going!

I was trying to set up my photo bucket account so that I could share the pictures of the ice and snow we got (for something else to talk about) but got frustrated!! LOL! I was also planning on sharing photos of our garden as it came together this spring.