Quercetin: The Pawsitive Bioflavonoid

Quercetin is a wonderful supplement for dogs or humans suffering from allergies or asthma. Quercetin is a bioflavonoid (or flavonoid), which is a type pigment found in almost all herbs, fruits, and vegetables. It is also an antioxidant. a natural anti-histamine, and anti-inflammatory supplement

Research has shown that Quercetin’s antihistamine action may help to relieve allergy symptoms and asthma symptoms. Quercetin helps treat allergies by blocking the secretion of histamine in the body. Histamine is what causes inflammation and swelling. The symptoms of a histamine reaction can be stuffy nose, itchy eyes, sneezing, itchy or red skin, runny eyes and more. The anti-inflammatory properties may help to reduce pain from disorders such as arthritis.

Quercetin supplements are also available in concentrated powders and tablet or capsule form. It is often packaged with bromelain (an enzyme found in pineapple), another substance that has been found useful for treatment of allergies and inflammation, which is thought to increase the absorption of Quercetin.

I personally use the Solaray Brand since it has bromelain in the formula. The Solaray formula comes in capsules, which makes it is easy to break one apart and sprinkle on your dog’s food.

My pet humans have diagnosed me with Squirrel OCD syndrome. I must make sure to chase every squirrel i see. Even the ones that i think are hiding from me. How they mock me – laughing with those little squirrelly snickers while running up trees holding their little acorns. The nerve. How i do wish i could catch one. But i am held back by a L-E-A-S-H. So unfair.

The pet humans now refer to the Salem Commons as”Squirrel-andia”. (Beta-chic has a song for Squirrel-andia to the tune of Oh Canada. Be thankful that we do not have a recording of that to post!)

And i am not sure why i keep hearing them say in a very bad Russian accent “Boreeese we must get squirrel” every time i stop and point at a squirrel. I think the only remedy for this OCD affliction is organic chicken sausage given at regular intervals 3 hours apart each day.

Time to go search for more squirrels,
Quan Yin

Click here to watch the Rocky & Bullwinkle Show!

Many people are stunned when my pet human insists that all TV, radio and music is turned off in the house during their dog’s acupuncture session. So i thought i would take this opportunity to talk about this from my canine point of view!

Music has a very powerful effect on all of us animals. Calming and classical music has been proven to relax people as well as animals. Have you ever notice that you become agitated while shopping in a store playing annoyingly loud music? Perhaps you would have stayed and shopped longer if the music was happy, peaceful or classical? Have you ever tried to eat in a restaurant that had really bad booming music? My pet human, aka Beta-chic actually has the nerve to ask the owners to please turn the music down. If they don’t then she walks out never to shop in that establishment again. In fact there are now several restaurants in Salem that neither of my pet humans will eat at because of the extremely loud music – or worse the annoying sound of several TVs blasting. Do we really need all this noise?

A dog’ sense of hearing is the second most developed organ. We dogs can hear a lot better than humans. We can hear frequencies such as ultrasounds. We hear things you can’t even fathom! So can you even imagine what booming loud music does to us – especially music with lots of heavy base like rap. It is upsetting, disturbing and can make us very cranky! (It does the same to people too!)

There are now several relaxing musical CDs out on the market to play for your pets while you are away. Or you could play classical music for your animals and your plants. I am a very fortunate dog. My pet humans despise TV so much they don’t even have cable so we never have that blasting in our home.

So to insure a calm and peaceful environment for the dog patient and Beta-chic, Four Paws Acupuncture has a policy to have no music or TV on during the session. It makes for a more positive experience for all and is in the best interest of the dog. We hope that this trend becomes so popular that all animal shelters, vet hospitals and doggie daycare centers start playing music to soothe us savage beasts too!
Until next post – Happy Tails
Quan Yin
Pawsitive Relations Director of Four Paws Acupuncture
p.s. Here is an article about the effects of classical music on animals below.

Animal welfare: Classical music soothes the wanderlust of zoo elephants
Playing Elgar, Puccini and Beethoven to the animals reduces abnormal behaviours such as swaying, pacing and trunk tossing
James Randerson, science correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Monday 17 November 2008 11.05 GMT

The rousing, patriotic sweep of Elgar’s Nimrod, the mournful tones of Nessun Dorma and the urgent eight-note allegro con brio opening to Beethoven’s fifth – they have all been helping animal behaviour experts to make life more comfortable for the elephants at Belfast zoo.

The researchers have discovered that playing classical music to the animals reduces abnormal behaviours such as swaying, pacing and trunk tossing, although they said elephants don’t seem to have a favourite composer.

“We tend to see in some situations that elephants don’t cope well with captivity just because they have this inherent instinct to roam vast distances,” said Dr Deborah Wells at Queen’s University in Belfast. “The rationale underlying this study is really to try and improve their welfare and in particular to try to improve these stereotypic patterns of behaviour that elephants are prone to.”

Her team recorded the behaviour of four female Asian elephants every minute for four hours a day over three five-day periods. “Every single behaviour the elephants could perform, we recorded,” said Wells.

During the first five days the animals were not exposed to any music. In the second five days the researchers placed a speaker in their enclosure playing a CD of classical music by the likes of Mozart, Elgar, Handel and Beethoven. During the final five days the speaker was switched off.

The team report in the journal Animal Welfare that the frequency of abnormal behaviours dropped dramatically while the music was playing whereas normal behaviours, such as feeding, remained unchanged.

“Elephants are incredibly sensitive beasts,” said David Field, zoological director of London and Whipsnade zoos.”Their appreciation of noise communication is far beyond our hearing range. They communicate in deep infrasonic vibrations … so it wouldn’t surprise me at all if [classical music] has this calming effect.”

He said keepers at London and Whipsnade zoos often put a radio on in the enclosures of animals that have to be kept on their own – for example sick animals or new arrivals at the zoo. Whipsnade’s elephants in particular seem to appreciate background music. “We always do tend to have music on but we certainly wouldn’t stick to classical music and I think our elephants are a bit partial to Terry Wogan and Chiltern FM,” he said.

Wells has already investigated the effect that music has on dogs and gorillas. “Classical had the most beneficial effect. Heavy metal had quite an adverse effect on the dogs,” she said.

She said dog shelters have begun playing classical music to calm their animals as result of that study.

To read the rest of this article go to http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/nov/17/elephants-zoos-classical-music-elgar

by Quan Yin
The reigning Organic Sausage Queen of Salem

Sausage of chicks and mellow fruitfulness!
Oh fatty-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with taste how to eat and eat
With fruit the tree that round the thatch-eaves run;
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill chicken with ripeness to the core;
To swell the bowl, and plump my belly
With a sweet taste: to set eating more,
And still more, later sausage for me
Until the case at Wholefoods never cease,
For Sausage has o’erbrimmed my dear food bowl.
Yum Oh!