Ol' Shep's Well-being: A Natural Perspective

Have you had occasion to reflect on the continuing escalation of debilitating chronic illnesses like cancer, heart diseases, various forms of arthritis, and the many other autoimmune diseases, despite our advanced development and medicine? Maybe you've also wondered why some people and animals are so naturally healthy despite this trend?

The author Euan Fingal has offered up a free ebook to try to help us understand how we might improve our well-being and that of our domestic animals in general, but especially that of our canine companions.

The book brings together ample unbiased natural sciences evidence, and the experiences of many naturally oriented caregivers, to clear a convincing swath through the propaganda surrounding well-being, and the misguided understandings it fosters. Due to it being much more comprehensive, and more thoroughly researched, referenced, and reviewed, it supersedes the previous Ol' Shep articles on this site. Bon appétit!

[Note:  As of 11/23/09 a second revised edition is in the works]

Click on the book's title below to download the 17.4 MB pdf file. With some browsers/browser-settings you may need to right/control click the hyperlink, and select download file from the context menu.  To view the book, all that is needed is one of the free pdf readers like Adobe Reader® (multi platform) or Preview® (Mac platform). The book is formated so that it is best viewed in single page mode.

Ol' Shep's Well-being: A Natural Perspective
by Euan Fingal

First revised edition published Tuesday, July 7, 2009
with a few additional changes uploaded Monday, July 20, 2009

Licensed under Creative Commons (Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0)

To insure the pdf file has not been altered/corrupted, the MD5 sum is:
18755bcc01dfb0ae3798e219721f0b12

The external supplement
Heartworm: A Natural Perspective (a paper by Euan Fingal)
is not yet available.

The book cover and table of contents, along with a how to get the most out of this book, are shown below for your initial appraisal.

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments_______________________vi

Editing Notes___________________________viii

Getting the most out of this book___________ix

Introduction____________________________x

The Human Aspect____________________x

A Word about Veterinary Practice________xx

Section One - Model Evidencing____________1

Origins_____________________________3

Domestication_______________________15

Nature, The Ultimate Laboratory_________25

The Diet of Wolves _________________25

A Wolf’s Digestive System ___________34

Wolf Behavior_____________________45

Wolf Health_______________________62

Nature's Lessons _____________________73

Section Two - Model Applications ___________77

Species Appropriate Diet _______________79

Avoidance Considerations ______________107

Exercise and Rest ____________________ 133

State of Mind________________________ 139

Concluding Comments____________________149

Appendix A: The Natural Order _____________153

Appendix B: Divisions of Geologic Time ______155

Appendix C: Inert Ingredients Issue Example__156

Appendix D: Hyperlink cross reference _______157

References _____________________________160

Change Log _____________________________175

Getting the most out of this book

The "Introduction" should be read to understand what it is that is generally wrong in our advanced society, relative to pursuing natural well-being. The idea is to set the stage for individual corrective actions. A bit of an author profile is also included.

"Section One - Model Evidencing" of the book details the natural sciences basis of what follows in Section Two. Except for the "Nature's Lessons" subsection, Section One may be skimmed in an initial reading, and studied more thoroughly when one is later relating the scientific evidence to what is presented in Section Two.

"Section Two - Model Applications" is the meat of the book, and all subsections should be read carefully, maybe more than once, to achieve a full understanding.

The "Concluding Comments" section is a synopsis of the overall perspective of the book, so the reader can relate their own situations to the more general detail provided.