German Shepherd Limp

Hello, My bitch German Shepherd is limping on her front leg on and off for about a week now. She still plays, eats and is running around with no signs of pain. Do I just leave it or do I take her to the vets?

Should of also mentioned she is 6 months old.. she's still acts like a normal pup but now with the on and off limp

Hello!  A reasonable definition of limping is weight-bearing abnormally to avoid pain (as we'd do, for example, if we had a stone in our shoe; we'd weight-bear differently so that it didn't hurt and that would cause us to walk with an abnormal gait, ie a limp).  Almost by definition, if a dog is limping then there is pain, even if they don't show it (they do not communicate chronic pain as readily as humans do).  That understood, there are a number of causes of lameness in young dogs.   As your girl is of a particularly large breed, your vet may be on the looking for OCD around this age, which in this case stands for Osteochondritis Dessicans.   Other reasons may range from a pulled muscle or a toenail growing abnormally, to elbow dysplasia or panosteitis.  Any of these can be serious, so it seems a good idea to let the vet have a look.  In the consultation, they might watch the patient walk, palpate the joint to find out exactly where in the leg the pain is coming from, and depending upon the suspected cause, they might carry out further tests, such as radiography, before a diagnosis is reached.  Hopefully they will provide appropriate pain relief but of course, if a dog isn't painful then they can put too much weight on the wrong place, so it is important to appropriately rest a dog on pain relief if you are asked to. Best of luck and please do let us know how she gets on.