Carolk9s

Dear dog but that is one ugly pooch! JMO mind you! And of course I know that beauty, or the percieved lack thereof, is only skin deep so I am not judging the dogs character in any way. Wanted to add, I am SOOO glad Spike is with people who love him and appreciate him!

Well my dogs do NOT want to please me every single minute of every single day. Sometimes, they wish to please themselves instead. Ya know, that is ok. Dogs are dogs. As long as what they are doing is not likely to cause injury or loss to them, me, or anyone else, they have SOME lattitue. Now and then, I do (gasp!) threaten them. OK, so I am for the most part joking, but a threat is a threat right? I tell Candy I am going to 'get her butt' when she is sassing me. Or I am going to 'paddle that hiney right out in public for everyone to see' Do I ever follow through on the threats? Nope. That is NOT to say I have not lightly popped my dogs on the rear now and then, I do save 'that ' for more serious transgressions. Do I physically hurt my dogs? Nope. I do get their attention and then reward them for their GOOD behaviour right away.

I think new pup is just standing up for himself and laying boundaries. Soon enough he will be bigger than her. Unless there is TRUE aggression and bloodletting, I would, to a degree, let them work it out. Of course you and hubby must, MUST be benevolent alpha's but dogs will generally settle their problems on their own. Give yourself and the dogs a break, if a situation is developing where you think there might be a fight, calmly and quietly step in make BOTH dogs focus on you. Treats in hand, have them both sit in front of you and pay attention to you, not each other. Teach each a solid down/stay but keep it light, happy, and rewarding. Don't make it seem like punishment, make it seems as though they are making Mom so very happy when they are minding their manners.

I like the black pepper idea, and it's cheaper than a new fence! You could always buy several really large boxes of it and liberally sprinkle it all along the fence line. Another idea, most dogs will not dig into poop. Find a hole, put their poop in the hole and cover with a bit of dirt. Might just solve two issues at once, your yard is cleaner and the dog won't dig where the poop is.

That poor dog! He is lovely! I want him! Any idea how old that sweet faced fella is? I agree, take him to the shelter. The only thing about reporting on his owners, what if by some screwed up karma they get the dog back? Is the shelter a no kill one? That or see if you can reach a Great Dane rescue org. He looks even thinner than Candy was when I found her.

[quote name='courtnek'] p.s. when I was a kid and had my golden, every sunday was pancake day. He would get pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon. I have no idea whether it was good for him or not, but it never seemed to upset him and he lived to a ripe old age for a dog his size....my dad insisted that if we were going to have "Sunday breakfast", then he should too.... :lol: :lol:[/quote] Your dad is my kind of people! My dogs LOVE their scrambed eggs on Sundays, sometimes with a little bit of cheddar cheese mixed in as well.

Did you say she IS on an anti inflammatory? If so, which one? Most, if not all, of them have the potential to cause stomach upset. I have an elder male, he is on Rimadyl. In recent weeks, he started refusing to eat his breakfast and picking at his dinner. At first I tried 'doctoring' his food with tasty additions, some worked but they too lost their appeal. One addition that he really liked is a sprinkle of grated parmesean cheese. As he had a bad bout with gastritis a couple of years ago, I wondered if his stomach was overloaded with acid. I started him on 1 Pepcid a day about two weeks ago. I actually use a store/generic brand. Both of his vets do approve of this btw. He is back to eating with gusto and looking for more. I must add, we have been getting more exercise lately, almost daily walks at the park which I'm sure have also had an effect on his appetite. It at least may be one option to consider with your girl. Check with your vet and make sure an antacid will not cause any harm or interfere with any meds first. Good luck to you both.

Jesse has also signed the petition 8) . Current count is 23694

I just signed the petition, the number is at 23,223.

Just a note of warning, if you have passenger side airbags in front, I would either have the airbag disconnected on that side or NOT let your dog ride up front. While being buckled in will keep them out of your windshield in a sudden stop or accident and should keep them from being ejected from the car, it will not protect them from an airbag. An airbag deploying right into your dogs face would most likely kill them. When I had a sedan and just two dogs, I would buckle Brittany into her car harness and the seat belt so she could ride up front and Jesse could have the back seat to himself. He pretty much took up the whole thing anyway! That vehicle did not have airbags. Now that I have the van, all the dogs pile into the back, they are unable to get into the front of the van as I have a piece of xpen secured right behind the front seats. While Candy had stitches in her foot, I put her up front. She wore her harness and I used two leashes to secure her. One leash wrapped around the seat one way, another wrapped around the other way, and both were tied to the xpen behind the seat.

That is very moving, and very thoughtful of you to share it will all.

Happy Birthday to beautiful Meg! Really, what a lovely expression, brimming with love and intelligence.

[quote name='Seijun'] Wolves are not solitary though, although their cow hocking is quite often "more that moderate". ~Seij[/quote] That is my point. What is the average life span of a wolf in the wild? The wolf's body and complete bone structure may well have adapted to being cow hocked plus the fact that the average wolf has FAR better muscle due to their life of running down prey than the vast majority of dogs. The additional muscle structure supports their bones and ligaments even if the structure is less than ideal. I do believe that a wolf with severe cow hocks is at a distinct disadvantage in running down prey, when they are young, the muscle can compensate, as they age, it's going to become more of an issue.

I believe I've heard the term easty/westy front for dogs whose front feet turn out a bit. Might also be called toeing out, as opposed to toeing in for dogs who feet turn inwards towards each other. Candy toes out a bit in the front. I also believe, and may be wrong, that cow hocks not only look 'wrong' for standards, they also put additional strain on the leg bones including and up to the hips. A slight cow hock would probably be mininal strain on the rest of the leg but severe cow hocking could affect how the hips ride in their sockets as well. As far as cow hocks being a benefit to wolves, not so sure that is true. If they were a solitary predator, it could be quite a drawback over time if the angle was more than moderate.

I bundled the pack into the van and headed out yesterday for a visit to their homeopathic vet. Jesse has been going to see this vet twice a year for a few years now, the girls have also been seen by her but not as frequently. It's about an 90 minute drive each way, man, I would love to live out where the vet does! Beautiful area. We were about two hours early which was fine, I knew she had plenty of area in which to walk the dogs and has an agility field also. We took a nice walk in the hills then I played a bit in the agility ring with first Brittany (who was not interested thank you very much), then Candy. Then we all trouped indoors. First Jesse got a massage, got stretched, and got some chiropractic manipulations. Brittany was next, got the same as did Candy. We all headed outdoors for some caveletti (sp?) work and some ladder on the ground work. Then it was back inside, accupuncture for Jesse as well as a vit. B12 injection. The grand finale was that Jesse took a bit of a swim. The Dr. has an indoor, heated pool with a continuous current. A flotation vest was put on Jesse and he was taken into the pool with the vet. He was a bit frightened at first but she was right with him every second and he was fine. He rarely took his eyes off of me, I walked along the sides to encourage and soothe him. The look I got from him was like, 'why the heck am I in here and you are up there???' There is a ledge that runs around the inside of the pool, he walked along that and then she helped him swim across the width. The pool temp. is kept at 90 degrees. Jesse was in the pool for about 20 minutes. Candy was also taken in, she was far more worried than I expected, I really thought she would jump in on her own. Jesse was EXHAUSTED afterwards, took him a few minutes to recover his land legs. He and Candy were dried off and we headed home. We were with the vet for almost two hours straight. Jesse slept almost all the way home. Besides being tired, I think the warm water and exercise combo relaxed his breathing. He has laryngeal spasms which cause episodes of apnea, his breath seems to catch and he has to cough then he pants very hard. He did not cough at all last night and has been fairly quiet in that respect today. I am already looking forward to our next visit in the spring! I believe I have heard of an indoor dog pool locally, I am going to check into it and see if I can take him there now and then. I don't even see a chiropractic dr. but my dogs do!

Personally, I stay away from flavored yogurts due to the excessive sugar content. I won't use lite yogurts due to the artificial sweeteners. This is why, as posted above, I declined to buy the store brand of yogurt or the lite kind, too much sugar and/or artificial sweeteners cannot be good for the dogs. What could be done, if your dog likes certain berries or flavors, perhaps add a bit of fresh fruit or a tiny drop of vanilla, not necessary but if you'd like to give them more variety, I guess this is an option.

Er, new pics are a bit of a challenge. Since all the harddrive issues I had over the summer, reformatted the disk oh about a dozen times, I can no longer get into edit my website. It uses coolpage, I've downloaded coolpage again based on my purchase verification but when I try to use it, I get some weird url that is asking for my login and pw. Perhaps it is time for me to revisit that issue and puzzle it out. If that fails, I will try to add some photos to webshots.

My dogs each get a heaping tablespoon of yogurt each morning. I just bought a new container today. I was going to buy the store brand as it was $1 cheaper than Dannon. The only kind the store brand had was vanilla flavored, I considered it. Then I saw the sugar content, 33g per serving. TOO much sugar. I then considered Lite and Lively, it had aspartamane (sp?) in it. Nope. Went with regular Dannon, 13 grams of sugar per serving and no artificial sweetners. I just plop the yogurt on top of their kibble and they all love it. When the yogurt is almost gone, either girl will 'wear' the container in order to lick out as much as possible.

Almost forgot my manners! I want to thank you all for being so supportive and caring from the start of Candy's boo boo saga to the end. I truly appreciate the good thoughts, the concern, and of course the congrats upon hearing the biopsies showed benign was the word. Hopefully, NEXT weekend I can take the dogs back to the park, even if Candy has to be on leash, she will still enjoy going. Thanks again to all!

[quote name='K']Carol...I remember this...this was WWWAAAYYY back when Gizmorednosepit [/quote] And THIS illustrates just how far behind I am! 8)

Very interesting. A little background, I recieved an email from a guy asking about Candy. He and his wife have a lab/terrier mix that looks very similar to her. I asked him how he found out about Candy just out of curiosity, what website did he see her on. Said he did a google search on lab terrier mixes and there she was. Hm, I tried the same and have not found her yet. However, I then did a google on lab/terrier candy, and there is a link to my website, amoung many others on this site. [url]http://bigheadpit1.tripod.com/animals.htm[/url] So far I have seen K's and Sasha's dogs and links to website as well. Anyone know anything about these folks? If they are simply dog lovers and wanted to showcase other peoples dogs along with their own, well I am ok with that. However, they have copied photos from personal websites, I presume without others permission as I certainly never received a request to use MY photos. If anyone knows more about them, please share, I will then decide if I will ask/demand that they remove my dogs photos from their site. While I am flattered somewhat that they chose my dogs, I am also wondering what they are about.

She is quite put out that I will not let her run and jump and wrestle with Brittany! The last bandage came off on Wednesday and the stitches in her foot MAY come out Monday. The stitches on her muzzle were taken out last Monday. She was put back on antibiotics as of Wednesday just to be safe. During the day while I am at work, she is separated from the other two and has to wear the elizabethan collar, otherwise I'm sure she'd have the stitches out in no time. She managed to 'bust' out of confinement this morning, I came home at lunch and she greeted me at the door. Sneaky little princess. She is still being leash walked in the yard as she wants to RUN. Each time she goes out, I wrap gauze around her wound then put a plastic bag on her foot and secure it so her stitches do not get wet. There is one little thing that irks me about this entire episode, the differing opinions and approaches by the different vets she has seen. Vet #1, who did the surgery, said take the bandage off her foot after just 2 days. Said it did not matter if her foot got wet once the bandage was off. Day 4 after surgery was when she busted all the stitches in her foot. Vet #2, who restitched her, said new bandage was to be changed in 2 days, then changed again but a bandage was definitely to be on for more than a couple of days. Vet #3, at the same practice of vet #1, rebandaged her foot last Monday. Vet #4, also at same practice, wondered why foot was still bandaged on Wednesday. This vet said her foot MUST still be bagged to keep her stitches from getting wet. Well, the important thing is I do believe she is well on the way to being healed. Wound looks good, she leaves it alone for the most part and if I am not able to watch her, the cone collar goes on. She REALLY hates that thing. Can't say as I blame her. I don't think she rests very much while I am at work, as soon as I get home, she snuggles up to me and goes into a deep sleep. So far, the bills total $884. Of course she is more than worth it and I consider it a blessing that the biopsies were benign. I am quite prepared to get a 2nd mortage on the house should any of my dogs require medical care that would cost more than I have on hand. Jesse and Brittany have felt rather neglected and I am sorry about that but I try to give each a few moments on one on one time with me each day. I know they all miss going to the park, heck so do I. Next Friday, I am taking all 3 to their chiro vet, I thought about canceling due to the big outlays of cash recently but Jesse can use a good going over by this vet. What the hell, it's only money!

If just to be on the safe side, he should be seen by a vet. Even if it's just a baby tooth, a break that close to the gum line could possibly allow infection to sneak in. That could affect how his adult tooth develops and presents.

I too was thinking Black and Tan Coonhound. Hey, no time like the present to get that girl of yours spayed, why have her going through the hormonal issues twice a year?

I 'believe' the dosage for a dog is one regular tablet for every 25lbs of their weight. This indeed would mean that you would give Bogart 3. Is there an emergency clinic anywhere near you? If so, perhaps you can call them for advice, I would hope they would be able to tell you this over the phone.