pei obssessed

All of them can instinctively swim--but some of them (like my piglet) do it as if their life depended on getting out of the water :lol: I think that if they're afraid of being in the water, the fear must overcome whatever instincts they have... who knows?

[quote name='TDG']you can stick with the bland diet if you like, but if you plan on feeding it for a while, it needs to be balanced for a proper calcium-phosphorus ratio because meat without bone has by far more calcium than phosphorus. [/quote] Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I think you mean that the meat has more phosphorus than calcium, and calcium is the one that should be supplemented. At least that's what I understood from some of your earlier posts, TDG :D

[quote name='Crested']But when it's just a misstake and the expected life for the child would be good then I vote NO. [/quote] But you're talking of financial things here, Crested. Don't the kids also need love, and time, and caring? Even if the family is well off, but they wouldn't love and care for the child, then I don't think the child would be any better off than in the first situation you described.

I'm sorry to hear about Holly--she'll be waiting for you and Boomer at the bridge...

I really feel for you, Noah... I have seen idiots picking up their dogs at the dog park (the screaming would also help :x )--and pretty much any other dog around goes insane. They're not trying to kill the lil dog and if the dog is put back down, they'd leave it alone. So I'm 100% sure that your dog isn't "vicious", and really I don't think you'd have any reason to worry about her around other dogs (with normal owners). Unfortunately, I don't really have advice--what I would do is try to talk to the animal control guy again and ask if there is anything you can do to reverse their decision (eg. would letters of reference from other dog people at the park help? would neighbour's letters help?). Good luck to you...

I'm pro-abortion--mostly because I don't believe anything has a life before being born. It's better not to have a child than to have an unwanted child. As far as the kittens are concerned--they can be born with genetic disorders, they can be very hard to place, etc.

I had to anwer to the off topic bit. Transylvania is still called that and it is one of the 3 Romanian counties. I am a Romanian and can confirm Mei-Mei's part of the story, except the ending. It is historically known that Vlad Tepes (or Vlad Dracul) was a very bloody prince of Wallachia (incidentally, that's another county); as a boy, he lived at the Turkish court for a while and there he came into contact with the bloody practices they had. He brought back this knowledge and used it as a ruler of Wallachia. Yes, he used to stake his enemies, as well as any criminals--so for keeping the Turks at bay and keeping "order" in the country, he is regarded as one of our national heroes. No bloody baths known... And no disease known either. But when writers take their models from reality, they tend to combine what they've heard/read about different persons into one fictional character. The disease you speak of, courtnek, was common amongst the European aristocracy--and yes, it is a result of inbreeding. Again incidentally, all 3 counties of Romania were either under Hungarian dominance or Turkish one for hundreds of years, and so the aristocracy would periodically get killed depending on who had bribed the Turks or the Hungarians to get in power; therefore, there couldn't be much inbreeding going on :lol:

can't wait to see the pictures... I wish they allowed dogs in retaurants (outside, I don't care where) here too, I'm so envious... We only got to take Hippo on a patio once at a festival, and that was only because one of the waiters really liked her--otherwise we would have all died of thirst :lol: anyway, I think beaches are lots of fun, I take Hippo to our beach too, and just like your Zebra, she doesn't wanna swim... she tries to drink all the lake up instead.

I wanted to report great success with lamb bones--she loved them and they were small enough for her to be able to eat. Unfortunately, there is nowhere I can buy just the bones, so she'll be having them only when we (or her) have lamb. I bought her frozen beef bones and gave her one--she licked it all around and pulled the meet off it, but now she deserted it. What exactly are they supposed to do with these big beef bones anyway--eat them completely? I don't think she can do that, as she can't get her mouth around them properly...

the ear rings seem pretty freaky to me, but the story of the poor sheltie is heart-breaking :cry:

I didn't get a shar-pei, obviously, because I never do :cry: So I started playing with the choices trying to get a shar-pei :D Eventually it occured to me that there are some choices there that if you clicked, the answer should be: NO dog, get a cat, or a fish. So I say: I'm not able to keep a dog securely on my property, I'm infirm, with small kids, my dog wouldn't excercise at all, I'll be spending under 5$ a week for food. And I get: ITALIAN GREYHOUND PUG WHIPPET BOSTON TERRIER Now there is something wrong with that!

I think dogs would read the signals of other dogs much easier than we can. To give you an example--my Hippo loves to meet all dogs and if she sees one coming she sort of pulls on the leash towards the dog (and if the onwer says it's ok, then they meet). But once in a while (and it happenned a few times!), she sees a dog anddoesn't try to approach it. Whenever this happenned, the other dog would start barking and snarling as we were going by! So before anything happens, she's able to tell that she shouldn't go there. So to come back to Bracy, she might have sensed the other dog wasn't friendly and warned him off first, or even more likely--maybe the other dog was a male or it wasn't fixed and that's why Bracy didn't like him. There are all kinds of factors that could have set him off. So I guess yes, dogs can tell if a person or dog is "bad" and I think they base their knowledge on body signals and smells that we don't have access to.

we go to the park for Hippo to meet her friends, have 3 petstores within walking distance that we visit :lol: , bookstores, bank, clothing stores (only if Hippo isn't slobbery :lol: )

congratulations on the new puppy--when do we see pictures? as far as food is concerned, there is no "best food"--look through the care & health part of the forum and you'll get a pretty good idea of the good foods that are out there.

she's so beautiful... I want to see pictures of her and Indy now... please :wink: