Mollie10

He's definitely got a lot of adorable in him! Cairns crossed with sweetheart definately! I love his little ears Can I steal him????

Can't go passed Ethelbert

Given the latest trend in people naming, if we can only name our dogs non human names, we'll be very limited!

I second this. Just because the pup is blue, doesn't mean the breeder is breeding blue pups deliberately.

Brilliant! I love their beautiful little faces

Really? Could you PM me details? Thank you

Beautiful!!!!

I am always worried the leather will be hard on his neck I think dark green will look lovely on him! Now that I have a girl, I can probably stop forcing him to wear girly colours! :D My two wear cotton harnesses. Anything else wears away their coat. While they aren't show dogs I still don't want them running around bald...

Thanks everyone! I was blowing bubbles for Anouk on the weekend and she loved it. She kept trying to catch them. Funny little girl.

I want to get one of those automatic bubble blowing toys for Anouk and Ziggy, but I'm not sure where to get them from. Anyone have any suggestions?

ohh I do like the sound of green. I bought him a brown collar with pink bones on it and everyone thinks he's a girl in it and I am like "Its BROWN!!!!" Green is nice too! I had a lovely harness for Ziggy - it was in earth tones and had little birds on it, but OH said it was girly...

Male dogs can totally wear purple! Purple in an imperial colour.

This is so true. All puppies should come with this warning....

Anouk was one of the naughtiest puppies ever. In many ways she was worse than a baby. I couldn't take my eyes off her for a second. It is because she is so very smart and she gets bored easily. She also saw stealing things as a way of getting attention. The way we dealt with this was to 1) remove ANYTHING within reach that she could chew on - shoes, clothes, remote controls, mobile phones - if she can reach it, it was hers. 2) crate her at night 3) Frequent short training and play sessions 4) Ignoring her when she stole something (unless it was really valuable in which case I'd bribe her); and 5) Giving her kongs and other self entertaining toys. I read once that you can beat a wheaten senseless and s/he won't change the behaviour. Most dogs are people pleasers. If you punish a dog when s/he comes to you, the dog will avoid coming to you. Instead praise the dog for recall and distract from the behaviour you don't want. Quite frankly I'd say the majority of people get to their wits end with their pup at least once!

They are so beautiful. If only they didn't shed, I'd have one in a heartbeat.... Damn allergies. (And no, I'm not advocating crossing a Finnish Lapphund with a poodle )

Erm.... But given Ziggy isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, I won't hold my breath. I honestly didn't know dogs could get bleeding noses. I'd never really had cause to think about it before.

This is a bit like Ziggy. He licked constantly when he first came to live with us. Now he's a lot better. He can contain himself to a few licks and be content

No black eye, but Ziggy got a bleeding nose once. Collided with another dog and all of a sudden there was blood dripping everywhere without an injury. I rang the vet and she said it's quite common and so long as it stops on its own there was nothing to worry about. These dogs are doofuses.

The other day we were out for a walk and a neighbour we ran into said 'she would of been a good looking dog when she was young' I bit my tongue I'm a sucker for a little grey face. I find the grey just makes Zola's eyes look bigger and darker and harder to say no to! I would so have said "Shame I can't say the same about you." I love the oldies so much.

Happy Belated Birthday Maxi! May you have many more. I am reminded of a line in the poem The Power of a Dog by Rudyard Kipling that has always touched me: "our love's not given, but only lent, at compound interest, cent for cent...

Could just be a cross breed, but s/he is so beautiful. As I said looks a little like a (big) wheaten, so of course I'm partial... love me a shaggy dog!

Belated 15th Birthday wishes from the 'other' DOL wheatens, Anouk and Ziggy Stardust! Ziggy is with Grumpy on the storms, no dog should have to endure storms on his birthday! Grumps - keep your nose pointed towards 16. :p ;)

How big? It kind of looks like an ungroomed wheaten. It's hard to tell from just one photo though. Huge (wolfie size) At a guess then a South Russian Ovcharka?

I'm jealous now... I'd move to Sweden in a heartbeat if I could.

Warning, my post is Hi Elina Do hope you're still tuned in, or will be soon! I'm very interested in your comment above, from page 3 of this thread. Can you explain why Finland does not have an abandoned dog problem please? As it is off-topic, it would be best if you could start a new thread. Many thanks! I have found this thread very interesting - I had not heard of the Caucasian Ovcharka before. What a difficult question and I don't know if I can give absolutely correct answer but I can try. I just want to let you know that this is not 'which country is the best' conversation. I just tell about Finnish dog culture. I know there is people from other European (or other continents) countries as well. They could tell about their countries. First a little background information. Population in Finland is a bit over five million and estimate is that every fifth household has a dog or two. You are allowed to takes dogs all parks, to buses, trains etc. It is allowed and common to keep dogs in apartments even in city CBD's. It is not allowed to sell puppies in pet stores so most puppies are purchased from responsible breeders who are very thorough to whom they sell their puppies. People train dogs a lot. We have loads of dog clubs and also commercial training companies etc. Even Finland is a very small country breeders from all over the world respects Finnish dogs, trainers and breeders whether it is about dog shows, obedience, agility or schutchund. We have won world championship and European championship contests in many dog sports. It is easy to travel outside the country border for dog shows and other competitions. It is also easy to import (and export) dogs since we don't have quarantines in Europe. Of course we have problems as well, but we have quite strict Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act. If you don't take your dog for walks, you may soon have someone knocking on your door and ask some questions. There really isn't many abandoned dogs. With cats situation is a bit more difficult. In greater Helsinki area (about 1 million people live in that area) there is one place where all free roaming animals are taken and they have capacity for 100 animals total. This includes places for cats and all other animals as well. They have told that there haven't ever been a situation that there won't be room for new incoming animals. Basically all dogs who's owners won't come to pick them up, will found new homes, which is just great. We don't really have so many situations that people just abandon their dog. With cats that happen more often, especially after summer :p There have been many campaigns that people wouldn't take "summer cats" and those have worked quite well. I think what I have said about Finnish dog culture will fit quite well also to Sweden, Norway and Denmark. I don't say that we don't have problems with dogs in these countries, but I think we may have have lesser problems. Because situation in Finland is very good, people who wants to help dogs which have been taken on the custody or are abandoned, travel often to our southern neighbour country Estonia, where situation is totally different. They have very different dog culture than in Finland and many dogs are abandoned and won't find new homes. Finally apologizes about the misspellings. I was amazed our first night in Stockholm we went into a pub and there were a couple of dogs in there with their owners. I was thrilled. I also bailed up several poor Swedes with dogs on the trains :D There were fenced dog parks everywhere we went. It seemed like a very dog friendly nation.