Sandra777

What sort of dog? Best toys here are a plastic pot plant pot or a bucket with the handle taken off. Next best toy is an old men's work sock tied in knots. Next best after that, a tiny tiny tiny strip of material off a blanket - any blanket! - that puppy can hide in it's mouth and run around pretending it really doesn't have anything at all. After that - anything with a squeaker, but they generally last between 15 and 30 seconds

If your yard is secure (and I mean SECURE) and the dog has shelter I don't have an issue if you are comfortable doing it. I would never do it myself and my dogs are LOCKED in walk-in kennels. This is because they are a breed which is prone to doing insane things if they decide to try and get out and which are targets for thieves. Thousands of dogs are left alone in backyards every day and come to no harm. If you said you were going to leave him crated inside all day you would have received the same number of stories about the terrible things which have happened to dogs left crated inside.

I wouldn't have been able to keep that on the inside :laugh: :laugh: Rustydoodle Oh My Lord :rolleyes: ;)

Sorry I just couldn't tell a stranger my dog was Yorkie poo :rolleyes:

Or he may never have had two testicles at all I know someone who was importing a puppy from the UK. The breeder didn't know the pup only had one descended testicle until the vet pointed it out to him (this was prior to the days of needing a certificate for such things). The breeder then offered her the other dog in the litter..................and she took the offer. Some people deserve each other.

Well ask yourself - would you leave a two year old child unsupervised with things it could potentially stuff down it's throat?

I have had full siblings, some similar some VERY different. Is the temperament you have typical of the breed or different in some fundamental way?

With some bigger breeds it is a bit inbuilt for them to pace because they're big and akward and "floppy" and not designed to go long distances anyway. Is this the case with her breed? Apart from this dogs mostly pace because either they are unfit or they are being moved at the wrong speed so what has she tried? It's probably a bit late to train the dog to fall into a trot as you could a puppy so it's likely to be more a matter of the handler changing the circumstances for the dog (speed, fitness). It is sometimes possible to unbalance a dog out of a pace with a change of direction (not necessarily accute) or a leash correction, but the bigger the breed the harder I could see the latter needing to be to have any effect!

Nope. Internet friend in the USA lost a dog after it got it's tongue caught inside a kong and suffocated Nope. I have read on an email list about some who lost a dog with a blockage caused by chewed off pieces of rope. Safe bet - nothing is a safe bet with dogs except they'll do something bizarre and unexpected

This is the second time in two days I've seen this reference. What are canon bones? I've never heard of them before. I give my dogs brisket bones from when they are pups, but under supervision as they eat them, not just gnaw on them. They occasionally get pigs trotters, which they love. canon bone is the bone from the knee to the fetlock (basically foot) of a cow or horse or I suppose camel or donkey. Long round shaped bone with marrow in the middle when sold in shops.

Any particular reason you don't want him to get chicken bones? For a smaller sized puppy they're ideal food and can actually be consumed. A big bone he can't chew pieces off is going to do nothing except wear his teeth down. A big bone he can chew pieces off automatically becomes a choking hazard. Rawhide chews - is your vet drunk???

Dogs' stomachs are designed to get rid of things they can't digest, so if they chew off pieces of bone harder than their stomach acid cam handle they'll throw it up. Normal dog behaviour

What size is Elbie? IMO canon bones and knuckle bones are too hard, I would be giving something like a length of lamb neck (not individually separated chops), mutton flap (the flank/last ribs) with some fat trimmed off, roo tail, beef ribs and that sized thing. I never use brisket after having a dog choke and die eating brisket (he was supervised) but most people don't have a problem. To me a bone for a dog should be covered with enough meat that most of the bone isn't visible.

Yep, Hereditary Cataracts in Staffords are early on set, however nothing in life is fixed so it is possible for it to develop more slowly in some dogs, nature doesn't work to a fixed schedule :D Your friends had the parents eye tested as in opthalmic exam? HC is a recessive gene which means both parents could carry the gene but they themselves can have perfectly normal eyes. This is how the disease has remained in the breed for so long, until the DNA test was perfected there was no way of knowing the difference between a "carrier" (unaffected but carrying the condition in their genes) and a "clear" (both unaffected and not genetically carrying the condition) until someone bred an affected puppy. The DNA test was available when your puppy was bred. A blind dog copes very well so long as the owners put some thought into it's surroundings so even though it is a horrible disease, it's not a death sentence or the end of the world even if you decide not to try and have the cataracts removed. Best of luck.

Are you talking about a Staffordshire Bull Terrier or American Staffordshire Terrier?? I have Staffordshire Bull Terriers and yes I find they will eat endlessly and virtually anything. Single SBTs can sometimes become very fussy, but this isn't too common. I assume she's been wormed? Is she active and shiny and well covered (ribs easily found, perhaps the back rib can be seen faintly). If so, she's fine and perhaps give her a huge bone to keep her occupied (roo tail or similar, personally I won't feed marrow or canon bones to Staffords)

Undershot, overshot, level and scissor bite dogs can all have converging canines or perfect canines.

Converging canines are a problem in a lot of breeds. I have Staffords which have this problem to a scary degree and have only had a very very few adults with converging canines in the litters I have bred over the last 32 years - but in every single case the dog's baby canines were converging so personally I wouldn't waste my time and emotions on a pup with converging baby canines. No doubt in some cases they can come right and I'm not saying for a second that the breeder is lying, just that IME the chances of it happening are a heck of a lot smaller than the chances of it not happening. If there is a pup in the litter with correct canines which is show potential and you are buying a show dog not a prospective breeding animal then there's no reason to be all that concerned about buying another puppy from the litter - but if you are hoping to one day breed from your pup (all other things being OK of course) then you'd want to do a whole lot more research into the bites of the ancestors before committing to a pup from a litter where 1/2 the litter has bad mouths already. Amstaffs aren't exactly rare, so perhaps you can keep on looking.

The dogs have always been fed before the people in this house and I don't have any issues. They will all wait at the door if told and know better than to try and take me out by shoving through when I'm half way in or out (which I do think is a manners/respect issue) but apart from that sometimes they go first sometimes I do. None will rush out the gate but that is because they have been taught they can only come out the gate if asked and you can leave the gate open say to bring the shopping in and they won't come through without an invitation. We live on acreage 400m from the road before anyone starts screaming and no I would never ever gamble their lives on them doing this on a regular basis or closer to a road, and I'm sure if the local hares or roos went past they would forget their manners on that one. The only thing I always insist on is that if I am walking they get out of my way, adults get stood on or a gentle kick in the butt to remind them, puppies get pushed aside firmly with a foot.

You can import into NZ from the UK with no quarantine & I think Hawaii too?? Sweden and Finland and somewhere else didn't used to require much and certainly no actual quarantine, but more tests at the other end I think? UK - NZ for sure, I did it, Hawaii was a definite as I met a pet owner who did it (but this was when there was quarantine between the USA mainland & Hawaii which I think is less stringent now so maybe Hawaii - NZ has changed too).

Portuguese Water Dog. Or if they can't quite manage that a Standard Poodle would be almost as good

Nothing to be concerned about except for the sun issue which you have sorted. It's because he has white around his muzzle area and is perfectly normal. You can get it tattooed if you like - but it won't stop it getting sunburned and would only be for asthetics.

You can post there and reply on your own post, but you can't reply on other people's posts.... anywhoo For some it is stud fee up front at time of service. Others will withhold the paperwork and allow the bitch owner to pay when the bitch is confirmed pregnant Others will have a sliding scale of stud fee, depending on how many puppies are born/how many puppies survive. In any case where a fee is paid and no pups are actually conceived it's usually considered "the right thing" to allow a free return service for the same bitch OR for a different bitch owned by the same person. Whatever you do, get everything in writing and don't sign any stud form until you have been paid. How unusual - usually the bitch travels to the dog Well what did you do on those occasions and why in this case does it need to be different? Were they to your own bitches?

No doubt some Boxer person will be a long soon, but AFAIK the short tail Boxer gene isn't a corkscrew tail but a short straight tail. The "corkscrew" tail - called screw tail in most breeds, is a different gene again. AFAIK there is no health issues associated with the Boxer bob tail gene. SOMETIMES in SOME breeds the screw tail is associated with other issues further up the spine, but again not so far as I know in the Boxer bob tail gene. It's quite likely Boxers also carry the screw tail gene as most breeds descended from the old bulldog types do.

It is possible for a bitch to have a silent season without any bleeding at all, and some don't have a lot of swelling. Assuming she has a normal heat you will certainly know when your bitch is in season for real, so I wouldn't stress too much and unless there's another reason to go I wouldn't bother with the vet again either. When she is in season properly I wouldn't allow her out of my sight and control AT ALL for at least 5 weeks. Some will stand from day one or two, others not until day 27 - they're all different and can be different in each heat too (usually not radically, but they can be). Don't walk her from your house, as someone else said it leaves a trail. If you must walk her off your property then drive her at least 1km from home before starting your walk, avoid dog parks (obviously!) and stick to the footpaths IMO. Check with your council - in some places it is against council rules to walk a bitch in season (not that too many people will check) Personally I never take a bitch off the property when she's standing, not even when we lived on a small town block.

It is not a VACCINE. It does nothing to the immune system. It is a massive dosage of chemicals which hangs around in the dog's system for at least a year. If your dog has a reaction to it it's there for a very long time, with the daily or monthly preventatives it's much easier to take the dog off the chemical. Yes I have done it and none of my 3 had any illeffects, but I certainly won't ever be doing it again or recommending it to anyone.