poodlefan

If I am away from home and there isnt' a dog door, my oldest dog wakes me in the middle of every night for a trip outside. I don't think he'd make it through without one and I don't intend to find out. The young and the old .. they need more from us. I agree that 11 hours is too long for any dog to spend without access to the toilet.

Fbaurdry: It certainly develops a bond.. but does require the dog to work away from the owner, developing self confidence as it masters new challenges. IMO also provides significant mental and physical stimulation.. an important outlet for dogs who spend significant parts of their lives alone. I'd call it part of a process of encrichment, rather than a universal cure but I think many dogs need some kind of 'job' to satisfy their mental and physical needs. The dog must heed the handlers directions, but complete the course itself.

I'll talk to him about her teeth when he calls me tonight.. Surely I would have hoped that he would have noticed her teeth being worn down as the reason for her bleeding and inflammation instead of charging me through the eyeball for blood tests. My money would be on his diagnosis, not mine but it wouldn't hurt to check I suppose.

These are questions for your vet but my lay persons guess is yes.. I gather she is a bit obsessive with chewing? That's not a set of teeth I'd expect to see on a young dog but I ain't an expert.

How many of these dogs are alone? Baby puppies aren't that challenging.. its the older puppies that need exercise and stimulation. But yes, your choice as to what practices you choose to follow.

She's not in any run and there's no wire for her to chew on in the yard. She has never gnawed on concrete before and there's no blood marks out on the back area where it's paved. I looked in her mouth last week and all her teeth were normal looking then. I thought her teeth looked like that from the inflamed gums? Would teeth become worn from chewing on wood? We were at Orange Vet, I might give them a call. I think any obsessive chewing could flatten them.

LOL, I agree, nothing more funny than watching a frantic owner trying to catch their dog who is running around the class doing "zoomies". I think I was just resigned to it.. zoomies seem to be a Whippet standard.

What? You mean Denzel didnt' get loose during playtime and circle the class at scorching pace for several laps. You haven't lived!!

Those teeth all look quite worn.. they are all flattened Is she chewing on some kind of wire barrier.. like a gate or run?? Does she gnaw on concrete? I'd be looking in the backyard for bloodstains on gates, concrete etc.

Dr Kirsty Seksel, who works out of the Sydney Animal Behaviour Centre has a very good reputation.

I'm no Aussie expert but it looks a bit fluffy.. does it need to be stripped of undercoat/dead hair??

Something the dog enjoys and finds stimulating but that is not directly related to the presence of the owner. Agility would be one thing I'd look at... self rewarding, energy intensive and confidence building. There is a balance to be struck between having a dog that is close to you and one that is excessively bonded. Again, socialisation - exposure to a wider range of people, to dogs and to enriching experiences - gives a dog more in its life than its owners. I think its healthier for an owner to be an important part of their pet's life, not their whole life. That's more challenging with some dogs than others.

Shellectra, how your pup handles separation and being alone is largely dependent on you. She needs to have a routine, to see you come and go calmly and to accept that this is her life. Personally, I don't support locking an active large breed pup in a room all day (I've made that point to you before) and would recommend that you change her situation ASAP. I'd strongly recommend you read Poochmad's thread here about the routine she initally instituted for her pup and the results it created. I don't necessarily think you'll end up with a dog with separation anxiety but you need to guard against it. Poochmad has also neatly summarised good practices for destressing time alone for a pup. Your dog needs stimulation and to learn to entertain herself when you aren't around. She will outgrow the room rapidly or possibly end up destroying it. Get her into a more permanent daytime accommodation ASAP and stop yourself stressing - she will be picking up on it. The smaller and more limiting you make your pup's environment, the greater the reliance she will have on you for stimulation. Have a think about that in terms of your current arrangements. She won't be a baby for long.

Poochmad, I know how hard you've worked on this issue with Henschke. It must be very disheartening to see one lapse in routine cause so much distress. I firmly believe that you are at the stage where you need help from a qualified veterinary behaviouralist, especially if drugs are being suggested. I don't think that's a bad thing but you need someone qualified to assess the situation before you go that route IMO. I'm pretty sure at least one Sydney veterinary behavioralist has a clinic in Canberra - you may be able to book a consult for them on the way through. Obedience training and more exercise cannot hurt this situation and may help. I think Henschke would benefit from a focus in his life other than you and your OH.

It does sound like somewhat like separation anxiety. I'd be summoning professional help.

LOL, well he has been training since he was like 5 years old and has been an instructor for the german shepherd dog cub...he thinks he knows alot more than me and tells me the dog needs rules. I've tried it the nice way now do it the harder way he thinks. He is a positive trainer but thinks there has to be some sort punishent in the 'getting mad at him' sense when he just wont listen.... i know this has worked in the past but its a risk Yes, the risk for a dog that has no idea what it's supposed to have done is that it will avoid you even further. We've got the bigger brains.. and we are one half of an agility team. Make very sure that you have trained him and conditoned him to be able to understand and excecute your signals. Make sure that you give clear direction and keep him motivated. If your partner is "scruffing" dogs for "disobedience", he ain't what I call positive. It also isn't very effective if the aversive isn't being given in a timely manner for particular behaviour. It's just bullying IMO. If the training isn't going well, take a step back, ask the dog for something you know it knows well and reward it. My honest advice? Don't train with your partner.. train with a club. You are probably a little stressed yourself by his presence. My guess is that he's not an agility instructor?

Ground sniffing is quite a common avoidance behaviour seen in agility. Dogs who display it may be stressed. Scruffing him for avoiding you isnt' going to make him want to be with you and work is it.. you need to get his focus back and hold it. It's fine to quietly take him by the collar and bring him back to where you want him but any more negative a correction than that would see you given a time out and a chat from an instructor about appropriate training techniques at my club. Ask yourself if there's any chance you are over facing or putting too much pressure on him before you write this off as him blowing you off. I get a general impression you are in a fair hurry to get into trialling - is he ready? At any rate, you need to stop, get his focus back and continue. If he does it, get him to come to you, do one obstacle and big reward. Are you drilling him over equipment repeatedly? Does he understand what's required of him? Can he handle shorter sets without this behaviour?

It's nutrionally balanced and it contains less protein and fat. Hills I/D is bascially just cooked chicken and rice. Now is not the time to let a feeding philosophy interfere with your dog's health Skwo. I'd be feeding the cans and reviewing all the your worming/flea treatments too. Don't use the spot stuff and cut it down to an absolute minimum of chemicals in her system.

Personally, I don't know why you'd go past a poodle for athleticism and trainability.

She's bloody good. A lot of people recommend her for breeding issues too.

Sounds like a great result Natty - did you see Sandra Hasset?

Charge them appropriately MissyMoo and explain why. Money talks.. and most folk will listen to that if nothing else.

Welcome! If you find your way to the GSP thread, you'll find a lot of fellow breed fanciers there. You need to start training your pup now. They grow (as you know) into active athletic dogs that need boundaries. To start with, have all her interactions with your sons ON LEAD. If they run and shriek, she will bounce and chase until she has the training and the self control to do better. She can be taught to sit to be patted by them but until she's older, you'll need to be the one to keep them apart. I have to say that a GSP pup and toddlers isn't what I'd call an ideal combination but if you supervise, train and control her, things will improve. I'd suggest, if you have not already done so, that you build a run in the back yard so that your boys can play without her interference and vice versa. It's imperative that you be able to supervise and control all interactions between them. Your sons have neither the size, not the skills to do so. If she's growling to protect her food, she's a resource guarder. You continually fussing with her food won't fix that - you may increase her anxiety. Feed her in a crate or run by herself and train your boys that they are never to approach her when she's eating. If you have guests with kids, put her away. If you want to decrease her anxiety about food, ADD to the bowl or call her away from it for a tasty treat.. but you won't change her instinct to guard what she values.. If you haven't already considered it, get her into obedience training now - it will help a lot to have her learn behaviours that will improve your control over her. You also need to ensure that she'd getting enough social interaction with the family. GSP's weren't meant to be kept in isolation. The more time she spends with you and your family, the less excited she'll be when your boys come outside. I'd strongly recommend you consider allowing her inside in a crate in your family room. She can watch and have company without interfering with your boys. If their interactions are limited to when they come to play the backyard, I expect she's not going to be very calm around them at all. Take her out walking with them as a family and allow her to chill out with you all at night.

Glad she is on the mend Rish. Now fix the gate. If the dog gets out under it, its your fault, not hers. She shouldn't be getting told off for your error.

Corvus: Corvus, the difficulty I've had from the beginning with your posts is that you state them in a manner that sounds non-theoretical. You make assertions and debate issues with highly experienced, professional dog trainers that, coupled with the word "zoologist" under your avatar, lends them a tone of authority that might make a dog person here use them. You've already backpedalled a considerable distance from your bold assertion that you didn't have to protect your dogs in encounters with strange dogs because as dogs, they had the skills to diffuse any newcomer they had to deal with. That cheers me considerably. As I said before, you're clearly not stupid. Whilst most posters here (myself included) do not have the academic training in zoology you have, many of us have trained mulitple species (dogs and horses for me) and know that their responses and motivations are dissimilar. I suppose to some degree what you learn from one experience you do bring to another but only from a broader perspective. I tend to want to encourage, rather than force, my dogs to do things because I learned with horses that you can't force a 1500kg animal to do anything it really doesn't want to do.. positive motivation works better. Operant conditioning does have some universal application but what motivates and rewards animals will differ. I think that is where you and I part company on a theoretical level. I recall reading one book on horse training from one of the early 'natural' horseman. His view was that in some cases, the best reward for a lesson well learned was to stop training.. get off the horse and leave it alone. I'm not sure how you'd apply that dog training other than not to drill what has been already offerred to the standard you require.. you don't reward a dog by putting it back in its kennel for the most part. Play works better. So you'd unsaddle brush down and turn your horse loose for a roll but you'd play with your dog.. both end the lesson but differently. The domestic dog has been selectively bred for generations to seek the company of humans and, to a greater or lesser degree, to seek direction from them. Cats, on the other hand, don't give a damn about pleasing you - they do only what they consider brings reward. Hounds can be a bit like that. As a first time hound owner I'm finding differences in training Howard from any of my poodles. I don't think a 'one size fits all' approach to training works even within a species, let alone between them. I do know that 'taming' an animal and 'training' one are not the same and that 'taming' does not change an animals instintive responses in the manner that selective breeding can do. Taming encourages tolerance. Training encourages obedience. That point alone is why I find your comparisons between a domesticated, selectively bred animal and a tamed feral animal less than convincing. I can accustom a lion or tiger to tolerate human interaction, but as the repeated tragedies involving exotic pets demonstrate, you do not necessarily engender obedience, nor do you take the predator out of the big cat, EVER. You also have to keep in mind that a hare, unless you give it no option, will never be a threat to you. You can't say that about any prey species (domesticated or not) large enough to take us on. All animals have a basic hierarchy of needs - food, safety, reproduction etc. No news to you I'm sure. My view is that "taming' fuflills basic needs but 'training' must reach further up ithe hierarchy to succeed. Satisfying the food needs of a wild predator never takes the hunter out of the animal. Similarly providing safety to a prey species doesn't remove prey responses. Startle a horse and you'll see what I mean. Perhaps if you make it plainer when you are observing or theorising, rather than asserting, much of the 'crossness' you have encountered will dissipate.