Rascalmyshadow

Any dog can do damage not disputing that, the only bite I have had in the 22years I've been grooming and specialising in nervous/aggressive dogs was from a 4-5 month old Maltesex pup, still had sharp baby teeth and it meant business, tore my finger top to bottom, all I did was put a pair of scissors near its face and it went crazy, was completely unexpected and very unusual for such a young dog, found out it had a lot to do with what it's owners had been doing to it, if it had of been a large dog and grabbed me that quick I would have been in serious trouble. Another scenario I wasn't bitten but I was grooming a very large rescue golden retriever about 40-45kg dog, for the first time, dog was fine one minute, in a matter of seconds without warning it turned nasty, blocked me from getting out of my grooming room, luckily I stayed calm and had a slip lead in reach, managed to flick it over its head and manoeuvre the dog enough to get out. The bite from the little dog didn't worry me even though it hurt like hell, but being seriously threatened by a dog that weighed as much as me, that was a whole different level.

Some of what she is saying is true it might be rare for a dog to kill its owner but when you work close enough daily with many dogs and their owners it is certainly not rare people owning dogs that regularly threaten/bite them. Also certain breeds should not be targeted but the bigger the dog the more damage they can inflict so are definitely a bigger risk if there are any aggression issues and should be managed much more cautiously. I have a 1.8kg chihuahua that has to be locked up if we have visitors as she will bite unprovoked (she's fine with us) her bite is minimal, kinda like being pinched with finger nails and she is obviously very easy contained, now if she was a 50kg dog and behaved like that she would have been PTS a long time ago as for me the risk of someone being seriously injured would be too high.

I can't imagine what everyone surrounding this situation is going through the dogs included, unfortunately dogs that control and bite their owners is not as uncommon as people might think. I have groomed many dogs over the years that have injured their owners on more than one occasion, and it has been bad enough to need stitching and/or medical treatment. Most of them have been little dogs so not big enough to kill an adult but certainly able to do damage. Some of them were due to owners having no idea of the dogs body language and putting them into threatening situations but others the dogs had abnormal behaviour, almost everyone of them was dangerous.

I have been grooming 22 years and owned poodles for 20 of those years and I have never heard of this style of blade/clipping system. i would be sending them back and getting a normal set of Wahl clippers or even better Andis clippers. My preferred blades are Oster, if you want a short cut on the body use a 5#, use a 10# to shave face, feet and tail (unless you want a teddy bear clip) for the legs (if you want them longer) use plastic combs over a 40#, they come in all different lengths, my preference is Laube size 0 if you want a bit of length or a 2 if that's too long. Can use the combs on the body as well if the 5# is too short. Hope that all makes sense.

Why on earth do they charge more for rabbits, I always paid less for the rabbits and guinea pigs.

I have never payed more than $65 for a consult even at other vets around where we used to live. We have been to this vet a few times now and it seems to be dearer every visit! It's not ideal having to travel so far, I know the cats will hate it, dogs aren't as much of an issue, it costs me very little in fuel, working around three kids will make it hard but at least my old vet is open 7 days a week and except for Sunday's is open until 11pm . If it's an emergency we'll go local otherwise everyone will have to put up with the travel.

Had to take one of my cats to the local vet yesterday for a sore eye, nearly had a heart attack when I went to pay the bill almost $200, $84 of that was just the consult! Rang my old vet to find out how much they are charging for a consult, $20 less and they are a lot more thorough, the drugs are a lot cheaper and they don't charge for a revisit like this vet. I thought a little country vet would be cheaper than one in an affluent suburban area, guess I was wrong. Looks like I'm going to have to travel over an hour just so we can continue to afford for our animals to see the vet when needed. How much do others pay for a vet consult? Are you in the city, country or suburbia?

I don't know if it's of any help but Biogroom do a spray on product called 'Show foot' it's designed to stop dogs slipping while being shown on slippery ground, might be something you could try.

I wouldn't be giving meloxicam without food can cause serious stomach issues. Hope you get answers asap.

I used to get the puppy urge but after so many years of working with dogs and fostering rescues the thought of an untrained peeing, pooping, chewing machine does not fill me with excitement anymore. As for having three dogs, that is our perfect number. It's a nice little pack, you can take out a single dog and the others have company, it is still manageable to walk them all together, proving they are not reactive to other dogs etc and are taught not to pull, and it is lots of fun watching them play and interact together. The downsides are, the extra costs, and they will behave like a pack which is quite different to just having two individual dogs, for example if one is reactive to something it will often set them all off, even the ones that initially weren't, probably the biggest issue we've come across.

We have been burnt multiple times by registered breeders even after doing plenty of homework. First time we bought an Airedale, at 5 months old he was PTS, his ureter (I think that's the correct name) wasn't connected to his bladder, he had abnormal kidneys and was in the early stages of renal failure. Second one we bought a 10month old afghan, she had been shown but hated it so the breeder decided she would be better in a pet home, we noticed very early on she slept a lot more than we thought was normal, breeder told us all his afghans were like that. At 18 months old she got worse, we lost her to what the vets thought was meningitis but quite likely it was a brain tumour. Third time we bought a 10 month old Samoyed from interstate, within hours of the dog arriving I knew something was seriously wrong with its back legs, took him into work with me the vets knocked him out and did X-rays, he had such severe hip displasia the vets advised me not to wake him up, he was pts on the spot. Turned out the breeder had lied wasn't even one of her dogs, she was just helping someone out rehoming him. The two purebreds we have now were from what seemed to be good breeders but unfortunately the chihuahua had to have surgery to fix her elongated palate and the poodle has to be kept to a strict diet or else he vomits, has been like that since we got him at 8 weeks old. I'm actually starting to wonder just how to find a healthy non problematic purebred when we ever decide to get another dog.

Are you sure your dog has parvo, one of my dogs got it when he was around two years old, he was exposed to it on a Sunday and was on a drip fighting for his life by the Wednesday, he spent 10 days at the vet in isolation and had to have plasma transfusions, we were not allowed to see him and each day a nurse was allocated to his care and no one else was allowed to go in with him. The pups I saw with it when working in the vets were also isolated, put on drips and were very sick, none of them were bright or running around. If your pup is in the early stages keep a very close eye on it, they go down hill very fast. If it is what you are dealing with puppy should be penned, not running around and anywhere the pup has been should be cleaned with F10, you should be wearing disposable gloves to handle it and avoid it coming into contact with any materials that you don't want to throw out. This is a nasty, very contagious virus and it is easily transmitted by even the tiniest bit of vomit or faeces. Please don't touch/handle anyone else's dogs and especially don't let anyone else's dogs onto your property.

Cute!!! Looks so much like my Rascal, he's a Lhasa x silky.

Cats are awsome in their own special ways Kinda like living with a tame wild animal.

Hi welcome to the forum. I would look at a better option I know some people have had good success with it but I tried it and it was the worst food I have ever used, the dogs dropped muscle tone, had dull coats and lots of dandruff and lacked energy, it took me a while to realise it was the food, then I started to find more people that had the same issues. Different dogs do well on different foods, we have four little dogs (three coated) we use Canidae dry and a combination of Ziwipeak and Holistic select tinned, (except for the poodle he needs sensitivity tinned) and they all have beautiful coats, good muscle tone and plenty of energy.

Totally understandable why they didn't workout, hope you have better luck this time. I think it's a bit easier when you have two of the same breed, they tend to share enough traits and have similar play styles.

What was the age difference? And how old was your rescue girl when you brought her home? Remember sometimes personalities just clash much like people age and gender don't always matter. Although it's worked very well for us only once it didn't and it was the worst situation ever, we had a hand raised, very protective older mini poodle boy and his best mate a mini poodle girl two years his junior, we introduced a female American bulldog pup, he hated her from day one, as she matured we had a few altercations, the last one she didn't back down (for the first time) and would have killed him, we sent her to a friends immediately, spent a lot in vet bills for my boy and she ended up being rehomed with a bigger male dog and they became best mates. Glad your taking everything on board. Good luck with it all, we've only once had two dogs under 12 months old and I will admit I would never do it again and I have had anything between 2 and 7 dogs in my house over the last 20 years.

I can't comment on the type of procedure your vet is using however I wouldn't wait and see if it improves, we did that some years ago with my old poodle girl and it ended up making it worse and was a harder recovery, when she ruptured the second one we did surgery immediately and we had a much easier recovery with less arthritis later.

In my experience living in a multi dog house for so many years getting a male and letting him mature, then introducing a female works best, not the other way around. Ive found the boys to be more easy going and more tolerant of pups. If we were down to no dogs that would be my plan.

Sounds like your being quite prepared, even if you decide you have to get two pups at the same time I would not recommend getting littermates, there's a good reason most good breeders won't sell two pups together from the same litter. I have seen my customers over the years have so many disasters after buying littermates, a couple have ended up having to rehome one, seems to be worse with same sex combos but I have noticed even in male/female there is more than a normal amount of competition.

We have had a multi dog house for over 20 years and the only con I have found having two than one (we currently have four) is the cost of vet bills and upkeep, the actual management is no harder and none of my dogs have ever bonded more to each other than myself. I however wouldn't add a second dog until the first is fully mature otherwise you are likely to find any bad behaviour will rub off on one another and can make life difficult.

If you decide to consider a poodle be very careful about which breeder you chose, we have had all three sizes over the last 20 years, we've also rescued and only a few have been tolerant with kids. The standards we're definitely better than the toys and mini's but our male was very rough and our female was very gentle with our kids but hated other people's, they also had very high prey drive and needed a lot of exercise and mental stimulation.

I wouldn't look at a lagotto for a family with young kids, maybe look into Samoyeds, they tend to have good temperaments, very playful and quite tolerant, they will blow coat twice a year but a comb through every few days and a monthly bath and blow dry and you won't find much hair around. Edited to add: if you want something a little smaller have a look at Finnish lapphunds, they have a similar coat and would also be suitable for what you are looking for.

Funny you say vets don't get paid a lot, maybe not if they work for someone else but all the vets I know that own/partners in their own practice drive very expensive cars, live in the richer suburbs, send their kids to private schools and seem to go on plenty of fancy holidays. Vets are good for medical advice, behaviourists are good for problems/issues, breeders are good for specific breed advice, groomers are good for maintenance/handling advice no one group can advise on everything and no one group has 100% reliable people either, its a matter of doing as much research as possible through out all these groups as well as doing lots of reading, eventually common denominators start to show up and that's usually a good place to start.

It's not vet bashing when it's true, most vets are just gp's, they understand medicine and surgery, that's what makes them money and they don't extend their knowledge beyond that. They listen to the drug companies and promote whatever they are told to whether it's vaccines, foods, flea products etc without any of their own research or hands on experience, again because it makes them money. Way too many vets treat problems but are not interested in finding the cause, why because it makes them money. I know vets that have bought their designer dogs from puppy farms and happily tell clients how wonderful the dog is. Ive worked with vets that automatically muzzle certain breeds before they will look them over, why because they can't read the dogs body language well enough. Sorry if I sound bitter but I have seen enough of the industry and so far only two vets I would 100% trust with their knowledge and ability so I don't believe over all they are the right people to give out any advice on purchasing a dog except maybe the costs involved in the upkeep. I wouldn't trust all behaviourists either but a good one is more likely to understand certain behavioural traits especially if someone is looking at adopting a rescue dog. Really for anyone new to dogs to get the necessary info they need to research multiple areas.