silentchild

Lovely, they truly are remarkable creatures. This link was going around facebook this morning too, some amazing photos here: http://www.wildaboutpets.net/info/innewsdetail.asp?nid=25&ID=1148

Voted.

This has been circulating around the internet... might be a handy tool to determine if you should be breeding. :)

Time for an update for my goals too! I'm still a newbie trialler so no rush for me. :)

Wondering whether it will be safe to take my dog out and about this weekend - was planning to go down to either the bushlands or the beach.. now that your Collie is sick I am getting worried! My girl is unvacced for KC too and as I am leaving her to go on holidays soon I really can't risk having her sick at all.......

Bugger. Not far from where I am at all and between Malvern, Kew and Ringwood it seems to cover most of the east. Not good.

Wow these are amazing!!!! I want one! But holy crap on a cracker the price tag...!

Guh! And I was just about to book her in to the vet for her annual check up. Thanks for the heads up. Any idea which suburbs it's most prevalent in?

In my research to buy a new car that has more room and is safer for transporting my dog, it got me to wondering what are the safest ways to go about transporting dogs? Some people have puppy bars built into the rear of the car - what happens if the car gets rear-ended or T-boned? Some people buckle their dog in with a harness in the back seats / front seats of the car - what happens if there is an accident and the air bags deploy and hit the dog, or the car rolls? Would the force of air bags be enough to kill the dog, much like a small child? Nowadays cars have air bags in the back seats as well as the front. Some people secure a crate in the car and have the dog in the crate - I am assuming the crate will protect the dog from air bags, but what if the car rolls, or if crate is in boot, gets rear-ended? Does it differ depending on soft crate or wire crate? Some people tow their dogs in trailers - much like towing a horse float I can imagine it would be quite horrific if it was rear ended or got loose and rolled in an accident. Also not really practical if you just have one dog, like me. So which part of the car is the safest to have a dog when driving? And is there a safest, most fool-proof method of transporting dogs in cars?

Wow, I've been lucky that I've not witnessed physical abuse by strangers as bad as some of you have. I like to think that I would say something though. There was one time I was driving home and I saw this chihuahua just trotting along by itself by the road, with a really bad limp, and it looked like it was struggling. I hopped out of my car and looked up and down the road for an owner - I saw a lady walking like literally 100 - 200 meters waaayyy up the road in front of the chihuahua and I yelled out as loud as I could "Excuse me!" She stopped and turned and I yelled again, "Is this your dog??" She called back, "Yes." I walked up closer to her and called out, "Do you realize it's limping?" She replied, "Yes, she's just had surgery." I really didn't know what to say.... so many things. I was gobsmacked and stunned speechless for a second. Why is it off lead beside a busy road while you're ten thousand miles ahead and obviously not even looking out for it and it is struggling to catch up to you? Why is it even out exercising if it's "just had surgery"? Before I could ask further she told me to mind my own business and kept walking.

Yep, been judged, from people giving me crap about not wanting to go out drinking or clubbing after work or on weekends because I would rather spend time doing dog things, to being judged for having the dog in the house - my mum famously screeched that there are microscopic mites in dog and cat fur that will kill me when I breath fur-infested air in my house - to someone who told me dogs don't need company and I will never get a man being a crazy dog lady and then turned around and told me I didn't love my dog as much as she loved dogs because I chose to be by my dog's side when she was PTS. Yeah, apparently she didn't think she would be able to bear having a dog PTS and witnessing it so therefore I must not love my dog since I managed to do it. Haters gonna hate. I just keep doing my thing and loving every second I spend with my wonderful animals.

Seven is a smexxy girl who deserves all her amazing results. Lovely pics Starkehre.... but why aren't you in them

My first childhood dog 'Gina', was a Pomeranian that lived to 14 years old. She was healthy and fit as a fiddle until the day she died. I have no idea how she died... when I left for school in the morning she said goodbye as usual and when I got home she was dead. The vet suspected sudden heart attack. She ate only Pedigree dry food and the occasional table scraps that we would sneak to her under the table. Her favourite was chinese broccoli, lol. She had suffered a broken leg when she was younger from a dog attack but other than that she had absolutely no other health problems. She was kept entire and was never vaccinated (other than puppy vaccs) or treated for fleas, etc (we lived and grew up in a third world country where pet care was not a common or well-known thing), still she never saw a sick day in her life other than her broken leg which she recovered from super quickly after surgery to fix. She did see the vet every year for annual check ups. She was an absolutely wonderful dog and the perfect dog for us to grow up with. She endured lots of childish games of hide and seek, long walks that were probably too much for her to handle, played Soldiers and Robbers and Dinosaurs with us, and was just generally an all-round incredible, amazing dog. Until today she is still the only dog I have ever had that knows how to fetch and loved it. She would sunbake right in the middle of the front porch and god forbid anyone wanted to move or park their cars - they'd just have to wait for her to be done. She was the real dame of the household. I will never forget the memory of the night Gina died and my mum was just standing in the kitchen cooking whilst tears streamed down her face into the hot wok. We buried her in our backyard with our own hands, my brother dug her grave, this young little boy crying as he dug and dug. We planted a Gardenia plant over her gravesite and now it flowers all year round. She made me fall in love with the Pomeranian breed and I swear later on in life I will have Poms again in her namesake to celebrate her memory.

100kg dog!!!! Is there such thing?! I hope it's a typo LOL Are the dried mussels any different nutritionally to fresh ones? I've given my girl dried ones before and she liked them. I don't think I've seen fresh ones anywhere... are they also called green lipped mussels at the fishmongers or are they just regular mussels? I know nothing about seafood... :laugh:

Grumpette....... I LOVE all your photos. Making me Rotti clucky again....

If we are posting photos of Rotties then how could I not post pics of Emma my beloved Fruit Balancing Rottie (R.I.P ) ?! :D And an 'Awww' photo just for good measure.

I've avoided feeding drumsticks because I tend to worry about that long, thin sharp bone most of them have, but I don't know if they really do pose a real risk or not. I do feed wings occasionally and they often have the little drumette bit attached, I have had no problems with those.

Everything!! There is not one single thing I don't love about her. I can't just pick one thing! But I do especially love her fondness for giving me face kisses. I just love how affectionate she is like that and how she reserves her best 'You're home!' greetings for me alone. And the way she turns around to sniff her own farts. And how she lowers her bum when she wiggles it. And how she sleeps in my lap every night. And how she digs at my head to wake me up every morning. And the way she grins at me with lolling tongue when she leaps through the air in the morning. Oh wait, it was just supposed to be one thing. :laugh:

We tried the Tug - Drop - Run game today with huge success!!!! First time ever she has chased after me whilst holding a tug, she normally just drops it - she loooved the game and we got some awesome intensive tugging from my not-so-enthusiastic tugger! I am pretty bad at catching the tug when she brings it to me tho... will have to work on my coordination! I pulled a back muscle today doing it, LOL. Have also been having fun with the Smoke Ya game but she is waayyy too fast for me and we can't play it on slippery surfaces cause of her soreness problems and she slips over a lot. Still a lot of fun and easy wins for her on grass! :laugh:

Yep I completely rolled my eyes at the 'if your dog sleeps on the bed they will think they are better than you' line too. Pretty sure my dog sleeps on my bed cause it's soft and warm and comfy, not because she thinks she is a superior being to me, lol. Sometimes I even let her sleep on my head, Dr Harry would have a fit. :laugh: I think what's more important is if your dog will happily get off the bed when asked - if it growls at you when asked then you've got a problem. Edit: my cat sleeps on my dog in the same bed sometimes, does that mean the cat thinks she is better than the dog.... Probably.

I use "Ok' too.

That's wonderful! Any progress is good progress. I just had some minor success with '101 things to do with a box' too... after her initial usual phase of touching it, she lay down and gave up as usual... so I started tossing the treats inside the box. She didn't react cause she's been trained 'It's Yer Choice' (lol) so eventually after about ten treats got thrown in the box I told her to 'Get it!' and she jumped up and tentatively put one paw in the box to get to the treats..... Click & treat and party!!! :D Eventually got 2 paws in the box, then whacking box with paw while in box, then resting head on side of box. Finally got her to stand on upside down box, but with a bit of luring so probably doesn't count. She still doesn't really get the hang of it and kept defaulting back but at least she offered a new behaviour today - good enough for me! :) Although if we are talking about Fenzi stuff she is sharp as tack and we are now pairing heeling with some very lovely Flys. :) Btw, is anyone doing the FCI heeling course or Bridging the gap?

Awesome news Staffyluv!!! Have a party!!!! That is just terrific... hopefully the lightbulb went on for Zig! :D

Thanks TSD. She doesn't ever leave the training area, she just sits or lies down and gives up/shuts down, or she will cycle through her entire repertoire of tricks, which have nothing to do with the box. I don't like pushing her to the point of shutting down either, as she is such a sensitive dog and lacks confidence... Yes, super hungry always and I only use amazing treats. I guess I will just have to wait her out? LOL. I'll give it another go tonight. Her being sore unfortunately leaves me with plenty of time to work on quiet tricks like the box stuff. Ok, I'm done with derailing the thread.

TSD, with 101 things to do with a box (sorry guys I know this is not Fenzi-related, sorry for going off topic! Sorry!) what do you do when the dog keeps offering the same behaviour even when you withhold a click? With my girl she will 'touch' the box repeatedly after the initial click and treat as she thinks that's what I want, and if I withhold the click she will just sit or lie down. If I move the box elsewhere to try and get a different behaviour, she will just do it again, and again if click is withheld, she just lies there and stares at me with "Stupid human WTF do you want" eyes. :laugh: So say for example I end the session and try again the next day. Say the next day she paws the box instead of 'touching' it. Click and treat! But then she just repeats it again and the whole process repeats itself. So regardless of whatever behaviour I click and treat, she will just repeat the same behaviour with no variations until she gives me the finger, LOL. Karen Pryor says to just withhold the click - that doesn't work for Breeze sometimes. Any ideas?