jacqui835

Laura...Laura... I showed that to my GP and he now plays it for every man who comes in with a cold. OK resume normal broadcast. I think we've taken this wayyyy OT Apologies to the OP Apologies from me too and this will be the last I say of it, but you would love what just happened. So he was at his computer, sitting up at the table, and he suddenly goes in a tiny raspy voice (and this is a 6'3 big guy btw), lunch. I look at him, and he repeats, lunch. I say ok, so you're hungry, lets go get some lunch. He got up and has now collapsed on the floor on the dog. When words aren't enough...

:D :D Oh dear god I feel your pain. Just make him some soup! Then tell him to pick his bloody socks up and stop giving the dog a hard time, the grub Omg this is it exactly - especially the part where the guy is like, oh I called for you - in the raspy, I'm dying voice. Thanks for that, I needed a good laugh

Does he get man flu? Stupid question - ofcourse he does Oh he has it right now, reckons he'll need tomorrow off work. Well we had the doctor actually do a house visit last night (because the other doctors were closed being a public holiday and Dan thought he was dying), turns out he has a common cold.

OT but why on earth doesnt he pick his bloody socks up? My husband would be mince meat if he left socks on the floor all week Lol because I do plenty of things that annoy him, such as leave bits of wrapping in places. When he loses it with me for leaving the museli bar wrapper or whatever on the kitchen bench, I lose it with him for leaving his dirty clothes in piles and well we seem to disagree on what makes a clean house (I hate dirty clothes and dirty dishes - good hygiene is what I want basically but I couldn't care less about a plastic bag on the floor) and he hates mess (so you can have dirty clothes stuffed into your cupboard stinking the place out so long as it's tidy :s) I care a lot about the dog training etc so he defers completely to me on that, and he cares a lot about the garden so I defer completely to him on that - working so far and we're both happy. The rest of things well, I just yell at him about those when I feel like a good argument - releasing some tension etc, and he gets grumpy with me when his basic needs haven't been satisfied eg hungry sleepy etc - typical man really right?

So what happens if Dan has left his stuff lying around and you don't try to reprimand him? Nothing, the dog's happy, Dan's happy, the socks stay on the floor lol until a week later when Dan comes crying about having no socks... ETA I could take a sock right now, throw it on the ground in front of the dog, and it's not like he'll get sad about it. Only time he might is if we start to play with him and get him riled up, well sometimes he looks for something to put in his mouth like a toy. Sometimes he sees the sock out of the corner of his eye and he'll go for it, and maybe touch it and then jump back because his brain has finally caught up. He'll look very cautious then and watch us to see what we're going to do. Put a sock in the middle of the lounge room floor before you go to work. I'm interested to see what happens when you come home. Tossing a sock on the floor in front of him is an incomplete picture. If he does or he doesn't do anything it won't prove anything, but I'd still be interested to see. Well that's exactly what Dan does. Dan takes his socks off sometimes whilst watching tv, and whilst he always moves his shoes, there are times when somehow, the sock is dropped in a random location or just even left next to the couch - so that will mean the sock is left there for at least 24 hours. If the dog is the culprit, he won't even come near the sock, he will be crouching in the doorway looking more ashamed of himself the closer I get to the sock. If he hasn't done it, he'll like walk right over the top of it and seemingly not even notice it. I am going to try really hard to get a video of this for you guys, because I don't believe mine can be the only dog who does this and maybe when I show everyone, it might be easier to talk about.

So what if Dan is lying and the dog is innocent? Do you get a different response from the dog? We have to be a little bit careful when having this sort of discussion. We're talking about one dog, and we're talking about one person's interpretation, and we're talking about something that probably doesn't happen very often. So the probability of things occurring by chance or error alone are fairly high, but I'm still interested. This is very true, and I certainly don't remember my dog before this one being the same, but he got much harsher punishments. Fortunately Dan is a pretty shocking liar, and I believe the dog over him so it's never really been much of an issue. If the dog is innocent, he just seems to behave like he thinks I'm angry at Dan or someone/something else, even if I'm staring directly at him. This was a dog though that I was with almost all the time until he was over 12 months old. He still comes everywhere with me -he was at the Clare horse races the other day lol and has stayed in many motels (some which don't even typically allow dogs but agreed to him over the phone because I think sometimes men just assume I'll own some tiny handbag type dog), and I think perhaps this has affected our relationship. We have a very close bond.

This is possibly true too, although, we have seen our dog like hesitate when he doesn't know anyone is watching. His favourite thing to be naughty with are Dan's gardening gloves. He will approach the basket, and then jump around like a wild brumby, then reach forward again and repeat. He'll do this for ages if he thinks no-one's watching - I think he enjoys the thrill and power rush of doing something/interacting with something he's not supposed to. Eventually, he'll either walk away 9/10 times, or he'll grab it and toss it immediately into the air and kind of run away from it. We've seen him do this a few times when he hasn't known we're there, and if we catch him he looks absolutely devastated.

So what happens if Dan has left his stuff lying around and you don't try to reprimand him? Nothing, the dog's happy, Dan's happy, the socks stay on the floor lol until a week later when Dan comes crying about having no socks... ETA I could take a sock right now, throw it on the ground in front of the dog, and it's not like he'll get sad about it. Only time he might is if we start to play with him and get him riled up, well sometimes he looks for something to put in his mouth like a toy. Sometimes he sees the sock out of the corner of his eye and he'll go for it, and maybe touch it and then jump back because his brain has finally caught up. He'll look very cautious then and watch us to see what we're going to do.

Thats the tone in the voice thats making the dog cringe. What you haven't addressed with presenting this video is when Jacqui walks into her house and her dog is displaying guilt right away, with nothing being said. That's right, it is the tone of voice - what this demonstrates is that the dog didn't need to do anything naughty to look "guilty", he has just learned how to do appeasement gestures and they don't have to be connected to any "knowing" about being "naughty". As I said earlier, you could repeat the experiment until the dog has learned to expect punishment then the dog will begin to look guilty before the owner says anything, just because the treat is missing. Maybe read my other posts first. Sometimes I start to tell my dog off for something that I'm sure is his doing - ie, one of Dan's socks randomly lying in the middle of the loungeroom. Now Dan will also point at the dog and be like, it was him. So how do I tell? I ask the dog. And unlike Dan, he might be smart enough to be naughty when we're not around, but fortunately he's not yet capable of lying. Or, sometimes I will tell the dog off for something that was his fault, can't have been anyone else's (for example he has this hole that he sometimes likes to work on), but he doesn't look sad despite my usual lecture. I know this means that Dan has already told him off for this particular crime - he is familiar with double jeopardy lol.

Very cute video, but, my dog seems to be different. Firstly, if I did that to him and he hadn't done anything he'd been told was naughty before, he wouldn't look guilty, he would just assume I was talking to Dan or someone else lol. Secondly, he looks guilty before we've discovered the evidence, and only when there is something to find. Sometimes we can't find what the problem is that night, and then the next morning in the sun we can see that he's worked on the hole next to the fence. I will try and take a video of it, because it's impossible to explain. I go back to work tomorrow, so tomorrow night, I'll have the camera ready when I get to back door. Now we just need to wait till he's done something. I will also take a video of what happens when I try to reprimand him, and he's either already been punished for that particular crime or didn't actually do it (Dan will sometimes just leave his stuff lying around, and the dog doesn't always get the benefit of the doubt...)

Dogs who are reprimanded for things after the event often learn to offer appeasement gestures a lot to avoid trouble. Dogs who are reprimanded at the time of the event learn to avoid trouble by not doing the thing that got them into trouble. If you are seeing appeasement gestures, your dog does not understand what he did wrong. What do you mean he doesn't know what he did wrong? He only does the appeasement gestures after he's done something wrong, and this is often before we even know he's done anything so it can't be coming from us. What I mean is we come home every day, the dog is waiting at the gate. His tail is always wagging and he's overjoyed to see us. I then go inside, get changed and then go to the back door to let him in. At this point, if he's not waiting right at the back door ready to try and drench me with kisses, and instead is perhaps crouched a meter or so away from the door, well we know immediately that he's done something naughty whilst we were out. He knows that what he's done will get him into trouble. Why else would he do that? Sometimes I come home, see something naughty and start talking in an angry voice to the dog and he just looks confused and distracted - like maybe I'm not talking to him or something. I know to stop very quickly then, because it always turns out he's already been told off for that particular issue by my partner. I don't know how else to explain his response, but it would seem to me that he knows he's done wrong, he knew it at the time and just decided that perhaps because he was angry at us for leaving him alone so long, or the desire to be naughty was overwhelming and our punishments not severe enough to counter the urge, he'd be naughty. Everything we tell him off for he has been caught in the act doing before. He's not a very naughty dog, maybe once a fortnight he'll do something cheeky - like for example, move my partner's gardening glove from the basket into the middle of the lawn. He knows he can't touch those gloves, he's been caught in the act and he had exactly the same response - ie crouching low and looking extra sad and sorry for himself. This is not a dog who suffers severe punishments. We're talking 10 secs of - (angry shocked voice) - what is this, this is unacceptable, you're a naughty dog and should be ashamed! - wait 5 secs whilst he looks at you sadly - ok let's go inside. And we can now go through the whole, oh I'm so happy to see you, hug time etc before we go for our walk/run/bike ride/dog park.

Indeed. To be significant however, we're going to need a sample size greater than one person's experiences... It kind of similar to what cigarette companies do, in that they claim that because they know of someone who smoked and didn't die from it, cigarettes can't possibly be bad for you. Yay for scientific method to help us see the forest from the trees. jacqui835: I understand that you feel strongly about this and that you are convinced that you are right and that it's clear no one is going to be able to convince you that cropping is anything but in the dog's benefit but when you say things like this: It's hard to take the above argument seriously because that makes it sound like it's fine to chop of the dog's entire ear and leave leave the hole behind because that's all that matters Also, I can't stress how much I disagree with your assertion that floppy ears are somehow dangerous or detrimental to a dog's health and have been introduced by humans because they are 'cute'. Although the 'standard for working line Kelpies states 'prick ears', there are many very good working dogs with floppy ears who are very valued by their handlers, who do not suffer from ear-related health problems and perform their functions perfectly - you can't really have a good herding Kelpie whose hearing isn't good. Nature wanted my Kelpie's ears to Rise and that they did, with no need for surgical intervention. Nature decided my other dog would go floppy eared and his hearing (like many other floppy eared working dogs) is fine ... You cannot possibly say that Australian farmers were breeding for 'cuteness' when they ended up with floppy-eared Kelpies - working line Kelpies are bred with pure functionality in mind and appearance is entirely irrelevant. If you mentioned breeding 'cute' into the mix, I'm sure the Kelpie breeders would be horrified... I think if you just said that if you said you wanted to crop a dog's ears for cosmetic reasons because you think it looks better, many people might not agree with you but probably wouldn't argue with you as long as the cropping was done by a qualified vet, in a jurisdiction where cropping is legal and the dog's health is not impaired ... It's where you try to shift the responsibility for the decision from you to the dog i.e. it's for the dog's welfare that it comes across as something of a tenuous argument... The dogs were selectively bred for floppy ears long before they were bred to herd sheep - in fact before we even had any sheep. They looked less threatening and hence it was easier to keep an animal once considered a threat near the family. Kelpies were developed more recently and supposedly have dingo in them, which would account for their upright ears. I'm not trying to say that I think dogs need to have erect ears to be able to lead happy lives or that they can't hear at all. But I believe their life is enhanced by having proper ears that firstly do provide superior hearing abilities and additionally, don't whack against their ears their whole lives. Lord knows I'd hate have something covering my ears or flapping against them. Anyway, through this I have realised that cropping is not the answer, it's unlikely to ever be acceptable again in mainstream society. So one day, if I'm ever wealthy enough, I will attempt to create a doberman with naturally erect ears - the way Dobermann originally intended.

Indeed. To be significant however, we're going to need a sample size greater than one person's experiences... It kind of similar to what cigarette companies do, in that they claim that because they know of someone who smoked and didn't die from it, cigarettes can't possibly be bad for you. Yay for scientific method to help us see the forest from the trees.

Well sure, point is though that you can find something a dog did several hours ago and punish it then and there and the dog knows exactly why it's being reprimanded. This isn't true when they're puppies, but you can see the transition as they age - by the time my dog was about 6 months old, if he'd peed in the house (usually because it was raining or something), he wouldn't come to greet me when I came home and I could tell how close I was getting to the scene of the crime by how far away from me my dog was keeping. And this was a dog who has never been beaten in his life, so I don't think he was worried that I'd hurt him, more he just seemed to fear my disapproval. However it wasn't until he'd been reprimanded that we could go back to being normal with each other again. If he'd done something naughty, he would act extra sheepy and sooky until I found it, told him off and then said, ok let's get on with life etc.

Let me assure you, he is a dog that has no moral compass and therefore no concept that what he did was wrong. Otherwise why would he have done it? He could probably tell afterwards that you were upset with him, but he wouldn't have understood why. I'm going to have to disagree with this. Sometimes dogs do the wrong thing, know it was wrong at the time and also know they'll get in trouble as soon as you see 'it', be it the hole in the lawn, the glove or whatever he's moved or the couch he sat on etc. Since starting work full-time, my dogs' reaction to my home coming is an extremely reliable means through which to determine whether he's been naughty or not. If I come home and he's normal I know he's been good. If however he's crouched close to the ground and actively maintaining a bubble between us, well it's time to search for the crime. You can even tell if he's been confronted for that particular problem yet or not; like by my partner, bc he will act normal, and if you spy the crime instead of looking super sad and sorry, or making a run for it, he just ignores it. Sure enough, everytime he's done this, Dan has confirmed he's already been told off. So it would seem he knows exactly what he's doing, and just chooses to offend anyway.

Well when the doberman was invented, Dobermann decided that he had the perfect dog and temperament and the ears could be achieved through cropping so it wasn't necessary. Can you imagine what would happen today if I said I wanted to start breeding dobermans with erect ears? If these forums are anything to go by, I don't think anyone would be interested in out crossing and I worry that it would be hard to include the best dobermans and get agreement on which breeds to introduce etc. If this is not the case let me know, and in all seriousness, I would be very interested in looking into how we could create a doberman with erect ears. Most cropping today is done for cosmetic reasons. I never said it wasn't. I said that I would elect to crop my dog's ears for the reasons I've detailed. There are wild members of the canine family who reside in deserts, and none have floppy ears - coyotes, fennec foxes. The only animals that have floppy ears are domesticated dogs - I am pretty sure all dogs originated from wolves, or potentially other members of the canine family but whom all possessed erect ears originally.

Poor pooch how can anyone say thats okay it looks so painful Well obviously we will have to agree to disagree. I would never crop my dog's ears unless firstly it were legal, and secondly, I knew of a very experienced and competent vet who could do it for me. Those two conditions satisfied however and I would opt for the procedure. I have listed my reasons for it, which no-one seems to have commented on (although yes it's true the bloodhound they claim has massive ears to assist with it's nose - this is not the case with the doberman, or why/how dogs were first bred with floppy ears. That particular example is arguably a side-effect capitalised on 1000's of years later after the floppy ears started appearing.) I have watched the procedure, and I've met dogs who've had it done and I felt very positively about it, the dogs certainly seemed happy enough. Guess we all react differently to stimulus, and that's what makes life so exciting - for me anyway.

You are kidding me.. have you actually seen ear cropping done? It's a major surgical procedure. What the hell do you think they're cutting off... its ear flap. Stuff that protects against crud getting in the ear. If you want a prick eared dog then buy one. Please don't pretend that by cutting off ear flap and taping ears up to change natural ear set the dog is benefitting in any way. Cutting dogs ears off may protect livestock guardians against damage by predators but this is not why the Dobermann is cropped. Cropping is banned in quite a few European countries by the way. Geez you can go watch it on youtube, you can even the recovery process. I would hardly call it major surgery, there are no internal incisions, no major bleeding etc. Yes, they are cutting off ear 'flap'. Tissue that has a very limited blood supply, next to no nerves and basically consists entirely of loose skin and cartilage. You always appear to be fairly intelligent, and typically I like what you have to say and how you say it, so I can't understand now how you could possibly be seriously trying to claim that the removal of a little 'ear flap' constitutes a major surgical procedure...

Me too!! I fell inlove with a bull at the ekka last year because we showed a heifer for this man and the bull was across from her and he was the sweetest bull and perfect looking to me he had the big broad head , the boy that showed him told be to be wary as he head butts i said umm well he hasnt head butted me yet im pretty sure he only loved me cause i kept sneaking him little bits of hay :D And I don't expect you to take my word for it... "Those with more natural ear shapes, like those of wild canids like the fox, generally hear better than those with the floppier ears of many domesticated species and in addition have a degree of ear mobility that helps them to rapidly pinpoint the exact location of a sound. Eighteen or more muscles can tilt, rotate and raise or lower a dog's ear." "By the way, dogs with ears that stand up have the greatest hearing ability, better than breeds with long, floppy ears. The pointed ears are natural cups for bringing in the sound, and the tiny muscles that control them allow the dog to move his ears in several directions." "Breeds with erect ears have better hearing than those with floppy ears due to their sound capturing ability." "The shape of a dog's ears helps with hearing too. Just as we cup our hands around our ears so we can hear better, a dog's upright, curved ears help direct and amplify sound. Erect ears, like those of wild canids, hear better than the floppy ears of many domestic breeds." For the doberman specifically: "The first is that a neatly cropped ear is less of a "handle" for an attacker to hang on to. Since the Doberman has been bred to be a personal protector, a cropped ear gives the dog a decided advantage in a confrontation with a perpetrator. The second has to do with sound "localization". An erect earred dog can localize the source of a sound to within a 5 degree cone, whereas a drop eared dog can only localize a sound source to within a 20 degree cone. Since Dobermans do SEARCH AND DETECTION as well as SEARCH AND RESCUE, cropped ears are a decided advantage." I just feel that floppy ears are a trait we've selectively bred for because humans thought it was cute, and I feel that this was done to the detriment of the dogs.

And ear cropping isn't an "unnecessary surgical procedure"? It serves one purpose only in the Dobermann - cosmetic alteration for the owner's preference. Yeesh. You're not changing the shape of the ear - you're removing ear and forcing it to grow into a different position. Where's the "benefit" for the dog? Well, we call it the ear but they don't remove the actual ear or anything that valuable... they remove some of the tissue that should be helping to increase the effectiveness of the ear (the ear and all it's components are within the dog's head), but which instead in floppy eared dogs is actually reducing ear function and creating an environment more conducive to bacteria growth. In doing this, they enable the ear to be able to stand and hence improve hearing and ear condition. Of course there are people who do it for cosmetic reasons, same as there are people who dock for work/practical reasons vs aesthetic but that's a different matter entirely.

Agreed. I'm moving to Europe in a couple of years and I will finally hopefully be able to own my cropped dobe As for the desexing, if you can last until 2 years with an undesexed male dog and managed to cope, I'm not sure that you'd need to worry about it. To be honest with you, I've only ever had female dogs desexed, I've also seen the studies posted and I just don't believe it's necessary or better for the dog health-wise. If you can control your dog and stop him from reproducing, I don't see the need and I prefer my dog to be as nature intended. For anyone who then says, "yeah but you want to crop their ears," that's because dogs originally all had upright ears, we just thought it made them look cute to selectively breed for floppy ears, so I don't see that as the natural state. You say you like your dogs to be as nature intended but you want a dobermann with cropped ears? Dogs born with floppy ears should keep floppy ears. Born with tail should keep the tail thats the way nature intended after all . As for desexing i cant really say, but i have found this thread very interesting to read Re the bolded section. There is no such thing as a 'natural' dog with floppy ears - they were selectively bred for the same way we've created heaps of variants, and it is my opinion that this was done to the detriment of the dog - as it results in poorer hearing and an increased incidence of ear problems/infections. As such, I would elect to have my dog restored to a 'natural' state to undo the damage done by human interference. I would not touch his tail, and that was actually one of my selection criteria when choosing a breeder (at the time, many dobe breeders were sending their dogs overseas or interstate to have the procedure). I didn't think it's cruel, but unnecessary and was unlikely to help my dog given the nature of the life I intended for him to lead (ie he's not going down any rabbit holes, and he's not going to be used in dog fighting/people attacking - which is my understanding of why dogs were initially docked). I don't believe desexing would enhance the life of my dog and hence for me it would be an unnecessary surgical procedure, which would in turn have the side effects of exposing him to several new potential problems such as increased chance of obesity and bone cancers. I still advocate desexing to the masses because there are too many dogs, and overpopulation is one thing desexing can treat. But there is no denying that it will change the growth patterns and end product - people who can train and contain their dogs just need to decide what sort of dog is best for them.

poodlemum and the other helpful people - thanks so much for being helpful on this thread. There are SO many DOL threads around that are quite anti-desexing these days (in great detail), which is totally fine but it's therefore nice to know about the practical implications of trying to keep a dog entire so that the decision to desex or not desex is made with knowledge of the pros and cons of both scenarios. Every time I read a thread that's discouraging people from desexing, I always wonder if the person being discouraged has the time and resources to be able to own an entire dog. I know I certainly don't I own an entire dog and I feel very confident in saying that there's a HUGE difference between owning one entire dog or 2+ entire dogs of the same gender vs 2 entire dogs of opposite genders. I don't really feel you need a whole lot more in the way of resources and time to own one entire dog - I would say that you need an escape proof yard and to be able to spend a couple of hours with your dog every day + training regardless of whether it's been desexed or not... But owning a bitch and dog, well, that's a whole different kettle of fish.

I have a video if you're interested of my dobe playing with a male rottie who was desexed at 2-3 months old - in the video they are both just over 1 year old. IMO, he's hideous, but the owner loves him. He is very leggy and tall - much larger than most rotties you see, has that strange sort of eternally almost puppy like temperament and a small head in proportion to the rest of the body. I also have some photos of my dobe playing with a GSP who was desexed at about 6 months, and again, he's very tall/leggy, is not fat but has more of a barrel shaped body than what the entire ones have and a small head. Just looking through my photos I also have some of a male weim who was desexed at 1.5 years compared with his half brother who was done at 6 months. One is a skinny tall dog with a fine head, the other is a solid impressive masculine looking dog. If you want to see any of these email me and I'll send you the links. It's definitely a matter of personal preference - what look you prefer that is, but there is definitely a difference.

Such a pity your in Brisbane and so far away from me, I'd love to meet Echo after everything I've heard, he seems like quite an interesting character (and well of course he's a dobe ) Anyway, that is strange, but if it makes you feel any better, my dog went through the exact same thing but with tree stumps. One day he was fine with them, the next day, he almost ran onto the road (dragging me with him) to try and escape from one. Well I just used to stand near the offending stump with the dog and wait till he calmed down and stopped being fixated on it. I just pretended I had something to do at that spot (check my phone or whatever) and paid no attention to him or the stump. Finally he got over it a bit (though this took several sessions) and enough for us to walk right up to it. I gave it a kick and he went up and sniffed it (looking extra sheepy) and now well he just views them as a highly desirable pee spot. I wouldn't worry, my dog isn't scared of anything now, and in fact he runs up in front of me to protect me when he does worry about something (instead of cowering behind like he used to...)

I've found this too - and it really irks me as a lab owner (it gives us bad names) because it's so easy to stop if you had put the effort in at the start. I had one lab the other day kept jumping up on me - I was telling him NO! DOWN! but his owner was standing there laughing, I said "don't think it's that funny mate - what if I was a four year old kid? your dog has just knocked me on my arse! plus it's rude as all hell" being 6ft4in and weighing in at 120kgs with a look of death on my face stopped him smiling pretty damn quick. I'm pretty lenient as well - I go down the park expecting to be jumped on - but not to be laughed at whilst their dog repeatedly does it. Take a hint bozzo I've told him no and down already. Part I find most amazing is that you try and tell these dogs to stop, say no in a firm no-nonsense type voice, and it doesn't even register, like they've never even heard the word before and it holds no meaning :s ETA but yep I totally agree, I go to the dog park prepared to interact with lots of dogs. But I do find having a beagle trying to like jump onto my shoulder when I'm sitting on a bench unacceptable. You end up having to shove the dog onto the ground which looks bad, but I certainly wouldn't expect anyone to put up with that from my dog. And labs may be cute but they're pretty big and strong so it can actually hurt if they jump on you.