FD26

Bluefairy - that sounds good. I bet your girls will love that!

I can't be too helpful on what breed you should get, but just wanted to say hello as I'm in the NT too

; I'll surely be asking her when I take the pup, but that's still quite a few weeks off and it's been really bugging me that I can't remember lol. I don't think it was heartworm, only because she said it was specific to Darwin (or the NT, not too sure). At the time I wasn't paying a great deal of attention because I had my dog and two cats there at the same time, which was a bit of a challenge!

Oh, also, I'm pretty sure there's an ongoing 6 month booster here in Darwin for something, but I can't for the life of me remember what it is. Does anyone have any clue what it could be?

I might be off with the first one, considering it's not one I actually have to worry about doing. I just know he will get one before he gets here.

I just noticed this. Why only 2? Mine will need his first at 6 or 7 weeks, before he gets here, then again at 12 and 16 weeks. The AVA recommended vaccination regime is 8 and 12 weeks followed by 12 months after the last puppy shot. Ok. Is this along the same lines as vets following the advice of the drug companies instead of the AVA?

UGH! Idiots! What did they expect? And then to want to get a cat? I hope you told them cats are destructive as well? My cats scratched a pair of my boots to bits recently time to get them reaccquainted with their scratching post! We have a saying in my house though, if something gets destroyed "it's your fault for not putting it away" and you can't blame the animals... :D This is mostly for the benefit of my 9 year old! Although, after losing our last pup he keeps his chewed up toys now in a special place as a reminder of him so I don't think he gets quite as angry about it now.

I've been lurking around the rescue area a bit lately, and it's doing my head in. I want to be able to do something to help, but I have no idea what. I knew all of that was going on before, I suppose...but not in the magnitude that it is. It makes me feel really bad, like I should be fostering 20 cats or something but because my older cat doesn't adjust well to newcomers, I just can't do it.

DOL's been a wealth of information for me. Mostly for information I was seeking out already, but I have learned some new things along the way. I think the main thing it will change when I get my new pup is socialisation. I think I used to think I was doing this correctly because I always had pretty balanced dogs...but now I realise there was so much more I could have done, and that my 'fairly balanced' dogs could have been a lot more balanced than they were! Oh goodness, I'm glad it's converted some people on food! When I read what was in the cat food I was buying in the supermarket I started wondering why I would treat my pets as anything less than the members of my family that they are. I'll tell you what, the day I read what was in their food I was off to the pet supplies shop to buy something better, their old food is still in the cupboad I think. And they've absolutely thrived since then! But for years I was feeding my (previous) cats that crap...and would have probably fed it to dogs as well. I'm really glad it occured to me to acutally stop and think about it.

My crate that size didn't fit super easily into my X-trail boot so doubt you will get one into a Getz. What do you use instead? I've seen the seat belt harnesses, and that seems like a good idea to me. In the past I've always preferred having my dogs ride with me in the car, rather than in a crate, although in the past I was slightly naive and problably not as safety consious as I should have been!

I just noticed this. Why only 2? Mine will need his first at 6 or 7 weeks, before he gets here, then again at 12 and 16 weeks.

$90 shipping alone to NT through vebo! Sometimes I really hate living here

I'm curious as I've been told by a vet that the "new" protocols are only for *some* vaccines. I have been told that the Canine Cough vaccine is recommended to be given every 6 months under the new guidelines - is this correct? Nope wrong. Yes there are vacc's registered for 3 yearly use, but the AVA have said that ALL core vacc's are likely to also last 3 years. They specifically state that the new protocol will likely mean administering vacc's as an 'off label' dose. Go to the AVA's website - plenty of info there! I just printed out a few pages to put in the waiting room Okay... for the dumbies... what is an "off label dose"??? And will it be accepted by training clubs and kennels? And, any chance you could post the linky for this dumbo to the website - I went looking a while ago and got awfully lost ;) I found this in my search: http://ava.informz.net/ava/data/images/doc...inal-june09.pdf It's still only marginally useful for me though, as it's in vet-speak it does give me something to bring up with my vet, though.

Yes, there have been studies that looked at the amount of land that would be needed to supply the current human population with enough protein from vegetable sources to survive. Even if every square inch of suitable land on the planet were used (including remaining animal habitat), it wouldn't be enough. So, a decrease in human population would be needed.... I suggest members of PETA should put their mouths where their principles are, and go first! Do you have an links to these studies? That theory seems bizarre to me. I'm a vegetarian that doesn't go around parading my opinions, in fact I'm the only one in my household that doesn't eat meat lol. But I still like to quietly dream of a day when we don't eat meat anymore, as a species. Its a nice thought, but unfortunately, humans are designed to eat meat. Some people can survive on a vegetarian diet and some (like me) can't. I was vegetarian for about 8 years, and I constantly struggled with anaemia. My body just couldn't digest enough iron from vegetable sources, I was on a very specific diet to try to get as much iron as possible but it just didn't work. Even iron supplements didn't help, my body just can't absorb them ;) So I need to eat meat to stay healthy. And to be perfectly honest, I like meat Hmm, fair enough. To each their own opinion. I highly disagree that humans are designed to eat meat, or that if they are that means we should carry on doing it. But, I don't really care what other people do, that's their prerogative. Both my partner and son eat meat because they like it, and that's their choice. :rolleyes: I outgrew arguing about it when I left my teen years lol. It's futile really, as you can't change someone's mind unless they want it changed! And I don't think quite so radically as I used to. A few years of studying psychology made it really clear that animal research etc. is still a vital thing although still something I can't personally do (thus why I don't study psychology anymore!). Funnily enough, I've been a vegetarian for almost 20 years and my body retains excessive amounts of iron lol. Always shocks my doctors. However, I do have a problem with B12, which I take supplements for.

How exciting, elsa! Can't wait til I'm picking my boy up!

I'm confused then. Does this mean they shouldn't have any yearly vacs? Or are there only certain ones that need to be done yearly? How do you know if you live in a high risk area? This is the first I've heard about 3 yearly vaccinations..

Yes, there have been studies that looked at the amount of land that would be needed to supply the current human population with enough protein from vegetable sources to survive. Even if every square inch of suitable land on the planet were used (including remaining animal habitat), it wouldn't be enough. So, a decrease in human population would be needed.... I suggest members of PETA should put their mouths where their principles are, and go first! Do you have an links to these studies? That theory seems bizarre to me. I'm a vegetarian that doesn't go around parading my opinions, in fact I'm the only one in my household that doesn't eat meat lol. But I still like to quietly dream of a day when we don't eat meat anymore, as a species.

True! We're looking at a used one of those for a second car at the moment, but I think it's still a couple months off. Oh well, I suppose I should get time to find out before he gets here anyhow.

Thanks Ellz, that's good to know. I'm watching a couple on ebay, but it looks as though they're going to surpass $100 soon, especially as most of them don't do flat rate Aussie shipping. It looks like we will be going with the DD crates, then. Another question for you..I'm not very good with measurements (I get so muddled having grown up in the US and then moving to Aus and having to learn the metric system lol). Does the 36" crate fit into a car easily? We only have a small car (a Getz), so I'm wondering if we will need an alternative for car travel.

Same Lepto as is spread by rats or a different version? Lepto in the form as spread by rats isn't that easy to catch (and isn't confined to the tropics, it's a major issue in NZ ). Assuming it's the same form of the disease avoid areas carriers (rats, bats?) could have urinated and it really won't be that much of an issue. I've had a vaccinated dog die of Lepto, the vaccination isn't very reliable anyway. A Stafford pup at 12 weeks weighs around 6 or 7 kg at the most, not really much of a burden! Tough, good for the pup to learn that you control the things he wants. Maybe I'm thinking of the wrong disease? My issue wasn't so much with the pup not being happy, but with my actual ability to carry him around when he's in such a state..

I actually have one of their's on my watchlist at the moment. They do flat rate shipping, which is good. A lot of them charge $60 for shipping to NT! We'll see how the auction goes...

I'm not sure about parvo prevelence here, but when we had our last dog our vet stressed not to take him for walks until after his 3rd vaccinations. Being in the tropics we have Leptospirosis to worry about, as well. And we also don't really have anywhere that's not a high traffic area - Darwin is FULL of dogs, every second yard has one sort of thing. Maybe just car rides? Will that help? I don't know how feasible it is to carry a staffy around everywhere although I do remember becoming very upset when I couldn't carry my last guy around anymore when he got too big, but that was only in the house. I'm not sure he would have been so happy to have been carried when there were things he wanted to get to! It should be safe to take him to visit friend's dogs, should it? I have a friend with a yellow lab that's pretty chill. I have another friend with a GSD but I'm not so sure how they'd go together, so I don't know if I want to risk that.

This has been really perplexing me lately. If the ideal time to socialise is while they're young, but you cannot take them for walks, etc. before they have their third injection how on earth do you socialise them? Our pup will have interaction with us, and the people who visit including other children. And also with the neighbouring dogs through the fence I imagine. But outside of that, how can we socialise him without putting his health at risk?

I agree with you here! I love pitbulls I owned one in the states, and had many friends who owned them, and we never had any trouble with them. It all comes down to what you teach the dog to do. My partner would never have a pitbull because he thinks they're all agressive and I wouldn't have one here as they are too hard to register, etc. but I do still love them, they're beautiful dogs. :D

Hmm, as a pet owner I see it as silly. BUT as someone who lives in an area with a LOT of dogs - I wish the council here would do something like that.