MonElite

Of course public is welcome, the more "audience" the better the show IMHO. Im showing on a Sunday, havent been in the ring since Easter - scary stuff

When I was looking for a prefix I wanted to use a latin name of some sort, best describing the dobes temperament. There were few that were already taken and there were few that I really liked but if they were pronounced the "English" way they sounded really silly, so I gave up on the idea all together. Then came an idea of the word Elite. So I thought of few one being Elitedobe, but decided that if I ever breed another breed of a dog it will not be suited. So I made lots of variations of the word Elite, different spellings etc. And a friend of mine came up with the combination of my first name (Monika) and the word Elite and this is how MonElite came about.

I dont let my dogs play with other dogs, or if I do its with dogs and owners I know. My dogs are rude and they can be the bullying things that others want to avoid, so I wouldnt put other dogs in the situation, I wouldnt want my dogs to be in. If I ever let my dogs off lead with a new dog I warn the owner that my dogs are not of the submissive type and they might, or might not bully their dog. But there are few dogs that my dogs will play with and they get an opportunity on a very rare occassion. They have each other at home to play, so I dont feel they are missing out on anything. Also I never forget that play between the dogs is really a test of strenght.

Permanently or for holidays?

When new owner come to pick up the pup from me I tell them to bring towels in case the pup gets car sick, but never had one as yet. Maybe bacause I take them for car rides few times before they are sold. Also each puppy (as part of the puppy pack) get a blanket that has been part of the dog bed in their kennel. Its dirty, smelly etc but at least it gives them something familiar. All the pups cuddle up to it for few days until they settle in their new homes. I also give the new owners enough food for about a week, so that there is no change in the diet.

Other then K9 pro you can contact Craig from Premier Dog training - he does house calls

Im sure you know about the teach- train -proof principle. Thats what you need to do here.

Hmmmm I dont agree with all what you said doglifetraining. My dogs rarely go to an off lead park to play with other dogs, in fact its hardly ever. I dont have a need for then to be running with a mob of other dogs, I much prefer for them to socialise with couple of dogs that we know or a dog we dont know, but one at a time. Having said that Ruthless Im more then happy for any of my dogs to socialise with Bruno, I think a on lead walk at first would be great.

RIP Codelia

Yes I do. I have in my contract that the puppy buyer is to contact me at least once a year, on the dogs birthday. I welcome a lot more contact then once a year of course

Im a VERY strong advocate of natural feeding and learned tricks on how to keep weight on a dog, not that I currently need to, as my dogs are all pigs and will eat anything, and are more on a constant diet to keep them lean. But I did have a semi fussy eater before, he never looked very underweight but looked slim. First thing that works is giving the dog what he likes, mine liked chicken so he ate a lot of chicken wings, carasses, necks etc. He wasnt keen on veggies but liked liver so when I was doing a veg and mince mix Id always added a bit of cooked liver to the mix and he like that. Im yet to find a dog that doesnt like cooked liver. He liked any human food, so any left overs would get thrown into the mix as well, cut up in tiny bits so he couldnt just pick the tasty stuff but had to eat the other things with it. Also adding beetroot to the mix helped - beetroot is sweet he seemed to like it. And the best motivator was eating in competition with another dog, not separatelly. I feed all my dogs together, I often just stand there looking and making sure they dont steal from each other, however they can see each other and naturally compete. Also when I trained I used food as rewards with his particular dog, so he got a lot of his food during training, he like that. Id teach him heaps of tricks at home and rewarded him for being a circus dog at home. I made sure he got raw fish, or canned, or at least fish oil capsules pretty much every day. His coat was super shiny, he had occasional flaky dry skin, but the actual fur was always tip top shiny, even if I didnt wash him for weeks on end. In winter he had a coat on at night, even inside the house (unless the heater was on full blast and he would make his spot in front of the heater then) And as others said - no harm in doing a thyroid and liver blood test. I do that anyway almost every year on my dogs that are healthy and dont show signs of anything wrong with them. I also noticed that over worming would put my dgos off their food, and when I used to vaccinate they would go off the food for several days. So I minimise worming and only do vaccinations as per J. Dodds advice.

Congrats!!!

Divani is my BF'd girlfriend, he adores her. Fury on another hand he puts up with. She is rude and annoying. I love that about her, as she is also very funny, but to full on for him. But the brown bitch has a special spot in his heart. All in all I dont have to compete with the dogs for his attention. And I hope he doesnt think he has to compete with them for mine, but who knows, maybe he does ;)

Im sorry for your loss, RIP Brock.

Breaking news:) we got a pass in novice this morning. Performance wise she wasn't great but we made it! I'm over the moon, my first pass!!!!

But the photo is actually real, just not the entire story

As much as I love the story, and it includes my breed it is not entirely true. http://www.snopes.com/photos/animals/gratitude.asp But even the real story is gorgeous and what a nice dobie!

Im happy to report that Poodlefans advice worked. I went to a trail on Sunday with Divani. She knows all the excercises and can do them ok but in the ring she is shocking, and its mainly due to me. In no way I will say she is a well trained dog but she should get CD title. In the ring every time I trialed she lagged behind me and wondered off in fig 8 sniffing people. Yesterday I played with her outside the ring, she got very interested in me. When I stood at the start peg I made myself smile. Judge started the heeling with fast pace, which I think helped. And she heeled nicely, prancing and looking up at me. She made errors but her attitude was 1000 better then before. We got to do all the excercises in the ring (including stays), there is no pass as she got up when I left her on the sit stay for the recall, but I was stocked with the performance. If it wasnt for the breaking of the sit stay I probably would ahve had one of the top scores in the ring too! When I walked out from the ring I said to my friends - thanks to PF I smiled and look at the result! Next time I might do the vodka and a smile ;)

Seriously - I used to get like this in the show ring. It took me about 2 years to gain confidence and be realtivelly relaxed to show my dog and know I wont stuff everything up. I havent shown for a while and did at Easter and walked in with a baby pyppy and totally freaked out!!! Won a class so had to go later for oposites (it was a specialty) so had time and had about 3 glasses of Champagne. I was all good the second time around So yeas perhaps I should put some vodka to my morning tea that I usually drink in the car on the way to the trial ;) Thing is that I know all these things PF, I just cant apply them to myself!! So frustrating!!! I am not kidding but I get less stressed going for a job interview, how sad am I........ I seriously would give Divani to someone to take her in the ring for me to trail, havent found a volourteer as yet, anyone here maybe????

My personal experience was completly opposite to Panto's. I got the weirdest people of domain, and very nice of gumtree

I am soooooo guilty of this!!! My dog works relativelly ok in training, good enought to get a comfortable pass Id say. Yet all we get is a fail in a trial. I am super stressed, she walks 3 meters behind me in the ring!!! What do I do to fix ME in the scenario???

Hahaha, funny that! I have dobes and I dont think they make the cutest puppies. As much as I love the breed I think that dogs with more fur make cutter puppies.

I do have breed prejudices, I think that most people do, am I wrong? After all certain breeds have bee bred for certain purposes so if you know the characteristics of a breed you coud automatically assume just basics. I have actually capitalised on people having breed prejudices. I have dobermanns. I wanted a guard dog, I wanted a dog that when I walk it at night people will think twice about aproaching me. And I have that. My Rex was super human friendly yet just because of his breed people would clear the footpath. It used to annoy me sometimes when people were going overboard with fear, but reality is - I wanted a dog that didnt look friendly. If I wanted something friendly looking Id get a Golden or a Sheltie. I now have 3 mean looking things at home, and think that someone would have to be a fool to try to break in to my yard. All based on breed prejudice.

Good Luck!!!

I had the same thought. Obviously the dog in question is happy enough to get into the car and doesnt drool nor vomit. What I would do is take the dog for several really LOOOOONG drives. If he is crate trained Id put him in a crate and just drive and drive ignoring the standing. My Rex loved the car and he liked standing and looking out the window, but if the trip was longer he would eventually get bored and go to sleep.