fuzzy82

Don't know how they do it over there, but my local obedience club has classes 1-4, 1 being the beginner's and 4 being the most advanced, ready to compete level. You don't attend each class for a set time, it's a drop in class where you pay $5 per hour, and when the dog has mastered the skills taught in the current class it graduates to the next level up. I took Obi to the level 1 on Friday, his first proper obedience class ever, and he graduated that night, so we will be in class 2 this week:) Maybe the club down there uses a similar system?

The Canidae food contains cranberry. My puppy went through phases where he would start peeing inside, always in the same spot. I restricted his access to that spot and took him outside more often. I found that as he started being able to hold it and was mostly housetrained I got a bit slack with taking him out and rewarding him for going outside, so whenever he's relapsed I just make sure I take him out more and reward.

My dogs always hang around and beg for food whenever I eat anything. No "pack" issues here. Not that I believe that humans are part of the pack or hierarchy anyway.

That is so cute:) How do you make a dog cake?

I would think it was weird if the breeder showed no interest in the puppy.. maybe she's just been busy? I still sometimes email Obi's foster carer, and she's always happy to see photos etc, which is cool. Btw, your check chain in the group photo is way too big for the puppy. I don't agree with using them on puppies, but if you are, at least make sure they fit properly.

Mine haven't had b-days while I've had them, but Obi's first and Pixie's second are coming up later this month. I am just going to take some photos, gush about them to everyone who will listen, post on fb and my blog, but the dogs won't know it's their b-day. As far as they are concerned, nothing special will happen.

Watching the dog walk/run isn't the way to diagnose it. The vet should feel the knee and try to push the kneecap out of place. How easily it pushes out and how quickly/easily it pops back in determines the grade. Not how often the dog limps.

I tried to get into earthdog a while back, and emailed a few people about where to find classes or fun days or anything at all to do with it. And never heard back, and I didn't find anything when googling it. Seems it's not all that popular, or if it is, they don't want do be found. It's cool though, I'd love to get into it.

Most pet insurance doesn't cover luxating patella anyway. Sorry about the LP though, my puppy developed LP at 9 months, so that was the end of his agility career before it even started.

Something in between the black dog treat pouch and the doog walkies belt would be nice. The latter is quite bulky, but I like that it has several pockets and somewhere to hook the leash.

There is also www.freesites.com.au. The designs are nice, and you get your own domain name, very easy to use. Thing is, you pay for the domain registration and hosting, but the design templates and content manager are free.

http://www.ellaslead.com/ does reasonably prices leather collars, loads of cool designs and they also custom make them.

Nope, I don't think you can. However, I think most people who set out to socialise their dogs think that socialising with other dogs is the most important thing in the world, and neglect to socialise the dog with humans. You can definitely socialise too much with other dogs, and get a dog obsessed dog. I don't really care about socialising my dogs with other dogs, I put much more effort into exposing them to new environments and people. I did socialise them with dogs as well, but not just letting them play with other dogs. I also taught them early on that they should still be able to focus on me and do some work even though there are other dogs around, and THEN they can play. My goal in socialising them with other dogs was that they will be friendly when approached and show the proper social skills. I don't care if they don't want to play with every other dog they see. I don't take them to dog parks and don't deliberately socialise them with other dogs, but in training class they have to deal with being approached and being around other dogs. Even when dealing with people all I expect is for them to be tolerant. One of them looooved all humans, and the other is aloof around strangers. So yes, you can socialise too much with other dogs, and no, you can't socialise too much with people and exposing them to the world etc.

Do ADAA agility or move to NSW.. or petition Dogs Qld to make an exception for the 2 dog rule for rescues. I'm not doing agility, I want to do obedience. If I was doing agility I guess there wouldn't be an issue. I will email Qld Dogs though.

They get two chances to learn from their "mistake" in Qld now. But what if it wasn't a "mistake" and they got their dog from a shelter, like I did? I have already made my two mistakes. All they are doing is excluding people who put effort into training their mixed breeds dogs. While some people might say 'well I'll just get a purebred for my next dog then', I say 'well bugger them, I want to get shelter dogs so I just won't trial'. How does that benefit anyone? It doesn't get rid of BYB's, it just makes purebred dog owners seem very elitist. Like our mixed breed dogs aren't good enough for them.

I have an oodle that I got from a shelter, and I also have a JRT x from a shelter. I had hoped to trial with both of them, but if I register them it means I can never again compete with a shelter dog, and I WAS planning on getting shelter dogs in the future as well. But now it seems the options are to either get a shelter dog, OR be able to trial. How is that fair? I already said that it sucks for rescue people and that there should be a clause in there for them. It doesn't suck for people that buy multiple dogs from puppy farms though. Or are you ok with people buying and registering oodle after oodle? Of course I don't support BYB's, but to go on the register at least they have to be desexed. So if someone did buy from a BYB and then decided to put all that effort into training to the point where they want to compete with their dog instead of breeding it, then I see nothing wrong with that. Being able to register the dog means they can never breed it, AND it means they are putting effort into training. How is that a bad thing? In fact, if these people were encouraged to register their dogs, there would be fewer BYB's... And even if they did buy from a BYB due to ignorance, and then realised their mistake and then decided they wanted to properly train their dog and trial, is it fair to forever penalise them for the original mistake by telling them their dog can't be registered??

I have an oodle that I got from a shelter, and I also have a JRT x from a shelter. I had hoped to trial with both of them, but if I register them it means I can never again compete with a shelter dog, and I WAS planning on getting shelter dogs in the future as well. But now it seems the options are to either get a shelter dog, OR be able to trial. How is that fair?

You are not supposed to reward immediately after using positive punishment. You must wait at least 10 seconds before rewarding otherwise you turn the roar and banging into a reward marker, and the dog will learn to ignore the noise.

The trainer at my class just told me that cccq only allows you to trial one unpapered (ie associate registered) dog in your lifetime. Just wondering if this is true?

My 11 month old is crated and has been since day one. My nearly 2 year old has never been crated. They don't seem to mind at all.

Smoking laws are the same in Europe, if not stricter, so that's not really an accurate comparison.

I think the two go hand in hand. In Europe, dogs are allowed most places, so they get socialised more and are more confident around people and in new places, and thus they are allowed to be in those places because they behave well. Here, because our dogs aren't allowed anywhere, they are not as socialised, less confident around people and not well behaved and thus not allowed to go anywhere. Also, in Europe dogs live inside with their families. When the family is at work, the dog is loose in the house or crated. When there are visitors over, the dogs are inside the house and have to interact properly with visitors. They don't just put them out in the backyard because they have people over, so once again they get more socialisation.

I don't know about UK, but I am from Europe, and while I don't know the specific rules, I know in my country it's easy to get a pedigree dog from a BYB, and pretty much every purebred dog is registered and has a pedigree, despite irresponsible breeding.

I was about to post that. I did a Cert I through them, they are quite helpful and nice:)

I crate trained my puppy, and dunno what I would do without the crate. It's a safe place to put the puppy when he sleeps (and he's not gonna wake up and wander into some corner and pee, he will hold it until let out) and when we're out I know he's not getting into trouble. Also, I found having a new puppy quite overwhelming, as he's quite drivey and I used to joke that he was on speed. So it was somewhere to put him away when I needed a break, and needed time to just be human and walk my other dog and do some housework etc. The con is that if he's in his crate while we're out we have to make sure we're not gone for too long, as opposed to him being in a puppy safe play pen or room, but we both work from home, so not really an issue for us.