fuzzy82

I actually disagree. We are guardians for our children, but they certainly don't get to do whatever they want, and they are certainly not equal to adults. Equal in value, yes, but not equal in standing. Guardianship implies responsebility just as much as ownership does, maybe even more so because guardianship implies that you have to take care of them and you are responsible for their well-being. Ownership doesn't mean anything. I own my car and if I want to drive it off a cliff I can do so, or set it on fire, or simple fail to get it serviced regularly, or not have it repaired when it needs it. If you fail to have your dog repaired when it needs it it's a criminal offence, so obviously they are more than just property.

While I don't have a problem referring to myself as my pets' owner, I can kind of see where ALV is coming from. We are also in charge of our children, we make decisions for them, we get to do stuff to them that our kids don't want to do, discipline, sending them to their rooms, taking them to the dr etc, but we are not our kids' owners, they are a separate entity that is in our care. Maybe that is how ALV wants pets to be regarded? I'm not sure what the Aussie rules/laws say about animals, because I am originally from Europe, but in the country I'm from the law clearly states that all animals are separate entities that have value regardless of how much they are worth to humans, and are to be treated accordingly. But pets are still regarded as property according to the law.

Not true at all, we built the ALV website, we also built the oscar's law website, and we know them personally. They are not against keeping animals as pets as all. In fact, all of the dogs saved from puppy mills are either kept by volunteers from ALV themselves (as pets), or rehomed as pets. That statement obviously refers to the general attitude towards animals.

How old is she? I wouldn't just praise when she goes outside, I would give a treat or two as well. When my puppy had accidents inside I would tell him 'noooo puppy' (calmly, not shouting) and pick him up and carry him outside. If he finished outside he was rewarded as normal, with praise and a treat. He was toilet trained in 2.5 weeks, but he still needs to be taken out regularly, because he's a puppy and he doesn't have much bladder control. Whenever he wakes up or has just eaten he goes straight outside, because being a puppy he is unable to hold it, and when he needs to go he needs to go. Maybe you just need to make it more rewarding to go outside, with a treat, but I wouldn't expect her to hold it, even if she has grasped that she should go outside. Depending on age of course.

Photographs must not be taken (or published) if a person’s identity is protected by a court order (eg. a suppression order, witness protection, child custody or protection order) Well, how would you know if this applies to the person you are taking a photo of, if you are taking a photo of a complete stranger? That alone should be reason enough to make a law against taking photos of strangers. They already have a law like that in the EU, group photos are ok, or if the photo mainly depicts something else (say, scenery, and you just happen to be in the photo someone took) but you are not allowed to deliberately take photos of strangers without their consent, and you would need permission to post the photo anywhere. I would think it was a bit creepy if someone took photos of me or my dog, unless they came up for a chat and seemed friendly and asked for permission.

I guess we did everything wrong then... but it worked out anyway, they are best friends now:) Adult dog is just over a year, new puppy is nearly 4 months now, was 3 months when we got him. 1. They met in the backyard, free to run around, no leashes or crates or anything like that. 2. I tried to avoid talking to my adult dog, because she is a bit timid around other dogs, and the puppy was no exception, so there was a bit of growling and trying to hide and wanting to stand back a bit, while the puppy kept running up to her. When she was quiet and not growling I would tell her it was ok, and I put her up on my lap at one point to let her observe without having to interact. 3. Yep, the first 2-3 days there was some growling and shoving, but no harm done. My adult dog has excellent bite inhibition and good social skills. 4. We didn't do that, I just sat between their bowls and stopped the puppy from stealing the adult's food once he finished eating. The adult dog sleeps on her bed in our bedroom, and the puppy sleeps in the crate, but during the day they took turns on the various beds around the house, right from the start. 5. Difficult one, because puppies take so much work and attention, so you can't really help focusing a lot on the new puppy.

I have a poodle x, I keep her trimmed pretty short, which means she mostly stays clean and she's low odour so she only needs a bath about once a month, or even less. But the regular trimmings cost money, and then of course you have the inconvenience of dropping her off and picking her up from the groomer's, and I think advertising them as 'non-shedding = low maintenance' is totally misleading. Either you keep them trimmed short and pay accordingly, or you let it grow out a bit and then they pick up dirt like there's no tomorrow, and of course need regular brushing to avoid matting etc.

With intermittent rewards, do you mean that you occasionally ask the dog to do something, and give no reward whatsoever, no praise or anything? And then next time you will reward, and work your way up to maybe rewarding every 5th time or something like that? I usually reward with treats, but sitting before I open doors is rewarded with the door being opened. I don't make them sit if they don't want to go through the door, but maybe I should, and that would then be an intermittent reward? Sometimes they enjoy going through the door (going outside) and sometimes they don't (going inside). Sitting until released at the front door is rewarded by going for a walk, but I have been meaning to introduce sitting at the door while I go through it and the dog is left behind inside, so that she doesn't actually get to come for a walk every single time she sits at the door... And what is a secondary reinforcer, for example? What do you use?

Try Revolution instead, it also treats the environment, which means you don't have to wash everything in your house. Obviously all animals in the household need to be treated.

My JRT x looooves being under blankets too, and loves his crate which I cover with a blanket when he's in it. I was wondering if it's a breed thing, seeing as they were bred for underground work:)

How do you teach an interruptor? I can call his name and that will make him stop what he's doing and come running most of the time, have successfully called him away from playing with other puppies and a person who had yummy chicken on her, but it doesn't work if he's decided to chase one of the cats. If I get him while he's still just looking at the cat it still works, but not after he actually starts moving towards the cat. Haven't tried it with humping, I usually just remove whatever he wants to hump.

Maybe smear some peanut butter or something on the ball instead, to keep him interested in it? The white hide bones are a big favourite around here. I have small dogs so they are only about $1.50 per bone, and they last ages. I think it's been nearly 2 weeks since I bought 2 (for 2 dogs) and my puppy is just finishing the last of it as we speak.

If you know which vet they are taking it to, maybe call the vet in advance and say to hold the dog and then go and pick it up?

Humping is a massive pet peeve of mine, I just find it really rude and icky. I have a just over 3 month old JRT x, and he has been humping stuff for at least a couple of weeks. At first it was just stuffed animals, so I removed them from the floor. Problem solved. Then I noticed he likes to hump his bed, not while it's lying flat on the floor, but after he has played with it and it's scrunched up into something humpable. I flatten it whenever I see him doing it, having been told that humping is self-reinforcing, and the more he humps the more he will want to hump. This evening I was sitting the floor doing a training session with him (clicker training) and when I took a break from him to work on my other dog for a few minutes he jumped up and started humping my arm/side. I pushed him off, and he tried another 3 times and was pushed off as soon as he jumped up, before he gave up. He then went over to his bed and tried to hump that again, and was stopped. I asked some more experienced dog people about it last week, and they said to train 'leave it' or 'off', but the first time I saw him doing it I tried to call him over with treats, and was completely ignored, so I think he enjoys humping more than food (and he loooves his food/treats) so I'm not sure that would work. If I keep stopping him, will that reduce how much he will want to hump? Is he going to give up on humping in front of me if I keep stopping him? Is it true that the more he does it, the more he will want to do it?

When I did this I used a mouse mat, and just put it between me and the dog, and when she walked towards me because she knew I had the clicker on me and she was anticipating a training session, she walked across the mouse mat. I clicked as she walked across it, then threw the treat away from the mat so she had to move away from me again. I then repositioned myself so that she had to move towards me across the mat again, and clicked when she walked across it, and so on. Didn't take long for her to get that both front paws on mat = treat.

Both my dogs are inside with me when I am home. One is 15 months and the other 3.5 months. The only time they are put outside is when we are not home, because puppy isn't fully housetrained and might chew cords etc, so it's not safe for him. Once he's housetrained they will both be inside when we are out (our older dog always used to be inside before puppy came along). I don't have kids, and I work from home, so it's easy for me to supervise him. But if I couldn't supervise because of kids I would set up a playpen or similar for him, so he could be inside with us as much as possible. A dog that is left outside will not become housetrained, he will simply learn that 'anywhere is good', and apply the same thought indoors. He will also probably develop bad habits as he grows up, digging, jumping the fence etc, and he will not bond with the family properly. He will never learn how to behave indoors if he's never let in.

A puppy playing with other puppies is actually the best way to learn bite inhibition, so it's an important part of puppy raising. Any good puppy class should have at least some off leash time. It's actually good practice, the one I went to last night with my puppy was 95% off leash, they were playing pretty much the whole time, which gave us a chance to practice recalls with distractions, and all the puppies actually did REALLY well, the immediately stopped what they were doing and came running. Good practice for future visits to the dog park I think.... When they weren't playing and we were practising 'go out' and 'come back', they were also off leash, so it taught them to behave well when they are not on leash too, so the leash doesn't become a MUST for keeping the dog under control. This particular puppy class is at an agility club, and when looking for a good puppy class I would make sure they use positive reinforcement (or even better, clicker training) no punishment, and that they have a lot of off leash time and at least some puppy play time. We also go to a Dogtech puppy class, and it does have a lot of off leash play time, but hardly any obedience, so for extra socialising I would recommend it, but not if you really want to work on obedience. My puppy is crate trained too, I worked on that the very first day I got him home, luring him into the crate with treats, encouraging playing in it etc. But we didn't really have time to work a lot on it before he HAD to be in there, because not being housetrained he had to be confined to it from his first night here. But it went really well, the crate was in our bedroom and we covered 2 sides with a blanket, and he has slept through the night since day one. During the day for naps he gets put away in a crate too, and I would stroke him and talk to him very calmly (when I knew he was already tired) and once gain the crate is covered with a blanket on 2-3 sides, and he will sleep for a couple of hours a couple of times a day. The blanket makes him unable to see when I leave the room, so I can quietly sneak out for a few minutes. He has now gotten to the point where he will go to his crate for naps, and whenever he is put in it he will simply flop down and go to sleep, and that's after only 2 weeks.

My two dogs will sit at the door and whimper whenever I left them outside. And then I discovered the magic weapon, Kramar chicken breast strips. They love them so much they don't even notice me going back inside. I set them up with full kongs and beds and toys out there, and hand them the chicken strips before going back inside (and then leaving the house) and they don't even care. After finishing their chicken and kongs, we're long gone, and they both go to sleep. So you could keep trying to find something he loooooves so much that he doesn't even notice you leaving. It might work. If you're worried about the neighbours, maybe put puppy in the laundry with his bed, toys and some newspaper while you are out?

I don't know what the rules are, but it has been over a year since they inspected, and they don't seem to care at all that we have more than the limit, and haven't registered them.

My dogs will both eat cat poo, but don't touch dog poo, neither their own nor others out on walks. I find it disgusting too, but we manage it by not giving them access to the litter trays. When they do get hold of cat poo I usually take it off them and give them something that they need to chew on for a while, like a chicken strip or kong, just to clean their mouths out.

We have 6 cats and 2 dogs. Our council allows 2 cats. One of our neighbours reported us to the council and they came out and inspected, and saw 3 of our cats, after we told them that we only have two. They also saw that we were working on cat proofing the fence, and told us that 'as long as you keep them on your property, we don't care, we don't want to know about it'. We are also supposed to register our cats, and a week later received forms to register two cats, which we ignored, because we consider it a money grabbing scheme, and they are all microchipped anyway. We never heard back from them. So they know we have more than 2 cats and that they aren't registered, but they just don't care, because we keep them on our property. That might not help you much, but just letting you know that as long as your dogs aren't a nuisance the council prolly won't care.

The nylon cord works well for me, but then my dog doesn't lunge or pull. I wouldn't recommend it for dogs that are known lungers, at least not with no protective gloves.

I looked around online for the same thing, and found only one that I liked, which was about $40. So instead we went to Bunnings and got some thin rope and a snap hook and it works just as well, and only came to about $12.

My adult dog sleeps on her bed next to our bed, and she knows that after sunrise she's allowed into our bed for a cuddle, so every morning around 7:30 she jumps into bed and has a cuddle until we get up. As soon as I sit up in bed she jumps off and is ready to go. Puppy sleeps in a large crate covered in a blanket in the bedroom and will usually sleep until I uncover the crate and let him out in the backyard to do his thing. He is then ready to play for the next 3 hours or so, before napping again. Before I worked out that the crate should be covered at night he would wake up as soon as the sun was up and whimper and then of course need to go to the toilet because he was awake.

I have signed him up to 3 different puppy classes, to socialise him as much as possible, and only one puppy class is held indoors. The other two are outdoors in grassy areas, so would be pretty much impossible to disinfect. One of the outdoors ones is in a fenced in area around the club house, but I don't see what would stop anyone from going in there when there are no classes being held. Not sure if there is any kind of fence around the other outdoors one. But then, I have another dog and I take her for walks every day (she is fully vaccinated of course) but if she sniffs some other dog's poo while we are out, then she could possibly carry the parvo virus back into the house and infect puppy... I haven't taken puppy out anywhere except puppy class, but he's hardly quarantined, because of my other dog that goes out... Even if I didn't have any other dog, there is still the possibility of me stepping in something while I am out and him then chewing my shoes and getting it that way. You just can't win can you... His vaccination certificate says his booster is due on the 23rd, he will be 13 weeks on the 22nd, so I thought that was a bit strange too. I thought you're supposed to leave 4 weeks between the first and second vaccination, but in his case it's about 8 weeks between them....