freundhund

One of my puppy buyers rang me today, to ask me about the other puppies in their puppies litter. The puppy is now 8 years and 5 months of age! Background, I bred her, I still have her 10 year old father, who is very health other than a small subasous <sp> cyst, I lost her mother, to cancer at the age of 13 years. Together, from this pair I had 2 litters, I haven't had any phone calls from any other buyers. I contacted a few today who don't have any problems. The bitch was desexed at 15 months and X-rayed at the same age for 0:0 hips and 0:0 elbows. She went to her home at 8 weeks of age. Apparently, after being a very active girl for the last 8 years has been very health, but she now has trouble climbing stairs and doesn't want to play in the park as much any more. I have recommended that the owners seek a second opinion with a vet who specialises in GSD's, as the owners local vet states the dog has a neurological disease. I am wondering if the bitch might have a pinched nerve or something. My problem is I really felt that the owner expected me to do something, but I am not sure what. What would you have said and done,please?

This club hasn't moved on from the 1970's. This is how I learnt to train my first couple of dogs back then. Yes, your dog will eventually do what you ask, BUT don't esxpect a willing worker, don't expect a happy dog and don't expect to feel happy in yourself. Most clubs these days have enlightened people who, see that to get great competition obedience, agility or any other form of training that the positive methods do give you a better job, it might just take a few extra weeks, and more thought and work on the owners part.

I don't seperate my bitches and dog when a bitch is whelping, but I know my bitches, some people find it necessary. Normally, I whelp bitches in the kitchen, with the family there plus any other dogs and visitors that turnup. I find it doesn't upset my bitches, but then my bitches are used to living in a lunatic asylum. A few litters a go I rang my vet for oxytocin <sp> who offered to pop by with it on her way to dinner, she laught when she walked in to my house, I had a number of girls from my daughter's class learning the facts of life, ie what happens after sex and you get pregnant Also I find after a day or two most of my bitches allow the other dogs into top and tail, accept one of my old bitches who used to lactate within a few days and would start to help feed the puppies.

You can buy wooden trellis that goes on top of colourbond fencing. Which can take the height of the fences up another 18 inches. (I think that is 45 cms) It is available from Bunnings, buy what you can afford and add it to the lowest section of the fences first. I would supervise your dogs for the first few weeks in the backyard/garden, just to make sure you don't have wonderful neighbours, that feel that they might like to give your dogs their leftover cooked bones. Or if the neighbours feel like coming and visiting your dogs .

I go to Sydney All Breeds on Sundays at Concord and am very, very happy there. I could go to the others that you suggest or Eastern Suburbs if I wanted to. I have been going to obedience clubs for 40 years, and I train at a couple of other clubs but find SABDTC excellent. I find that the instructors at Sydney All Breeds have done quite a few courses one has done the NDTA course, another has done a lot of courses in the USA. Lots of motivational training, not just with food but with toys as well. This club has no issues if you use a halti, a flat collar, a martingale collar or a check chain, if that is what suits your dog. Also the club offers, obedience, basic start of agility and now starting to teach Rally-O.

Glad you had a good time, which beach did you use the airport one or the one of Foreshore Drive itself?.

If you are talking about the beach just at Kyeemagh, by the old flight tower. Where there is off street parking. Okay, the horses are mainly down there early in the morning, however, both the trotter people and the racing people are lovely. What happens is if dog people and horse people are at the beach at the same time most of us divide the beach in half and the dog people stay at one end and the horse people at the other, it has worked well in the last 20 years that I have used the beach. You get some people that walk just up to the flight parimeter of the airport to take photos. As for the guys that use the bushes for a beat, they tend to give up when there are so many dogs there in summer, also sometimes the police swim their horses there as well in summer, they don't hang around. If you are talking about the beach where you park on Foreshore Drive itself, you have to park there on the side of the road, make sure you have collars and leads on your dogs as the trucks fly along at 70 kph minimum and don't leave a lot of room to get out of the car, also the beach isn't far from the road and if your dog took off it could run back to the road to quickly. Note, you do get some people down there with very small dogs and know dog knowledge.

The German Shepherd Dog Council of Australia does have its hip and elbow statistics posted on its website!. The GSDCA has been publishing Hip results since 1983 and elbow results since 1990. I can go back 8 generations my young girls pedigree and see the results of all her ancestors hip results. The GSDCA's data also shows which stud dogs improve hipscores in relationship to the scores of the dams put to the dogs. Most breeders have at their fingertips in hard copy the scores of the relatives of puppies being sold. Imported GSD's from Europe have a number and a rating which can be checked on the SV's international database. The number rating for hips in Europe, is calculated from both parents, all other progeny from parents, grandparents etc as well as the Xray reading and is re-calculated quarterly. So a dogs hip-rating can change by a point or two if he/she or a close relatives has a litter that when X-rayed has a lot of problems with HD. I have to be honest and say I haven't come across many dogs that have been X-rayed here in Australia that have fouled the GSDCA's or the AVA's schemes. In saying this I have heard people say that a puppy in a pet home has been diagnosed by their local vet at 12 weeks (3 months) for its 2nd or 16 weeks (4 months) 3rd vaccination with HD, however, on investigation and having the puppy seen by a vet that is very experienced with GSD's and actually X-rayed quite often the puppy has been found to have excellent hips!

Sandgrubber Please note that those statistics and information on that site is incorrect and bares no relation to the Australian German Shepherd Dog population. The GSDCA publishes it results here in Australia annually.

Hi Stefie Please find the web address for the ACT GSD Club, they have a puppy listings officer who might be able to assist you. ACT GSD Club Alternatively, as there are not many breeders of GSD's in the ACT, you might wish to try the NSW GSDL, see link GSDL You would be able to find puppies closer to you listed on their website as well. It is unusual to find GSD puppies or even young adults in pounds or shelters. The GSDL does run a rescue service, but most dogs thru rescue are also adults. To give you an idea of the price at the moment a good quality GSD pet puppy will start around $1500 at this price the puppy will come with pedigree, registration with DogsNSW, immunisation certification. The puppy would be from Breed Surveyed, Hip and Elbow Certified parents. With GSD's it is not often that you would get to meet both parents of the puppy, as a lot of breeders will use a stud dog which could be interstate or not that close by. If your friends contact either club they will find a lot of people willing to assist them. Good luck with the search for your friends.

Believe me after dealing with the police this morning, our entire family is in a state of shock. We have finally worked out that according to the owner of the dog "our family was having a domestic and she came to tell us to be quiet!". Only thing was it was the family next door yelling at their children, not us! And I am sorry but as far as I am concerned I have dogs myself and don't want to get into a tit for tat situation, which is where this would end up. This woman knows where we live we don't know where she lives or who she is. We had to ask the police for a business card as it was, the police made us feel in the wrong as it was! What really upsets me is when I was assualted and lost a baby the police couldn't even be bothered to turn up to the incident. Someone this time called 000, that is what makes the difference.

My husband got bitten by a pit-bull this morning, luckily the police won't be doing anything because the dog was loose with along female who was totally off the planet. I and my 23 year old daughter watch the woman attack my husband in a completely hysterical reason, where by her dog raced in and bit my husband. Husband is leaving the house to go to work. Woman claims husband attacked her and dog protected her. Police advise the incident is a neighbourhppd domestic, we have no idea from Adam who the woman is!!! We won't be complaining to the council, we as a family felt it was the owner not the dog that was a problem.

Hi Sorry, I have never heard of H/E. Can you tell me what breed H/E is in and a link to what it is, pls?

Contact the GSD club in Victoria or NSW as GSD's are shown on 6' (2 metre)leather leads and have a variety at different prices.

Hi Steve Thank you for your comments, they are extremely valid. This also shows that one thinks something but until someone comments I forget that I might not have written my views on an area. I know that at one stage EDBA was a very active organisation, however, when I went in search of it on Google, I couldn't find anything current or active in the last few years. This is why I felt that a new lobby group might be needed. My views with regards to Dangerous Dog legislation is at the moment in NSW, there is only black or white. Once a dog is declared dangerous there is no chance of rehabilitation, I feel that one of the areas if we form a lobby group is that we need to work on levels of Dangerous Dog legislation with the ability for dogs being rehabilitated with accredited instructors. Again we would need to agree on who and what are accredited instructors. Under current legislation, in NSW a dog is basically permenantly locked in a cage, unless it is taken for a walk on a lead and muzzle, if your dog is declared dangerous you cannot even have it in the house, even if wearing a muzzle. From what I am gathering from various people that are involved in helping people whose dogs have been declared dangerous, is that there is a higher standard of proof required to show that the dog is not dangerous, than for a normal dog. ie a dog that has been declared dangerous could fail the proof to show it is not dangerous as it is happy and excited to meet another dog, unless a dog that has been declared dangerous can completely ignore another dog. Again a dog that has been declared dangerous has to pass a test showing it can ignore cats, where the average dog doesn't. I also firmly believe that our other charter if we had one would be to educate dog owners in training their dog and the law and their dog. I firmly believe if the general public actually understand how the legislation impacts them and their dog they might put more thought into how they interact and train their dog.

Okay, is there a lobby group that I have missed that is already working towards halting the progress of BSL and Dangerous Dog Legislation? If there is not, I was wondering about putting a poll up on DOL. possibly in the General Section, asking how many people are interested in forming a lobby group! I truely believe that we need a lobby group for each state, to deal with state legislation, as well as a Federal group to deal with Federal legislation, particularly in light of remarks being made in Federal Parliment with regards to the Federal Government legislating against BSL and Dangerous dogs. Do readers on here really feel that we could get a lobby group of the grounds? Funding? How much do members feel that they would be prepared to pay to belong to a group, with the group having properly audited books and being financial accountable but realising we are going to have to pay people ie solicitors, barristers, lobbyists etc. Are we going to be able to successfully fund raise, are we going to look at this as a serious enterprise with the idea of getting people onto local, state and federal positions? I know we have members that have a lot of expertise but we are not going to be able to continuously work for free, we will have to cover costs etc. Do we have people here that can agree to disagree for the greater good. Can we manage this all without stabbing ourselves in the back before we have even started to get off the ground? The reason I am playing devils advocate is I believe if we seriously start down this track we will have to be prepared to work very hard at it, sometimes with very little to show for it, as well as be prepared for a long time to ask for minimums to gradually get towards maximums. My other concern is that people will find it difficult not going into attack against legislation boots and all, when we possibly need to do the softly, softly catchee monkey route. Please again give your thoughts.

Please accept my apologies for a very long post. Also if you don’t agree, please understand these are my thoughts on how we need to deal with BSL and Dangerous dog legislation and I would like to debate suggestions, my ideas need to be perceived as a starting point and I am happy to listen to other points of view. Firstly I believe that anyone that owns currently either a prescribed breed under BSL, those breeds that are listed as able to compete in Schutzhund (I will deal with the reasons for this late) and in some cases large breeds in general ie almost every breed where the dog measures more than 20 inches or 50 -52 cm at the shoulders, need to be concerned about short and long term proposals regarding dog legislation. To deal with current and preposed legislation, I believe we have to take a leaf out of the GSD breeders’ book and look at how they managed in 1972 to achieve having the ban on GSD’s lifted. Whether you agree with the GSD’s clubs and breeders current ideals they did manage to achieve changing legislation and this is where we need to go, the GSD fraternity managed to get a ban lifted at a Federal level and this should be a good starting point for us. We as a group of concerned dog owners, breeder’s etc need to remember that ANKC and ANKC affiliated clubs are registration bodies only and for them in particular unregistered breeds are not on their radar. As such we need to form a political or friends of, or concern group of dog owners. I personally believe we need to go down the political route, particularly in this day and age of minor parties achieving seats at local. State and Federal level and holding a balance of power! I believe that there are more dog owners than, fishing persons or Gun owning persons! I honestly feel that we need to create in each state a group and that group make suggestions and create a Federal body. These bodies are to have a nominated spokesperson, were that spokesperson is able to give very clear, controlled and emotive statements to the media etc when there are negative dog situations whether it is a dog attack or when preposed legislation is brought up in the media or even random by unqualified people. We need to set up a fighting fund, were monies go towards advertising campaigns, government lobbyists and assisting in creating schemes where by we can work to prove that our dogs are safe. We have to look at paying solicitors and barristers to give us learned opinions on how changes to dog legislation can affect us as dog owners. We also need to work to bring in requirements that local governments have to proper requirements for dog inspector/catchers not any person can become a dog/inspector/catcher without a minimum of 2 years study at a TAFE or recognised institution. (We need to even put what needs to be in these courses together). We need to set up a form of Breed Survey where the dog has to pass a set of basic tests to show that the dog doesn’t have a temperament issue, where the dogs’ microchip number is put on the paperwork. This test eventually has to be designed to be accepted in a court of law, so we even need to set standards for those people doing the testing. Whether we like it or not we have to unite as currently most of us are writing letters as individuals, were we are seen as individuals, unless we are seen by the major political parties as having numbers and clout, we are basically powerless. We also cannot have people making emotional statements ie this is going back to Nazi Germany but in the dog world, whether we feel or believe this statement is true, it is the sort of statement that the media would jump on in a very negative way. Possibly in the future we would even need to utilise the services of a paid spokesperson to get the most politically correct and sympathetic comments across to the media. To my mind in the last 5 – 10 years the media has really started run a campaign against dog and dog ownership. We as dog owners again need to be very aware of this and make sure we have people able to put a positive spin on dogs and dog ownership, including making media companies realize that if they continue to spin negative publicity about dogs we will try and hit them where it hurts in the hip pockets with boycotts etc. My concerns have been growing over the pass couple of years on hearing various political spokespeople, members of state government commenting on, why do we need dogs taller than 50 – 52 cm (20 inches) at the shoulder, why do we need dogs that can bite (ie the Schutzhuund breeds) and it will only take one politician or media representative to find a list of accepted Schutzhund breeds for these breeds to be placed under BSL or when a dog is declared dangerous for the fact that it is a listed Schutzhund breed to be brought up. I would also like us to ask the science community to provide us with papers and give seminars and conferences on what they have on BSL and Dangerous dogs, ie markers, research that either proves or disproves that dogs are dangerous. This would include veterinary papers, maybe in the long term we would have to pay for a Phd student or researcher to do papers to help or prove whether some types of legislation will or will not be effective. Whether you agree with this or not, local councils should provide X amount of local park space for dog parks depending on the number of dogs registered in their municipality. As well local council rangers should be running basic obedience clubs for local ratepayers, so that people can learn basic obedience and control of their dogs. A lot of councils are unwilling to have obedience clubs in their municipalities due to insurance requirements. (Note basic obedience clubs by the councils could be conducted under State dog controlling bodies under their insurance umbrella). At the moment the Dangerous Dog Legislation in a lot of states is changed by stealth, no-one in the dog community ie dog clubs, obedience clubs or State Dog Controlling bodies seem to be involved as far as I can ascertain or if they are they do not appear to be able to promote the welfare of the dogs under a lot of states legislation. Do we have people willing in each state to start the ball rolling? Book a venue, call a meeting and start to form local and state bodies? I really feel that unless we start to do something we as dog owners don’t have a future. Do we really, really want to save our current dog and our future dos? So is there anyone interested in these ideals as starters or am I on my own with my thoughts and ideas. FH.

Hi ReadySetGo Unsure why but I tried to send you a PM and got the message you were unable to receive. Will try again tomorrow. I looked Wayne Asplet up on Google and he comes up as St George Animal Rescue Pty Ltd and as NSW Animal Services. NSW Animal Services appears to be used to outsource of dog catching by various councils? Am I correct? Thanks FH Hi GT really stupid question but how do I look up archived pages?? Thanks FH

I cannot find a link on Channel Seven's news tonight but there was a 'spokesperson' Wayne Asplett who is "an experienced dog catcher". This person claims that Dog attacks increase in Spring. Again sensationalist reporting, no proper statistics, just this man's opinion. And an emotianal mother saying she still remembers this everyday!!! Does anyone know who the spokesperson Wayne Asplett is and what his qualifications are to make his comments?

I voted NO, I like to keep in touch with my puppy buyers. In saying that, I have friends and family members I wouldn't sell to. I admit that I have only bred 150 puppies in 30 years, and have had 3 puppies back, 1 due to the owner dying, but her family knew and in her will she stated the dog was to come back to me. The other 2 came back as the result of divorce. But I have had people that I have declined a sale to over the phone even before meeting them, as well when the people have arrived I have declined to sell them a puppy. Mainly this is due to my belief that the wouldn't care for the puppy well enough, or that they wanted my breed as a guard dog, or that they really didn't understand the reqirements of the puppy.

Michael Do you think I can tell Jenny K you offered her as my rider.

Still training for the ET in Canberra at the moment. The Diva can do the distance, however I am very worried about my own ability to do the distance.

Hi Angelsun Sould you please advise when the Sydney judges course will be. Would love to attend. Cheers FH

I show GSD's at specialty shows... Which begs the question "What are show clothes when you are galloping around a ring the size of a football field".

Does anyone know how the dogs doing the ET in Sydney today went?