erinonthefarm

What a cutie! Is she only a little thing? Love the purple nail polish

Sheees that's a bit expensive. What sort of dog? Dobermann, was a bit of a shock thats for sure (the 500 was when they were "subsidising" the cost)

That's insane!! Dog or bitch? Even for a bitch that's outrageous (unless it was a pyometra??) Dog One retained testicle which they charged me 10% on top of the nromal rate for a dog, same rate for a bitch- people where I live are up in arms about the cost as we have no choice on where we go

Thats what Dol is for, my OH's eyes glaze over when I start talking about dog stuff.....

Paid 500 last year, no pain medication included in that, price has now gone up to near 1000 for large dogs like mine

I feed my dog morning and night, but the night feed is really around 4pm at the latest, then he goes out to the toilet at 8pm

Before I got my boy, I would never have picked a boy, but I just love him and now I wouldn't really care what I ended up with! Just always thought girls were easier, but they're not really especially when you have to worry about heats, and my boy isn't always marking things (except when he was about six months and cocked his leg on the flat screen ) which is what put me off with other peoples males. I'm sure what ever you end up with, it will be an adorable bundle of fluff, love the fluffy babies!

Me too, almost have the face of a wooly kelpie. I would love one of these dogs if they were ANKC recognised, but apparently the MRCCR club is not interested in persuing that

Exactly what I was thinking!

Wow, that dog could not look more like a dingo- must have common ancestry with the pariah dog of SE Asia. Is the temp similar to spitz breeds

Most people who will do it that well will be choosy about which dogs they take on. Are you confident your girl is high enough quality to regularly win in your local competition? I think part of the whole business of showing is just accepting that there are going to be times when you look out of your depth, stuff it up etc. I'm also in a competitive breed with some gun handlers and I'm not a natural. If you're going to progress you have to cut out all that noise in your head and just work away in your own little bubble with good advice from people outside your breed/group/state. You can improve. Don't know about where you are, but at my home club they just yell out novice handler so the judge understands why I might be a bit awkward or not get the dog stacked especially quickly. I'm showing in neuter so I suppose I don't feel heaps of pressure to be perfect, but I think most of the sense of achievment when he has been in a best in show line up (not that I've won) is from showing him myself. After my last 5 shows I actually have had a great time suiting up and everything and really enjoyed myself, wouldn't dream of handing the lead to anyone else and soon I will get to be showing two!

It feels like yesterday, not 3 months, that I was waiting like you, good luck with it, are you hoping for any particular gender or colour?

My eight year old son has to correct me far too often

I'm in this situation too, by the time they are out of baby puppy and can start earning points towards ch. you would hope they have come through

Any news on your puppies sjp?

Here is Savannah at 7 weeks, 1 week to go

I went through this (8 years ago) with my son when he started pulling himself up and walking, we had four dogs (two outside, two inside) and the inside dogs were quite stressed when my son got mobile. I decided to rehome my old Jack Russel with my parents who had cared a lot for him while I was away studying, as I thought it wasn't fair on him to have to try and adapt at such an old age to being poked and prodded, my Dobermann who was 1 at the time was scared of my son crawling ect. I guess I was lucky as without really doing anything except keeping them separated unless I was with both of them, that the situation settled down with my Dobe and she turned into a baby luva! I think she just needed time to get used to seeing the way kids behave. My Jack Russel happily lived out his days with my parents who spoilt him rotten, without the stress of trying to adapt to kids when he never had much to do with them before. He never liked kids much even when my son was older. Just my perspective on the way 2 different dogs adapted to the same situation.

I saw my first cairn terrier last weekend

Well I don't really know, but he is 2cm taller than the standard and the same weight as his dad (40kg) also he is only 19 months so he might get heavier. To me he looks fairly muscly

Well I don't really know, but he is 2cm taller than the standard and the same weight as his dad (40kg) also he is only 19 months so he might get heavier. To me he looks fairly muscly

We got five open neuter in group, but struck out on the Rally O because I still haven't worked out my left and right :D

Well I'm on my first ANKC registered dog and learning a lot of new things that I would never have contemplated with my other pet dogs, but I think that sort of thing could wait- OH is very interested as a cop who likes the idea of being a dog handler one day, but I prefer more sedate persuits :laugh:

Sorry to hijack the thread, but someone who is a RAAF trainer, was talking to me about bite work and I was worried about doing this with my dogs because of all the kids around here and that potentially they may muck around with my son, wrestling ect and the dogs would get the wrong idea? Obviously I don't know much about it, but I was wondering how the dogs make that distinction or are they not really trustworthy in that situation?

Yes, well we are now in that position too. Where I live, the local people won't even get out of their cars outside our yard because they are so scared of our dog, because even desexed he can tell when people don't think they should be at our house. We did do training to make him more reactive by getting visiting strangers to "skulk" around our place and then rewarded our dog for alerting us that there was someone there.

Its up to you in the end, but if you are neutering try to wait until they have physically matured, I have heard this is very important in large dogs. My neutered male Dobe is still very protective, perhaps taller than his entire male brothers and same weight- He was neutered at 10 months as he had a retained teste but I would of neutered at 18 months otherwise.