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Can't wait Lhok! :D

I don't know a whole lot about vaccinations, there are others that will come on here that know more but I will just say- When my dog came to me at 9/10 weeks, she only had one booster with my vet and her next one was 12 months. Seeing as her first vacc with her breeder was on the 13/5/11, and she was born on 2/4/11 she was 6 and 10 weeks. With puppy class, just make sure it's in a place that is cleaned/disinfected properly before pups come in I took my pup out before the "10 days" were up. I took her to an isolated beach with dogs I knew were vaccinated (other family dogs) because I 1. knew the parvo risk was low there and 2. wanted her to socialize with other dogs. I will be following the same routine with my next pup.

I will have to write that on my website when I get one :D they could be really ridiculously radical radiant rambunctious registered snazzy Dalmatians.

Weight can be a very sensitive issue with some dog owners. Some people take it as bad criticism as their ability to feed their dog or a criticism of their own weight. I think a lot of people don't realize that a trim, fit dog is a healthy dog. They don't need padding, you should see their ribs and a nice waist definition. I get a lot of compliments on my dog's weight (I take her to work with me), I love maintaining her health! (ok, i'm weird :laugh: ) but I have trouble telling people that their dog could do with a kg or 2 less. We have the most horridly obese Labrador that comes and has a bath every Monday. Unfortunately I could never say anything, his female owner is quite rude and abrupt, and her and her son are both also morbidly obese. I hate to think how this poor dog's joints are suffering, but I hope - as demonstrated by them bathing the dog every week - that they care enough to take it to the vet who they would probably listen to.

I had a list of 10 then I sent in. I was really hoping for my first choice - Dalluxe (a play on my breed, surname (Luxford) and the word deluxe) but didn't get it. I was a bit bummed as I thought it was awesome lol :laugh: Ended up with Dotdashdot which is ok...it's growing on me, I put it in there to make up my 10. Sorta hoped it was a significant letter in morse code (eg, like my initial or something). But it's R which has no significance at all.

If you have the right people around you, and meet some lovely people showing, I can guarantee you will like it! I'm only new to the show world, have a whole 6 shows under my belt! To me, it's fun. I'm only showing a neuter at the moment, so the pressure and competition is less but it's great to learn in that sort of group (similar to baby puppy I would imagine, I didn't start until Cleo was 6 months old). My breed mentor and breeder of my next pup is also my good friend now. We catch up at shows and compete as well, and she introduced me to more lovely dally people who took the time out to work with my girl, lent me a different show lead to try and complimented my girl to boot! also - every judge I've met so far has been kind and patient! Until my last 2 shows I was a nervous wreck, bumbling around and messing up - I may not have won but they were still kind. I now have 12 points under our belt and can't wait to get into the ring with an entire dog!

I am SO excited for you. AAANNNDDD I might be a puppy pre school teacher in the near future! I'm gonna try and convince my boss that I am the one to send down to Sydney to be trained up to run our own puppy school here. It costs a bit but I'll be accredited. I know it's nothing fancy or serious, but it's quite exciting! I think the opportunity to help educate people with their pups is exhilarating - I use my DOL accrued knowledge so much, I will love the chance to share that, and work with pups!

Everyone else has explained well about the LUA's, but I will elaborate. So yes, originally every single Dalmatian (and currently every pure bred Dalmatian in Australia) is classed as High Uric Acid or HUA. They cannot metabolize purines, a form of protein found in high levels in organ meats, some red meats and other things. Dally owners have to be really on top of their dog's diet to prevent the stones forming. I will never give Cleo liver, other offal or beef, as well as some fish like herrings. Tuna is a rare treat. Her main protein sources are chicken, lamb and a bit of rabbit in the form of BARF patties. Male dogs are more likely to develop stones, as shown by my friends on my Dalmatians of Aus and NZ group. Females can get them, but as males have a narrow tube to pee through, more chance of obstruction. Not every dally descended from the pointer backcross is automatically LUA, but if a dally has two LUA parents, they WILL be LUA. This would be the ultimate goal, no HUA Dalmatians - it really has no benefit to be HUA. The LUA Dalmatians are 99.9% pure. Fiona (Fiacre First and Foremost) was the first to be accepted and shown, and I believe she was about 16 generations down the line. This is a great link about the backcross project, http://www.dalmatianheritage.com/about/nash_research.htm and if you google "Dalmatian backcross project" you will get a lot more hits to read about. The reason for the "blank spots" too is that because the AKC has only recently accepted LUA's, some of the first few generations on the AKC pedigree are missing. And the ANKC won't let us register a dog unless it has a complete pedigree with 3 generations. So technically we COULD import and have LUA pups here, but we couldn't show them until the blank spots are "filled". It's just easier for everyone to only have dogs with already filled pedigrees. AND FFYI (fun for your information!) if I capture a cup of my dog's pee and put it in the fridge, and put it next to a cup of your dogs pee in the fridge(provided it is not a Dalmatian) they will show very different things!! Cleo's pee will go cloudy/milky and most other breeds will stay clear. Some other breeds are stone formers too, but I don't think they are as widely known (eg some mini schnauzers are prone apparently)

My girl is exactly the same, just as nutty as ever (in a good way of course). She still does her 4pm zoomies, still can't sit still at dinner time etc. She's been desexed for a year now, and is 2 years old.

So glad to hear this! I'm glad that so far, I haven't come across anyone who doesn't support the idea...as you may know some American's were being funny about it with the whole 1 pointer in the lines. I just hope that when the blank spots are filled, and we can import, that I have my own bitch to inseminate. So far, all I will be doing is financially supporting the importation of the semen for someone else to use (and possibly get a pup from that, but with a HUA dam, the pups only have a 50% chance of being LUA) in any case I will try to keep you updated with how things progress, there are a few on DOL that are interested.

Haha I decided I wanted a new puppy in February....the mother of my pup is not due to come into heat until January 2014....I'm proud that I've lasted nearly 6 months! Only 6 months until she comes into heat and only 4 months after that when I hopefully get my pup! But we are keeping an eye on other dogs as well, I am SUPER keen to jump back into the proper show ring, not just the neuter side of things. I also want to import semen for some special dallies to be born but we're having issues with blank spots on American pedigrees, we need one more generation to be born and then we're in action! THe waiting is KILLING ME! I keep seeing so many pups coming into work and just want to get another NOW, but I know that the pup i'm waiting for will be special which keeps me sane. Lhok, I can't wait to hear your news! :D

I'm not a huge fan of dogs being there that don't belong to the exhibitors. I've just found that a lot of the time, the public don't know how to behave or how their dog should behave and when you're already nervous about showing, having to watch out for stray fingers or dogs getting too close to a crate can be stressful (well I stress when dogs get close to my girl in her crate, she doesn't like dogs approaching her in "her" space). One tip is, if you want to talk to someone, maybe wait until they've gone in the ring. I'm no good to talk to until after I've gone in the ring.

Another Coffs local :) Like half of Coffs, I had some wedding photos taken on there. Such a cliché but just had to do it. I truly feel like we live in a special spot.

He is or was the Petstock "vet". He was on our brochures. This link has a pic of the same guy that was on our brochures, http://www.petbox.com.au/blog he is indeed a real vet, but I would have no idea why he would start a site like that.

Here's my experience.... This weekend just gone were 4th, 5th and 6th shows. My girl is 2 and I started when she was 6 months old, so our efforts have been spaced out and I've been a nervous wreck each time. This weekend though, was our biggest show yet and far from home, at Hillsborough (we're from Coffs Harbour). On Friday I got to meet some new dally people, friends of my friend. Obviously they saw my efforts and my nerves and offered to help me on the Saturday morning, especially with going over Cleo's head as she shied a bit from the judge on Friday. So they did, and I also got some GREAT pointers on how to stack better, and got lent a different show lead. Cleo was also complimented which gave me a HUGE boost and it showed in the ring! At the end of the day, I walked away with my biggest achievement yet - neuter in group. Doesn't matter to me that I didn't have to beat anyone to get it, because I was so proud of my girl! Now, my husband can't wait to get his own dog to show! And we're planning to enter many more shows soon. I'm only a newbie with a neuter, but I can't wait to get back in there!

Seconding a greyhound. Or maybe a whippet if you want something smaller. I know a few whippets, a couple are little pocket rockets but the others are quite happy to have a romp and then just sleep the day away.

I agree. The drawings are awesome, I can't wait to see Cleo's! But can you please swap my spot on the list with Lhok's image of Raiden?

My dally comes to work with me, usually once a week. My workmates love her, she's such a good girl, she makes me so proud! She is attached to me by her lead all day unless I crate her when an unknown dog comes in. Her favourite part is putting her front paws up onto the counter to greet the customers as I serve them. It's also great exercise for her (I walk from the back of the store to the front and back to the back etc all day long) and she's much more outgoing since I started taking her....which now means that out on walks she's got to say hello to EVERYONE! I tell her she can't greet everyone but I don't think she's understood me yet. I have also got a couple of cute photos of her helping me unpack and check off items from a delivery, and pushing a trolley (I work in a petstore)

Ok. I knew the submissions on the report had closed, but I thought DogsNSW were still encouraging us to have a chat with our local member. I've already sent him a letter, just wanted to follow it up. My dad knows my local member as well, and I was hoping him knowing my family would help him try harder for us. I tried to keep it simple, I just had 2 main points. 1 - enforce the current laws before bringing in new ones (pups under 8 weeks being sold and not microchipped, only because I see this nearly every week at work and it bugs me that the laws are ignored) and 2 - that DogsNSW breeders be exempt from these new regulations. I didn't want to take in a heap of info and confuse myself and him but maybe I've just missed the boat anyway. thank you

I have booked a meeting with my local member, I thought it was today (rocked up at the office and everything) and was told no, it was JULY that my appointment was booked for So could somebody tell me when it's too late to try and talk to our local member? For some reason August is in my head, but I have no idea why. If the deadline is before July 19 I'll just cancel my meeting.

Lhok I am so sorry for you and your family. This just seems far too cruel for you guys to lose him so early. Run free little man, you were such a cute fluffy little bear.

Oh Lhok I am so so sorry to hear this terrible news. I am sending you so many big virtual hugs right now. I can't imagine the pain you are feeling right now, i'm sure all my workmates will be just as devastated to hear this news I hope you and your family are ok. Raiden was the 2nd Akita I've ever met, and he was absolutely gorgeous. Big hugs

Don't know that exact one, but there are a few products that are very similar with different names. The only horse shampoo that can be used on dogs that I know of (I know there are probably more) is Hoss Gloss. Maybe look up some dog ones and compare ingredients. Doing this is how I found out that Aristopet's Quit Itch is the same as another more expensive product designed for horses.

I was talking with my friend who is also the breeder of my next pup and she had an idea for the show name after I told her about my strangely specific dream about my future pup. She reckons "D_____ I dreamed of you" and I love it! Although maybe dreamt instead of dreamed coz that's more grammatically correct. lol.

Cleo has dreams where she makes funny noises, like little grunts but higher pitched. She twitches at the same time. We just call out to her softly to bring her out of it as it doesn't sound nice or fun for her at all. She also has normal dreams where she has little twitchies. She's cute when she sleeps :)