Leah82

Ok I've been pretty slack lately. Most of my spare time has been spent on my new grooming venture. But I couldn't resist posting this one after Collie and Sarah got a bath and blowdry today so I'm going to jump ahead Week 34/52

I'll be devils advocate and say I love having 2, each dog has 'their' person so they both get plenty of attention at cuddle time. Realistically though I'd love a 3rd, I just know I won't be allowed to :p

I think gertrude would be a great choice :) here's some photos she took at Kepala last december http://www.dolforums.com.au/topic/253964-december-kepala-photos/

Collie will eat anything anywhere as long as it's dog food or people food, Sarah on the other hand needs her spot and you need to be visible but not too close. If you leave the room she won't eat, if OH is being too noisy in the kitchen she won't eat and it's preferable if the TV is on to provide some relaxing background noise :p

I've done it before as well before collection and I don't have a problem if someone uses ours, it all goes to the same place in the end and I can't say I spend much time inspecting the condition of my bin after collection :p Our council is pretty bad when it comes to council bins, there are hardly any. Our closest park has a couple of wheely bins but I suspect that's more to do with the sporting clubs that use the grounds. There's another off leash park not too far away that's very targeting towards dog owners but not a bin in sight, there's not even a fixed outside bin in the primary school next to the park, consequently there's always a few fresh poos lying around waiting for an unsuspecting shoe. I'm just thankful we do have a regular rubbish collection. My parents have to dispose of their own. Oh and when I do have had to carry a poo around for awhile I get the biggest evils from Sarah, she's not a fan of the plastic bag

Just realised that pip put in soft drink as well so I'll throw in a green salad List of Dogs Snout Girl- Bert, Sally, Bruce and Poppy Steph M - Gus and Rosie pip 1981- Dakota (and human baby Elliot- maybe Daddy Ed and big brother Jeremy) Leah82 - Collie and Sarah Terri - Didi deadsheep - Bronson, Cassie, Kane and maybe Hannibal List of Food Snout Girl- something vego for bbq, meatballs, pasta salad Steph M - Potato Salad and Sausages. pip1981- crunchy noodle salad, soft drink (I can bring my supplies bag if that helps SG?) Leah - Soft Drink in the car fridge & green salad Terri - Bread + something of the cake/slice/sweet variety deadsheep - chicken skewers for bbq

Ka89, I think I rememeber you saying in a previous topic that you were in the northern suburbs. If that's the case this will probably be your closest obedience club... http://www.northernsuburbsdogclub.org/ I imagine you could head down and watch some classes without cookie to decide if you think it's worth signing up

List of Dogs Snout Girl- Bert, Sally, Bruce and Poppy Steph M - Gus and Rosie pip 1981- Dakota (and human baby Elliot- maybe Daddy Ed and big brother Jeremy) Leah82 - Collie and Sarah List of Food Snout Girl- something vego for bbq, meatballs, pasta salad Steph M - Potato Salad and Sausages. pip1981- crunchy noodle salad, soft drink (I can bring my supplies bag if that helps SG?) Leah - Soft Drink in the car fridge

Thanks guys, will start implementing some of these suggestions and see how we go, my next booking is Saturday so hopefully we can get some improvement between now and then.

If he was crate trained he would be relaxed in there any time, not just when there's nothing exciting going on. Are there other times he gets excited (ie dinner time, if you train your other dog etc)? So I play crate games with him which he loves, I reward him when he is being quiet and relaxed, what am I missing to get him to the point where he doesn't escalate? and yes he does get excited around meal times and especially when I'm training Sarah, although definitely not to the same point as a new person in the house, it's more pawing at the door and whining

he is crate trained and most of the time is happy to be in there but when there is something more exciting going on outside of the crate he's not happy being in there. So the question is how do I train him to behave without using customer's dogs as training aids? I had a friend drop their dog off this morning. There was initial excitement but a couple of minutes out the back getting to know the new dog and he's now curled up in his crate with the door wide open with the new dog wandering around

Ok, I need help with collie. I have just started a grooming business from home and Collie is not coping well with strange dogs coming and going. He's always been a barker when someone knocks on the front door, no blocking or telling him it's ok will get him to shut up until he is able to greet the person. There's problem number 1, I don't want him barking at every customer that arrives. I've managed this one so far by distracting him with a frozen chicken wing outside while I get the customer and dog in, do the initial consult and bundle the dog into the grooming room (laundry). Once I have the dog locked away collie gets to go back inside in the front room where he doesn't have direct access to the laundry, if OH is home he's ok, if not I get a lot of whining and howling interspersed with moments of peace. And of course the main issue is when the dog leaves, knocking on the door means more barking and at that point distracting him with food is impossible because he's already agitated. Putting him outside means barking and howling, putting him in the crate results in the same the only thing that keeps him quiet is to put him in the car outside. Anyway help would be appreciated, I don't want to subject my customers to helping me train my dog and I don't have anyone that can drop by with a dog on a regular basis either. At this point I'm thinking a dap collar or drugs for when I have customers so he stays quiet and can get lots of praise for doing the right thing

Happy Birthday Mac!! He doesn't look anywhere near 15 in those photos, advantages of white fur I guess, hiding all the grey hairs :D

Bonnie is looking gorgeous Michelle glad to see she's going well

The point that I would agree with most is that Rabbit sniffles are the cutest thing ever. It's not just the big sneezes coming out of their little faces but they then feel the need to rub their little faces with their little paws. I have a demonstration video somewhere, I'll see if I can find it at home later :p On a more serious note, when we went on our 2 week honeymoon we came back to a cocker spaniel that was 1kg heavier because the FIL likes to share his snacks And I'm still trying to make the OH understand that left overs shouldn't automatically go to the dogs

That's colorful .... Very classy, huh! Lol, I think that one might need a nsfw disclaimer

This sounds like a great idea, we need to start thinking outside the box to protect our native species. I do wonder about the Maremma's ability to protect small nocturnal animals who are generally solitary creatures, that definitely poses more of a challenge than a flock of sheep as they can't be everywhere at once. But we don't know unless we try.

Postponing due to lack of interest/availability. Hopefully we get it organised in the near future :)

I stick mine under a hot tap in the sink while I prepare their food or in the microwave for 20 seconds or so. It melts the outside just enough to poor out an approximate teaspoon each for me that's easier than scraping out the required amount

He's got the perfect head for it as well huga :D We tried putting a similar beanie on Collie but his head is too skinny :p

haha yeah, the dog ones were taken by me and the fancy pants ones were taken by the OH Sarah's face in the snow was her way of trying to get the snow off her face I saved the day after that though and got the snow off her :p And Clover we were in the state forest behind Marysville up Mt Margaret rd, we only made it about half way up the mountain before the snow got a bit too deep

In the evening when the puppy dog eyes go from cute to annoying :p No toilet issues here, they go out to toilet at 7am, 8.30am and stay out all day, about an hour after we get home from work, after their dinner and then just before bed. I'm pretty sure they save the poops for during the day as they generally only wee during the short toilet breaks.

I'm so sorry PD I'm not sure how you would go about telling your daughter but your probably right about leaving the doctor out of it. Could you tell her that he was just really old and his body didn't work properly anymore?

loo sounds great :) Where's your club Sue?

I must admit our dogs are pretty well behaved, Sarah has her digging spot under a tree but doesn't touch the garden beds, Collie can be a bit whiney and annoying especially when he's outside and your not but it's nothing major, we can even leave stuffed toys with them outside or inside and they have never been defluffed. So I thought I was pretty lucky...until last night. OH and I went out to the movies and left the dogs inside because it was cold and the possums can get pretty noisy which creates barking dogs. I had setup 2 baby gates (reinforcing each other in one door way) to stop them getting into the main living area/kitchen etc. When we came home from the movies we found Collie had busted his way through both baby gates and then emptied the entire full contents of the rubbish bin and spread it all over the kitchen So it seems I have a naughty dog after all. Poor Sarah was left to watch Collie enjoy a lovely bin dessert because she wasn't game to climb over the fallen baby gates