sandgrubber

My 20 mo old Labbie, Bonza, cannot catch. If I throw a treat . . . easy throw . . . toward her face, she'll allow it to land on her nose with no snap and gulp whatsoever. Same with toys. Otherwise she's a pretty normal pup. All the dogs I've ever owned mastered the food catch. . . if I remember right, they usually get it down by around six months. I wonder if this means something about Bonza's vision. Perhaps she's farsighted and can't see the flying food? Ideas?

What like sending a text, come out come out where ever you are? If spellcheck doesn't catch it, it's not there.

Collars off-property are law in California. The collar must display a rabies tag. The tag can be traced back to identify the registered owner. Yes, collars are a hazard. But I'll bet if statistics were available, you'd find that they save more dogs than they hang. When I find a lost dog, I call the owner if it has a tag with a phone number. I call the pound if it doesn't. The pound is not no-kill.

Damned if you do and damned if you don't . The nanny state make too many rules and costs too much and steps on toes. Ohio, in this case, made no rules at all, and failed to protect. If Australia had 50 states, you'd have a much more interesting mosiac of over and under regulation. I'm not saying this is ok or good. I'm amazed that, despite the CITES treaty, an obvious whacko was able to purchase not one, but 18 Bengal tigers. This should have triggered a federal response, but it didn't. I'm sure the regulatory framework will be made stronger in the near future. Societies are pretty good at closing the barn door after the cow has gone walkabout. It's hard to get the balance between regulation and protection right in a democracy . . . as seen by needless killing of a large, but apparently uncounted, number of dogs who happen to look something like an APBT in Victoria. States rights are relatively strong in the US. You are out of line to decry the country for failure to regulate in one, or a few, states. p.s. If I remember correctly, California got strict at regulating 'exotic' animals in the 1980s when a few movie stars got some nasty claw marks from their pet ocelots.

To the original poster (=OP in forum jargon) If you want better feedback you're going to have to provide more/better information. BYB needs definition. What did the alleged BYB do? Why do you call them a BYB? In my book, BYB is essentially a slanderous term, thrown around because one guy disapproves of how another guy breeds. But when push comes to shove, we're going to be stuck with choices between relatively informal breeders who operate out of a back yard, and relatively formal breeders, who have a kennel of sorts. We need to get better at deciding what standard are acceptable for the back yard . . . and what are acceptable for formal kennels. Also need to get clear about the difference between 'pedigree' and 'purebred'.

I'm reminded of Christopher Robin and Edward (aka Pooh) Bear going bump, bump, bump, all the way down the stairs. Please tell us how this went. I hope, not down the stairs :D.

Many years ago I took on a tenant, two unit property, shared backyard. She had a young spayed female dobie. I had a young spayed female Lab (Lab X??? . . . rescue dog). Her dobie beat the sh#t out of my Lab in the first few days, with no worse costs than a little blood and a somewhat macerated ear. After that they were great friends and I'm sure both dogs benefitted. When the tenant eventually moved on to other quarters, my dog mourned the loss of her companion. I personally -- and there is no science to back this -- think dogs hate being alone and like company, even if it means putting up with a bit of rough adjustment. I have never found that having a second (or third) dog interferes with bonding of the dog to the owner. Of course, as others have said, it's not ok to take on another dog if you can't manage it. But based on a sample of one, I'd say that dobies like company, may be a bit dominant at first, but in the long term work out well being companions to both another dog and the owner.

Exactly what I was thinking, this thread makes labs sound like demon dogs ETA: Spelling Labs are not demon dogs. They continue to be preferred by guide dogs and by millions of families who are in the second, third or fourth generation of Lab owners because, apart from breeders who don't cull for temperament problems and people who buy family pets from lines bred for high drive, they are great with kids. You can't expect ANY puppy to know how to handle a mob of kids without supervision of both the dog and the kids. The biggest strike against Labs, in my opinion, is that people tend to think they are automatically 'nanna's' in the sense of the dog in Peter Pan. Sorry. No dog of any breed is qualified as a child minder. All dogs require supervision and guidance around kids. Not necessarily formal training. But somebody MUST set some bounds, both on the dog and on the kids.

Please, eventually, post your results. I have some suspicions about what your hypothesis is. It would be interesting to see what it is and whether I'm correct.

Fingers crossed for you and your rescue girl and her pups, Fiona. I've only been through milk fever with a goat. It's awful. I wonder if it might be worth putting together a blurb on hypocalcaemia and its prevention for the Breeder's section. There was a discussion of diet for a preggers girl some months back. I got the feeling that some people didn't realise milk fever is possible, or how horrible it is. I don't know that much about calcium needs -- I've always just upped the bones and shifted to puppy food during pregnancy, which does the trick. But some people seem to think diet as usual is ok . . . which I think could be risky if the usual diet is low in calcium.

In running a boarding kennel, I've had to learn a bit about seizures. How many seizures has the dog had? What are they like? How frequent are they? How long do they last? If they're light seizures, without loss of consciousness, not lasting long, it's probably ok to play around with holistic meds. Or simply cutting back the dose of phenobarbital. Or even stopping it altogether. If it's the full grand mal or cluster seizures, I'd be cautious and would not do anything without vet assistance. Although, if there was only one severe episode, it could be poisoning, in which case the pheno is doing nothing. I presume your vet went through this with you. It's not the sort of thing that can safely diagnosed / managed over an internet forum. If the dog got put on pheno after only one seizure, I'd read up and consider changing vets . . . generally you need a few episodes to establish a pattern, and if the frequency is less than one a month and the seizures are pretty mild, the vets I know say it's better not to medicate. My favorite vet in Australia was also against running tests when the seizures are light and infrequent. She says the tests are expensive and usually inconclusive. Your vet has probably already done the obvious tests . . . eg, blood chemistry.

I started a thread a few years ago asking people how many teats their girls had. Mine have always been all over the place, odd numbers as common as even. . . .though almost always 9 or 10. Sometimes there are doubles at the back. Sometimes they line up in nice neat rows. Sometimes they seem to be somewhat random in placement. People who replied on the thread reported similar. Inverted nipples, if the girl has them, are obvious, and most likely to be in the front. They can be a problem, causing mastitis cause the pups can't suck them. However, when the milk comes in strong, they may pop out, and you may be able to get them to pop out by messaging.

It's hard to predict whether a dog will keep running or hang out in the area it got lost or find its way home. Is your dog child friendly? Does it go up to strangers all waggy-like? Or does it avoid unfamiliar people? Schools are a good place to put notices, cause kids generally like dogs and are likely to be walking around. Friendly dogs who don't have ID tags are very likely to get taken in by well meaning strangers and eventuallly handed over to vets or the local pound. If they have microchips and your ownership is properly registered on the chip, you're likely to get a call. On the other hand, there's also a chance that friendly dogs will get adopted rather than turned in . . . which makes return unlikely. It's important to contact all local vets and the pound not only in your own shire, but in surrounding shires. One of our neighbours in WA lost a cocker. It was hit in a very minor way by a car. The driver stopped, picked the dog up, and took it to the all night clinic, which is in a different shire. It was only through someone knowing someone who worked in the clinic that the guy found out where his dog went. . . . the dog very likely would have been adopted out if it had been in the pound for more than a few days. (Young, attractive, friendly, purebred dog has a good chance in a shelter).

To be pollyanna-ish . . . the good side of this is that it's obvious that the problem here is the owner, not the dogs. Hope he gets 10 years in the slammer.

Any dog with a few small children around is going to need watching. For the dog's sake as well as the kids. I was told about a family Lab who was taken to the vet to be PTS because it bit one of the kids. After the vet had killed the dog, they noticed that it had several staples punched through its ear. I've had a couple problems with Lab pups placed with families with young children. The biggest problems arise when the puppy is encouraged to think of kids as playmates and play isn't supervised. Games get going, like puppy chases kids, kids run and scream. Puppy thinks it's a game. Puppy has sharp teeth. This can go down hill rapidly. Labs have very high pain thresholds and generally, strong bite inhibition. Some have very little drive and very strong nurturing personalities. If you talk around, you'll find loads of people who had a Lab for a best friend as a kid . . . most of them get Labs as adults. A low drive mature Lab will be about as easy as it gets, for kids dogs. But puppies go through stages, and rules are required . . .no matter what breed of dog you have..

Dogs are like children. If you've got lots of money, you tend to spend a lot of money on them. If you're poor, or have several, you tend to seek economies.

No surprise, this is getting a lot of press in the old US of A. One of the things about having 50 states is there's one of everything . . . turns out that Ohio was absurdly liberal in laws allowing exotic pets. Don't think that's going to last long.

Bump!!!! BUMP. BUMP!!! BUMP!!!!BUMP!!!!BUMP!!!! I can't afford to fly from California to attend . . . but those of you with weaker excuses . . . come on . . . get out there. This is not an event that should fizzle. It's so, so, so bloody wrong that the law is having dogs executed for looking something like a pit bull.

The problem is, the market is flooded with BYB Staffies and crosses and some of these are crap dogs that takes extremely responsible management and training to keep dogs like this under control keep everyone safe. I would like to see BYB's wiped out and address the problem at the roots. Breed isn't the problem, it's the fools who breed dogs with aggressive temperaments mostly because as breeders they haven't got a clue what they are doing or breeding. Dog breeding shouldn't be a God given right to just anyone, dog breeding is a serious business that takes knowledge and dedication to get right, the quicker we leave dog breeding to people who know how to breed a good stable dog, the better off we will all be IMHO???. I'd say 2/3rds owner's fault, 1/3 breeder . . . but both contribute. Call if 50:50 if you want to fault the 'breeder' (or irresponsible person who permitted their girl to get preggers) for not placing pups in responsible homes. I remember a couple years ago the MDBA folks were pushing to get the 'breeder' recorded on microchips as well as the owner. The more I think about this (sometimes I think kinda slow) the more I think it's a good idea. If attack data starts to show that some idiot BY'breeder' (if you care to dignify them with the title) has graced the world with three or four aggressive out of control cr#p dogs, maybe the law can find a way to go after the breeder. They seem to be managing to blame pubs for serving drunks. . . I'd say it's the same general idea.

I'm all in favor of rescues, but they aren't all smooth. I had a family buy a Lab pup from me. They did a wonderful time with him, and had a responsive, sensitive, wonderful young dog. One day he broke into the garage and broke into some snail pellets that no one even knew were there. They found him dead. They hoped I might have an adult dog to place with them, but I didn't. I encouraged rescue, and found a rescue Lab in the Eastern States (none could be found in WA) for them. The husband flies a lot on business, and was able to bring the dog out as excess baggage. The dog was a disaster. One of those Labs with no off button . . . made worse because he had had no training in puppyhood. Three years old . . . never settling.. . no ability to concentrate. They did behaviouralist work with little success. The family eventually went overseas and chose to leave the dog with another family. The other family had problems too. The gift horse is the first horse whose teeth you should check. If someone is looking to rehome a pedigree dog you'd expect to pay, say $1000 for, and is charging an adoption fee of $100, there may be a problem they aren't telling you about. Perhaps temperament, perhaps health problems. Most rescues work out well, and I'll never hesitate to recommend rescue, particularly if someone either doesn't want to, or isn't set up to, deal with a young puppy. But don't jump in with your eyes closed.

Maybe this is heresy . . . and not to contest the validity of asking these questions. But I worry about the larger picture. Hereditary cataracts, apart from PRA seem to be difficult to diagnose because its manifestation is often (usually??) mild. The dog may end out with poorer vision, but seldom goes blind. Sometimes there is no detectible problem. Dogs function well with partial vision impairment, and there's no indication that cataracts are painful. Non-genetic testing is expensive, and not definitive. It requires regular examination by a specialist . . . for those living in rural areas this means long drives. Genetic tests may be or may become available . . . in which case many of us will need to decide whether to apply them. Something like 1/3 dogs dies of cancer. In humans, it's well known that there are genetic propensities to various cancers. To my knowledge, there are no tests available. I haven't seen a lot of statistics about the incidence of hereditary contract. I'm under the impression that it's one percent of less in the breed I'm most familiar with. I am all for health testing . . . but it's going to be the undoing of pedigree dog breeding if we end up with a long list of diseases for which we are expected to test, and mixed breed breeders have no testing obligations. If we are obliged to do all the tests the geneticists develop, and prioritization follows the lines of what the geneticists are able to come up with, rather than what ailments are most serious for dogs, it's going to get ugly. How important are these tests? Are there higher priorities?

Can anyone enlighten me on this :confused: eg, chicken carcasses, spoiled milk, bones. Sure dogs eat those things, but I struggle to believe any breed was developed to consume waste specifically I try to listen sympathetically, even to idiots. My guess is the joy with which dogs eat the stuff humans throw out played a role in the early domestication of dogs . . .and has strengthened the bond between our two species for eons.

This guy has never met a JRT (or any other small working terrier) if he thinks the APBT is unique in being willing to take on a larger opponent.

Can anyone enlighten me on this :confused: eg, chicken carcasses, spoiled milk, bones.

I don't know how many puppy buyers I've told . . . if you want a really good Lab, especially a bitch, go for black . . . people will pay more for a poor quality chocolate than a good quality black. As for yellow girls, no breeder ever has enough.