What are you and your dogs up to today? Part 2

[MPbandmom]

Nice to see all the good news and happenings. We headed out for the beach vacation on Saturday. We broke the trip in half and spent Saturday night at a motel. We asked about a local park to walk the dogs in and were directed to a lovely park with a stream to walk by. Things have been going very well at the beach. It has been pretty quiet. Sirius has ignored most sounds with the exception of people talking which fortunately has not been a very common occurrence. She has seemed much better with the ocean. I think some of that is due to the fact that the ocean was very calm initially. She hasn't gone in the water. Neither of my two have any interest in going in the water. We had storms last night and I was awakened to a panting and trembling dog in my bed but she settled down fairly quickly.

The AC was broken in the unit when we arrived. OH and I went out one day to buy some groceries and came back to find the furniture rearranged in the sitting area. We learned the next day that the maintenance people had come in and used the furniture to corral Sirius. The dogs and I spent about 8 hours on the beach alternating walking and hanging out under a screen house tent type of thing. The dogs did well except for when other dogs came out onto the beach. I was positioned as far a way from the traffic area as possible and their upset was pretty short lived. Sirius learned to dig out a cool spot in the sand.

The day at the beach seemed to just about do Sirius in. The next day as we were walking, she would lie down every time we stopped. She did then get up and come along easily when we started moving again. She has also been having some tummy troubles. Vomiting the first couple of days and I don't think she has had a solid poo all week. Yesterday I added pumpkin and yogurt to their dinner.

We have had only 2 bad encounters in the passageways in the building. Yesterday OH had the misfortune to duck to the side in exactly the spot where the people were headed, which happened to be a dead end corner. Sirius lunged and snapped at the lady as she and OH were discussing the situation. Then this morning, he encountered another dog coming out of the building just as he was going in. We gave Sirius some herbal calming tablets last night.

I finally got Sky out for a game of long line fetch this morning. She has been eagerly anticipating playing fetch since I brought the long line and chuckit in from the van a couple of days ago. We have been lazy people though, sleeping late (7-8:00) and taking the dogs for a potty break and then feeding breakfast to try to keep breakfast time consistent for the dogs. Then the temperature would be too warm for fetch before her breakfast was sufficiently digested. I have also observed off leash unattended dogs on the beach each morning. Fortunately we didn't see any this morning while we were playing fetch. Today the weather is stormy, so we are chilling inside waiting for the rain to pass.

We are all getting into very good shape this week. My fitbit has been registering 10,000 steps generally around noon each day. We are on the 3rd floor and taking the steps rather than the elevator when we take the dogs out. Sometimes for potty breaks, that means I take each dog separately. I am not as out of breath when I reach the third floor now as I was when we first arrived. The dogs have been enjoying the walks on the beach and OH has been collecting seashells for my mother who decided to stay home since my father didn't want to make the trip.

[lucyandbella]

Lucy has been doing agility classes for over a year now, we are now in competition training and have competed in a few trials. With my other dog Bella being fear aggressive, it's nice to have a dog I can do things with. This past weekend I went for three days to the central coast in California and Lucy was fantastic. I was going all day long and she was right at my side. She saw horses for the first time and had zero reaction. She was interested but soon ignored them, (not how she behaved around sheep) so I was pleasantly surprised. She didn't even care when my sister worked her horse and it got running. We also did a lot of hiking and staying on dog friendly beaches. This was her first time at an off leash dog beach and she had so much fun running as fast as she could up the beach and then back to me, and running into the waves. She also went to a tourist shop area where lots of people were and calmly walked past them and would wait with me if someone wanted to go in to look at something. She wasn't nervous at all to be in a crowd. Then we went to look at tide pools and had to climb through a lot of big rocks and she carefully would follow me and not rush past making me fall. I really couldn't believe how good she was. She slept the entire day when we got home.

On the other end of the dog spectrum I took Bella to the vet for her anxiety and fear aggression issues for the first time yesterday. It's something I have avoided mostly because I feared what they would say, but her anxiety and behaviour has started to cause me anxiety. We talked for an hour and he said it sounds like she needs some sort of anxiety medication because she seemed to be at minimum mildly anxious at all times. He said I should go to a veterinary college's hospital we have kind of near us. It will cost a lot but be the best option as the incorporate a training and behaviour plan in with medication if they decided to go that route. So it looks like I will be trying to scrape up money to do that. He also said if I couldn't he would work out a plan and work with me, but that those veterinary behaviorists know a lot more and have so much experience they would be the best.

[JudyN]

Let us know how you get on with the vet behaviourist, L&B

OH and I met up with an old schoolfriend of mine who I hadn't seen for 24 years yesterday - her whole family were staying in Swanage to scatter her dad's ashes off the pier, where he used to sail. We gave Jasper an hour's walk in Wareham forest on the way to Swanage, then, after a quick lunch with my friend and her mum at a beach cafe, walked along the front for going on 3 hours. Jasper was mostly on lead as it was a beautiful day and there were plenty of picnics around, but we were able to let him off for some of the time. He behaved impeccably, if you don't count him trying to swipe my friend's sandwich because he thought she might be less on guard than us, and having a bit of a grumble at a GSD pup.

He was so tired in the evening he didn't even notice me eating a yoghurt and pester me to let him clean out the pot, and toddled off upstairs to bed very early on

But he had about an hour of intermittent whining in the night - very quietly, but just enough to keep me awake - and decided it must be morning about an hour earlier than usual. We really could have done without this as we both have colds and were exhausted too I'm waiting to see if he seems extra-tired today, or thinks he might be entitled to another long day out and more ice cream.

OH forgot to take his hat and has a sunburnt scalp now, but he does have even less coverage than Jasper's baldy bits

[JudyN]

Oh, the joys of a guardy dog... you can manage all you like, but what to do when a dead squirrel just drops into your garden out of a tree? I think it had been dead for a while, it was so stiff you could have picked it up by the tail and used it for a cricket bat! Resolving the situation involved ice cream and a spoon, stairgates and long lead, and a level of strategic planning that hasn't been seen since WW2. But we got there in the end

Jasper had a play date with a couple of other dogs today who came back to our house after for coffee and cake (for the owners, obv.). Luckily he's not at all territorial about his house, his bed or his toys so they got on fine. One, a rescue GSD lurcher, got under the table and growled a bit if the other dogs got near, and I think her owner felt she should tell her off for politeness sake - but was happy once I'd reassured her that it wasn't a problem - she was just telling the other dogs she wanted her own space, and they respected that.

The other dog, a lovely dalmatian, found an old rotting tree stump in our garden and had a good chew on it. Jasper must have been taking notes - later on, after the other dogs had left, he went out and had a chew on the stump (which he'd never done before) and had the funniest look on his face: 'It must be food, I saw her eating it, but it sure doesn't taste good'

[delladooo]

bless him Judy!

We had a rather interesting day. We went about an hour south with MiMi (Laufey stayed home) to observe an open peke show. We met the gentleman who is now continuing her father's kennel and the lady who originally established the kennel as well as some other peke enthusiasts. MiMi wasn't overly happy with all the other dogs but she didn't get to interact with any of them anyway but she did very well with the people. Also, the lady who established the line had a hold of her and a good feel and thinks she's well built which is a huge bonus as she feels floppy to me she was an angel in the car but did have a slight panic when we were heading back to the car to leave and it started raining really badly but I'm 99% sure that's because we panicked and ran!
We then got home (no rain) and took them out for a walk which they enjoyed as usual and now they're both fast asleep

In other news, I've ordered a starter agility set (jump, tyre, chute and weaves) for Laufey and a balance pod to try and get us into agility too

[bendog]

When management fails.....


These two ladies somehow ended up unsupervised together on our bed yesterday evening.
I was out, and OH phoned me panicking about how to move them without one of them jumping up too suddenly and causing the other to react! The bed, and particularly being touched/disturbed whilst sleeping is one of the big flash points with our girls which is why they aren't supposed to be on there at the same time!

Managed to tell him to keep calm as him panicking will only make Poppy panic! And luckily for us, this time it all ended well and he managed to call Poppy off the bed without anything kicking off! Says a lot for how their tolerance levels have improved that they even managed to get that close in the first place, it's a king size bed and so plenty of space for them to have kept their distance if they'd wanted to!

[JudyN]

Jasper seems a little under the weather and stressed. I think it's probably the warm weather - he's not very good in the heat and though it's not that hot, he has to acclimatise to warmer weather gradually. But he has had a fair number of stressors recently, including an infected toe, painful cut pad, long day out, evening left alone, the 'dead squirrel' incident, and me hosting a discussion group last night.

But we had even more stress this morning. I decided that instead of buying chicken mince in tubs, I should buy it fresh in bulk, mix in some liver & heart & whatever else I could find in the freezer, and tub it up. It works out cheaper, I don't have to worry about remembering to include the extras on a daily basis, and it saves on plastic tubs as I can reuse them. But the fresh mince is collection only, so collected that along with some carcasses, heart & pureed veg on the way home from a walk. Just being in the factory shop must have been stressful for him, he was desperate to get out the car when we got home.

Then I discovered that a 15kg box of mince is just on the limit of what I can lift out of the car and carry into the house. And way beyond what I ought to carry Once I'd got everything in and the frozen stuff in the freezer (Jasper having to be shut in another room) I then had the enormous (for my feeble body) task of pureeing the liver, chopping the hearts & tripe, mixing them into the chicken mince, and then tubbing it up into 700g tubs. All the while Jasper's nose was sticking under the stairgate, driven mad by the smells. I then had to send him to another room so I could transport the tubs to the freezer in the garage and then of course I had to arrange them all in the freezer with some semblance of organisation.

I am now competely cream crackered. This on top of all the cleaning I had to do in preparation for the discussion group last night isn't good for me! I'm planning a very relaxing second half of the week, for both of us.

[MPbandmom]

Good for Poppy and Sash getting along on the bed and OH for getting them separated without a squabble.

Wow Judy, that sounds like a lot of work. I think I am glad that mine eat things without having to mince and puree.

I have managed to get the dogs out for a morning outing twice this week. The weather has warmed up enough that I don't have to put on loads of layers of clothes and try to clear off a frosty vehicle windshield to try and get the dogs out. I am still sleeping through my alarm some, but not having as many obstacles to getting the dogs and me ready, loaded in the van, and the van ready to drive, helps quite a bit. There is also the added motivation of another walking challenge being going on at work and I would much rather walk outdoors with the dogs than on a treadmill, given sufficient daylight to do so.

This morning we walked the full circuit around the park behind my house where we encountered a couple of runaway dogs having the time of their lives racing down the sidewalk. Unfortunately they decided to come and say hi to my two. Should I say that the dogs were pittie types? I don't particularly have anything against pittie types in that I consider them an aggressive breed. They are however amongst the breeds that I would rather my two not tangle with as they strike me as much more powerful and thus as having a distinct advantage over my dogs in the event of a dog fight.

I tried the voice of doom. I apparently wasn't doomish enough. One of the dogs came up close to Sirius, who was NOT behaving in a peaceful manner. I placed my foot on the dog's chest in an attempt to move him backwards. (Not a kick, a push) I might as well have been trying to push a large rock. The larger of the two dogs was perfectly calm and from what I could tell of Sky, she was likewise perfectly calm. I admit the vast majority of my focus was on Sirius and the smaller of the two visitors who seemed to have more of an issue with Sirius' behavior. The smaller dog and Sirius had a very brief physical argument and then the visitor dogs decided my two were lame and boring and took off for some other grand adventure.

We had walked a little further when I spotted a van stopped at the entrance to the park with the side doors open. I watched as the van entered the park and thought, someone is looking for the dogs and they must LOVE car rides. She asked if I had seen two dogs and I pointed her in the direction they had run off to. The van driver then came across a truck coming from the direction the dogs had headed towards and that driver had apparently seen the dogs also. I continued on my walk as the two vehicle drivers joined together in the search for the dogs.

I loaded my two into my van and headed towards home hoping the owner would soon have her dogs rounded up. As I turned onto the street behind my house, I once again spotted the two dogs racing up the sidewalk. Then the owner's van came around a curve towards me and pulled over and stopped close to where the dogs were and they both immediately hopped into the van and she drove off. I was glad to see them reunited with their owner. They probably had a good nap once they got back home after all of the running they had done.

It was very obvious that neither of the runaways was aggressive in the least, but I always worry about my two reacting in a manner that kicks something off. Much as Sirius was doing with her barking, growling, and lunging at the two dogs. When the other dog went neck to neck with Sirius and responded in kind I was afraid that it was going to lead to a big blow up, but it was all noise and very brief and seemed to serve to settle Sirius down a bit and that was the end of it. Clearly the other dog had told her to knock it off and stop acting so stupid and she was wise and listened. I was certainly wide awake after our walk this morning.

[JudyN]

Wow Judy, that sounds like a lot of work. I think I am glad that mine eat things without having to mince and puree.

Don't get me wrong, raw feeding doesn't have to be hard at all, I just made it hard for myself! And was starting with an energy deficit after some hectic days recently.

[MPbandmom]

Sirius tried to make a break for freedom today. It was apparently very short lived and then I received a call at work from our neighbor informing me that OH was locked out of the house.

The storm door on our back door finally bit the dust this winter and we have yet to get a replacement put up, or even bought for that matter. (At least until this evening. ) OH was doing some yard work and rather than take his keys with him or unlock the door to the house, he opted to leave the door hanging open.

With the layout of our house, if the door is open to a certain point, it usually blocks passage from the living room to the kitchen and thereby blocks passage to going out through the open door. The dogs could push their way through/past the open door, but usually they don't. Apparently today, Sirius did. OH said he felt something brush against him and looked down and there was little dog headed towards the street. He grabbed her by the collar and quickly stuck her back inside the house and closed the door to prevent a repeat occurrence. He is lucky I work close to home and could run home and let him back inside. Otherwise he would have had to try to call our locksmith son.

[JudyN]

There was another f...... lipping dead squirrel in the garden today! I managed it fine using the stairgate and ice cream method, but it's a bit worrying. Jasper didn't want to eat it, which is just as well as I'm wondering if someone might be putting down rat poison. We have a couple of neighbours with chickens and another with an aviary so it's possible (one of them has got a cockerel in the last few days judging by the noise, which I'm not delighted about either ). This one, unlike the last, looked fairly fresh, plump and healthy - or as healthy as you can look when you're dead - so it certainly didn't starve to death.

[delladooo]

That does sound slightly worrying Judy, can you speak to your neighbours or will that just end badly?

I have a slight problem - I've noticed that Laufey is very fixated on my hands when I'm trying to teach him anything and I'm not really sure how to make him less obsessed with them. It almost rivals his food obsession. I do use my hands quite a lot but I've never really thought about it too much and I think it's confused our training slightly

[MPbandmom]

The dead squirrel thing does seem worrying JudyN. It might be good to ask around of the neighbors if that is possible.

Big brag today. This morning I met up early with a friend from the club to see if we could finish off the video requirements for the Dog Scouts of America Scootering/Skijoring badge. I already had video of Sirius being harnessed and Sky running and pulling in harness for the required minimum one mile. (Sky had actually run 5 miles that outing.) I still needed video of Sky being harnessed and Sirius running/pulling for the minimum 1 mile. At the same time, I hoped to get another 5 mile run on Sky to add to the Samoyed club Samtona100 mileage. I think Sky is at 16 miles, the challenge ends this month and there is only one more weekend after this weekend to run.

The plan was for my friend to run in front with Sky playing rabbit. The plan worked great! We got video of Sirius pulling for a mile +. After about a mile and a half things started getting iffy with Sky. Apparently once the adrenaline wore off from the Yay we get to run, she realized that I wasn't on the bike behind her. My friend's bike also had squeaky brakes which I think Sky became unnerved by. We tried several different means of getting Sky back on track and she would go for a little while and then stop and step back towards the bike and look at my friend. She very clearly wanted something from her, but we never figured out exactly what. Sirius was also obviously getting tired, so we kind of nursed the two of them to a good stopping place about 2 miles out and gave them water and let them rest for a while. For the trip back to the cars, we walked them on leash and pushed our bikes.

I had decided that depending on how today went, I might try and get Sky out again next weekend to get 26 miles total for a quarter century mark on the Samtona. It looks like our scootering season is over for this year and I am not certain that I will run Sky at all come next season. Although next season, she will qualify with the Senior crowd which can do 2 mile runs instead of the 5 mile runs required of the youngsters.

While Sirius did really well and we have completed the requirements for the badge, I don't foresee ever running her again. The only reason I ran her today was to try and complete the requirements for the badge. Sirius is now officially retired from mushing, (Not that she was ever exactly active in the sport in the first place. )

[JudyN]

The dead squirrel thing does seem worrying JudyN. It might be good to ask around of the neighbors if that is possible.

I'm going to hang fire for now - Jasper didn't show any inclination to eat either of them - he didn't seem that interested in them apart from the fact that he would still guard them And if they have been poisoned, it's pretty bad luck that they should choose my garden to die in. Two could be coincidental, but if there's another I think I will ask around - they may not even realise that they are killing squirrels (and think that it's OK for rats to die a horrible death but not rats, which I never really understood).

We had a great day today, going to visit a friend who has recently moved into a centuries-old farmhouse complete with a 3-acre overgrown garden, several fields and outhouses. She has a 3-year-old unneutered male working black lab, Bertie, and I was expecting Jasper to try to put him in his place but they were fine. We had a long walk (which went past Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall's original River Cottage) - Bertie found an old tennis ball which was thrown for him a few times. Jasper did try to muscle in on it but Bertie made it quite clear that it was his. I'm wondering if that's why Jasper didn't try to make sure Bertie know he was in charge when they first met - he may even then have realised that Bertie wouldn't put up with it.

It was all 'communication' rather than aggression, and the dogs listened to each other, so all was fine

What wasn't fine was when we were in the farmhouse, Bertie had a slipper, and one of my friend's daughters tried to take it off him. He showed the whites of his eyes and growled, tightening his grip. As you can imagine, alarm bells were ringing in my head, so I called him over, offered him some kibble, and he instantly dropped the slipper. My friend commented on how he'll now go searching the house looking for slippers he can exchange for treats He's been such an easy dog and brilliant with the girls, that I fear one day he might have a 'moment' and snap at one of the children 'out of the blue'.

[rnor1120]

Chance-dog and I have been trying to get back into shape (alright, I've been trying to get back into shape and I don't want to run at night by myself so Chance is being forced to get back into shape). I've got this neighbor who insists that her Bichon is so well behaved he doesn't need a leash ever. Mind you, I've nearly hit this dog with my car more than once because he runs out into the road. Just the other day, Bichon and owner were walking down the road while I had my two (leashed) dogs in my front yard for a bathroom break and had to quickly interrupt their weeing because Bichon ran up my driveway while owner kept yelling "I want to go inside come back come back come back, blah blah blah blah" while doing absolutely nothing to get him. Chance just went after a golden retriever a few weeks ago when he slipped out the front door, so I have zero trust in his abilities to handle sudden dog introductions.

Anyway, we were out running tonight and I happened to see someone about 100 yards away walking in the opposite direction. As I got closer, I realize that this person was waving their arms in the air. As I got even closer, I realize it's the wacky neighbor and Bichon was tearing up the road toward us. We had been running, Chance's drive and energy were high and the Bichon is barely half his size. Visions of my dog tearing the head off of a fluffy white dog belonging to a nice old lady appear. Not looking good... I pulled Chance to a stop, tried in vain to get him to sit and look up, and held my breath as the Bichon approached and "It's okay, he's friendly..." rang off in the distance. The Bichon was clearly uncomfortable, Chance was very uncomfortable, I was super uncomfortable, and this clueless lady was babbling on about how much she loves it when her doggie makes new friends. Bichon cautiously approached as I reassured Chance. I've learned that sudden interruptions to Chance greeting new dogs tend to not end well, so I allowed about five seconds of awkward nose to nose contact before I managed to calmly disengage Chance and continue on with our run. Problem avoided for now, glad Chance was able to keep himself composed enough to not rip the head off a Bichon. Small victory after he went after the golden retriever.

I'm really concerned because this lady lives just a few houses down and the Bichon is wandering around on a fairly regular basis. I have no idea if Animal Control would be able to help in this situation and I really don't want interactions between my dogs and her's to escalate into a fight because small and fluffy won't win against two pit bulls. She's not exactly the type of person who'd gladly leash her dog because she thinks the sun shines out his butt...