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Dolly is half a Dachsund, the other half is Cocker Spaniel, got her from a pound about 7 weeks ago. She is about a year old.ankoi wrote: Are you cautious about your wieners' backs? Do you let them walk stairs? Jump to beds and off? Do you use collar or harness, or does it even make any difference to their backs?
My friend had a dachshund who had intervertebral disk disease (had to check wikipedia for the correct term 
) and became paralyzed and few years after that had IVDD again. That makes me kinda nervous about his back. I avoid walking stairs if I have Tami with me, but I let him jump to beds, sofas etc. I've been thinking that when he's old enough, I'm going to get his back scanned, mostly because of my peace of mind 
I doubt a scan this early on would be of much help, as the disease usually develops with age. If you are worried about it, Please discourage, jumping on and off furniture, train them to wait to be picked up, do not allow him to run on a hard surface (concrete, brick etc) only soil, and yes, avoid stairs. You can start early supplementation of glucosamine500mg and chondroitin 400mg, when he is about 1 year old, and feed him also some fish oil. This should ensure a less traumatized spine. Tami is a standard, already weighs over 15.5 lbs (about 7kgs) so I guess he's gonna become a big guy. I've ever heard of glucosamine and chondroitin, but I must do a research on them and whether they sell them here. Keep his weight to a normal range (do not let him get to heavy) and Truly, just avoid stairs and jumping all together, he will thank you for it when he is a little old man dog 
***Melissa*** wrote: Bibi is a little insecure (we're working hard on her confidence)...she's a weird one though. She walks nicely on lead but she doesn't like it at all.
The shelter told us that a "breeder" surrendered him and one of his littermates (already adopted when we adopted Charley) because she couldn't sell them. Probably bred them as "Christmas puppies" and left them at the shelter before they got big enough for people to tell that they weren't true minis . We think he's probably some sort of cross between a mini and a standard, because at almost 2yrs old he's about 16lbs but he has the "mini look" to him. We always walk him on a harness. I do worry about his back, but unfortunately Charley doesn't... We don't have any stairs, but he used to jump on/off our bed so much that my husband made him a little carpeted doggy ramp 
Charley will still jump off of his ramp when he's about halfway down, but at least now it's not as much of a jump. (He sleeps in his kennel with his snuggly dog bed, but during the day he loves to nap on our bed!) ) which only comes out when we can supervise, as left to his own devices he'd chew it to pieces.... This morning it was raining - he hates rain! - so I hid little bits of his breakfast in different cubes and Charley got to hunt for his food. Boy, he loved that! After he found the little stash he'd run out of the tunnel looking for more, so I sent him to his "place" (a little mat in the living room) while I hid another little stash and had him watch me until I released him to go hunt for it --- after a bit of this Charley ran to his place on his own, sat down, and looked at me with his "I'm-ready-let's-do-this-again!" look Melissa, your dogs are adorable!***Melissa*** wrote:I have a standard dachshund, Striker, and he is about a year and a half. And then I have Bibi (a dachshund x jack russel), and she's a little over 7 months.
