Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Pond Boss Getting new dog(s)

Sunil, you don't have dogs, you've got a couple of ponies that bark for the kids!

Anna, Your #4 on your list is what I've been telling people for a long time. I'm not a vet but I've had dogs most of my life. My dogs that didn't make it past 10 or 11 years all had there shots regularly. Now we've had a doberman make it to 16yrs and a husky make it to 17yrs before they had to be put to sleep. Their only shots were puppy and rabies.

We have three Golden Retrievers and just adopted a 14 month St. Bernard. We are going really light on shots.

Also believe it or not, the St. Bernard is better behaved than the retrievers. He is fixed but has been no major problem.(he is still gunshy about everything)

Anyway, thanks for listening to me blabber. Its getting late, I have to go to bed.

I disagree about vacinations, and unless you have evidence (not anectote) to back up you belief, then it is superstition (by definition). I buried 4 fully vacinated dogs at 14 to 15 years old (2 German shepards, and 2 Norweigen elkhounds) a few years back. Feed them meat instead of grain and the immune diseases will be uncommon. Canines are carnivours. And please keep your unvacinated dogs contained so my family and dogs don't catch their diseases! Sorry, but mistreated pets at the hands of do-gooders is a pet peeve of mine (pun intended).

One more tid bit, dogs (and people) with worms virually never get immune diseases including allergies. And those people with the worst allergies are most resistant to worms. The theory is that many immune diseases, including auto-immune diseases are caused by an immune system geared up to fight parasitic worms, but with "nothing to do". Worm-free animals (and people) are a recent phenominon in evolutionary times. Pig roundworms, that do not complete their life-cycle in humans, are actually being tested as a treatment for irritable bowl syndrome (an auto-immune disease). Don't think that I am advocating not deworming your pets. Our pets' (and people's) lives have never been so long and healthy. But getting old brings on a host of new diseases. However the alternative is not so good either.

Shame on all of you for not posting the length of your dogs.

How in the hell are we supposed to calculate relative weight?

With my dogs you would definetly need their girth as well. I swear the neighbor is feeding them table scraps.

My old dog used to have the run of land with three homes on it.

One day he came back to our house with the distinct odor of smoked meats on his breath.

When interrogated, he said nothing.

HAHA!

They never do! My last dog and the present one get treats from my parents that live above my garage when not in Florida. They NEVER EVER tell you they already had one!

You must use the proper interrogate techniques when questioning a canine.




SPEAK FIDO, SPEAK.

GOOD DOG!

Kidding folks, only kidding.

I'm out of town again, so my wife emailed me a pic (not so focused) of the dogs:



Boone, on the right has to be over 110 lbs. and Milo on the left must be just over 100 lbs. now.

Good dogs.

I have to get some video of them playing in the yard. It's pretty entertaining.

PS. These dogs are masters of the "perplexed" look as you can see.

You had some pretty good Boone and Milo stories when we were in Branson. I'd love to see some video footage!

No wonder Boone's skin looks loose.

What do you mean?

edit. I think I get it now

They are some cute dogs... It's hard to resist those faces they make isn't it?

We posting puppy pics?

Why not?

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Ha, Sue, that second picture is hilarious. Sure have a lot of lab owners here.

Labs love the water and so do we!

Had to share a couple of pics of Max, my Chesapeake Bay Retriever, who is the follow-on to dearly departed yellow lab, Sue. Yeah, there's just something about the retriever line that gets ya!

Here he is looking like a total doofus in mid-head shake:
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And here he is looking totally in denial as he was caught about to get into some manner of mischief:
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I think Sue may be referring to the Ground Hog incident.

When we were talking to the adopt-a-pet type lady, we got the story that these two dogs were strays in rural Ohio, and some lady had to try and lure them in over the course of many weeks.

This made me think that the dogs might have learned to live off the land, so to speak.

I'm sure that they don't know how to live of the land by this point.

A few weeks after we got the dogs, I was out of town. As told by my wife, her mother was at our house watching our kids in the back yard when she heard some agressive barking and possible some highly animated squealing coming from the front of the house.

As she quickly made her way to the front of the house, she saw Boone with his head streched out, and leaning back like in a tug of war.

A large ground hog was attached to his lower lip.

While this wouldn't necessarily create enough reverse force on Boone for a tug of war, the fact that Milo had the ground hog by the tail apparently trying to pull it off of his bro certainly would.

My mother in law yelled out and all parties kind of just stopped activity like the ringing of the bell at a boxing match.

Boone had to go to the vet just to get checked out; he's fine.

Now, I'm almost 100% sure that this ground hog still lives in our yard as there's a ground hog in that vicinity with a broken tail. I think all three of them are friends now.

These dogs seem to have two other obsessions being toads and grasshoppers.

Our house has a lot of concrete around it, and at dusk in the summer, we get a lot of toads coming out onto the concrete. These dogs find this so entertaining. Then tend to softly step on the given toad, and then roll him back. I try to break it up, but there's just too many toads and the dogs have free roam. A month or so back, Milo rolled a toad to the old dirt nap. He kept waiting for it to move again.

Regarding the grasshoppers, they seem to love trying to step on them also, for hours.

Pretty much, these two are a pair of wimps.

Experienced groundhog dogs always seem to have an ear or two torn up. This is about all a groundhog can reach while being held in the dog's mouth by it's neck.

I had the dogs back at the vet for a check up and have their weight stats:

6/9/09 Boone 64; Milo 68.
6/23/09 Boone 74; Milo 73.
6/30/09 Boone 78; Milo 73.
8/13/09 Boone 97; Milo n/a
8/19/09 Boone 96; Milo n/a
9/01/09 Boone n/a; Milo 91
12/15/09 Boone 120; Milo 96

According to the vet, Boone has mild hip dysplasia in his back left hip. He favors it whenever he just gets up from laying down until he warms up a bit.

The vet said it was mild and that his bone was not coming out of the joint, but had a slight movement when flexed up and in.

The vet recommended regular Glucosamine (sp?) and fish oils.

I think we are also going to start trying to feed Boone a little bit less. For all we know, they might still be growing.

I know we have some vets out there so any input is appreciated (vet or not!).

Anna, paging Anna...

I use a salmon oil additive on Shanny's evening meal I got from Anna and feed a glucosamine supplement both at her breakfast and evening meals.