daisygirl

I got one of those extender leads that rolls itself up automatically. Yes the sand does get in and jam it up after a while but at least you dont get tangled up. We only used it once before realising that our dog had WAY more fun off lead. I think the secret is not to be nervous around your dog and let them have some fun. Yes, other dogs will come up and sniff but in over 13 years of taking our dogs to the beach and leash free parks we have never had a problem and to see the joy on their faces is priceless.

I received an email yesterday and sounds like a fun day with doggy events and free samples. All dates are at: www.purina.com.au/beneful/events.html Queensland events are: Weekends From: 9am - 1pm, and from 1.30pm - 5.30pm Saturday 6th November, 2010 Downfall Creek Reserve, Virginia (9:00am - 1:00pm) Monoplane St Park, Ashgrove (1:30pm - 5:30pm) Sunday 7th November, 2010 Gordon Park, Lutwyche (9:00am - 1:00pm) Powerhouse Park, New Farm (1:30pm - 5:30pm) Saturday 13th November, 2010 Brooker Place Dog Off leash Area, Bellbowrie Buchanan Park fenced enclosure (Crendon St), Caboolture Sunday 14th November, 2010 Nudgee Waterhole Reserve, Nudgee (9:00am - 5:30pm) Saturday 20th November, 2010 The Spit, Main Beach, Gold Coast (9:00am - 5:30pm) Sunday 21st November, 2010 Colmslie Rec Reserve, Morningside (9:00am - 1:00pm) Elanora Park, Wynnum (1:30pm - 5:30pm) Weekdays From 3:30pm until 6:30pm Wednesday 10th November, 2010 Homestead Park, Shailer Park Thursday 11th November, 2010 Underwood Park, Priestdale Friday 12th November, 2010 College Park, Forest Lakes Wednesday 17th November, 2010 Lilli Pilli Park, Southport, Gold Coast Thursday 18th November, 2010 Ron Short Park, Southport, Gold Coast Friday 19th November, 2010 James Oval Park, Southport, Gold Coast The Spit, Main Beach, Gold Coast

All the new sights and sounds will be interesting enough. Even if it only stops raining for 5 mins you can have a run down the beach or a good sniff along a pathway. Just be careful of snakes as they like sanddunes. If you take some of his toys from home you can play tug under cover or a chewy like a pigs ear can keep them busy. If you were home he would just be sitting inside so no different to sitting in the lounge or sitting in a tent.

The next peinic is Sunday 14 November at Nudgee Beach dog park at 3pm. This is a fenced park or you can go outside the fence to the beach and swimming area. All non Sharpei are welcome too.

My latest dog came from AWL at Ipswich. While I think they do a great job I was a bit disappointed at the lack of service and never replying to emails. My girl was a bit special and was known to most of the staff and had a wonderful foster carer since she was a small puppy with a bad injury. Being a foster carer myself I know how hard it is when they go to forever homes and never hearing about them again. I made a special effort to send updates regularly but not once did I get an email back to say even thanks we have received the photos and sent to her carer. I also never received replies to emails about other information and if it hadnt been for our perseverence and ongoing calls I never would have been able to adopt our puppy. People with less time on their hands may have given up. Hopefully if AWL gets the contract for Brisbane they will employ more staff with people skills and can communicate and make people feel welcome and they might then get more people adopting.

I had 2 sisters but they were a litter apart. They lived together for 12 years until both passed away within 6 months of each other this year. Never any problems. They never played and wrestled like normal dogs but certainly slept next to each other and travelled in the car and went camping together all the time. There was only ever one very small tiff over a leftover schamako chew on the deck where the older girl ended up with a very small wound on her side that turned into a scar. They were both desexed very young which I dont know if that helped or not. As kids my aunty always had mini foxies and always had a mother and daughter. My mum and dad also had a small wire haired cross something and we went away all together to the holiday house a bit and once again never any problems. So yes it can be done but I think its rarer NOT to have problems as you hear so many stories about people that do have problems with 2 girls.

We are heading off to Nudgee Beach now. I have seen kids swimming there but the water is a bit murky and the last few weeks the rumour are flying about the so called crocodile sightings. I think the best beach for humand dog swimming is Coolum if you want calm water. Otherwise Red Beach at Bribie is good. We go there a lot but dont swim. The spit at the Gold Coast is lovely in the surf or the calm water side for both dogs or humans

Can you put the crate in another part of the house and further away so you get some sleep? The dogs wont know if they are 3 metres away or 20 metres away. All they know is that they are in a crate and not in the same room as yourself. I was once told at dog training that the secret is consistancy so if you want to train them not to be on your bed then you cant have the off for a few nights and then on again for a night and then off again.

I was also at the Brisbane show for the four days and we certainly wouldnt have used the dogs if they were stressed. We had plans in place that at any time we could pull a dog out and have it transported back to my place but they were all fine. All dogs that we took were rescue dogs (either recently adopted or available for adoption) and they loved all the pats. They had plenty of loo breaks and also time out the back away from the public. The girls that were on the Brisbane stand that worked for Pedigree said they do all the Australian shows so I am sure that if you voiced your concerns to one of them they would have been willing to help as they were so good to us in Brisbane.

Having owned a home dog boarding service a few years ago I think I can pretty safely say that by this time of the year nearly every one will be fully booked. If they are not full then I would be wondering why not and are they just the "no so good" ones left with availability. Seriously though, if you dont trust your dog with friends and family because it would be "too hard" for them then I would recommend using a kennel. I used to hate it when I would get owners absolutely lie through their back teeth just to get their dog into care at Christmas because they had left it too late and all the kennels were booked out. Then the dog would be the biggest pain in the neck and be destroying everything and barking all day and impossible to move to another minder or a kennel because everyone was booked out. If you cant find the right place for your dog I would suggest cancelling our holiday and trying again next year when you have a lot more time to plan and get your dog into the right place for it. There is nothing worse than getting a phone call when you are on the other side of the world saying "Come home now" because your dog is being a nightmare!! Some dogs I told the owners straight out MUST go into a kennel next time for their own safely and the sanity of the rest of the neighbourhood. Otherwise you might be able to try a housesitter. At the Gold Coast Pet Expo there was a company called "Poppies" that were all vet nurses that did house sitting. I was going to use them for my 13 year old when we go away in a few weeks time but unfortunately she passed away two weeks ago. They seemed really nice though and I would assume a vet nurse would have a bit more knowledge about problem dogs than the average housesitter out there.

Depends on the size of the outlet but we use one of the blue hoses from the pool shop that they have for the skimming things in the swimming pool. It is quite long and has blue ridges all the way along the hose. Our original one we found at the dump and have just purchased a new one from the pool shop.

Are you just using your hydrobath at home or are you going to be using it for a business and driving around?? If you are just using it at home its usually cheaper to get a basic version with one tank and no heater and then just use your hot water from home. I find that some of the heaters in the hydrobaths take forever to heat up the water. We have an old hydrobath under our house which is close to a hot water tap. This tap has a hose connection so just click on the garden hose and fill up the hydrobath and away you go. We then use the hose for rinsing off. We are lucky because our hot water system has a control panel setup so you just dial in the desired water temperature and then only turn on the hot water tap and no cold water needed. If you are going to be driving around with a business then a whole different story.

At our dog obedience club beginners are never allowed off lead, especially after only 4 weeks. You have to progress through all the classes to get to a high level to do offlead work. When its time for the recall exercise can you use a longer lead. Most clubs have some equipment you can borrow or maybe just for that exercise use of those extender leads and then he wont get tangled when coming to you. There are all sorts of distractions at a dog training ground including dropped food, other dogs to play with, other dogs barking so he needs to learn that you are much more exciting than wanting to dominate another dog. Do you use treats in class?? Maybe reward him super big time and he will then think its much better idea to come straight to you. I dont think you are supposed to get cross at them, especially for the recall or they will never think you are better than the distraction.

I was recently at a dog event and there was a lady that had a rare breed. To protect her identity I wont say where we were or what breed but I thought it pretty odd that every time someone asked what it was she said "........ and its the only one in Australia". Absolutely EVERY time. Second odd thing was that I assume it was on heat because it was wearing doggie undies but she still took it to a weekend event with around 100 dogs there of all sorts of breeds. Must have just really annoyed her bitch coming on heat and not being able to go away and show off her dog so they went anyway. I thought it very rude and inconsiderate of other dog owner just so she could have bragging rights about "the only one in Australia"

Same here for all my dogs

Ok, I have calmed down over the weekend and I can certainly understand that a yearly policy may be payable BUT my big gripe is that I did call about one month after she passed away the staff member said "No problem, I will make a note on the file and once the last claim is processed we wont charge any more". It now turns out that the particular staff member was wrong but in my distress I didnt write down his name and date. I did ask if they needed it in writing ie an email and once again he said "No everything is fine, sorry for your loss" Now this twit that I spoke to on Friday didnt have any empathy or try and say sorry for the mistake and was quite rude. It has bought back all the pain of losing my dog four months ago which I was just starting to heal from and now we are back to day one. The staff at these insurance companies should be taught how to have a conversation with someone who is worried out their pet or has lost a pet recently because when you look at the stats I bet 90% of people who are calling would be distressed about the situation going on with their pet. I think that was the biggest shock that out of everything you have to deal with that these people are the rudest and most unhelpful out of all the people in the pet industry.

I know that there has been several queries about using pet insurance and just thought I would relate my experiences. I had my dog insurance for approx 10 years with them but in the last couple of years every time the renewal was due there would be less coverage and now the doozy of them all is because she turned 12 years old that the coverage was decreased even less. Because of her age I couldnt transfer to another insurance company so was stuck. Three weeks after the yearly renewal on 1 April my dog passed away suddenly one week after an operation to remove a mast cell tumour. This was the second tumor as six months earlier she had the same operation and was fine. The reason she passed away was unrelated to the cancer but may have been aggrevated by the operation. When we put in our claims we only received 50% back because of (a) her age and (b) having had cancer previously. Isnt it obvious that older dogs have more problems and therefore need the coverage? Now AFS Pet Med want to charge me for another 12 months until 1 April 2011 ??? How they can justify that. I have been unhappy with their service and their diminished coverage so would suggest that everyone avoids this company like the plague or the rules will be changing for you every 12 months as well.

A spray bottle with water and vinegar mixture (or a super soaker water gun) should be used on the dogs doing the barking (ie the ones in the yard). If you happen to accidently spray the ones on the other side of the fence it wont hurt them either. If your dogs are barking in the house at the window then still spray them as a bit of vinegar and water wont hurt the house. Always remember to praise them once they are quiet so they know when they are doing the right thing as well as the wrong thin. They soon learn pretty quickly what they can and cant bark at. I too walk around the block and wont let the maniac dogs going crazy win by making us walk quicker. One crazy lady down the road raced out as I was sedately going past with our 13 year old and started yelling at me that the neighbours were complaining to the council about her dogs barking. Simple solution, dont let your dogs bark. The people that annoy me are the ones that stop outside our house at 5 - 6am and have a chat because we are at an intersection and one of the party goes up the hill and one straight ahead. Havent they done enough chatting going around the block?? Several times I have to get out of bed, get dressed and tell them to shut up. In the meantime all my dogs are still in bed and trying to sleep to.

Mine are outside when we are at work but inside when we are home. At weekends they tend to go out and lay in the sun for quite a while and then come inside to cool off. I think they do need to get out of the yard for mental stimulation. You can really notice dogs that come into care that havent been out of their yard and everything is really scary and frightening when they do go out. If you are not comfortable walking them close to home I would definately be going for a drive, even once a week to the beach or a big park. Make it a nice outing and get yourself a coffee or morning tea and I think your dogs will enjoy the new sights and smells.

Keep checking on ebay. We got both of our metal opening gates on ebay for around $30 each. One had a broken catch but we just use a dog collar to keep it closed.

Why cant they come inside when you are home?? We back onto a train line and some of the fosters or visiting dogs have been startled when the train toots. Can your dogs see the train and know exactly what makes the noise?? One of my more nervous fosters was on the overhead walkway at the station and the train tooted and he nearly jumped out of his skin. He looked over the side and saw what made the noise and was fine from then on. If your dogs can see what makes the noise maybe take them down to the station for short bursts??

I have had chunkers sit in the fridge for over a week and then fed them without any side affects

He has been found safe at Logan Pound

I have posted in Lost and Found section and but know that more people read this area. George is a flowered Sharpei and has been missing for a few hours and we are really worried about his safety. He has been missing from Oak Avenue, Browns Plains since approx 11am and several cars have been driving around looking for him. He was last spotted approx 1km away but he could be close to several major roads and shopping centres. Any information please call 414 513 129 or 0401445641

What are you looking for in a trainer?? Most people just do general classes unless they discover a particular problem and then call in maybe a service that visits your house. Most vets or obedience schools have puppy classes. Once again Anvet at Kedron have been recommended to me in the past as they get a special trainer in to do the classes. Otherwise we also do ongoing training at Metro Dog Club at Chermside. Where are you based in Brisbane as you probably dont want to be travelling for over an hour each way, each week to get to training, especially if your new puppy is prone to car sickness.