Mim

Do any of you go camping with your dogs? Where do you go and what sort of things do you do? I love exploring with the dogs in new exciting places so I think a little camping trip could be lots of fun but since I've never been camping I don't know where to start! Can you hire tents from places or do you need to buy one?

Yep, but they come in damn handy for some things. Focus on what tails are doing And just to contrast is a docked corgi doing extremely well at flyball and in my opinion, her turn on the box is a lot better than a lot of the dogs in that video.ETA: the turns these dogs are doing may be worse or better than others, due to factors such as how they were trained, their size, their speed, or as Souff mentioned, their physical construction. Tail may have very little to do with it (or it could have lots to do with it, I don't know I haven't read any research on it).

Does "body stance" include dancing around on your hind legs, even though you don't have a tail, when you are just sooo pleased to see somebody? :p The best dancer here is 14 years old and yes, she was docked as a puppy. She could give lessons in communication .... and balance! Sounds like my bobtail girl! Her whole body wiggles like crazy and she dances around. It is a nice sight to see

Dogs show other animals how they are feeling by using their body language. This is not limited to use of a tail. There is facial expression, ear set, body stance, hackles up/down, mouth and tongue movement etc. A dog can communicate just fine with or without a tail. So there goes the thought of "a dog can't express itself without a tail" which I know I hear A LOT from the public.

Balance. That's interesting because my docked and natural bob corgis, I would say, have better balance than my tailed corgi. He is very clumsy. Also, this is besides the point but when the dogs go swimming, my tailed boy is weighted down incredibly by the heaviness of his wet tail and makes it hard to swim, while the bobs are gliding along in the water. Corgis aren't bred to be swimming so it has nothing to do with why they were docked but are there any water breeds out there that were docked for similar reasons? Poodles?

I spy a corgi! Those tollers have the most beautiful rich red colouring

In my opinion 30 minutes is far too generous. My pups get 15 minutes at the most and then anything left is taken away. No need to soften the biscuits. It's better if they aren't soaked as they can help to clean her teeth as she crunches them. Get rid of the cornflakes. It could just be that she simply isn't hungry when you feed her because she's getting 3 meals a day. My youngest weaned himself off his lunchtime meal as he was just not hungry when it was lunch time so no point putting food down. One thing you could introduce to her diet is meat. Perhaps start with one chicken neck and monitor any poos or vomiting to make sure it's getting along with her tummy.

Thanks for the info. My guys are fit and boy can they pull! I think they'd enjoy it but at the moment I work weekends Maybe in the future.

That is so cool boxagirl! I didn't know there was sledding in WA. What are the details? When/where etc. Can any breed join? Any corgis doing it? Can you have a team of 3 dogs?

Tails are not vital. A vital part of the body is one that is required to live, such as the heart. I completely agree with Souff's posts.

I have pembroke corgis. I prefer a dock over the other options (natural bob or full tail, although you could get half length tails etc). I wish everyday that my long coated boy was born with a bob or could have been docked. I hate his tail and I think he does too. It is always getting stepped and pulled on accidentally, it gets stuck under things and trapped in doors and he even trips over it sometimes. I currently have 1 docked and 2 natural bobs and always get dirty looks or comments about how cruel I am. I just ignore it, I am over explaining to people that it is not cruel

Hey guys, I know there's a few sciencey-oriented people on here who might be interested in this. There's a protest starting midday tomorrow in Forrest Place against the government cutting funding for medical research. So if any of you are in the city tomorrow could you please stop by to join the protest. We are all trying to wear lab coats or white shirts Even if you just stop by to "yeah!" or "boo!" it would be much appreciated!

That sounds like he could do fine, in that situation I'd give it a go too. Me too, Diva. He is fit and healthy otherwise and is a tough dog and his owners and vet are confident he will have a good quality of life if the surgery is done. How is your lab doing, harley?

The dog in question doesn't have bone cancer, just one of the websites I found is bonecancerdogs.org and he is a small dog (corgi X). He has an aggressive form of soft tissue cancer on his foot which hasn't spread anywhere else yet. It's either amputate and give him a few more years or don't amputate and have him PTS

Thanks guys, good to hear an older dog has done well. My friend's dog is older but very fit and healthy so the vet is confident he will cope easily.

Hmm.. my old dog made snorting sounds like that when she had a small seed stuck up her nose.

I've been meaning to ask this same question. I have friends who live in the country and they have dogs and want to start giving them heartworm protection but don't want to drive ages to the nearest vet just for a blood test. They've asked me what they can give the dogs without the test (they have no symptoms) but I don't know.

My friend's dog is having a back leg amputated next week and she's (naturally) worrying about it. Does anyone have any advice, information, stories or anything that I could pass on to her to ease her worrying a bit. I've found some really good websites about pre and post op care (www.bonecancerdogs.org for one) and there are lots of videos of 3 legged dogs living normal lives on youtube but if anyone can think of anything else, it'd be much appreciated!

I use human antihistamines. Daina gets 1 Phenergan (sp?) tablet.

Daina reverse sneezes and her attacks last a while. I block her nose and stroke her throat or give her something to make her swallow. The last one she had was a couple of months ago and her tongue and gum went blue and it took ages to get her calmed down. Poor girlie, it was just as we were leaving the house that she started so I worry what would happen if she had another really bad attack and we weren't home. Excitement, heavy exercise and freshly cut grass set her off. Antihistamines before a walk tend to help.

Use some Sard Wonder Soap on the feet It's fabulous stuff just get it from the laundry aisle at your local shop. It is very drying though so just use it on the feet and not the main body of the dog unless you have a really good conditioner to restore everything the soap takes out of the coat. It amazes me every time I use it how white the dogs come up.

Best to listen to Aziah as she knows way more than me. I just used masking tape It worked and didn't pull too much hair off when it came off and didn't seem to cause Muddy any discomfort. I look forward to pictures too

My neighbours dog howls when he's home alone (which is pretty much all the time). I read on DOL that howling is a dogs way of looking for its other pack members by communicating over long distances. Is he howling when a member of your household leaves? Perhaps he's trying to call them. ETA My neighbours dog, like yours, has always been an outside dog. He lives with no other dogs and is used to being outside. He's 9 years old and only started howling a few years ago. Before that there was never a peep out of him. Now he howls all the time, poor thing he has a terrible life and is depressed. Not saying your dog is depressed though! Just that dogs can all of a sudden start howling.

We have 4 dogs (1 is a foster, we did have her sister too so 5 dogs but she was PTS), 3 cats (was 4 until last year), 2 rabbits, 2 guinea pigs and 5 goldfish who have recently died as they got a disease but they were 3yrs old so a good innings. I hope to add a show pup to the crew in the near future but won't do that until our foster is adopted as she wouldn't enjoy having a puppy around.

I had success taping my youngest corgis ears at 7 months. I don't remember how long they stayed taped, I think it was a month or so with one removal for cleaning during that (tape taken off, everything clean, hair trimmed, tape reapplied). Ears are up and stay up but they aren't super strong. They flop around when he runs and droop down if he's been swimming/washed and they are wet. If you feel them in comparison to my female, who has beautiful rock solid ears, you can feel the difference. He has very weak ear leather or "soft" ears and yes, it can be passed on to pups and run in certain lines. This is how I taped his ears: Cut out thin card (I used some from a cereal box) to match the shape of the ears. I just outlined his ears on the card. Tape it to the ear and bend to make the U shape and then secure with more tape. Do the same to the other ear and then tape them together so they are standing nicely. I checked every day to make sure there was no rubbing or discomfort and the U shape allowed good air flow :p Hope you get her ears up!