The Spotted Devil

Absolutely. But some shelters (acting as pounds in Vic) are now refusing to release to Army due to "welfare concerns". Frustrating but it is the reality. A relative of my ESS has been working as a bomb detector dog in Afghanistan. Yep, I've heard a couple of shelters/rescues say the same thing and it drives me mental as most of the suitable dogs for the Army are the ones that go nuts in the shelter and aren't fantastic pet prospects either. Cos it's much better to kill the dog than give it a great working life satisfying all it's drives.... Don't get me started…..

Absolutely. But some shelters (acting as pounds in Vic) are now refusing to release to Army due to "welfare concerns". Frustrating but it is the reality. A relative of my ESS has been working as a bomb detector dog in Afghanistan. Where there is a public face for the organisation (e.g. AQIS, GD) they will use Labs (and in the past, Beagles) or ESS because they are more readily accepted by the public. I assume the Federal Government highly values the field bred Labs that they are getting because they are consistently retrieve crazy AND have excellent health (hip, elbows etc).

Guide source most of there dogs from show breeders as do assistance dogs certainly here they do & yes some are sired by the dual working dogs so have the best of both worlds AS for drug detection many are failed pets just like the beagle brigade . The prison dogs in this state where also failed pets & from the pounds .(GSD ) Lets face even the police dogs where failed pets at some stage . Lets face it dogs of unknown heritage have been used as assistance dogs for how many years especially through the prison training system ,it comes down to what each dog has to offer The bomb dog in this state many years ago was also a pound dog a Sibe/GSD mix . So its safe to say many assistance dogs in this world are mix & pure often rescued & given a second chance Clearly things vary from state to state. Guide Dogs Vic have their own breeding stock. Field bred labs are HIGHLY valued by the Federal Government. labadore - I just saw your response - I agree with you that GD would have sourced their original dogs from breeders. But selection pressures have changed the Labrador used for GD as much as it has changed the Labrador used for other purposes. And that is ok by my book!

But Guide Dogs tend to breed their own Labs - they don't care about the head shape or coat or look of the dog provided they are A) sound and B) can do the job. You don't want a GD that is attracted to birds, chasing and retrieving. The dogs used for drug detection are at the complete opposite end of the spectrum for drive to retrieve.

I'm not going to get into that debate. Vive le difference. But I think for MRW to imply they were crossed with Greys is a stretch. You only have to look at how all dogs have changed over the last 100 years to understand the effects of selection pressure on conformation and temperament.

HW - just trying to clarify. Are you of the understanding that Labs in the US were CROSSED with Greys?

I understand about that feeling of safety too with my other half working away quite a bit - a decent bark is really all I feel I need and my Dally certainly gives me that. HW made some excellent points but I echo "what breeds do you love." My advice is to get a breed YOU want to walk and train and toilet at 3am because you will be the one who does all the work!!!

BC Crazy - my Springer has a cast iron constitution and happily eats anything and everything and does well on it. However, within 12 hours of eating Hills dry she was scratching (pulling out chunks of hair) so sometimes it's a quick response! It was so quick I didn't realise straight away it was the food but 24 hours after her last meal of it the scratching ceased.

Isn't that lovely! Thanks for posting Kavik :)

Kavik - love your video! What was your time commitment for the course on a daily basis? I would love to do it but don't want too many distractions at the moment...apart from my usual ones :laugh:

Thought I better update this thread! Training wise I've been doing lots of lining work as that is our real weakness. I'm having her pick up a line of white dummies on an angle so she has to run past some dummies to pick up another - mixing up order, distance, angle and cover. The other fun one is doing a wagon wheel type exercise where she has to run through and past 2 white dummies to pick up the black dummy further out. Very hard but we are taking it slowly. She was so frustrated the other day that she yipped in my ear LOUDLY as if to say if you don't want THAT white one or THE OTHER white one what the hell DO you want??? :laugh: The weekend just gone I was privileged to be invited to a friend's place for a relaxed day of rough shooting. The first time Em has been shot over and she did really well. Started by running her with a GSP in a big paddock but that was just encouraging her to quarter and hunt too far from the guns so I ended up working on her own. We put her in a scrubby paddock with saplings, bushes and some rougher terrain and she really improved. Didn't have any finds in the morning. After a break we went out again and I sent her in the other side of a fence as we were pretty sure we had a runner in there. Em blew me away. Worked the area beautifully, picked up the scent and had a lovely find and flush. I was using the lighter whistle so she didn't recognise the stop whistle until I switched whistles so not a clean stop to flush. No retrieve for her (it flew off to another handler/gun) but that little bit of success was enough to tap into her genetic memory and she "got it". I've still got a grin on my face at the memory :D

Personally I'm not going to argue the merits of show vs field bred. I've always said each to their own. But I will say this: FF is NOT used because the dogs won't retrieve. It is not how I will ever train but that's the predominant method used in the USA. In my opinion the dogs are hard mouthed because of training methods.

I tend to agree with HW, having come in contact with them through retrieving trialling (these dogs also bred for show). Highly capable dogs but they need a job/plenty of exercise from what I've seen. Certainly a breed for the enthusiast - also a good description for my own breeds!

Dearest Chester. I'm so very sorry CM. You know how soppy we all were over the lad - the Dally thread has been blessed with his beautiful face since ever I was a member here. What a talent you have to bring his personality to our screen. From the house of The Spotted Devil, may your beautiful Spotted Angel run free and effortlessly by the ocean. Much love xxx

As far as I'm aware you're not going to change the nutritional content of the dry food. However, I would be concerned that Sarah's teeth are causing her pain - the only time I have needed to soak food is when Em had a very dramatic teething - it all happened at once and she was quite sore. I would be more insistent with your vet or seek a second opinion.

Maybe maintain the raw part of the diet (if I understand it correctly) and ditch the supplement for a few weeks.

Start with a smaller amount - oil stains and you're feeding too much parrafin. I don't notice that my cats pass more hair in their faeces, just that that they throw up rarely.

Once a week in general and once every few nights for my over groomer :)

Yes I use paraffin oil for the cats - just a quarter of a tsp in their dinner does it for them.

I think it's pretty good stuff too - especially the lack of artificial colours! I've visited the factory - they come across as a business with a decent philosophy in terms of producing quality food.

Just to clarify, Moonee Ponds appears to come under the Moonee Valley Council. They don't have their own pound. Like the vast majority of (suburban and semi-rural) councils in Vic they contract out to other facilities. On the MVCC website they state that:

My Dally's 2 favourite things in the world are pi$$ing on trees and flirting with bitches - puppies, adults, oldies, desexed or entire lol. So he only gets to do those things if he does some work for me first, plays tug or plays food games. So I transferred the value of his A-list rewards to his B- and C-list if that makes sense. To the point where he will happily come training with me when Em is in season. My field-bred Springer, on the other hand, has zero interest in other dogs (apart from Zig) - that's definitely genetic. BUT she is obsessed with fur and feather so she doesn't get to retrieve either unless she is doing it under controlled conditions. I learnt early on that letting this particular dog chase fur and feather freely would be a huge mistake. It's like her ears fall off lol. My dogs enjoy playing together but would pick training with me any day.

How do I do that? I am currently exercising myself to strenghten my lower back and hips, I wouldn't know how to make a tiny psycho Iggy do what I'm doing though :laugh: Heh, heh….you teach a lot of these things through shaping using a clicker or a marker word and some good treats. It takes patience and a sense of humour sometimes! I can't think of the perfect book or web source at the moment but if you googled rear end awareness dogs I think you'd go pretty well. This is my two doing perch work a few years ago…

If you think it's a recurring thing, it might be worth building up the strength and awareness in her rear end? I do perch work and teach a bunch of tricks which really seem to help my dogs. I think Em has a lot of natural rear end strength and awareness but I can really see the difference it makes to Ziggy in agility and recovery as I've become more diligent with it. He used to get a little tight through his back and glutes when he was younger (I think it was crazy Dalmatian stuff - similar to crazy Iggy stuff) but he has improved out of sight.

It's been done in some states for a while, Tassie, but it's only just getting a look in here. Here's a link to a recent trial: http://www.agilitytrials.info/k9feb14top.htm I'm sure the trial secretary could help you answer your questions but I will take my best guess at some of them for Vic trials. NFC entries submitted at the same time as normal entries. They are advertised in the schedule (see below). Example cost: Entry Fee: $8.00 per class ($4.00 for 'Not For Competition' Open's*) Toys only (noise less). No food. Toys must not leave the body of the handler. I would suggest yes to negotiating with the judge - even out of politeness. Not sure about the Dogs Vic aspect.