Little Gifts

So how do you know whether you own a cold frog or a sick frog then? My pei girl feels the cold terribly but has no body fat and is practically bald over half her body so of course I assume it is a temperature thing and not a health issue. She can make the whole bed shake when she gets really cold. Unlike Megs's girl she has no injuries and her coldness ties into when the weather is cold or the temperature drops so I assume it is normal? Also, once in a coat or under a blanket she does warm and stay warm. I'd hate to think she had a health issue I was oblivious of, so I guess I'd really like to know, before I start being a worry wart, what is hinting to health issues for Megs's dog over it just being cold? Is it mainly the cruciate ligament issue?

Firstly, if I knew I owned DA dogs then a lot of safety measures would have to fail for them to find themselves loose on the street, not just a front gate left open. Secondly, if I owned a dog that attacked another, not even on its property, for no reason, and viciously dragged it down the street by its leg, regardless of how much I loved it, I would put it to sleep immediately. At the very least the owner should be seeing a behaviourist and getting a proper assessment done. I am glad she paid the bill but she still has more work to do.

I just saw this and can't believe it! I'm in shock. Horrible and unnessecary experience. I hope Maddie, Stan and you get through this ok. Can't believe they have to be the ones wearing a freaking muzzle....

That's being generous, LG . Of course, they have the capacity - anyone can pick up a phone and call a vet. Your second comment as to not having the interest is more to the point. I was meaning more that they only know how to deal with products that stay at the shop - they don't have foster carers or a sick room so have no capacity to appropriately respond when their 'products' are sick. I suppose even the staff wouldn't take it home with them until it was better if they weren't getting paid for it. As for the benefit of community petitions - I have seen some do great things and others do squat. I think it depends on how wrong the naughty party really thinks they are in the first place. I recently purchased a beading related product that turned out to be three years old and very out of date. I rang the shop where I purchased it (they didn't care), contacted the company who made it (they told me someone else made it and fobbed me off elsewhere) and finally made a complaint to Fair Trading who told me it was a waste of public monies to take my complaint any further. I rang the company who I got fobbed off to and they were horrified they had been bad mouthed by another associate and sent me on my way (sympathetically) too. By this time I was mighty pissed off so detailed every little thing on a bead forum to warn others and re-emailed the company in question telling them what I was doing. They immediately sent me a very formal email stating they can't be blamed if I choose to buy something out of date (even though it was sealed and I couldn't check it before I left the store), they threatened me with legal action if I did not remove my comments from the bead forum but also offered to replace what I'd purchased with two other items worth basically twice as much. This is your basic corporate bully response - act totally offended by the 'unfounded' complaint, throw in a threat, but as a gesture of goodwill offer a deal to shut the complainer up. So in this instance - everyone knows the pet shop was doing the wrong thing by that puppy so there was a somewhat satisfactory and quick response.

Oh Megs I know exactly where you are coming from! I have a Tang style shar pei with a horse coat, which means she doesn't have much in the way of wrinkles or hair. Her undercarriage and legs are basically bald. Her first winter of life she spent with her litter mates. Her second one with me was a nightmare! She would shake with cold in her soft crate. She was terrified of anything over her body. I spent a fortune on heated beds and those round disc things that stay at a constant temp for 12 hours. Anything 'strange' in her crate and she'd do pretzels to be away from it. And she wasn't very knowledgeable about sleeping curled into a ball for body warmth either. Eventually my other dog encouraged her to sleep on the bed with us and I started a very slow process of blanket bunching, first around her body and eventually over it. If I tried to pull her close to me or cuddle her for warmth she would panic and jump off the bed. She would be so cold she would shake the bed with her shivering. Even my other dog tried to help by sleeping close to her and pushing her nearer to me. As I make dog coats I custom made a style that she seemed to be able to cope with. It was very lightweight and loose, had full front legs and a big body so it would drape over her as she slept. Honestly this took months of persistence and now she is the best spooner ever! I actually have a photo of her with a blanket bunched right over her and only her nose poking out from late last year. It felt like a miracle to get her to that point! I am more than happy to make a reasonably priced, custom made coat to suit your girl's needs if you want to send me a message? I have lots of different fleece fabric and coat styles available and have made them for cold frogs, large and oddly shaped dogs (shar pei are hardly standard - hence the custom making). Alternatively try those round disc heating pads. I think I got mine off ebay. They are hot pink in colour and designed for use with animals, so are waterproof and made from a tough plastic. Someone here might know the actual name of them?

Clyde, if you go to this link and then click on her name you come up with the Mmz KieraLee page and on it are a few pics of chickens. Could some of them be yours? And she may have cleaned up but how the hell did it get so bad in the first place? Even inside was unsanitary! Also look at the water in the chicken's pen in this pic. Maybe she should drink it and see how she likes it - https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10152117313522621&set=a.10152117293872621.1073741830.520717620&type=1&theater

Wrong, wrong, wrong. This is why live companion animals should not be sold as retail stock. When something goes wrong neither the staff nor management of pet shops have the capacity or interest in doing what is right for the animal. If it's damaged it usually gets marked down and just goes in the bargain bin. Except you can't do that with a puppy, so you stick it back in the window and hope somebody takes pity on it and buys it quickly. What a way to treat a sick baby. Shameful.

Last night a close friend of mine finally asked me why people should bother buying dogs from breeders. Her belief was that you only got a dog from a breeder if you wanted to show and she assumed that meant these types of dogs cost a lot. She felt that only left shelter dogs if you didn't care about breed and pet shops or BYB's if you wanted a specific breed. She was of the belief that dogs from these sources were pure because they were being advertised as so. She didn't understand the difference between a papered dog and one where the breeder just says it is pure. This all makes me sad. She is an intelligent person who has fostered for the RSPCA for years and has taken in an ex puppy farm dog. One of her own dogs came from a neighbour who simply bred her two 'pure breds'. Not sure about the other but it is also a swf with terrible skin allergies. Maybe most people just don't want to know the truth until they are ready to deal with it? I always assumed she knew the same things as me and maybe she has always been too embarrassed to ask? Given the breeds of dogs she has I am now thinking she has no clue about BSL either. Why would she? So from now on I will not simply be forwarding all those rescue and anti BSL messages on FB - I will be explaining how I feel and why in the hope it shares some knowledge and starts others thinking in more depth about it too. I actually got the opportunity to do so this morning. There is a pic circulating on FB of a beagle puppy with a broken leg sitting in a pet shop window. It is being treated with soft bandages and was sporting a cone of shame. Staff didn't know if it was getting any pain meds. It was still on display to be sold like that and it would probably be tugging on some person's heart strings. I was able to use this image as the difference between buying from a pet shop and a good breeder. A good breeder would have that 'baby' confined in a quiet home environment, under vet care and receiving pain meds if needed. It would not be sold in that condition. It would be vet checked before being cleared for its new home. Once healed the injury would be disclosed to the new owner. The price would reflect the overall quality of the puppy and its future purpose (it may no longer be show worthy or it might be a working dog). Matching with the right new home would still occur, factoring in this injury if there were ongoing ramifications to it. But the pet shop had that sick baby on public display able to be picked up by anyone who felt sorry for it. The soft bandage looked like a freaking tea towel. Retail staff rather than skilled dog breeders or vet staff caring for it and assessing its pain and recovery. As little money as possible being spent on the 'product' so as not to reduce the profit margin too much. Puppy probably slightly discounted like other damaged goods to ensure a quick sale, with any future complications or veterinary care from this break being at the expense of the new owners. No-one in the pet shop is going to care who buys it as long as someone does and it isn't sitting in the window like that for too long. I was also able to add that healthy beagle puppies from a registered breeder are currently available through DOL for $900 as I'm sure the pet shop would be selling their beagle puppy for the same price or perhaps more. Maybe that is the type of info that is needed out there to challenge people's assumptions and get them asking questions? Certainly all my animal loving friends were horrified that a puppy with a broken leg was in a shop window but they never said why it felt wrong to them. It is wrong to me because it is not necessary. A living, companion animal is not 'shop stock'. It is not suitable for farming en masse. And you don't get what you pay for. The pet shop in question has been reported to the RSPCA.

Oh that is bad.

Happy Birthday Ziggy! Thank you for being such a wonderful foster sibling and filling the gap in your mum's heart after she lost Ollie.

Without good breeders our favourite breeds of dog would become extinct and then we'd be bitching about that. It's not a competition between the two. For me it is always about reducing the dog numbers that fall into that higher risk of abandonment/abuse category. On one side of that is puppy farmers, BYBers and unwanted litters and the other side is people who buy these dogs without a clue on whether it is the right dog for them or understanding/care for how their money is continuing the whole sorry cycle.

I don't think there is anything more beautiful than a shiny black coat! I also think it's even more beautiful when the white hairs starting showing up on the dark haired oldies.

We've been lucky overall though Teekay. That was really her first ever health issue and surgeries. I think it has aged her a bit but overall, for a large breed dog of almost 11 she is doing very well. I'm always amazed at how dogs bounce back from even the scariest of surgeries. Maybe because they just don't carry any emotional baggage with them! Let's hope for good news next week with Jenna!

My sister's large breed started getting similar growths last year at the age of 10. The first one was burnt off but it grew back fairly quickly and she has since had three cut out. I'll have to ask my sister what they are called though when she gets out of bed (she's got a lergy). Her dog didn't miss a beat after any of the surgeries and they were not cancerous.

Do they sell crates big enough for horses?

Ricey I had an SBT girl who we pts just shy of 17. She was blind, deaf, incontinent from both ends, had cancer, pancreatitis, dementia and some mobility issues. It might sound like I let her suffer but she was one tough cookie and did not waste a minute of any day being old. She was the centre of everything that happened in this house and considered herself head of our three dogs. She still played with the other dogs every day, still pulled the in line and absolutely refused to be left at home when it was walk time. She was never the type of dog to just be lying around seeing out her golden years. We managed all her issues with diet, medication, nappies, socks (she dragged her toenails) and a dog pram. She would've lived a few more months if I left it up to her but my fear was that she would get stuck somewhere while we were out, either from her dementia or because her legs wouldn't move in the directions she wanted. It would've broken my heart to come home and find her hurt and distressed. Only you and Hobbes will know when the time is right. Bodies do fail but this can be managed to a degree. It is when they lose their spirit and will to keep living or when they become a great risk to themselves you have to intervene sooner rather than later. Enjoy your time together and take things as they come rather than worry too much about what will happen in the future. 14 is certainly a fantastic age but let's hope he is still capable of hanging around for a while yet!

So funny! Now that Tempeh has discovered spooning I have to sleep in an S shape - one dog sleeps behind the knees with my lower legs curled back around it and one has to be near my chest with my arms wrapped around it. There is no rhyme or reason to who takes what spot and throughout the night they seem to swap anyway. Luckily I never 'need' a good night's sleep!

Very cute! Takes the job very seriously too!

Where is the like button.....

We had a stinker here overnight. All three slept with me for the air cond. Instead of Tempeh waking me up this morning to advise it was breakfast time I had to wake her. It's very overcast (they don't do rain) so they all went back to bed (my bed) straight afterwards and now at close to 1pm that is where they remain. With the air cond still on. I've cleaned half the house while they have snoozed!

I had to leave a distressed and panting shar pei loose on an extremely hot day recently. No traffic but I couldn't get close enough to restrain him and even if I had tried to leave water down in one spot he would've run too far to see it. The more I tried to more upset he got so I had to just let him be. I posted on the lost dogs FB page and found out a week later that it wasn't the first time he's been loose. Given it was a small semi rural community I hope he found his way home and got some water before he collapsed. You can try but you can't fix everything.

Thanks T!

Here is my sister's dog. Her 'hot freckle' position is her most popular. Plus another couple of my girl Stussy who can sleep anywhere.

My sister's dog likes to sleep with her furry butthole against everything - legs flat against her belly and tail pointing in the other direction but I can't find a pic of it right now. But here are my girls dead to the world after having a massage.

Sounds like Canon entry level it is! Thanks everyone!