lanabanana

I don't really see an issue, it's a film...it's not like the dog will actually be attacking anyone.

You can use my dog if ya want, he speaks on command but he is not anywhere as nicely trained as other peoples dogs on here. Unfortunately, he is a mutt so you may not be interested (benefit to being a mutt though is it doesnt discredit any particular breed LOL).

EDIT: On second thoughts probably not a good idea. Once you start him barking it can sometimes be hard to shut him up again LMAO, plus he'd be wagging his tail the whole time and trying to get cuddles every 5 minutes. And he is probably not well trained enough though he has potential. He does kinda meet requirements though, large blocky head, black, can look staunch, but also have that other look you were talking about.

Good luck with it though.

OMG that is amazing

I sent a PM.....my boy is probably not quite what they are looking for, but he plays, and speaks on command so thought wed send a message.

How exciting for whoever gets to be involved.

First off, I would love a puppy as a gift but my OH never gets the hnt and I always end up getting them myself LOL

Secondly, in regards to people saying they just love your dog and they want it. I had a very good friend who was very in love with my big boy Barney. When they went looking for a dog of their own, they wanted a dog like Barney. They lived with us for the first year or so of his life so they knew him quite well. He always stayed at their place when we went away or whatever, and they always said they would want him if we ever decided we didnt (yea right).

Well, when we first moved to Oz, they agreed to look after our dogs until we would get them over. This was a period of 3 months. Turns out they didn't quite love Barney as much as they always raved about and were quit ehappy to see the back of him LMAO (they did say "we love him dearly but no, we dont want him anymore like we used to") .

Sorry for your loss.

When we lost our dog when my daughter was 5, I told her he was in heaven waiting for us all when we got there. We explained he didn't have a body anymore (it was in a small cremation box so that helped to show her) but his spirit was around.

She seemed to accept that (I am not religous at all, but thought it was the kindest way to explain he wasnt coming back).

Someone I chat with has lost her house unfortunately - realy sucks.

There have been a lot of quakes going up and down NZ...I hope it is not going to get an even bigger one.

I dont think it's the dogs fault as he was doingwhat he was meant to do.

I dont think it is th eboys fault.

However, I do think more care should have been taken by the police before sending un unrestraned police dog into a house where children live and could have been present.

I dont think police dogs shoudl be "let off" though just because they are trained to do that stuff. It shoudl be looked at on a case by case basis. Recently, a police dog was at a kindy giving a talk with the officer and the dog bit a child whilst there (this is in NZ). IMO, that is not acceptable. It wasn't out doing a search or attack or whatever.

what the hell is a lambradoodle when its at home?

We flooded when we lived in the NT in 2006. We were lucky that we had a friend on the dry side of town happy to take us in. He already had 2 dogs of his own, so they were tied around the front of his house. We had our big girl Sophie and Buster tied around the side of the house so we didn't have to deal with intro's etc because none of the dogs were overly lovey and it was a stressful time.

We also had puppy Mac so we kept her inside with us, along with the JRT another guy had that was staying with him for the flood aswell and our cat that we kept locked in the bedroom, we had 2 rabbits in seperate hutches that we took with us and another woman we had staying aswell had her budgie.

Not easy, but they were the first thing we packed up. We had a bag of clothes each and the computer in the car but we felt awful we couldn't take the fish from the back pond.

One thing that worries me now is that if we have an emergency now we have the horses to take care of aswell.

Yea thats a concern, probably not practical to cram them into a backpack or the back seat of the car.

Yea clamshell pools are fab!

When we moved in to this house someone had left one down the side of the garage and it was great over summer. It has big cracks in though so we will get two new ones for Xmas and make one a sand pit.

I have also heard that you can find a lot of them when spring cleaning comes along and people leave them in front of their houses.. Would love to just pluck some stuff up, also seen COUCHES on the sidewalk, and that would probably make a fantastic outdoor bed for a dog.

Thats a good point, I have seen a lot of clam shell pools out at collection time!

LMAO at zero's car

Yea clamshell pools are fab!

When we moved in to this house someone had left one down the side of the garage and it was great over summer. It has big cracks in though so we will get two new ones for Xmas and make one a sand pit.

Aww gorgeous pics!

dju, yea sticks probably arent the best due to splinters but they love em so much I just cant get rid of them. I do pick up all the smaller ones though.

LOL at the condom bed.

Yea, sticks are good, specially big ones. We had a branch fall in our back yard a while ago and we sawed it up and put it somewhere the dogs couldnt get it. Wrell lo and behold, little miss found a way in and dragged out 2. One is about forearm sized, and the other is a chunk of wood (maybe the branch fork) and as big as the little one (no idea how she pulled it out but she is always carrying it round the yard) and I just don't have the heart to remove them. They love them and are always playing with them.

Kongs, Cuz & Aussie Dog Toys are the only ones that my destructo dogs can't eat thru

Kongs

Cuz Toys (this site actually has quite a few heavy duty toys)

Aussie Dog Toys

As for beds, mine had blankets and reject shop beds until they learnt to respect their beds. They only respect their inside beds.. the outside ones get destroyed in a day..

They have these Bone Fido beds as their inside beds

Youre cat is just gorgeous!

LOL what is a condom bed?

What kind of pup are you getting?

Cool, so I'll add a rope toy to my list. I was initially worried that playing tug would promote aggression (this is what one of my neighbors have been telling me). But then again my neighbors have aggressive dogs without rope toys so I'm not sure I should trust their advice :D

I don't think it promotes aggression. Both my dogs are sooks. They play tug of war together and it always sounds nasty but they are just playing (really the litle dog just gets dragged round making a load of noise LOL). We also play tug of war with them and the little dog growls and snarls....the big dog won't actually play it with us much. Shock horror, we even let them win tug of war soemtimes LOL

:D So the tug toy rope things are a good investment then? I had a feeling that the thick ropes couldn't be chewed that easily. But I heard about really tough toys on the market like.. Kong Wubba or something like that, which is impossible for dogs to chew through or something like that.

I'll probably opt for the kmart fold-out kid sofas as well, they're cheap enough to break.

Yea the ropey things dont seem too bad (the ones without any plastic/rubbery bits). Mine have a couple. One for inside (they are only allowed non squeky toys inside LOL) and then one outside, which gets trashed all day while we are at work and that one has lost it's loose end, but we have had it for over a year now (was a pressy for the dogs when they arrived from NZ in July last year) and it still looks pretty good

I haven't tried a Kong yet even though I have heard good things about them. My concern is that I will spend loads of money on a couple and then th ebuggerw ill demolish them anyway LMAO

Got our collars form pigdogsupplies.com they're lasting well, and certainly are in the elements daily, made to size. I did see a website called rogue royalty.com.au heaps of nice stuff, but the nice stuff doesn't last long with dogs who like to chew each other collars as a game.

Beds.. ah!! stopped using them as they kept getting eaten, now the dogs have ownership of an armchair each which they don't eat, though i'm thinking of getting them one of the Kiddies fold out lounges about $20 from Kmart see how long it lasts.

That's a really good idea! Our dogs wreck their beds too but they are allowed on the couch and stuff but I may have to copy you and pop one of those in the lounge for them.

They even eat their own beds?? Good thing to know, I was going to go ahead and buy an expensive bed for my dog because I figured "oh what the hell, it will last a while" :D

That is my dogs favourite thing to attack.

I used to buy nice beds too and then when we were gonna throw out an old foam queen size mattress, I decided to cut it into pieces and give it to them for a bed. I cut the right size, then sewed a thick blanket round it. They proceeded to chew through the blanket to the yummy foam underneath and put massive holes in. I recovered it and they have done it again so I have stopped fixing it and they now sleep on it with a big hole in the middle that you can see the floor through (which the wee one loves to sleep in) LOL

Those are a hell of a lot of toys..

I'll check out the collars though, thanks!! :D

LOL probably a slight exaggeration but I usually buy 5 or 6 new toys every couple/few weeks.

Our lab x will grab the new toy, chew it til it breaks (usually about 2 minutes. Then our wee foxy/shih tzu x jumps in once it has been broken and proceeds to eat it piece by piece so toys are often broken and have missing bits within the first day.

I did buy a knot thingy about 3 months ago which is lastign really well, they love it (it's one of their "quiet" inside toys) and thrash it, but so far there are no breaks and the loose ends are still in tact - I got that from the vet

Got our collars form pigdogsupplies.com they're lasting well, and certainly are in the elements daily, made to size. I did see a website called rogue royalty.com.au heaps of nice stuff, but the nice stuff doesn't last long with dogs who like to chew each other collars as a game.

Beds.. ah!! stopped using them as they kept getting eaten, now the dogs have ownership of an armchair each which they don't eat, though i'm thinking of getting them one of the Kiddies fold out lounges about $20 from Kmart see how long it lasts.

That's a really good idea! Our dogs wreck their beds too but they are allowed on the couch and stuff but I may have to copy you and pop one of those in the lounge for them.

LOL sorry, I cant be of help....my dogs are on about bed 5 ths year and toy number 367 LMAO.

I did get them leather collars from KMart though and surprisingly they still look new 6 months later.

Yes I believe so.

See lots of smooth borders working the farms in NZ

I have a wooden crate sitting in my laundry if anyone is interested. May be good for someone who rescues and needs extras????

I used it to ship over my old girl last year, and as she is no longer with us the crate will not be used again (too small for the big dog - plus he has his own large one - and far too big for the wee dog - and she can fit in the large one with the big boy LOL). It has been used to crate the wee girl for a week but other than that it is just sitting there looking sad and unloved.

I will pop measurements (and maybe pictures) in here tomorrow but it was used to ship a lab/staffy x at 14 kgs (underweight at the time after being left for 3 months but we wont go into that) and would probably fit a dog up to about 22 kgs or somewhere round there depending on height etc. There was plenty of room (excess) for our girl when she was in it.

The whole thing is wooden, with holes on the long sides and half double layer mesh on the back wall and a double mesh door.

I understand it should be IATA approved, seeing as it should have been to ship the dog, but there is nothing on it to say it is.

I can also supply the plastic water container with holes in to attach to the mesh if wanted.

If you are interested let me know otherwise it may end up in the council collection and that feels like a waste.

EDIT: I thought rather than being lazy I would just go measure it now....height is 68 cms, width is 56cms and length is 90cms

I would imagine a lot of pet owners choose a breed based on looks initially.

Most people start liking a breed because they like the way it looks don't they? They then go off and either get that dog or research further to see if temperament etc all match what they want?

Not everyone "cares" about personality or exercise needs or grooming etc.

I know of many people who don't mind short or long hair, low exercise or high exercise. Most would want a friendly dog obviously but I think initially your response to a breed is based on the way it looks.