sandgrubber

if you haven't gotten responses, try posting in General. Few people read "Breeders" these days.

If you're after character more than look, I'd suggest working with a good rescue. Not all Rotties are good Rotties, and the temperament of a good Rottie does show up in other breeds, or mutts, from time to time.

But I don't think the poll gives you enough accurate figures re. population vs sample, skewness, significance etc to draw any real conclusions. Interesting to read people's experiences though. Agreed. If you are trying to do statistics, read up on "Opportunistic Sampling".

Sounds like a heyday for lawyers, therefore something to steer clear of.

Around here the near-universal sign is simply BAD DOG. It is especially common on the gates of people who don't have dogs :D. When I see this sign where there are a couple pits staked out in the yard, I'm inclined to give wide berth. I'd expect the next version to be BAD ASS DOG, but I haven't seen it yet.

Remember, they LooK cute, but they're the devil in disguise. I have 14 week Patty old running around my house. I woke this morning to a rather painful play bite to the nose. My shower scrubber is in tatters on the living room floor. It cost me $27 to replace the library book she explored. There are holes by the front porch and holed under where I park the car. She leaves a trail of destruction everywhere she goes.

Not sure how to vote. Mine have a couple acres to run on 24/7. Don't have a good local place to run them off leash, but they get run on-leash a few times a week (alongside a bicycle on a bike path) and sometimes we go to an offleash dog park that's ~25 km away..

Sending two Labradors from Perth to SFO cost me a bit under $4k (2010) . . . inclusive of crates, shots, and paying someone else to handle the paperwork, and a one night overnight stay in Sydney. I think that's pretty reasonable.

I think all mine have broken my skin with puppy bites, but I excluded this. Milk teeth and old lady thin skin are not a good combination. As with others, the "other animal" category is problematic. I encourage them to kill mice, rats, gophers, squirrels, and depending on where I live, rabbits. There is no way they would attack a sheep or pig or other larger domesticated animal. Chickens? Might be a problem, or they might just fetch them and bring them to me.

Had they hit problems, this could have been just as bad as the guy who ended up eating his dog and barely surviving.

some numbers for fraction of pups with low enough antibodies for vaccines to take, using newer, live virus vaccines. 6 wks 37% 8-9 wks 79% 12 wks 95% These results were found in Rottis, a breed that seems to be relatively bad for seroconversion. see http://www.newvaccinationprotocols.com/Current%20Knowledge%20of%20Immunology%20101.htm

Thanks everyone. Having looked at that video and done a little reading, my dogs are usually trotting, not pacing. Ie, same gait as you use in the show ring. The problem is that the old girl goes into a canter well before the young girl does so. Found a good canter vs. gallop clip I'm pretty sure she canters rather than gallops. Btw. The PennHip crew have a good description of gait as related to diagnostics. http://cal.vet.upenn.edu/projects/saortho/chapter_91/91mast.htm From what they say, a dog that paces is probably doing so for a reason, and it would be better to address the problem rather than trying to change the gait. I can't seem to find anything about the whys and wherefores of the speed at which a dog shifts from trot to canter or gallop. Guess it doesn't matter that the old girl goes to a canter while the younger girl is still trotting. Maybe it has something to do with being older and a little less flexible? I'll try to get some photos.

I have some tendon problems and there are limits to how much dog walking I can do. So I bought a recumbent tricycle. Works great. The dogs can pull it at their own natural pace, which is faster than mine. I've got breaks and steering so there's no danger of them taking off when an animal (deer are worst) crosses the path and I can slow them down. I pedal on uphill parts, and a little on the flat, so they never end out pulling very hard. They love it and get excited when I get the trike out. (One of these days I'll talk someone into taking a picture for me). I want to keep the dogs in shape, but don't want to harm their joints. I know running on pavement can be hard on joints, but what about pacing or a canter? Specifically: If I let the younger girl (4, radiographically has moderate dysplasia in L hip, 0:0 elbows, has never shown any sign of stiffness or limping) set the pace, she paces and the older girl (9, healthy and arthritis free, 2:1 hips, 0:0 elbows) breaks into a canter. I generally let this happen for a few hundred meters and then slow them down so that both pace. We go something like 4 km total. Question: Would it be harmful to the old girl to let her canter more? More generally, how do the different gaits stack up for stress on the dog's legs? p.s. the surface is mostly tarmac bike path, though the dogs can shift and run on grass if they want. A bit of limestone track as well.

I have a similar problem when I have a young pup and older dogs. Usually we do a short walk altogether, then the pup gets put away and we do a longer walk . . . or bike ride. The puppy complains seriously loudly. Dogs have a strong sense of justice, and mine don't take it well when they get left out.

Huh? What does this mean in practice?

Great story. I wish more ended like this!

My dogs sleep everywhere, but come on the bed at night, especially when it's cold. Woke up this morning at 3:53 with a puppy on my head. Grrr! I like having them snuggle, but in-you-face is too much, especially when they chew on and pull hair!

I think you'll get more replies if you include a URL for their website or something. I can't figure out what they book.

Come quick, you can probably pick this one up . . . http://lakeland.craigslist.org/pet/4141562348.html Seriously . . . do try rescue. Dogos and cano corso show up periodically cause people get into a pickle with housing. Typically these are much loved dogs. CraigsList is a PITA cause they don't allow pet sales . . . so you see 'small rehoming fee applies' a lot.

p.s. The government side is reasonable, but the AKC is a pain with respect to imports. Somewhere in the fine print they tell you that if you want to breed from an imported dog, you have to register its DNA with them before they will register the pups. Then when you go to get pedigrees printed up they give only the rego numbers, not the names, for the Australian ancestors. Looks really ugly on the pedigree papers. Like everything in the AKC, you can fix this if you pay them for some service or another. Cynic that I am, I think this has to do with protecting AKC affiliated puppy farms from imports.

I had a pup that acted like it had parvo . . .went on drip and all... turned out it ate a large amount of sand. Fingers crossed it's something like that.

I'd say both the owner, and the breeder. Some idiots breed dogs without stable temperament, and some breed for DA. The dog world could live without these folks. With respect to quarantine, I imported two Labs from Perth to SFO. Apart from some health tests, getting rabies shots, and a little paperwork, it's easy. No quarantine. If you're flying from the East Coast, you may even be able to fly on the same flight as your dogs if you play your cards right and don't have breeds that the airlines don't like. If you don't do the rabies vaccine stuff properly they impose a sort of house quarantine, but it's nothing like Australian quarantine. You might want to look at LA and surrounds or Texas. I think you'll find more places with dog-sized yards . . . and plenty of boxing. I can't see Dogos liking snow.

With most meds, keep them cool and they're ok for a long time. High temperatures speed chemical reactions . . . which is what you don't want. I've kept scourban for years in the fridge . . . it seems to work fine.

No need to go that far to have a well adapted pup/dog, though I think a lot of handling early on does make pups more social (orphaned pups who end out bottle and tube fed often become great dogs). I'm suspicious of anyone who brags about using bio-sensor. Video clips are frustrating cause they talk only about 'studies have shown' rather than saying what study. See: http://www.border-wars.com/2012/02/bio-sensor-is-bad-science-the-failure-of-super-dog.html

As a minor breeder who raises pups as part of the family, in the house, I have never seen the 'fear period' . . . or any fear period. Just did a google search and found one source that claims there are four fear periods (http://www.positivedogs.com/articles/early_doesnt_mean.html ): Between seven to nine weeks of age Anywhere from four to six months Again at around 12 months At approximately 14 to 18 months and with some dogs can even be as late as 2 years I have a 14 wk pup at the moment. She IS afraid of the neighbor's goose, and of the DA pit bull down the street. But she waggles up to every human she meets, cries to visit the greyhound and wolfhound who live across the street, and comes running to investigate power tools or other loud noises. Based on a dozen or so other pups I've raised in my house, I expect this behavior to continue...though by the time she outweighs it, she will ignore the goose. I've seen pups in this age group hit an electric fence and develop no lasting fear response, other than avoiding lines that look like the electric fence. With respect to really bad experiences, such as being mauled by a bigger dog or tortured by a child...I wouldn't let that happen to a dog at any age.