Dog Owner Chat v2

[FuzzyThePunkCat]

@WarriorCat, she's talking about ovarian cancer, not the kind of cancer that is more specific to breeds. I still feel later altering is better from what I've seen. Vets all usually say early spays and neuters, but they just want your money and to decrease any chance of litters. You HAVE to be able to keep your dog from breeding though.

[Cardinal]

Fuzzy, I did maths.

Excluding the canned if you sourced raw for 1.37 per lb you'd pay the exact same price you're paying to feed the dogs blue buffalo.

Including the canned (saying a can lasts 2 weeks) you have a wiggle room of sourcing 1.60 per lb of raw. This is with Wolf eating a solid 2lbs a day and kiba eating 3oz a day.

Your margins are a LOT better than my 55 cents! I estimated upwards as well and calculated if Wolf was 80lbs and Kiba was 5lbs.

[orpheus.]

We decided to get Lyra spayed 3 months after her first season.
She'll be over a year by the time she's had it and is ready to be spayed. I would have waited for her to be around the 18 months mark, had I been living in my own house, but it isn't that practical for us.

[FuzzyThePunkCat]

Fuzzy, I did maths.

Excluding the canned if you sourced raw for 1.37 per lb you'd pay the exact same price you're paying to feed the dogs blue buffalo.

Including the canned (saying a can lasts 2 weeks) you have a wiggle room of sourcing 1.60 per lb of raw. This is with Wolf eating a solid 2lbs a day and kiba eating 3oz a day.

Your margins are a LOT better than my 55 cents! I estimated upwards as well and calculated if Wolf was 80lbs and Kiba was 5lbs.

Thank you! This may just be possible then

[MacGyver]

Help-
Ohana is 90% housebroken now and hasn't had any accidents in a long while. But ever since he got here (he did have 2-3 accidents on the carpet in the hall), Sherlock and Murdoch have been peeing all over the house. >__>
Is there someway we can stop this??

I'm actually going through a similar situation at the moment. Well okay actually it has been happening for years but I finally got off my butt and asked my friend JinkxMonsoon what I should do about it.

See Jacques, adorable middle child, is a marker. I never used to notice because he's such a little thing and I was living with my parents so I got out of most of the cleaning *snorts* Ever since youngest child Étienne came along it became a real problem though. He's entire, you see, so when he sees Jacques marking he's all...hang on a minute...and then pees over it. Since he is entire not only is the pee larger and more yellow it also stanks so bad. At the beginning I didn't realise it was Jacques causing the problem. Until it just so happened that sometimes I would leave two pups with my mum (since she missed them) for the weekend and keep one with me to have some company and to give him a break from the others. Remy was home alone with me. No pee. Étienne was home with me. No pee. JACQUES was home with me...suddenly little puddles everywhere. AHA. Lightbulb moment.

The thing is, he's so gosh darn sneaky he is really hard to catch out. He's very ninja like. He will creep out of the room you're in before you'll even notice. Ninja Min Pin. So after a while of this I finally get to my wits end and ask Jink what I should do;

I treat markers like pups.

They get no unmonitored time at all so catching them in the act is possible. Take them out as often as you take out a pup, treat for peeing outside and interrupt any indoor marking. I just go back to potty training 101.

And of course clean any marked areas with some sort of super strong enzyme cleaner.

So I invested in some new toys!

Strong enzyme cleaner


Soft play pen


And of course, my pups favourite treats dried liver!


The first thing I did was put all the pups outside and block the doggy door into the laundry (their 'place'). I scrubbed all the floors, doors and skirting boards.

I was lucky enough to have a few days off, so after the intense cleaning I let them all inside, but placed Jacques in his new pen with a bed to lie on and a bowl of water. I've been taking the pups outside roughly every two hours and encouraging them to pee and then treating. Jacques and Étienne get why they're getting treats but Remy is a little bit of a numbskull and still thinks he'll get rewarded for free. He takes a little more coaxing.

At night, I put Jacques in a his crate and close the door after one last pee and we leave him there until my partner gets up in the morning to feed them. When he's fed them, he puts them outside with some water and blocks the doggy door before going off to work. When I wake up, I let them in and Jacques goes straight in his pen. Étienne has been somewhat sympathising with his little brother so he starts off the night sleeping near Jacques in a soft bed that is always in the laundry but inevitably ends up between my partner's legs some time during the night. Remy being my personal velcro dog jumps into bed with us as soon as we retire but he's clever enough to take himself outside if he feels the need to pee or poop.

So far, so good.

I also alternate in sometimes putting one of the others in the pen with Jacques so he doesn't get too lonely and for a little crowd control. I absolutely love the pen because it can fold up into a bag roughly the size of a large briefcase and it also comes with a fabric bottom and mesh top. I can see myself using the pen in a variety of situations, such as when we visit friends who don't mind us bringing dogs or if we have a doggy day out and want to chill for a bit somewhere in a park for lunch etc.

Thanks SO much! I do have a question though, what are some other enzyme cleaners I can use? I didn't see Urine Off at PetSmart (I'll be checking other places this morning). They did have a lot off different cleaners from Nature's Miracle though, are those any good? Or the ones Bissell makes?
Note: I'm in the US.

[vaska]

My mother and I use kid's and pets, found in petsmart, works great.
Removes all urine stains and odors, too.

[Saracirce]

My dog Kakao is sensitive to the touch. When you touch her paw, and shes not ready for it, she jerks back wildly, then ignores you for the rest of the day. Obviously, she doesn't like it, so, any tips on how to get a dog to be less sensitive to the touch?

It's normal for some dogs to dislike having their feet touch, particularly if they've experienced having their quick cut when nail clipping or have allergies/skin conditions that make their paws itchy/painful.

First thing's first, find a super yummy absolutely awesome treat that she'll do ANYTHING for. Touch her shoulder, say 'yes' (or click if you have a clicker) and treat. Keeping doing that until she knows that you touching her shoulder = treat. Repeat, touching her elbow and then just under the elbow then the middle of her leg then her ankle then finally her paw. Don't even pick up her paw, just touch it. Remember, only move on to each step when she seems completely relaxed and comfortable and doesn't mind you touching her. Finally, you can start BRIEFLY picking up her paw, treat, let it go. Work on extending the amount of time you're holding her paw. Then you can start messing with her paw. Separate the toes, touch the nails and nail beds, put you fingers between her paw pads, run you thumb over the top of her paw, etc. If there's anything that seems extra difficult for her to handle, work on that more. Work on one leg/paw at a time.

If nail clipping is a stressful thing for her, you're going to need to work on that too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWZUcLfHXLE

@The Spay/Neuter discussion: I can't find the article/study I was looking for but: The reasonings behind early spay/neuter are simply to prevent pregnancies though often people treat it as a magical fix for behavioral problems like aggression and marking. that certain helped my cat that was fixed at 8 weeks and still sprayed. Studies show that it's actually the opposite and early spay/neuter increases the rate of aggression. Spaying can also cause incontinence in females. Spaying or neutering a dog before their growth plates have closed (generally they're closed by the time the dog is 18 months) can cause the dog to grow too much because they no longer have certain hormones/as many hormones regulating their growth. This can lead to joint problems. However, I find it silly to say that spayed/neutered dogs are claimed to have lower cancer rates when of course they can't get cancer in body parts they no longer have. There are other problems that I don't specifically remember right now but, ultimately, I'm of the opinion that I'd rather avoid spaying/neutering all together unless there's an immediate health problem requiring spaying/neutering. I don't see it as being that difficult to avoid 'accidental' breedings and, even if there is one, the female can simply be taken in for an e-spay.

@Ethulai: your puppies are so cute. How much do you have to exercise them in order to get them pooped for the day?

[Jazi]

A little late, but I spend about 35$/month on raw for one dog. This is keeping in mind that some of my meat is free and some of it comes very cheap as scraps from butchers or raw co-ops. My expensive stuff is the deer and rabbit I throw in for red meat variety. I'm debating adding small amounts of pork and goat but haven't decided yet. I'm still nervous feeding raw pork (it's okay to feed but for a while it wasn't) so who knows.

I also don't feed fish as I'm allergic to fish and Creed licks my face and mouth all the time. So that helps keep my costs low. I might feed a fish oil pill, who knows.

[Imzadi83]

@MacGyver - I like Fission, but I've heard good things about Nature's Miracle though I haven't tried it myself.

[FuzzyThePunkCat]

A little late, but I spend about 35$/month on raw for one dog. This is keeping in mind that some of my meat is free and some of it comes very cheap as scraps from butchers or raw co-ops. My expensive stuff is the deer and rabbit I throw in for red meat variety. I'm debating adding small amounts of pork and goat but haven't decided yet. I'm still nervous feeding raw pork (it's okay to feed but for a while it wasn't) so who knows.

I also don't feed fish as I'm allergic to fish and Creed licks my face and mouth all the time. So that helps keep my costs low. I might feed a fish oil pill, who knows.

Thank you. I found a butcher a few towns over that I might check in with. I wouldn't be able to feed rabbit though, since I have two rabbits that my dogs and cats are always around and that just feels wrong to me lol.

I use Nature's Miracle for scrubbing my carpets and furniture.