Gil

It is not inhumane. It is required medical treatment. Crate rest till better is a lot better than the foot not healing or becoming worse, requiring surgery and possibly longer crate rest. A stuffed and frozen kong or other chewable toys will help with boredom and teetheing. Jenny

Logan is 20 weeks. Approximatly 23 pounds and 17.5 inches at the shoulder. Looks very lean and long legged. Will have to figure out how to post a picture.

I feed the Fromms 4 star, usually the grain free but picked up a bag of pork that has grain for a change. Will be back to Game Bird when it is gone. Rotate pretty much between Game Bird and Beef Fritata with an occasional bag of Salmon Tortalini thrown in. Gil is not as fond of the fish based foods. It is ALS so Logan has been eating it for the last 9 weeks and is doing fine. He just gets more. He is now 19 weeks He gets about twice what is shown for his weight. Some of the canned is added from time to time.

Get up and dressed, let puppy out of crate and head outside. Gil ( 5yr old dog ) and Logan play while I eat breakfast. They eat breakfast. Logan outside again. Crate time if Gil has class or I have errands. Little bits of training snuck in among the play. Practice recalls once a week at flyball.Last potty trip before my bath and to the crate for the night. Will be adding walks as the three of us need to get ready for a walk in Oct. Will add a foundations class for Logan in a couple of weeks. He is 16 weeks and 21 pounds. No set routine and time for things. breakfast can be anywhere from 4 am till 7 am. Play time usually happens but may not if I'm heading out early. Jenny

What I hear on growth plates is around a year. Your vet can xray to be sure. Agility requires they be 15 months for AKC and 18 months for USDAA for competition. Flyball requires them be a year of age to compete. Fetch is fine with a rolled or gently tossed ball. No wild acrobatics to catch off the ground. I don't think there are any frisbee classes listed here. Search on the web for a local disc dog club. I am in Alabama so far enough away not to hear about training facilities near you. Glad she is doing well in obedience. Jenny

I don't do any frisbee other than playing in the yard because I can't throw. Repetitive training and jumping is not recomended till the growth plates close. However there is a lot of stuff that can be trained now that will be usefull later. Sit, down, stay, walking with you politely, socialization with new people, places and things. Rolled discs and balls, recalls, and tricks. Send off to be trained by a pro is not usually done. Taking classes and seminars is more the norm. Logan is 13 weeks so just a little younger and we are working on recalls, sits, downs, retrieving a rolled ball, and visiting as many places as we can. A basic obedience class or a foundations for dog sports class might be good. Jenny

Started out with the plan of keeping Gil intact till the age of two unless he had behavioral problems that neutering would help. Wanted to wait till he was mature mentally and physically before doing it. He is now 4.5,still intact and behaves fantastic. Don't have a fenced yard so he is only outside under supervision. Suburban setting so all dogs are supposed to be fenced or leashed. Will I neuter him? Depends, right now I have a one dog household and have no reason to do it. We compete in flyball and train agility, obedience, rally and some herding. Hope to get back to competeing in agility and obedience soon. Think it comes down to the dogs personality and the situation at home. Jenny

I think footing matters to people. I train on grass and most trials are dirt arenas. Two are indoor soccer facilities with artificial turf. The occasional irregularity I can usually handle and plan my path around it if I am concerned about it being a problem. With one site it starts out OK but as it is packed from use it gets ridges. I will pull Gil or get some one else to run him because my risk of falling and gait problems. Not all problems people have with moving on irregular surfaces can be dealt with by improving their conditioning. People are talking with their pocket book and if the surface consistantly has problems they are not coming back. Jenny

Will be there with a couple of friends Saturday and part of Sunday. Jenny

Hope you both had fun. Gil loves it! Jenny

The time includes the turn. 9" jumps.

Over the flyball lanes Gil covers 102 ft in 3.9 seconds. To compare to the agility time it would be approx 9yds per second. Will let someone else convert it to mph. Jenny

I have made adjustable nylon quick release collars for my dogs. Looked for a martingale pattern. Didn't find one but did find ordering instructions for custom collars. They were using chain for the adjustable part and a 4 inch spread. The main collar was a loop to loop measurement taken tight right behind the dogs ears. Theirs was not adjustable but it wouldn't be difficult to add that. DH has taken up kayaking. Jenny

I got Snap at either 6 weeks or 4 weeks depending on which is correct. The breeder told me 6 weeks but when I got the papers they showed her DOB as 5/11 instead of 5/1. In the situation she was in I don't think additional time there would have been better than with me. Gyp was 12 weeks and in his case I think earlier might have been better. Gil was 13 weeks. Could have had him at 10 weeks but it was not in his best interest (out of town trip). He moved right in with no problems. I know some is being a better bred dog than the other two and some is personality and temperment, some is also a great socialization program before I got him. His ability to learn, focus and do amazes me. This one I want to stay forever. Think it has a lot to do with which party has the best ability to do the socialization and exposure needed. Jenny

Came home early on a Friday from an Agility Trial to go to a Christmas party with DH. Came home from the party to find flour and parts of the bag all over the kitchen floor. Two dogs with flour on their faces. Made it through the night fine. Headed out to the agility trial the next morning, Two humans, two Border Collies and a couple of Yorkies in the car. One sick Border Collie about 45 minutes into the trip and 30 minutes to go. Made it to the trial. They were OK once they cleared their stomachs out. Jenny