AfterThought

I like Nylabone's Big Chew Toys...they are huge, and come in shapes of turkey legs, beef bones or ham/steak. Virtually indestructible and worth the 25 bucks I paid for each one! (My dogs are crazy chewers and it's been 3 mths but both are still unable to annihilate those chews.)

I'm in Edmonton. 2.5hrs north of Calgary. Is that too far for ya to drive to? I have a 16mth old spayed BC(21",39lbs) and a 3yr old neutered husky/mal X (28", 67lbs) Both love other dogs (the BC more so).

Congrats on your new addition! I named my Husky Kindle -- as in kindling a fire...I usually shorten it to Kin in agility and it works great. It'll be cool to have a "name twin"! lol

Banff and Lake Louise are spectacular...I have some great pictures of my dogs there with the lake and mountains as background. Don't forget to check out Lake Morraine (in Lake Louise) too!

Claire, My one dog used to be really slow (walking) in weaves. He's 100% accurate but just slow. What I did was go back to channels. He's really food motivated so I put a little container of treats at the end, got him all hyped out while holding him back and then finally releasing him thru the channels with a "go get your cookies!" and me racing to the treat container as well. After a while, I took the channels away and it was back to a normal straight line weave. Still, I did the same thing with the food container at the end. And he had to weave really fast to get to the food. Also, I don't treat unless he's fast thru the weaves. That's cuz he knows how to do them. For Bailey, I might get him to actually be 100% accurate on weaving first. I've tried it with toys at the end and it works for me as well.

GO OILERS GO!! We will bring the cup home!

My husky is as noisy as Gonzo! Here's a video of him playing with my BC. It's their first play session after waking up in the morning so they are particularly frisky. Usually, as the day wears on, they become more subdued and my husky is usually the one on the floor with the BC dragging him across the room. And him groaning non stop of course.

My male dog's left testicle didn't descend at his 4mth old check up but by the time he was booked for neuter( at 6mths), it had already descended.

LOL my dogs still act like that and they've been together for more than a year! (one's 3 and the other is 15mths)

That would be me. I have a Mal/husky as well and last winter, I trained my BC to pull a sled. She only weighs 30 some pounds but then again, we only do recreational sledding (not long distance). To be honest, my BC was better than my husky at sledding.

Carson Crazies, Thanks for the clarification. I just called my vet's office and they said they don't do titres. But the tech told me that my dog's upcoming vaccination (he's almost 3)will be his second adult booster and that will last for 3 years. So he won't be due again till 2009. Definitely feel better now.

I have a dilemma. My dog's annual vet visit is next week and I had wanted to do a titre test instead. But we are going away next month and he needs to be boarded and they require up to date vaccinations (including parvo, distemper).

Right now I have 2 dogs, a BC and a Malamute. And I don't necessarily think that my BC is way smarter than my Mal, just that she learns faster and is more bidding. For example, when I taught the dogs how to stand on a stool and walk around it with just their back feet, my BC got it in <5 tries. My Mal took significantly longer. 2 days I think?. Also, both my dogs compete in agility. Sure my Mal is not as fast and driven as my BC, but he is still very accurate and reliable and Q's on occasion. I guess I'm saying that both my dogs can achieve the same end results but my BC can definitely do it in a shorter time. In my eyes, that doesn't make my Mal any less smarter than my BC. Just slower I'm biased. I have a soft spot for my sucky baby boy The downside for me is that BCs are so full of energy and need constant activities to excercise their minds. My friends actually call my BC "the dog with ADD". My Mal on the other hand, just wants to sleep all day. LOL.

I have a male dog that was neutered at 6mths and has never lifted a leg to pee (he does a semi spread eagle instead) or marked until recently. It started a couple of mths ago at age 2.5 and he will occasionally mark a fence post or tree stump at the dog park. If I catch him in the act, a stern "Leave it" command will get him to put his leg down. One time I actually pushed his leg down and becuz he still had tons of pee in him, he continued peeing with both feet on the ground but his pee shooting off sideways! LOL.

As an aside, Stanley Coren is a great guy. He was my psych professor at UBC and many of his books on dogs are awesome (eg: How Dogs Think; How to Speak Dog etc etc).

Joe Anne, I give my dogs cottage cheese mixed with yogurt as a meal subsitution occasionally (once/twice a week). I use cottage cheese as a protein source and the yogurt for the good bacteria. Between my 2 dogs (BC --> 35lbs; Malamute ---> 65lbs), they get a 1kg tub of cottage cheese spilt into 2 meals in a day.

LOL. That reminded me of the first time we went tent camping a couple of years ago. It was so cold that I slept in the fetal position all night. The result in the morning? My knees locked up and I spent 3 PAINFUL minutes trying to straighten my legs! And age had nothing to do with it. I was only 21 then!

Since you are in Canada (me too!), I guess you would most probably be competing in AAC later on? For Lightning's height, he would have to jump 26" in AAC regular division. Or you can put him in the specials division and jump one height lower at 22". My BC pup is almost the same age as Lightning (born Feb 03 2005). We usually practice jumping at 16". (She's shorter than Lightning though.)

Ruth, no more eggs for her!! I'll give her some boiled rice and beef tonight.

Oh no, now I'm getting worried. Luisa, I checked her gums and compared them to my other dog. They are a light pink, almost the same as my other dog. I don't think they are in the "pale" category tho. Thank goodness. Anyways, I scheduled a vet visit for wednesday (that's the earliest spot). I'll be monitoring her till then and hopefully she gets better.

Liz, Yes, she is very interested in food other than her usual raw food. She will eat anything other than her raw food with much gusto. Michele.

Hi all, My 2 dogs are on a raw diet (commercially packed made up of chicken, bones, organ meat and veggies). They occasionally get oatmeal, cottage cheese, canned sardines and have been doing well on this diet for the past 12 mths. On Friday night, I gave them their usual raw meat dinner with a raw egg each. On Saturday, my BC(14 mths) vomitted it out in the morning and had really bad diarrhea all day. She was literally spraying it out. I felt so bad for her. I've given them eggs before, but not too often (once every 10 days or so). Anyways, she didn't eat much on Saturday but had access to plenty of water. She still acted normal though -- playful and active. On Sunday, she had normal hard poop (yaaay!!) but refused to eat her usual raw food. She's a real food hound but when I put her bowl down, she looked at it, poked around in it, and then refused to eat. Being that she didn't eat much on Saturday, I made her some oatmeal with honey instead and she chowed that down happily. For her dinner meal, I gave her more oatmeal and some rice. This morning, I tried feeding her raw. Again, she poked at it, made an attempt to eat it but eventually decided not to. I gave up and fed her a can of sardines and she chowed it down like a hound. Her poop today is borderline diarrhea. It's probably from the oatmeal yesterday. She has never had 2 meals of oatmeal in a day before. Other than that, she's acting her normal self. (We did some agility just now & she was tugging like a maniac. Yup, she's definitely feeling fine! LOL) What should I do? Does she have a taste aversion to the raw food? (i.e she associates it with getting sick) Should I leave the food out for 10 mins, and if she still doesn't touch it, keep it and give it to her for the next meal? Or should I switch her to a new diet? (I rather not.) My 2 dogs eat Mountain Dog Raw food and they have a good reputation where I live. I suspect it was the raw egg tht gave her problems. BTW, my other dog is fine and is actually happy the BC doesn't want to eat. He gets to eat her leftovers! Thanks in advance for any suggestions, Michele.

"there was a song on the radio that went "It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right- I hope you have the time of your life" Kelpiegirl, I love that Green Day song!!

Kristi, Where did you order your Dyson vacuum from? We emailed Dyson a couple mths back and were glad they decided to finally launch it in Canada. Do stores like Futureshop/Bay/Cdn Tire carry them or do you hafta order them online? EDIT: Nmind, I looked up the Dyson website and found the stores that carried them. I'm off to Future Shop to get one tomorrow! Ka ching !!

Speaking of bruised toes, my BC was doing the teeter and I didn't realize my big foot was in the way, and the corner of the teeter(with a 40lb BC) slammed on my left toe. Did I scream in pain? Nah, I made sure she did her "bottom" position, gave her a treat, watched her eat it, then made her wait a couple of seconds before releasing her, all the while with the teeter and dog STILL ON MY TOE. LOL.