katchambers

Thanks all, something to think about. We are going to meet her today, cali will meet her and if they don't get on then we def won't take her, altho cali gets on with everyone, usually! She is a small bitch, 11 months old, I know she will get bigger. We are on hols next week so we will be taking the time to make our decision about her. I didn't just double the amount, I actually asked some people who have adult gsd's how much food they eat. Cali only costs us £15 a month for her food, so £40 is a lot more, I have quotes for pet insurance too, thx though! You have given me a lot to think about, thx Kat x

Hi everyone, Just want some opinions from some outsiders who may potentially like dogs as we are only getting views from people who hate dogs at present, which isn't helpful. I have a border collie called Cali, she's a gem, but we are thinking about adopting another dog, a german shepherd. I grew up with german shepherds and totally love them so have always wanted my own, my husband has decided that he likes the idea now so we have been thinking about it. The problem is that we have told a couple of our friends and my parents and they are all reacting negatively, I have taken they're viewpoints on board and will think about what they are saying. Firstly, we don't have a lot of money, but we have put in the budget the extra food it would need and the extra pet insurance and sundries, we are thinking it will cost between £35-£40 a month for that and have budgeted accordingly. Secondly, we have a 3 bedroom house with an ensuite and a garage and a large garden and lots of lovely places to walk our dogs nearbv, but apparently our house is too small. I only have one dog and we have plenty of room, I have also dog-sat a lot over the last 6 months as I work for platinum petcare and we have had 2 full grown weimeranars running around with Cali and still had room, so I don't see why that would be an issue, although anyone who has 2 dogs please enlighten me. Thirdly, we are trying to have a child at present, my mum thinks that would interfere. I personally think another dog will keep cali company so she stops bugging me every 2 seconds to throw a ball. Everytime we dog sit we have loads more time to ourselves as cali is happy playing with the other dog. Fourthly, there has been 4 rapes in my area, right where I usually walk cali and now I am too afraid to walk her, and I am trying to lose weight so not being able to walk her now is a real downer for that, cali wouldn't hurt a fly so I really don't think she would protect me, a german shepherd on the other hand, I believe it would protect me, as I had one before. Since security has become a big issue in my area lately I would feel more secure and confident with a german shepherd, especially when I have a child too. Anyway, I really would like to bring a german shepherd into the family, my husband really wants it too and we are big animal lovers so I don't see why that would be a problem. Any advice would be grately appreciated, especially from people who have more than 1 dog, is it easier in some ways, or harder in others? Thanks Kat x

Hi, Cali is now 10 months old and I was saying to my husband that I would love to get another dog at the end of the year when Cali is a bit older. I have always wanted a German Shepherd, I have wanted one my whole life, and even though I love Cali my gorgeous adorable Border Collie to bits, I can't help that I still want a German Shepherd too, I really think it would be great for Cali to have a sister to play with every day as she has sooooooooooo much energy and wants to play constantly, I think it might burn off her energy more, because I have boarded dogs before and she always has the best time, and is always so happy when other dogs are around. The thing is, I really want to make an informed decision, I have never owned more than one dog at a time, so I really don't know what the long term implications of having two dogs or more dogs are. For example, my mum said, if you want a baby in a few years (which we do) how will you push a pram/buggy and have two dogs on the lead? Which is a good point, I don't know how that would work, does anyone out there have more than 1 dog and a baby at the same time? I would like to get the German Shepherd from a puppy as I think they will get along better that way, although I fully expect some fighting to happen once in a while, but if you guys could clue me in about having more than one dog that would be helpful, and do you think its a good idea, especially if I have a child in a few years? Thanks Kat x

Thanks to everyone who left kind messages and hugs, and also advice. Because this has never happened to me before, I simply didn't know what to do, the shouting and crying and tugging just came out with fear, but now I have some advice, I think the coat thing and the pulling the hind legs are good ideas, so thanks for that. I wasn't trying to place blame either, I know I am at fault to, but the problem is, how do you teach a puppy to come in exciting situations if you don't take her into those exciting situations to train her? I had her off the lead because she was training, and she did really well up to that point, guess she was tired by then as it was near the end of the walk. I know Cali still needs training but I will never have her on the lead at all times because I am still training her and can't do that on the lead. I do believe the owner is also at fault because she knew her dog had done that before, and that is just terrible. I just wanted some hugs and sympathy, not trying to blame anyone. Kat x

I thought I would come on here for some hugs and sympathy from people who love dogs and understand how attached we get to our little darlings. Cali is 8 months old, she is a sweetheart, so kind, loving and very friendly, she is becoming more trained every day and me and my husband love her so much. Well yesterday I went through a traumatic experience that shook me to my core, it was probably the scariest thing I have ever experienced! I was taking cali out for a walk, a nice long one, we were gone for about 2 hours, she was having a great time, we met some friendly dogs that she played with and it was a lovely sunny afternoon, all was going well until we were about 10 mins from home, and right near the bit that I put her on the lead. She saw a dog on the otherside of the trees and decided to run through and say hello, I called her to come back, as I prefer her not to run off like that, altho she often doesn't listen because she gets so excited whenever she meets another dog or person, because she is so friendly, then I saw both of them run round the trees towards me, and I thought they were playing, then suddenly, cali comes running towards me yelping with the dog fast at her heels. The dog was a full grown staffie, I was very scared, I called cali to me when I saw the dog was trying to attack her, but she wanted to run, but I thought, if she runs and she can't outrun the dog then it might catch up to her far away from me and just maul before I even have a chance to reach her, or they might have ran out into the road, even though the road wasn't very close, so my mind thought very quickly, get her to me and I will pick her up, so I called her too, me and the dog, started grabbing hold of her throat just as I tried to pick her up (she is big and heavy so not so easy), then the dog had her completely by the throat and started thrashing her, I grabbed hold of her tightly and punch the dog on the head, and screamed please let go, please let go, cali was screaming and yelping this whole time, and finally the owner caught up with us, the owner took hold of her dog and tried to get her dog off, but the dog was having none of that, it just held on for dear life, the owner tried really hard but couldn't get her off, I kept saying please get her off... I was near tears at this point, I even pulled out some treats to give to the dog to distract it. Then the owner started really pulling her dog, and I suddenly had a vision, of her pulling her dog off and the dog taking cali's throat with it and blood pouring out! I was terrified, I really thought Cali was going to die and really expected these to be her last moments, I started crying and screaming and punching the dog, and eventually the owner got the dog off her neck. I hugged cali so close to me, then I quickly checked the neck and was so relieved to see hardly any blood or marks there. I was shaking and trembling so much. The owner then apologised profusely, she was very upset too, but she said, my dog always does that when she is surprised, and later I thought, if your dog has done that before it should be muzzled and on a lead. I didn't take her details because of the shock, I just put cali on her lead and walked round the corner, where I couldn't stop shaking and began to cry once more. Some nearby people had heard the commotion, since cali was yelping so loud, they came over to see if I was ok, then we walked home. As soon as I got through the door I checked her wounds and couldn't see anything too bad, I called my husband, cried down the phone and then phoned the vet. The vet saw as straight away and was very nice to me and cali. They shaved off her fur round the next and cleaned it all up. Cali was lucky to have escaped this ordeal with just a graze to her neck, there were no puncture wounds from the teeth, just some blood and grazing to the skin, it looked quite nasty but was not bad, they gave her anti-biotics and pain killers and it cost us £87! I am so happy that she is ok, and she is absolutely fine, she is playing and running around like nothing happened, but me, well that's another matter. I didn't sleep well last night and I keep getting flashbacks of the event, it was terribly distressing for me because I really thought she was going to die, it was just awful. Thanks for listening to me... Kat x

Hi guys, Cali is 5 1/2 months old now and the last 2 days she has been acting weird. She is more hyper-active than normal, wanting to play constantly, has started digging up the garden, peed on my leg today, running around like crazy, keeps biting our face, just doing things that she used to do when she was a lot younger. We have no idea what has caused this as she has been good for a while and nothing has changed in our lives that I can put my finger on. Any thoughts? Do you think she might be coming into season early, if so would that affect her behaviour? Thanks in advance Kat x

Hi guys, Cali is 5 1/2 months old now and the last 2 days she has been acting weird. She is more hyper-active than normal, wanting to play constantly, has started digging up the garden, peed on my leg today, running around like crazy, keeps biting our face, just doing things that she used to do when she was a lot younger. We have no idea what has caused this as she has been good for a while and nothing has changed in our lives that I can put my finger on. Any thoughts? Do you think she might be coming into season early, if so would that affect her behaviour? Thanks in advance Kat x

Cali is 5 months old and we have had her from 8 weeks old, she is normally a very loving dog, and we have trained her to not touch her own food until we say so, but as soon as there is other food around she just gets extremely aggressive. Thanks for your advice, Vets visit it is to get her checked out. Can I just ask you to clarify, why to we have to feed her from our hand? Not sure I understand why that would help, thanks. kat x

I really don't know what to do, advice needed. Cali has been really funny the last few weeks with food and has gone for me a couple of times when I have taken food away from her, food she has found in my bedroom or something, that she shouldn't have, not her own food. So we recently increased her food as we thought we might have been underfeeding her and now we have been borarding another dog for a few days, they get on really well, have been playing really nicely all week and are really happy together, but a couple of times, the dalmation hasn't finished all her food and cali has shot over so quick you would think we have been starving her, so obviously we pick up the food and take it away as it is not her food, but each time she has growled and gone crazy nuts, trying to bite us. Well today we fed them both, they both ate nicely, then my husband said he didn't give the dalmation enough food so we put a bit more food in her bowl when she was done and Cali (who had finished her food) shot over to her bowl, I grabbed Cali and both dogs growled at each other, my husband came over to me to help me with cali as she was struggling out of my arms and going nuts trying to get at the food, and she growled, hissed and turned around and bit my husband on the arm, it actually broke skin!!! I can't believe cali would do that and I am very shocked and not sure what to do. I have never had a dog do that before so I am scared that it means Cali has something wrong with her and that we won't be able to keep her, but I love her so much I don't know what to do. Please can you advise whether this is normal behaviour and that is not likely to continue or whether we have to consider the unthinkable! Has anyone else been in a similar situation with their own border collies? Just to make it clear that we are not staring Cali, last weigh in with the vet she was not underweight and she now gets about 550g wet food and about 300g dry food over 3 meals each day, plus her training treats and the occasional rawhide every now and then and dentustick. Please help!

Everyone, including my vet, a friends vet, our breeder and various dog owners we trust all have different opinions for different reasons, and we are having trouble coming to a decision and we have only 1 month to decide. Do we get Cali spayed at 6 months or do we let her have a season first? We had finally made a decision to spay her at 6 months, for many reasons, 1 of them being its hard to have a to keep an energetic border collie off the streets for 3 weeks while she is in season. However, our friend said she has 2 labradors, one who was spayed before first season and one after, and the one who was spayed before has remained immature compared to the other, we don't want that as Cali has too much energy as it is and we were hoping that getting her spayed might calm her a little as people have told us it has a calming effect. Can you all tell whether you spayed before or after their first season, and why? Thanks Kat x x

Thanks Cali is all better now! I'm glad, guess it was another 24 hour thing, guess I should be a bit less liberal with the rawhide and bones. Thanks everyone! Kat x

Yes she has had access to water all day long. Thanks

That's interesting you say that because her diarhea started again on the day of my uncle's funeral, which incidentally was the day she was left alone for 8 hours and we gave her rawhide to keep her busy/happy! She hasn't had a problem with rawhide before though so maybe she sensed by stress and sadness about my uncle, plus I was crying quite a bit over the last 2 weeks when she has had diarhea on and off, I wonder if that affected her? We feed her wet food, it is called Nature Diet and is really good all natural stuff, she absolutely loves it and never had a problem except when my husband accidently fed her the adult version for a couple of days. We feed her 3 times per day and never leave the dish down, altho even if we did, she eats it so quickly anyway so it's not like she would have any food to return to. The bowl is porcelain. We never feed her human food as we don't believe in that. We feed her in the morning around 7-8am then lunchtime 12-1 and dinner 5-6pm, she relieves herself straight after each meal and occasional in between. She is still poorly, still lots of energy but her poo is not solid. She is also really hungry so I am feeling really guilty about not feeding her. What do I do if they are still not solid tomorrow, after being starved for 24 hours, surely we will need to feed her even if they are not solid? Don't know what to do. Thanks

On the happy side we have some nice new pics of Cali, taken last week! Enjoy!

Hi everyone, We need advice as Cali (4.5 months) is having her third bout of Dihorrhea in 2 weeks and we don't know why she keeps getting it and also what is best to do when she has it. She is starting to look a bit underfed because everytime she gets it we have been stopping her food for between 12-18 hours, when we stop her food she seems to get over it but it seems cruel and she is looking a bit underfed, and if she keeps getting it she won't put any weight on. We think the first bout was caused by her having a bone for a few days, the second by my husband giving her adult rather than puppy food and the third (today) we are not sure, but my husband said she drank water from a dirty puddle yesterday, so not sure. We are getting worried now, so any advice would be appreciated, do we stop feeding her or just give her bland food like just plain chicken? Do we give her water (we have done in the past) and any ideas what causes it? Thanks Kat x