*** Show us your Dogs ***

Soldato
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Any luck with the pulling Matt ?
Adolescence has definitely come with mine, he's now 7 months and really started playing up at puppy training 3 weeks ago.

He's not dramatically different but he's been trying it on a lot more ignoring commands, barking etc. Trainer told me I was letting him get away with too much, so am being a lot stricter with him.

Dont know if its a teenage thing or he's always going to be a bit headstrong. He might get a visit from the testicle fairy at this rate )

Ups and downs to be honest..

We had a trainer who went with the whole strict thing and I don't know if we're the typical middle class spoil the dog parents etc but we didn't like it. So we ditched the choke collar and got a hardness and ditched the "make them walk with you at all times" and let him have a sniff and whatnot, I figure walks are his time.

And actually over the last few months he's changed anyway, he's gotten a little better on walks, less lungy. We've managed to get the lead off him for weekend walks and he mostly comes back (although this weekend he did escape a field under a gate and then after I got him back literally bolted over a field after some other dogs on the same walk, I may as well have been someone he'd never met before) he just wants to play and sees everyone/dog/thing as a potential best friend. It's very sweet but a bit much.

I do wonder if it's more age, like he started cocking/marking finally about 4 weeks ago, barely stops now...

One thing that's really helped is we came across this great dogsitter who has a mix of dogs pretty much every day so we take him there roughly once a week so we can work in peace and he gets time with other dogs which has really calmed him down.

We're sure the testicle fairy will visit but not until he's about 18 months. I want him to properly round out, there's a lab that needed them off at like 7 months (medical reason apparently) at the sitters and he looks like a girl... I'm putting the time in now so we can have a lumbery old round faced bloke at some point.

However, we did finally properly look through the pack that came with him and the pic of his dad would suggest he's just going to be a lean lump of muscle forever. Proper award winning gundog and they look pretty much identical.

10.5 months, I'd guess just over 30kg lol.
 
Soldato
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Probably the wrong place.

We're a cat family currently. Our cat is 12 years old. But I think we're all coming round to the idea of having a dog.

Any good getting started guides? I have a 9 year old lad. 1 cat and 1 wife. Live in a townhouse and don't have a garden as such, but plenty of fields and country paths on my doorstep.
 
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Ups and downs to be honest..

We had a trainer who went with the whole strict thing and I don't know if we're the typical middle class spoil the dog parents etc but we didn't like it. So we ditched the choke collar and got a hardness and ditched the "make them walk with you at all times" and let him have a sniff and whatnot, I figure walks are his time.

And actually over the last few months he's changed anyway, he's gotten a little better on walks, less lungy. We've managed to get the lead off him for weekend walks and he mostly comes back (although this weekend he did escape a field under a gate and then after I got him back literally bolted over a field after some other dogs on the same walk, I may as well have been someone he'd never met before) he just wants to play and sees everyone/dog/thing as a potential best friend. It's very sweet but a bit much.

I do wonder if it's more age, like he started cocking/marking finally about 4 weeks ago, barely stops now...

One thing that's really helped is we came across this great dogsitter who has a mix of dogs pretty much every day so we take him there roughly once a week so we can work in peace and he gets time with other dogs which has really calmed him down.

We're sure the testicle fairy will visit but not until he's about 18 months. I want him to properly round out, there's a lab that needed them off at like 7 months (medical reason apparently) at the sitters and he looks like a girl... I'm putting the time in now so we can have a lumbery old round faced bloke at some point.

However, we did finally properly look through the pack that came with him and the pic of his dad would suggest he's just going to be a lean lump of muscle forever. Proper award winning gundog and they look pretty much identical.

10.5 months, I'd guess just over 30kg lol.

Yes when I say stricter, she means making him sit where you told him to .. not letting him walk around and eventually sit when he feels like it, making him come to me rather than me going to him, not telling him hes a good boy half way through i.e a stay command, only at the end. Things I'm doing a bit subconsciously, its still positive training , she doesn't mean aggressively dominanting him.

Same problem with other dogs , his recall is mostly ok, except with dogs about and then its non existent which means his recall is not great I suppose.

Every so often he'll go through a fence on the park to where he thinks there is food(someone puts stuff out for foxes), and he'll acknowledge me and you can see the gears grinding in his head whilst he thinks should I take his treats ... Nah... and then he pees off at high speed, he knows he's in the wrong because he wont come to me at all then. Very frustrating.

I think the recommendation for the chop is min 1year and it might make a difference, so not looking to rely on it. Hes 7 months, 25kg and family are like yours , lean working dogs.

He needs a bit more exercise but trying not to over do it whilst he's growing.... asked the Vets about the 5 minute rule, 5 mins walk for every month of age and she felt it was a bit of an old wifes tale, so we do a bit more than that.

I want him out with my old dog walker as well once a week , but they have a good hour to 2 hour walk and its probably too much at the mo.
 
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Our new addition. She is currently 12 weeks old. Full GSD. Excuse the old rags on the Sofas, I cannot get them to sleep on the floor/beds and get tired of washing the covers. This time of year is hell for dog owners who have a full grass garden so our sofas are stripped ready for the onslaught of mud/grass. :D

Marley is a 12month old Boxer, full of energy and stubborn as anything. He rules the house.

IMG-20211116-201243507.jpg


IMG-20211116-203219026-5.jpg
 
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Probably the wrong place.

We're a cat family currently. Our cat is 12 years old. But I think we're all coming round to the idea of having a dog.

Any good getting started guides? I have a 9 year old lad. 1 cat and 1 wife. Live in a townhouse and don't have a garden as such, but plenty of fields and country paths on my doorstep.

Possibly a miniature or standard poodle, they are pretty calm, very easily trained, low shed and odour and will tolerate only moderate exercise but relish as much as you can throw their way. But ONLY from a puppy as you have a cat, they are hunter / retrievers and an adult standard not used to cats may be the feline's demise. Trimmed in a neutral way they don't have to make your lad embarrassed to walk it, or your wife look like she's on the game looking for the Champs Elysees ;) I have always loved the standard poodle and like most German breeds they have been selectively bred to perfection.
 
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Whilst I'm here I took one of my usual ropey photos of my Anatolian Karabash on nursery duty with two of my 15 week old standard poodle cross giant schnauzer pups, with another from the same litter I was minding for a friend whilst he was on holiday. Two black and one brown pups, the standard poodle mother being brown. A very successful cross, probably too big for Inoton's purposes though.

karabash-and-pups.jpg
 
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Our new addition. She is currently 12 weeks old. Full GSD. Excuse the old rags on the Sofas, I cannot get them to sleep on the floor/beds and get tired of washing the covers. This time of year is hell for dog owners who have a full grass garden so our sofas are stripped ready for the onslaught of mud/grass. :D

Marley is a 12month old Boxer, full of energy and stubborn as anything. He rules the house.

Those ears ;) Marley best enjoy his rule whilst it lasts I suspect.

I shudder to think what breeders are charging for a pedigree GSD these days!

A nice pair indeed.
 
Soldato
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Yes when I say stricter, she means making him sit where you told him to .. not letting him walk around and eventually sit when he feels like it, making him come to me rather than me going to him, not telling him hes a good boy half way through i.e a stay command, only at the end. Things I'm doing a bit subconsciously, its still positive training , she doesn't mean aggressively dominanting him.

Same problem with other dogs , his recall is mostly ok, except with dogs about and then its non existent which means his recall is not great I suppose.

Every so often he'll go through a fence on the park to where he thinks there is food(someone puts stuff out for foxes), and he'll acknowledge me and you can see the gears grinding in his head whilst he thinks should I take his treats ... Nah... and then he pees off at high speed, he knows he's in the wrong because he wont come to me at all then. Very frustrating.

I think the recommendation for the chop is min 1year and it might make a difference, so not looking to rely on it. Hes 7 months, 25kg and family are like yours , lean working dogs.

He needs a bit more exercise but trying not to over do it whilst he's growing.... asked the Vets about the 5 minute rule, 5 mins walk for every month of age and she felt it was a bit of an old wifes tale, so we do a bit more than that.

I want him out with my old dog walker as well once a week , but they have a good hour to 2 hour walk and its probably too much at the mo.

Yep all sounds very familiar. We stuck to the 5 minutes-ish until recently, he's 10-11 months and we'll frequently do an hour or a little more at weekends.

To be honest he can get a bit hyper or over stimulated (we think) with much more, stops being calm and starts whining a lot at nothing then we take him home and he passed out for the rest of the day lol.

Tough time of year though I'm finding, we had a good line in taking him for an evening stroll but now it's dark he's much more lungy/nose driven which I guess makes sense seeing as he can't see anything!
 
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Ups and downs to be honest..

We had a trainer who went with the whole strict thing and I don't know if we're the typical middle class spoil the dog parents etc but we didn't like it. So we ditched the choke collar and got a hardness and ditched the "make them walk with you at all times" and let him have a sniff and whatnot, I figure walks are his time.

And actually over the last few months he's changed anyway, he's gotten a little better on walks, less lungy. We've managed to get the lead off him for weekend walks and he mostly comes back (although this weekend he did escape a field under a gate and then after I got him back literally bolted over a field after some other dogs on the same walk, I may as well have been someone he'd never met before) he just wants to play and sees everyone/dog/thing as a potential best friend. It's very sweet but a bit much.

I do wonder if it's more age, like he started cocking/marking finally about 4 weeks ago, barely stops now...

One thing that's really helped is we came across this great dogsitter who has a mix of dogs pretty much every day so we take him there roughly once a week so we can work in peace and he gets time with other dogs which has really calmed him down.

We're sure the testicle fairy will visit but not until he's about 18 months. I want him to properly round out, there's a lab that needed them off at like 7 months (medical reason apparently) at the sitters and he looks like a girl... I'm putting the time in now so we can have a lumbery old round faced bloke at some point.

However, we did finally properly look through the pack that came with him and the pic of his dad would suggest he's just going to be a lean lump of muscle forever. Proper award winning gundog and they look pretty much identical.

10.5 months, I'd guess just over 30kg lol.
Wow! Your dog/puppy is an impressive size and huge!!

Think it weighs just a bit less than me as I'm about 36kg!!
 
Soldato
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Wow! Your dog/puppy is an impressive size and huge!!

Think it weighs just a bit less than me as I'm about 36kg!!

Hah yeah my other half isn't much heavier than him which has certainly presented some challenges for walking around roads/at night etc which has meant I have to be a little bit more involved with HER dog than I'd like (I jest, he was definitely her idea.. we've 100% bonded... lads :))
 
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I cringe when I see kids and lightweight people walking big dogs on harnesses, big dogs NEED choke chains, Period. No matter how well behaved they NORMALLY are it just takes something unusual to trigger them and unless the walker lets go they are lurched into the road or a fall. A kid CANNOT properly control a big powerful dog unless it has a proper choke chain collar, and even then they can be a handful. Two big dogs, proper big dogs, even on choke chains are really not controllable by an adult male if they are determined to do something rash. As for "professional" dog walkers with about six canines on leads, well, it's plainly ridiculous, they basically have a pack under their sole control in public...
 
Soldato
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I cringe when I see kids and lightweight people walking big dogs on harnesses, big dogs NEED choke chains, Period. No matter how well behaved they NORMALLY are it just takes something unusual to trigger them and unless the walker lets go they are lurched into the road or a fall. A kid CANNOT properly control a big powerful dog unless it has a proper choke chain collar, and even then they can be a handful. Two big dogs, proper big dogs, even on choke chains are really not controllable by an adult male if they are determined to do something rash. As for "professional" dog walkers with about six canines on leads, well, it's plainly ridiculous, they basically have a pack under their sole control in public...

Completely agree with this, often see kids walking large dogs and think what if... you really do make some valid and interesting points in this thread Chris.
 
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I cringe when I see kids and lightweight people walking big dogs on harnesses, big dogs NEED choke chains, Period. No matter how well behaved they NORMALLY are it just takes something unusual to trigger them and unless the walker lets go they are lurched into the road or a fall. A kid CANNOT properly control a big powerful dog unless it has a proper choke chain collar, and even then they can be a handful. Two big dogs, proper big dogs, even on choke chains are really not controllable by an adult male if they are determined to do something rash. As for "professional" dog walkers with about six canines on leads, well, it's plainly ridiculous, they basically have a pack under their sole control in public...
I disagree. My dog is about 40kg. No choke chain required. No lead required. My granddaughter is quite comfortable with him.
 
Soldato
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I cringe when I see kids and lightweight people walking big dogs on harnesses, big dogs NEED choke chains, Period. No matter how well behaved they NORMALLY are it just takes something unusual to trigger them and unless the walker lets go they are lurched into the road or a fall. A kid CANNOT properly control a big powerful dog unless it has a proper choke chain collar, and even then they can be a handful. Two big dogs, proper big dogs, even on choke chains are really not controllable by an adult male if they are determined to do something rash. As for "professional" dog walkers with about six canines on leads, well, it's plainly ridiculous, they basically have a pack under their sole control in public...

Totally agree, any dog can make a lunge I don't care how much any owner says there dog is different etc.
 
Soldato
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I get all of that but at least in my experience Barkley used to lunge on a choke collar.

The only difference was that he's end up gagging and hoarse with it, the harness is much easier to control him with.

Basically choking was not a significant enough disincentive to stop him.

That said I don't know if my opinion would be different if he were in any way likely to attack or hurt anyone, he's a pretty typical lab and the only person likely to get hurt is one of us if he pulls us over.
 
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What is the dog straining to get at? I could probably cure him in a day, but you might not like the method. The dog and your lives would be the better for it though :) The methods many of the pro trainers show on YouTube are not what they actually use once the cameras are off and you've left the dog with them!

What would I use? A shock collar. That's the best way to stop him, a mild stimulus to get his attention, if he persists some stronger ones. Don't approve? Prong collars may work, but they are likely to damage his coat or worse long term.

A shock collar is 99% guaranteed to bring harmony to your walks, and usually they only need one for a couple of days, they usually defer and just stop the tugs of war after then, collar or not.

I have had some real problem rescue dogs, big ones, that would never be able to be taken out in public because of lunging at other dogs or even people that have been able to live an interesting and fulfilling life going on "normal" on lead outings in busy places thanks to turning their entrenched appalling behaviour with a few jolts of volts. In most cases a choke chain would never have worked reliably until they got a real message that lurching at every other dog they saw was just not going to be tolerated.

Same with livestock chasing, I can absolutely promise you a dog not brought up alongside livestock cannot be fully trusted for ages (weeks) when they encounter them. Some breeds a lot more so than others. A sheepdog really wants to chase and get a grip of a sheep but is trained to just chase in a VERY controlledmanner

If a dog is new to livestock they can get at, you have to assume they'll want to get close up and personal to it, (and once the real chase instinct kicks in they become very determined to do so, and you have little hope of calling it back).

You have three choices, never let them off a lead near livestock they can possibly get at, put a shock collar on them, or risk a farmer shooting them with zero comeback. One local farmer shot three dogs so far this year alone. They won't (and shouldn't have to) tolerate it. What does the owner always say when the dog has caused a cow to abort or killed or mauled a sheep to the extent it has to be put down? "Oh, he / she has never done anything like that before, I don't know what possessed it! It just wouldn't stop!"

Dogs chase things by nature, and you use whatever methods are needed to stop them around livestock unless it's desired for them to do so. So sad to see an owner picking up a dead dog because they thought a shock collar was cruel and he'd been pretty OK last time he saw the sheep in the field we walked him across, or by, off lead. Used sensibly a shock collar is a marvellous tool in training difficult dogs, or where you can't be TOTALLY sure what a dog new to livestock may do. Hate me if you like :)

I can tell you the story of the big rescue Karabash in the photo that used to think chasing our birds was fantadtic fun, and how a robin that got into the glass porch and was flapping about with me chasing it to drive it out the other week. He was in there alone with it, for some time before l even noticed, and he never attempted to even get up, as he'd been trained that he DOES NOT, EVER chase birds. Even I was quite impressed and a bit surprised by that good behaviour ;) He's not had a shock collar on for years.
 
Soldato
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That's quite a flex given further up the page you didn't know you had 2 dogs that don't get on and ended up having to use pliers on one of their faces :cry:

Horses for courses, with patience and persistence Barkley has gotten much better at knowing he's supposed to want to be next to us, we just treat it as a journey. He's 10.5 months old and much better than he was at 6 months etc.. we're working with reward and repetition rather than choke and shock.

Prong collars should be banned... personally I think shock probably should too.
 
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