The dog musing/vent thread

[Dogdragoness]

Ugh, can Doc Emmett Brown come around with that delorean time machine of his and fast forward me and Lincoln to friday, when he gets the stitches out from his neuter? I miss my "doing things" buddy and this being on a leash for everything has us both down!

Also, Josefina is going to have to go in, when she is due for her shots to have BW done, she had to be shaved at the beginning of the summer due to a serious infestation of dog lice, and her hair still hasnt grown back. She has to be shaved once before, when she escaped from my parent's yard and was gone almost 2 weeks, she came back so covered in ticks, that I had to, and her hair grew back fine the first time, but this time, it hasnt. She is also going to have to get her hips x rayed, and she is only 6 1/2!

 

[lancerandrara]

My roommate is scared of Lila, because Lila barked at her since they didn't get a proper introduction yet.

I asked her, "Do you want to bribe her with treats?" and roommate replied, "I don't want to touch her." in this hateful way. So we went in our room and closed the door. This was two days ago...

I tried again yesterday, and she's completely unwilling to go through the steps to get Lila to like her. And then we had some huge drama online even with her friend involved defending her side over her "phobia of barking dogs" and roommate's unwillingness to go through the steps to get Lila to like her. I think she just has a dislike of small dogs to begin with, less than a "phobia of barking". Because when Signal initially barked at her, I immediately told her what to do and she immediately went through with them, and Signal liked her. She just seems particularly hateful/scared of Lila.

Life is not easy lmfao. I'm going to see today if one of my coworkers is willing to foster Lila.

I was not informed that my roommate has a general bias/phobia/dislike/unwillingness to understand dogs. She was fine with Signal before, so I thought she was good with dogs.

Life is not easy LOL

 

[lancerandrara]

Found a temporary foster for Lilah in one of my coworkers!! Thank god. -_-

 

[pinkspore]

For future reference, it's possible to teach a dog to tolerate someone without cooperation from that person. It's easier when they're willing to spend the time getting to know the dog, but with really fearful dogs or uncooperative people you can do Look at That and treat for seeing/existing in their vicinity until the dog decides they're cool.

 

[Liminal]

I got a new goat today, for free. Why free? The people giving her away were in a hurry to get her off of their farm because their "cow dog" border collies had hassled her. Supposedly just bloodied her nose but when we got there we found a goat so exhausted it couldn't stand. She's extremely sore at the least and we're not sure she didn't somehow get a cracked rib although she didn't have any visible bite wounds. They had at least closed her up in a pen to keep their out of control dogs away from her, but hadn't given her water - she probably hadn't had it for around 24 hours.

I'm pretty disgusted, not really that surprised. There's a trend of farmers and ranchers that have never worked a dog on stock a day in their lives let alone trained one buying dogs and throwing them on animals, especially cows. Cow-centric stockdog culture also sometimes fetishizes animals with "grit" and "grip" to an extent that is pretty crap for the animals being worked as well as, often, ineffective. (Like 9/10 times I see someone saying their cows have a lot of fight, the dog seems to be causing the problem by pressuring too much and putting them in fight-or-flight mode... ditto hogs in bay pens for that matter.) Instinct and drive are important in a herding dog but good training and handling are completely indispensable as well, from this novice perspective, and some people just fail at the latter two.

So, yeah. Thanks, irresponsible cattle farmer, for affirming my decision to spend a load of money to make sure I'm learning to do this herding stuff correctly. It says a lot when my working dog of a breed attuned more to feral livestock can work sheep and goats pretty safely, but your 30-40 pound dogs were nearly allowed to kill one. Call me soft but I like to keep in mind that you don't strictly have to cause pain to or scare the crap out of your stock even if you do plan on eating them later.

 

[lancerandrara]

For future reference, it's possible to teach a dog to tolerate someone without cooperation from that person. It's easier when they're willing to spend the time getting to know the dog, but with really fearful dogs or uncooperative people you can do Look at That and treat for seeing/existing in their vicinity until the dog decides they're cool.

Yeah, I agree there. It was tough to handle at the moment, because my roommate was freaking out/staring her down as well while Lilah was determined that she's a bad guy, so the two were kind of actively bouncing negativity back and forth. I tried to soothe my roommate to stop standing stiff against the wall while trying to get Lilah's attention.

Good news it that new foster home (aka coworker) says she's calmed down at home and is also doing well with her roommate.

 

[Samsonyte!]

Quick question about neuter recovery. Wilson's stitches are all healed up and dissolved and everything looks good, except his scrotum is still really saggy and visible? I've never had a dog neutered in my care before (Sam was neutered when I got him) so I was wondering if this was normal? It's not red or swollen or anything, just there. Does it shrink back after a while? How long?

 

[Dekka]

Its normal. They have pancakes for a while but those disappear over time.

 

[Samsonyte!]

Its normal. They have pancakes for a while but those disappear over time.

Ah okay, thanks. Do you know how long they usually take to go away?

 

[Laurelin]

Yeah Hank still looked like he had balls when I got him. I don't remember when they vanished... but they're all gone now.

 

[Bruschnazzy]

Eek, Petrie is home & I'm going into the mode where I am worrying if I made the right decision. He is very fearful, and I wasn't expecting him to be so, and I've never dealt with a dog like this. I know it's only been 2 days, but I'm still just working myself up.

There was progress already after a day, but now it seems like he's gone back to how he was when get got here, almost. I was very surprised the progress he had made so fast, so know there is plenty of hope for him to get fully comfortable in time. Especially because it's like he craves attention, because he'll come sit by you - but if you move will run away, he gets excited when you act excited and he'll get a little wiggly, but won't come too close, or sometimes he'll come close enough to get a close sniff in or lick your hand, and then back off right away. Which is compared to on his first day and he was just cowering the whole time and wouldn't even look at me. He, like I said, almost seems back to his original way, so I don't know where I did wrong or why he feels more nervous again.

Then I'm not sure if he's pottying or not outside, because he seems to just want to hide under the deck or by the door if we're outside with him, but if it's just him & my dogs outside, he'll at least go into the yard and move....but I don't know if he's doing anything as can't really see from the available windows. He doesn't seem to have any accidents in the house, except for when I go to pick him up - and he will pee himself, but not a ton like he was holding his whole bladder, just like a fearful piddle. But I can not get him to go outside otherwise without carrying him. He seems to bounce back from having to get held and brought outside, so not sure if this is the current issue or not?

I don't know. I know I need to give it more time, but I can admit I'm feeling a bit stressed over the situation.

 

[straw]

I don't blame you for feeling stressed, that's always tough. How old is he? If he's over 4 months I'd be doing a good 2-week (at least) staycation, if you have not already considered/started that. This is a blog post I love about it, if you're unfamiliar with the concept: http://rollinwithrubi.blogspot.ca/2012/08/two-week-staycation-in-beginning.html

Sounds like he really needs some time to decompress and bond with you - everything will come more easily after that. I'd be limiting his access to Little Foot and Chomper right now as well. It sounds (based on his behavior and the hobby breeder he came from) like he is more comfortable with dogs than with people and you want him to see YOU as his best friend first.

Solo potty breaks on leash are probably a good way to start. Good luck!

EDIT: If he's under 4 months I'd still be doing a modified stay-cation to allow him to decompress, but still give him socialization opportunities - ones that won't push him far from his comfort zones, like textures/sounds/situations/exercises he can do at home.

 

[Bruschnazzy]

I don't blame you for feeling stressed, that's always tough. How old is he? If he's over 4 months I'd be doing a good 2-week (at least) staycation, if you have not already considered/started that. This is a blog post I love about it, if you're unfamiliar with the concept: http://rollinwithrubi.blogspot.ca/2012/08/two-week-staycation-in-beginning.html

Sounds like he really needs some time to decompress and bond with you - everything will come more easily after that. I'd be limiting his access to Little Foot and Chomper right now as well. It sounds (based on his behavior and the hobby breeder he came from) like he is more comfortable with dogs than with people and you want him to see YOU as his best friend first.

Solo potty breaks on leash are probably a good way to start. Good luck!

EDIT: If he's under 4 months I'd still be doing a modified stay-cation to allow him to decompress, but still give him socialization opportunities - ones that won't push him far from his comfort zones, like textures/sounds/situations/exercises he can do at home.

Thank you, I'll have a look at it. He is 6 months old.

It just seemed more helpful to use our current dogs to get him to go off the deck area and possibly potty. They're hard to get away sometimes, but I'll see what I can do, lol. I had been doing some solo potty breaks on leash, but he will start to fight the lead or it'll be us standing out there for ages and nothing.

I can handle it all but the constant urinating by him. I just don't like that happening, and it is that you can hardly move by him too much and it happens. He loves to be up on the bed and lay on the end of the bed even while I'm also on it, for example, but I don't want to have to keep having things soiled because if he's up there, even me moving to get comfortable becomes an issue, and he urinates, so I haven't been allowing him up there again.

It sucks because I just got him and this whole time I just keep thinking don't think I'm cut out for him. Not to say I'm saying I plan to get rid of him, but it's just that that is all I've been thinking today where I've had to take a step back from him and I've let him stay in my room free-roam, but not out with me to breathe. It probably sounds so stupid due to most of this is coming from him urinating out of fear (and not feeling fully prepared for this type of dog), but then it makes me think that I don't know how long it will take for him to be fully comfortable, and how do I manage that, when I need to move near him sometimes or try and get him to potty outside, etc. I don't mind needing the patience to have a dog warm up and work slowly to get him comfortable to come near, etc. is the thing. If it was all that without the urinating, it'd be okay. Plus it's really stinky urine.

 

[StompinT]

I just accidentally fed my dog the bandaid off the end of my finger. No indication from him he even realized there was a little extra "something" with his treat.

 

[StillandSilent]

I cried the entire way home(5hours) after adopting Gambit because I thought I had made such a huge mistake. Then I cried for the next month because I knew that he was more then I could handle, and he deserved a better, more experienced owner, but who else would take him? It got better, but, yeah, I totally get feeling overwhelmed and WTF did I just do?

 

[pinkspore]

I can handle it all but the constant urinating by him. I just don't like that happening, and it is that you can hardly move by him too much and it happens. He loves to be up on the bed and lay on the end of the bed even while I'm also on it, for example, but I don't want to have to keep having things soiled because if he's up there, even me moving to get comfortable becomes an issue, and he urinates, so I haven't been allowing him up there again.

Sounds like someone needs a belly band and a maxi pad. He can piddle all he wants and you won't know or care. Can you tether him to you so he can get used to this whole leash concept? I never stand around for leashed potty breaks, it's all brisk walking until they can't hold it anymore.

 

[sassafras]

Sometimes with these poor scared dogs, less is more especially when they're SO new to your household. Beyond necessities like taking him outside, just maybe let up on any social pressure. Sit on the floor in the bedroom with him, a good book, and a bowl of chicken and just mostly ignore him other than to toss a piece of food every once in a while. Let him come to you. Be trustworthy and predictable.

 

[Bruschnazzy]

Sounds like someone needs a belly band and a maxi pad. He can piddle all he wants and you won't know or care. Can you tether him to you so he can get used to this whole leash concept? I never stand around for leashed potty breaks, it's all brisk walking until they can't hold it anymore.

I was actually thinking of getting something like this as well, or dog diapers, for the time being. The thing is that, putting anything on him is just too much for him right now since me even touching him is too much for the most part and cans see him start to shut down again. Then it seems by the time I have anything on him, he's already wee'd himself. So, I've not tried putting a leash on him again. When I was, though, not much walking could happen as he would start flipping out and just fighting the leash and collar, if I tried to coax even one foot moved forward.

Sometimes with these poor scared dogs, less is more especially when they're SO new to your household. Beyond necessities like taking him outside, just maybe let up on any social pressure. Sit on the floor in the bedroom with him, a good book, and a bowl of chicken and just mostly ignore him other than to toss a piece of food every once in a while. Let him come to you. Be trustworthy and predictable.

You may have saw this in the facebook group, but did try that last night with good success using his dinner kibble, and did it again with his breakfast kibble today, as well. Starting with throwing him a piece near him, and slowly working him more and more from his "safe" spot, which is the blanket he lays on now. Even our first session last night ended with him grabbing a piece from my hand, even if he did go back after grabbing. Today he seemed to know the drill from last night, haha, and started off the blanket, even, for the kibble to start coming. By the end I tried positioning my hands different ways for him to grab kibble, and he slowly started getting comfortable with it coming a different way, and he was actually giving some tails wags, when usually it's tucked. For sure makes me feel a little better, and then he potties all over & I have to be like....whhhhhhhhy. Because I did try letting him out with our dogs again, just because it seems he'll move with them and be excited, and I thought that way was better than no way, but as soon as he hit the living room he just did it all from my bedroom into there, I learned after letting mine out (since he won't go past the kitchen even with them).

So, I would really like to try the belly bands, in the least, or doggie diapers as I try to work on getting him outside and pottying outside.

 

[Bruschnazzy]

I cried the entire way home(5hours) after adopting Gambit because I thought I had made such a huge mistake. Then I cried for the next month because I knew that he was more then I could handle, and he deserved a better, more experienced owner, but who else would take him? It got better, but, yeah, I totally get feeling overwhelmed and WTF did I just do?

To be honest if I knew about this issue beforehand, I never would have got him. It didn't sound like he would be this way from the girl helping rehome the dogs. I know he has the potential to be great once he's comfortable, as when he does try to let himself engage, he gets very wiggly and playful and sweet (even if it's from afar or more towards the other dogs than myself), before running off to hide again, but it's not something I've ever dealt with, so am not at all prepared.

 

[StillandSilent]

Yeah, I wouldn't have taken Gambit either if they shelter had flat out said "look, these dogs were born feral, didn't feel a human hand touch them until they were 20 weeks old, we haven't done anything with them other then throw food in their pen and get them fixed and, by the way, Dad was probably a coyote."

"A little timid, but he warms up and bonds quickly" just has a better ring to it. Bullshit, Gambit had never bonded with a human in his life before me.