Anyone Adopted a Retired Racing Greyhound

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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I’ve never had a greyhound, but quite a few people at the dog park where I take Bitz the WonderMutt have them.

Many of the greyhounds I’ve met do seem a little shy (not wary) around strangers, but if their person is around and the person doesn’t seem loud or jumpy, they’ve all allowed themselves to be petted and played with.

Bitz is a great socialization dog, and she takes it on herself to a) look out for and protect shy or small dogs when big and boisterous ones want to engage in unsolicited play and b) gently play with and persuade shy and small dogs to play with her.

I’m probably giving dogs too much mental credit, but it seems that they figure out if the 110 pound Labweiler can play with them and nobody gets hurt, maybe play in general is a good thing.

Lastly, I’ve found that the getting dogs to figure out humans can play too thing that Johnathan Chance mentioned above is very easy to do: You just act like a dog. You get down on all fours, put your arms out in front of you on the ground, lower your head and quickly swivel your neck. I have yet to meet a dog that doesn’t immediately recognize this signal.

Whether you get a greyhound or adopt a different dog, thank you for adopting one in need of a home rather than going through a breeder. There are just so many great animals who need good homes that I don’t understand paying hundreds of dollars to a breeder rather than saving one in need.

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One more question that came out of discussion I had with my dog walker - she obviously knows my dog very well, and she also knows a number of greyhounds, so she had a good insight I hadn’t thought of.

She said all the greyhounds she knows are major chowhounds and gobble their food right up. My dog is a picky eater - sometimes really picky - he’ll let food sit for hours or even a couple of days at time, and I recently had him to the vet because he was going through a particularly bad stage (turned out to be just a stage, and right now he’s eating like a pig - for him - which means sometimes he eats his food right away or if not, he generally gets around to eating his dish of food that day). So my dog walker’s concern is that with a greyhound around, what food would be left for Gizmo? One caveat is that Giz is a little better eater when other dogs are around (pack mentality, more competition, whatever).

So what do you greyhound owners think about this?

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I’ve only known one greyhound who didn’t fall upon his food like a mongol horde on an unprotected Turkish village.

Just this week we dog-sat my brother in laws two pointers. They were much more reticent at first about eating…taking their time and suchlike. So our dogs ate their food.

By day two they were all over it.

Give little Gizmo (you MUST name the greyhound ‘Spike’) a day or so to realize that food doesn’t patiently wait for him and he’ll take it.

On the good side the group eating that greyhounds do almost always means they’re not terribly territorial about their food bowls. They’ll share and think it’s a communal bowl. So when he gets the nerve Gizmo can start stealing from the greyhound while it’s eating.

It’s an astonishing thing to see.

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My wife and I have had a retired racing greyhound for about five years. You’ve been getting good advice so far, so I’ll just chime in with a story.

About a week after getting our dog, I decided to let him have a run in a fenced-in baseball diamond that was just down the hill from our house. I was working second shift in another city at the time, so these walks usually happened pretty close to midnight. The only light was from a few mercury lights over by the clubhouse. I was running back and forth calling the dog and generally looking like an idiot while trying to get him to understand that he could run around. He was completely confused as to why I was trying to run away from him and just trotted along by my side. crap.

Okay, for you to fully appreciate this next part I need to tell you that Archie is almost completely black. Black dog, dark park. Anyone not see where this is headed?

I had a flexible frisbee in my pocket and on a lark made a long low throw into the corner of left field. What happened next is difficult to describe. I can say that it was explosive, frightening, in a way almost violent. I lost him in the dark as he was finishing his second stride and could only tell where he was by the sound of (I swear I’m not making this up) hoofbeats. Hoofbeats which cross from left to right and then (ohshitohshitohshit) come straight at me. I had enough time to think a) “He’s trying to kill me.” b) “Maybe he just can’t see me in the dark.” I’d decided to try to jump out of the way and take the chance that I didn’t jump into his path, but I couldn’t get my legs to move. He went past me on the left so close that his tail (I’m guessing here) ticked the side seam of my jeans as he went past. I never actually saw him on the first pass. It was a lot like having a semi go past you at high speed. He was actually pushing a wall of air in front of him and throwing up a rooster tail of dirt and sod behind him. He made a game out of running a figure 8 pattern for the next minute or so with me at the center of the pattern. I’ve had more relaxing walks.

That weekend I went down to the diamond to see if he’d torn it up very badly. He had. It looked like someone had been practicing his chip shots all over the field. I paced out the divot marks and found the longest to have 18 feet of space between them.

My advice to you is this: health permitting, let your grey run. It’s one of the most exhilirating and athletically beautiful things you’ll ever see.

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I’m really glad to see all of you who have adopted retired greyhounds over the years…they are the sweetest and most loyal dogs I’ve ever seen. LabRat, the reason your dog running sounded like hoofbeats is that a greyhound’s stride is almost exactly the same as a thoroughbred horse. One of the most thrilling things you’ll ever see is a greyhound running for the sheer joy of it!

My late wife ran a greyhound adoption agency here in Georgia for many years before she passed away…and she was never really a dog person :). But she fell in love with the big galoots from the first time she ever saw one up close…it must be those big brown eyes!

Anyway…she was the brains of the outfit…I was just the manual labor. She’d train them how to act around kids and cats, bring the skittish ones out of their shells. My job tended more to the, shall we say, sanitary side of the chores :D. In addition, I would get to be the van driver when we would go to the breeding farm in Florida to pick up new dogs. Nothing like driving down the highway with 10 greyhounds wanting to see what you’re doing or trying to sit in your lap. My wife, of course, would leisurely drive behind us with one of her friends, laughing all the way.

We were really lucky in finding a breeder who really cared about the dogs. His contract with owners stipulated that the dog would be returned to him when it’s racing days were over. Believe me…this is unheard of in an industry where a .22 slug behind the ear and a hole in the ground is the best even a winning dog could hope for. If any of you happened to see the 60 Minutes show several years back of the farm in Florida where hundreds of dogs were found being kept in brutal conditions and mass graves of slaughtered greyhounds, our breeder friend was the one who blew the whistle on them. He left the business right after that, totally burned out.

Anyway…hearing you all talk about greyhounds has brought back a ton of great memories and I thank you all for this.

Porcupine - a couple of things to keep in mind when you’re making your decision:

  1. While it’s true they are mostly couch potatoes, they DO need a lot of exercise to maintain their overall health. This means more than just taking them for a walk. Greyhounds love to run…you can see the joy in their faces when they’re doing it for fun. We were lucky enough to have a big fenced yard, especially when there were times when we would have 20 dogs waiting for adoption! I would stand at one end of the yard and my wife at the other and we would take turns calling them with a noisemaker that our breeder friend gave us that they train them with…they’d race back and forth full out, just for the fun of it.

  2. Diet is important for them. Most of them are fed raw meat when they’re racing (for the protein) and that contributes to their rotten teeth…LOL. With that many dogs around, the cost of food was a definite concern. We found that one of the best foods for them was Old Roy Lamb & Rice…from WalMart of all places! We had a vet who contributed his services to us for the dogs and he recommended that to us. A side benefit…it would clean up their teeth.

  3. They are very graceful dogs, but the ARE big…if you’re in a small apartment, don’t leave anything valuable or breakable where they can bump into it…LOL. We found this out the hard way with a Lladro figurine.

But you won’t regret it…they are the sweetest dogs you’ll ever want to have, and they’ll love you to death. Good luck to you!

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I also have a retired racing greyhound. It sounds like you have all the info you need, but I just wanted to add that this is a great dog. He’s the first and only dog I’ve had, and I also have 2 cats.

The person at the adoption agency was very good at matching dogs with people (based on whether you’re home during the day, whether you have other pets, etc.) so you should describe your situation to the agency person and let them guide you.

I feed him Iams chunks. He does not “wolf” down his food, I leave food out most of the day for him.

He sleeps a LOT. Which for me is an advantage, as I work, and I know he’s not going to be too bored during the day. And one of the cats is relatively friendly with him.

Teeth cleaning – they are famous for bad teeth. Mine had his cleaned once under anaesthesia, it was a big production.

When I first got him, he seemed to want to know where his own sleeping place was. And he seemed to think that anyplace that was not his sleeping place was free game for pooping/peeing. (Not all the time, but enought that it was a pain.) I soon bought a crate (the largest I could find) and kept him in it during the night to prevent peeing elsewhere in the house. He’s fine now, it didn’t take too long for him to learn that he is supposed to go outside.

Another good use of the crate is if you have someone visiting who is allergic or doesn’t particularly like dogs. It’s easy to put him in his crate for a while. He doesn’t ind it, and he sleeps most of the time anyway.

Yes, he hates stairs. He is able to use them, but doesn’t like to.

If you don’t have a van, you may want to consider making a sling for the back seat of your car. My dog would fall into the crack between the back seat bottom and the back of the front seat. I made a thing out of canvas that ties onto the front and back headrests. It prevents him fron falling into the crack.

Here’s more info:
http://www.greycanine.com/

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ratatoskK, I’m a big advocate of crate training, so I’m not worried about the housebreaking. And many of the local rescue groups foster the dogs before placing them, so it may be a non-issue. In any case, the dog will be crated when I am not home when I initally adopt him anyway, because of the cats. I’ll plan to take a few days off work when I first get him, and I hope to be close enough to go home for a quick walkies at lunch until we get adjusted to the routine. And he will be leashed to me to start as well, again because of the cats. Even if he’s “cat-friendly,” I’m not taking any chances until I’m 100 percent sure. The next step will be gating the dogs in 1 room while I’m gone (once I’m sure they get along 100%, of course - otherwise they will be separated as well). And I may end up gating off the second bedroom permanently so the cats always have a way to escape the dogs (I don’t do this now because for some reason my dog never goes in the cat/computer room - I have no idea why, really).

As for the exercise, that may be a challenge. I don’t have a fenced-in yard, and I probably never will - I’m a condo dweller - currently suburban and soon to be urban. I have no idea if the area I move to will have a fenced-in baseball field or anything like that anywhere in the vicinity - it’s doubtful. We may have to just deal with it. My current dog is supposedly a fairly high energy breed and the breeder just told me when I got him as a pup to adjust his food to the amount of exercise he’s getting so that he doesn’t get fat. Do rescue groups reject potential owners if they don’t have someplace to run the dog off-leash? I suppose some do and some don’t.

Looks like this thread may get to two pages. I never would have thought something this obscure would do that. Kinda neat, huh?

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Any further comment from folks on the exercise issue for owners with no regular access to fenced-in areas?

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Mine is tired after a 20-minute walk, which we don’t do every day. So I wouldn’t worry about not having a fenced yard, as long as he gets a nice walk once in a while. On those occasions when you can safely let him run, you will see a beautiful sight!