Yet another pet thread

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

OK so I am in desperate want of a pup. My dogs (well I call them my dogs but they live with my parents on the other side of the country and realistically they are family dogs) are just too far away and I am going through dog withdrawal.

I have been trying to research dog breeds because I have a bit of a complicated lifestyle. I generally live in one place from September to April and another for the summer. My schedule is all over the place, so an independent dog would be best. I live with my boyfriend and he has a bizarre schedule as well, last year it worked out that I worked mainly days and he worked mainly nights, so it is not out of the question for someone to be home for most of the day.

We would need a medium sized dog, that doesn’t need a huge amount of yard. We would walk him but he might not have a yard to call his own.
We both agree that the toy size dog is not for us, and as much as I would LOVE a big dog (Great Danes are the most beautiful dogs in the world) sadly I don’t think it is practical.

I have found this breed the Coton de Tulear
http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/cotondetulear.htm
and have fallen in love with the pictures.

Does anybody have any breed suggestions?

2

That dog looks like it will need some pretty regular hair maintenance.

What about a retired Greyhound? I’ve heard them called “The World’s Fastest Couch Potato” and understand they need a good walk/run daily to meet their exercise needs but that otherwise they are very laid back and make good apartment dwellers as long as their exercise needs are met.

Plus, they are pretty!

3

Gotta ask why on this one?

Sure, they take up space, and they eat a lot, but they don’t require a huge yard or even daily walks. In fact, they spend most of there time doing this !

4

Why limit yourself to pure-breds? The pound is full of lovable mutts.

You could also arrange for doggy daycare. I take my puppy to a daycare center when I’m working. Not only does she get the benefits of socialization and training, but she gets to swim, romp and wrestle all day-- and a tired dog is a good dog.

Likely you have a daycare center near you. They’re not very expensive, and it eliminates any guilt over leaving the dog at home alone all day.

5

Sadly my living arrangements can’t handle a big dog, Apartment renters don’t always understand and I am apprehensive about the stories I have heard. If I am wrong please let me know. I have heard that you need to carry them up all stairs until you physically can’t anymore, and that they have notoriously bad hearts along with other health issues.

The main reason is that my SO is not sold on the Great Dane idea, I saw the most beautiful one a few weeks ago and wanted to take him. I don’t think his family would have been pleased though. And I think if I had one I would have to name him after a Scooby Doo character, probably Daphne, and that’s just mean :wink:

6

First, about the stairs: all puppies have issues with stairs. Usually, they’ll learn to walk up them long before they’ll attempt going down them. (You can imagine the balance issues and how it would appear to be scary, going face-first down a slope.)

You have two options with that: you can spend endless hours with treats in hand, trying to coax the pup to go down the stairs, or you can drag them up and down them a few times until they see it’s not a big deal.

Big dog health issues: Yes, big dogs generally have shorter lives than small dogs. Their joints start aching when they get older, and picking things up off the ground becomes a challenge. (Always give a big dog a food dish on a stand so they don’t have to bend over all the time.)

Pure breeds each come with their own set of potential health problems. Mutts are not a guarantee of a healthy dog, but you do reduce the chances of genetic problems due to inbreeding. In my experience, mutts tend to be a sturdier animal, but YMMV.

Bigger dogs can certainly do more damage than smaller ones, simply because their mouths are bigger, and stronger. If not properly trained, they’ll be a pain in the ass, knocking over visitors, and dragging you around on the leash. They don’t realize their size or strength. (If you let them sit on your lap as a puppy, they’ll likely want to do it as an adult, and there’s no funnier sight than a Dane trying to position himself on a human lap.)

Any dog is going to come with its own set of inconveniences, but the rewards are great.

7

Oooooh, that’s my breed! Most people don’t know about them.

Okay, now for the information:

First of all, they kind of very in size. I would describe them as small, not medium. My darling’s mother was 18 pounds, which is considered very big for their breed, and her father was 7 pounds, which is considered very small (don’t ask me how those two even managed to breed; I don’t know). Mine’s a more normal (for her breed) 11.5 pounds.

They require lots of grooming. Even though we take her to the groomer every six weeks, we still have to spend lots of time brushing her in between. Most dogs have fur, this type of dog is one of the breeds that has “hair.” Basically, it’s kind of like your hair or mine; there isn’t shedding all of the time. They say that the dogs never, ever lose hair; that’s not completely true- they lose hair the same way we do.

Expense is another issue. We chose this breed because it was the only type of dog my brother was not allergic too. However, they are expensive. Most breeders follow something along these lines: If the dog is show quality, which means that they are pretty much a perfect specimen of a dog (there’s a whole list of qualities), then the dog is $2500. If not, then she/he is $1800. Since it is often difficult to tell how the dog will turn out when he/she reaches adulthood, you sometimes have to pay the full $2500 from the beginning and get a refund later.

We don’t have a fenced-in backyard, but Mia does get to run around a bit with us. We also run her around the house. Walks are fairly important, as with any dog.

If you have any other questions, feel free to ask. And let me use this excuse to link to a couple of adorable pictures of my Coton:

This is Mia, lying in the sun. (Notice that we pulled her hair out of her eyes with a clip. It took her awhile to get used to, but now she can see!)

This is Mia after her head has been hanging out the car window.

And this is Mia, enjoying Dairy Queen.

8

We never expected our dog to be able to do steps immediately, so we didn’t put up a gate at the bottom of them; imagine our surprise when we turned around and there she was, up at the top!

I’ve also trained a dog to go up and down stairs; you basically have to wait until you have a lot of time and treats (break them up into pieces so that you don’t give them too many) and coax them up and down.

9

How about a Maltese (check out the pictures of Gizmo the Maltese puppies on the second page!! He’s so CUTE!)? They’re small and will do fine in an apartment without a yard. They’re really shy and curious when they’re puppies. When we first brought our dog, Cherry, to our townhouse, the first thing she did was sniff everything. Maltese are also good for allergy sufferers. They shed hardly any fur. As for stairs, Cherry learned all by herself! My brother and I tried gently pushing her up one stair and giving her a treat. So, we bent down to get another treat for her and suddenly, she was already halfway up the staircase! Then, she got to the top and started whimpering (aww!) because she realized she couldn’t get down. She learned to go down the stairs when I took her to my friend’s house. My friend’s dog is older and started running up and down the stairs. Cherry followed her up and when my friend’s dog went downstairs, Cherry just tried going down the stairs all by herself. Of course, I had to give her a lot of treats for that.

It was also really easy to housebreak my dog. She did have a couple of mishaps, but that happens with puppies. Maltese are also very intelligent, but they want rewards for everything, so you have to give them treats all the time. They’re also somewhat picky eaters, so a treat or two should be put in their food.

As for grooming, they border on high-maintenance. We don’t have enough money or time to take Cherry to a groomer’s, so we bathe her by ourselves. They require brushing every now and then because their fur will tangle really easily. Once their fur tangles, you have to cut it all off, unfortunately (we had to do this a couple of times…Cherry ended up looking like a lamb). And Maltese don’t need to have their fur long like the show dogs. I don’t grow Cherry’s hair long. It’ll cause way too much grief. They look cuter with shorter fur, anyways.

Maltese bark at suspicious noises, so that could be a problem. But, since you live in an apartment, it doesn’t seem like it would to me. We live in a townhouse and if our neighbour goes outside to his/her backyard, we can hear him/her talking from our backyard. My dog immediately starts barking because she hears someone, but she can’t see him/her.

I was going to get a Coton de Tulear, but we couldn’t find a breeder near us. Good luck with everything!!

By the way, I now have an excuse to show Cherry’s cuteness: here she is, and here and here.

monica, Mia is adorable!! I love that picture of her enjoying Dairy Queen.

10

Sheeeeeiiiiiiit!* I spent about two weeks doing this with my puppy, Polaris. I even started a thread about it, because it didn’t seem to be going well. I even tried with pieces of steak as a reward. Nothing doing. She’d go up 'em, but she would not come down.

I finally had to do the drag method. Four or five times of being tugged down them and she discovered that it wasn’t death-defying after all.

11

I know what it’s like when you have your heart set on something, but can I ask you to please consider a pound dog?