Dog Stuff
All kinds of information about dogs, especially our Bernese Mountain Dogs.
Saturday, April 24, 2004
Training Dogs not to Bark
For some reason lately, all the dogs have started barking at the slightest thing. We can walk down the stairs, open a door, make a funny noise, and they start barking ... it is just too much! So, we’ve been exploring techniques to train dogs not to bark.
One thing we’ve done with some limited success is buy a water spraying gun from ToysRUs. Today’s water guns are not anything like what we had when I was a kid. These things look like something The Terminator would carry around, have a huge water reservoir, and are battery powered. When you hold down on the trigger they fire a good stream of water continuously while making noise and flashing lights. So, when the dogs start barking, we start shooting. This stops them from barking at the moment, but isn’t training them not to bark at all.
Today we rented a citronella bark collar from the local feed supply company. These things are expensive, so they let us use one for a week to see how it works. Bart was the closest dog around once I got it assembled, so he is wearing it today. It has a small microphone and when it detects the dog is barking, a brief spritz of citronella spray shoots up from the bottom of the collar toward the dog’s neck/jaw.
Boy is he surprised! He just can’t figure out where this stuff is coming from and he does not like it one bit. We are creating situations where the dogs bark, then rewarding Bart when he finally decides not to join in. After a day or two, we’ll rotate the collar to Heidi or Alex.
I don’t know if this is going to work or not, but it is worth a try.
Our other option is a shock collar, which we just can’t bring ourselves to try (yet).
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Monday, April 19, 2004
Heidi turns 11!
Today, Heidi has her 11th birthday. This is quite an achievement for a Bernese Mountain Dog. Their average lifespan is around 8-1/2 to 9 years of age.
We’re travelling on her birthday and she is with our house/pet sitter. But, we’ll have an appropriate celebration in a couple of days when we get back.
We got Heidi from a breeder in Switzerland in 1993 while we were living in France. She was a cute puppy, but like a lot of girl puppies, she was very mischievous and taught Indiana all kinds of bad habits. She has always been the rabble-rouser in the family, barking a lot and spurring the other dogs on to mischief. But, she became one of the best obedience trained dogs in the house and did animal-assisted-therapy with children for 3 years. She finally grew tired of that. Other than a bad case of hip dysplasia—which she has compensated for by building really strong hip muscles—she has never been sick and looks like she’ll be going strong for a while yet.
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Sunday, March 28, 2004
Scottsbluff Dog Show
This weekend we attended a 2 day dog show in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. We attend this show every year and it has, generally, been good to us.
March is a bit “iffy” for this show, usually we encounter snow and sleet and cold winds. The weather forecast for this weekend, however, was for great, warm weather. It was cold and windy and rainy…
The big news is that Alex, our 17 month-old puppy won 2 points toward his championship! Of course, we took him to build points for Sailor, who needs 4 points for his championship…
Here is the promised photo (posted on 24 April, 2004)
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Tuesday, March 23, 2004
A New Member of our Family
This weekend, we welcomed a new addition to our family. Her name is Hailey, and she is an 8 week old Bernese Mountain Dog.
She comes from a litter of four puppies, sired by our Sailor.
For a couple of more photos, click on “more…”
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Saturday, January 31, 2004
We Lost Mira This Week
We lost Miracle this week. She had been doing so well lately—very energetic and happy. Then starting last Saturday, she “crashed”. She wouldn’t eat, she kept throwing up, she wouldn’t drink anything and she had a hard time getting around. We had a vet appointment for her on Monday scheduled, but we went in a couple of hours early. After some x-rays and an examination, it became clear that she had a particularly aggressive form of cancer—not uncommon in Bernese Mountain Dogs.
We almost put her down at the vet’s, but she seemed to be doing okay and she made it clear to us that she wanted to come home. So, they gave her some fluids and some shots to calm her nausea and we brought her home. She was so happy she tried to jump out of the truck! She wouldn’t let me carry her, so she walked to the door. But, she couldn’t make it any further. I carried her to a favorite place in our hearth room where she slept comfortably for a couple of hours. Then, she got uncomfortable and tried to move around some. Finally, she stopped breathing and quietly passed on.
Mira is the third dog we’ve lost to cancer in the past year. It has not been a good year for us.
She was born in France on April 5, 1996—so she was not quite 8 years old.
I have a friend that has a theory about why animals do so well for so long and then “crash” so quickly. Click “more” to read it.
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