Winding down, but still enough energy to ride in a van from Florida to California to visit Runyon Canyon, which he visited almost every day the first four years of his life.
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One time to relax like that. Beautiful.
Update on the menace: while we were in the process of finding a trainer, one night we were in the pool and he was outside going crazy barking at our other dog. I splashed some water at him and he immediately shut up and sat down. So we decided to try arming the children with spray bottles, if only as a stopgap to protect them until we could find a long-tem solution. After literally one day of getting sprayed in the face with water when he attacked them, he stopped. I Googled this tactic and every dog trainer recommends against it, and when we finally had a dog trainer come to the house he said “did you fix the problem, or the symptom of the problem?” Which I understand, but all I know is that he used to attack my children all day every day, and now he doesn’t. It’s almost like he thought “oh wow you guys really really don’t like me doing that, OK, point taken”. The only unwelcome behavior that is left is stealing everyones’ shoes and chewing on them, but imo that’s puppy stuff that will pass with time.
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The bad news is that all the best advice suggests that positive reinforcement of good behavior outperforms punishment for bad behavior. I dont blame you, because I empathize with the frustration. But you need to know that there is a correlation between punishing dogs and having them later “snap” and seriously hurt someone.
I definitely hear that, and would be concerned if it was something we needed to do constantly. Was definitely not something we wanted as a long-term solution, which thankfully doesn’t appear to be necessary anyway. I think James thought he was/could be in charge of the kids, and this experience disabused him of that notion. He’s not scared of them - if anything he’s more affectionate with them now.
One other issue we were having is that when you took him for a walk he went crazy when he saw another dog. The trainer told us to pick him up when that happens (he showed us a specific way to do that). That behavior, too, stopped almost immediately and we don’t even need to do it anymore.
I think James was having trouble understanding what was expected of him but is now getting with the program.
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I miss living near people who didn’t shoot off fireworks every night when it’s vaguely a holiday. My poor dog is so worried all night.
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With Juneteenth it’s now been 2 + weeks of fireworks going off every day.
My dog has developed a tolerance but still hates them.
Hunter (the Golden) freaks out, whines and pants. Even WInston (coon hound) jumped on the bed with me, where he knows he’s not allowed.
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Mine is fine with gun shots but fireworks and loud thunder send her running for her safe spots in the house lol.
Next to the whole gun thing regular people setting off fireworks is one of the weirder American things.
I wish I had some on election night and on inauguration day to piss off all the Trump people that live within a few blocks of me. I never buy them for the 4th though so had no stash.
We have a private club about a mile away that shoots them off on any day ending in Y. Poor Jake the IG is terrified but manages if we crank up the AC, a floor fan and the TV volume while he is wedged between us. Poppy the chihuahua doesn’t give a shit.
We are heading home from the shore right now to be sure we are home.
Those thunder shirts really do help with a lot of dogs.
He was a puppy mill stud dog for four years before being abandoned. Sadly this means he didn’t learn to pee properly. About half the time He literally stands there and shoots the stream against his belly.
But will get one and try for short cycles of fireworks. Just can’t leave it on him.
I haven’t tried one because my dog is almost always ok except loud boomy fireworks and thunderstorms. If you have neighbors lighting them off that often that it bothers your dog I’d try one.
The Damn Mill Dam club, a swim and tennis club built on the site of an old mill pond.
Got a pup coughing and vomiting, not sure what to do. Most internet searches point us to kennel cough, though her cough is more like gagging and less like honking. (Also, she got that vaccine, though it’s been 6 months). The accompanying vomiting is making it more difficult and more concerning, because she’s unable to keep anything down (not even water - it comes up in the next coughing fit).
We’re visiting my gf’s mom in the middle of nowhere New York, 6 hours from home, plus it’s 4th of July, so I think we’re leaning towards trying to manage this until we get home tomorrow and then go to an animal ER if it continues.
Thoughts welcome. I’ll put a more detailed description of symptoms below.
Symptoms
She had a few light coughs / reverse sneezes this morning when she woke up but no gagging or vomiting. Those came later, starting around 12pm, sparked by excitement and meeting new people. A few coughs followed by phlegm / clear or yellowish liquid. Then a long car ride with typical (we assumed, since she usually gets car sick) car sickness / vomiting. We got here about 4 hours ago. The past couple hours it’s been coughing/gagging like every 10 minutes. It appears like she’s hacking up phlegm, but we know it’s vomit (or both?) because we’ve seen the contents of her stomach come up with it. Unfortunately this includes all the water she’s had, so she’s probably super dehydrated, which probably makes the coughing worse…
Maybe relevant: she had terrible diarrhea a week ago so the vet put her on 3 days of dewormer, which was Wed/Thur/Fri nights. Also probably relevant, we’ve been traveling since Wednesday so she’s been in unfamiliar territory around unfamiliar people. She’s acting totally fine fwiw.
She’s 9 months old and is vaccinated against kennel cough, though it’s been ~6 months since that and I understand they typically last 6 months. She has had contact with other dogs recently.
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We’ve always been told 24 no food just water then mix up some boiled burger and rice (sometimes some pumpkin pie mix for flavor and some stomach soothing).
If dehydrated an IV and anti emitic shot might be needed. If you haven’t seen a dog IV they run the fluid fairly quick in the layer under the fur and then the body absorbs the fluid over a few hours. We’ve been sent home that way.
Im no expert—just an experienced dog owner and my ex was a vet tech.
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