Mike516

I'm not sure either, I'll have to make a mental note next time she does it. Some good advice how to teach her down or sit. We're having trouble teaching her sit but want to do both eventually. But speaking of "bowing", we recently turned around a big floor mirror we had in the bedroom that we had turned away so Ginger wouldn't freak out. So, she looks at herself and keeps bowing, front down back up, walks away, comes back and bows again, over and over. What's she doing? Is she mental? It looks like a greeting?

Oh I'm a sucker for the standing up ears dogs. I'm sorry for your loss

I like it because with the extension it fits a pretty wide space. We have one in a doorway, no problem there. The other is in a hallway so needed to be wider. The gate I have (looks just like the one in the pic) comes with an extension that makes it pretty wide. Very easy to put up, the only thing is, the way I had originally put it up (to keep her out of the bedroom, not in) if Ginger jumps on it on the side away from the doorstop, it does come down, which she did when we tried experimenting with leaving her in a bedroom when we went out and she freaked out, knocked the gate down and put a nice gouge in the hardwood floors So I'd suggest putting the gate on the side of the doorjamb that has the door stop on the side that'll stop the gate from sliding out of jam (does that make sense? You want the dog on the side that if she jumps on the gate, the door jam will stop it from sliding out of the doorway). The one in the hallway, I'd have to attach to the wall with hardware if she messed with it but luckily, so far, she hasn't. Also, you can't beat having the cat door. We have them tied open so they can't get locked out of the safe-area.

I have 2 of these same gates. They're perfect for keeping the dog out of the cat's safe area and in the bedroom at night.

Nice!

I was told that the hour after a meal thing was for exercise. Ginger goes out on a leash for her morning walk after breakfast and is fine.

Wow, he's a nice looking dog! Congratz!

Congratz Hurley on the successful surgery! Here's wishing you a speedy recovery and plenty of treats (Just thought I'd slip that in there for ya )

He's got great coloring. Tough first night, and yea, they look like they're conspiring to do mischief to me also LOL

So how is Swifty?

I agree with greysmom. I don't think locking up the cat and letting the dog have at her is a good idea, sorry. I think you'll traumatize the cat and make the situation worse. Just my opinion. The test Greyt_dog-lover proposes sounds interesting though. If you try it, I'd be totally curious to hear how it goes. That said, I'm new to this as well having gotten Ginger, who is cat safe so not the exact same situation, about 6 weeks ago. Having 3 cats myself, I know how you feel and we are still very careful. Ginger was wearing her muzzle for safety for the first few weeks and is still crated when we're not home. My big orange tabby kind of set the tone though. Ginger was initially somewhat interested in the cats but when she got a little too close to the orange guy and stuck her nose in his face...WHAP! right on the snout. And that, as they say, was that. Ginger didn't like being swatted at all. We didn't set this up, we didn't have to, they did it on their own, and for days afterward, Ginger whined whenever the orange guy walked by lmao. I originally posted: "I'm not saying encourage your cat to thump the dog on the nose but if she decides to do it, it might not be the worst thing in the world " So after reading the "test" idea above, I'm editing this to say that it may be the best idea I ever heard. We still keep a close eye on everyone, because you just never know...you know? Best of luck to you, I hope everything works out.

Ginger gets nervous with new stuff, but she acclimates quickly. Kids are definitely a constant though. If there's one or more a block away, she won't walk. She'll stop dead and won't take another step unless we cross the street. She doesn't like loud noises in general, but she's especially scared of the soda maker after you press the carbonator 3 times then it sort of buzzes. She doesn't like the buzzer but she's getting used to it I think. But she'd drink the soda if I let here lol. She's not scared necessarily of the ceramic tiles in the kitchen or bathrooms, but she prefers to not walk on them.

Thanks greyers. Yea we're doing chicken and rice then the low residue. We'll just take it slow and see how it goes. Back to square one :/

The Avoderm was what we thought she was eating at the kennel (she actually wasn't, but we thought she was) so that's what she started on. She did terrible on it so we stopped giving it to her. I only mentioned it as an example ie. the avoderm was lamb and rice also just like the Iams red bag so maybe it's the lamb she's not doing well on. We're not giving it to her anymore, we gave it away. In any case, the point is moot. She had diarrhea in her crate today. She wasn't doing great, but her poo wouldn't be considered diarrhea, and as you say we didn't want to keep switching her from this food to that food to the other food so we were trying to give it a chance to settle. But as we feared, the red bag isn't right for her. I really think it's the lamb. Unfortunately, we think she ate the poo in her crate because she threw up something that smelled like poo and the vet said it's not uncommon for them to do that. So, as would be expected, her stomach is upset now as well. So nothing to eat for tonight and probably nothing until tomorrow night and then she's back on the low residue. When we get her straightened out we'll try switching her to the Iams green bag everyone has had so much success with or we'll just keep her on the low residue. Thanks anyway for the advice but the situation has taken a turn

This must have been scary as heck. I'm glad he's doing better and hope he's back to his old self soon. Best wishes and thoughts go out to you and him.

I was afraid I made it sound more confusing than it had to be. She was on the prescription stuff for a couple of weeks and was doing great on it, but it's a prescription and not something we'd prefer to keep her on if we don't have. So, at the vets recommendation, we started switching her to the red bag Iams. We did the switch as you are suggesting in 25% increments over the course of a little over a week and it seemed like as we added more and more red bag, the poops got looser and looser (note: we also believe that the avoderm lamb food also made her have loose poops). We are now at 75% red bag and 25% prescription so we mixed together 75% red bag and 25% prescription in a food storage bucket and still have a good bit left of the mix but I would like to try the green bag Iams everyone was raving about and this long weekend is a perfect time as we'll be around and can watch her closely as we switch. So, the question is: what are thoughts on switching her to the green bag using the mixture of 25% prescription and 75% red bag as the old food to mix with the new food?

We didn't exactly time the switchover very well. We were switching her very slowly from the prescription food to the red bag but when we hit a cup and a half red bag to a half cup prescription, we were going to do that until we ran out of the prescription so we just mixed the two at those proportions (3/4 red bag to 1/4 presc). Our timing was so far off that we still have a lot of the mix left but I think I want to switch her this weekend. If you're getting confused, don't worry, I'm confusing myself lol. Ok, so the long weekend is the perfect time to do this. What do you all think about switching her from the 3/4 - 1/4 red bag to prescription mix to the green bag using the mix as the "old" food? Does this make any sense whatsoever ?

Great news on the progress. Poor guy is just sensitive is all.

Great to hear he's doing so well!

I think the lamb and rice isn't the right food for our needle nose. I've read a lot of good thing about the Iams green bag on these forums so we're thinking about switching to that. I hate to switch her again but the Iams red bag lamb and rice isn't right for her I think.

It's awesome...the perfect exclamation point on the "happy dance-walk-eat dinner-burp" ritual every night. And the finale is the nap

Kicks the blanket, and she jumps up and snarls... Sounds like he's scaring her up? I'd growl at him too Is she asleep when he kicks the blanket? Does she have sleep aggression?

I actually think Ginger is getting closer to doing this. The other day she put her front feet on the bottom of the door jam. So while Melissa held her leash, I ran around to the other door and tried to coax her with a biscuit. She put her head down once or twice like she was going to jump in but then decided better of it and tried to leave lol. I think she's going to do it eventually, she figures stuff out *whispers*but she's a little slow, shhh. Don't tell her I said that*whispers*

Bully sticks seem to be a popular choice here, so we picked up an extra large one the other day and she loved it. I think we'll have to limit her to half an hour or so because I think she'd have eaten the whole thing in one sitting if we'd have let her lol.

Nicer people will say to go get the leash and put in on her to lead her off. I would most likely just pick the dog bed up and flop her onto the hard floor. I don't manipulate that easily. Although none of my dogs have bed issues. If I had one with bed issues and they did not listen maybe body block them off while keeping hands crossed in front of you? Or perhaps a squirt bottle? JAJ2010 -- Don't think I am nicer, but I have become a bit... um, wiser I guess. Because I've got a dog here who if totally fine having his nails done while he is laying on his bed. Heck, he'll sleep through it. However, if you try to pull a bed out from under him he will growl at you. It is the only time you will ever hear him growl. When I told our trainer what I did she asked why. I said, well I had intended to train him "Up" anyway but I just didn't do it soon enough and... "And you were being lazy?" Well, yeah. I had to admit I was. Mike516 -- People laugh when I tell them this but the very first command I had to teach this boy was "Up". He is the only dog I know who would lay down on a bed & refuse to get up. His was pure, unadulterated laziness so a bit different than your case. Still, train her at other times to get up on command & reward her well for it. Practice crating at other times as well & reward that highly. Then practice sending her to her crate from farther & farther away. When she does the commands separately practice the routine. You should end up with a dog who is reliably getting up off her bed & running to her crate. I have a new Grey who I still crate when I leave for the same reason you crate. Just muzzling isn't good enough to spare a cat should things turn unpleasant. I watched a Grey chase down & corner a cat then use her muzzle as a battering ram. Grey was snatched away by collar & cat was OK but would have been very dead had someone not been there. I do not believe our newbie would do that but am not taking any chances this soon. If you think you still need to crate then keep crating. To make going to her crate a good thing I crate her for meals. Crate for short periods of time, 2-10 minutes, for treats. And then when I head to work I crate her with a stuffed Kong or another treat that she loves & will last at least long enough for me to get out the door, in the car & down the driveway. She knows the routine & knows I will be leaving but we've made the crate rewarding enough that she's willing to go in without balking. Just remember what I told JAJ. Even the nicest dog doesn't like to have the bed pulled out from under them & may take exception to evil humans who do such things. I'm with ya there. I couldn't dump her out of bed lol. I'm probably going to leave her harness on after her morning walk so I can control her. If she is asleep I'll certainly wake her up before doing anything with her. Leaving her muzzled all day isn't the answer imo. I do not believe it is the crate that's making her unhappy, it is being left alone. She hangs out in her crate with the door open very often when we are home. She just doesn't want to be alone and would go nuts wherever we left her in the house and the last thing I want is for her to hurt herself. The crate is not planned to be a permanent living condition for Ginger, it is merely a temporary necessity to keep everyone safe. When she's ready, she'll get more freedom. Right now I don't believe she's ready and don't really think she'll necessarily be any happier unless we were home with her 24/7.