Why do people like pure dog breeds?
Why is it worth so much to get a pure dog breed when you can get a mutt for much less?
Do we value a dogs heritage more than the dog itself?
I guess people like to categorize. This dog is a lab, this one is a collie, that one a poodle. When we go dog shopping we expect the dog’s personality to be preset as well. Look I got a chihuahua so it must be energetic and loyal. Really, doesn’t a dog deserve to have at least a little say in what it wants to be and not what we want it to be. Isn’t it such a shame that some dogs have been inbred so much that they have problems with their sight, their ears, their brains and their internal organs. I for one don’t think there is anything wrong with mutts and believe they can be just as dashing or cute or fun as any other purebred out there so why must we continue to be the Hitlers of our dogs futures?
October 19th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (1)
Lately Lucky has been getting thinner and thinner. It is hard to see why because he eats constantly. For a while he had a loss of appetite but that is because he had a fight with a dog and injured his jaw making it difficult to eat but he seems to be eating a lot now. Hopefully I would get some advice as to what is happening to him but until then I just found this really helpful website called petplace.com and they gave useful advice one how to rightfully tell if your dog is too thin. What I am thinking is he may have gotten some sort of parasites or something of that nature. Hopefully, everything will be okay.
October 15th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (1)
What exactly do we consider to be smart is the question.
Many believe it is the dog’s ability to receive and follow orders as says an article on Dog Intelligence by Joy Butler and they even argue that certain dog breeds are smarter than others but I’m really not so sure about that…
Would you call a human that obeys orders well a smart person? This of course would place people on the bottom of the working ladder as the smartest as they are always having to follow orders from their superiors. Or maybe do we think people are smart by how successful they are? Then wouldn’t this also apply to dogs as well?
As two of the Guest commentor’s replied on Joy Butler’s article, so do I believe that judging dog intelligence isn’t as easy as making a list of desirable dog traits and measuring them against that. The only thing I have ever trained my dog to do was shake paw and I never even had to give her food as a reward but this doesn’t make my Nacha smarter. I think what made her smart was her ability to get what she wanted when she wanted it. Or figuring out all the smart ways to break the rules so that she could get what she wanted without getting punished.
Out of all my four dogs I would have to say Nacha was the smartest that I have owned and it definitely wasn’t because she was the most docile or sweetest. I would have to say Lucky was the most docile and I think that dog was dumber than anything I have ever seen but nevertheless, he is such a sweetheart. Children could have been pulling his hair and he would have been pleased about being played with.
Nacha on the other hand would always have to arduously be chased or pulled out from under the trailer when it was time to give her a bath because she hated bathing and she would always know that I was about to give her one before I could even warn her. Furthermore, she could distinguish anytime the sound of our car’s engine and start going crazy way before she saw the car coming. She always knew at what time I’d be getting home from school and be waiting outside by the corner where the bus would stop. As a protector of our home she always knew who to chase out of the yard and who to calmly accept. I believe she always knew when she’d been naughty and we were mad at her because she would immediately hide under the trailer way before she saw us.
As an innovative and successful dog, Nacha would definitely receive a ten but as an obedient dog she would have flunked miserably. So, what do you think makes your dog smart?
October 11th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Leave a comment
Having four dogs for me means sometimes means you get crazy stories to tell. I know I’ve previously spoken about male territory issues but I must also recognize that females have a bit of the same problem concerning who gets the right to birth puppies.
I remember the first time Chula had puppies we had serious problems. First of all, Nacha was there before Chula ever got there so there were seniority issues as well as dominance issues. It was because of that that we knew that if Chula got pregnant, Nacha would try to kill the puppies and we were right. I know it sounds cruel and inhumane but I don’t think dogs know the meaning of those words. All I think I know is that dogs in nature understand survival and for that, it is common sense that if there are two females breeding it means less food for the pack and more work. I guess you could call it a survival instinct. I guess also that dogs don’t really know that now a days there’s plenty of Pedigree to go around.
Well anyways, the point is we knew we had to keep Nacha away from the puppies so at around the time we knew Chula was getting close to birthing her puppies we carefully split the yard so that Nacha was in her own side of the fence and Chula on the other.
To our great surprise, and I do mean really great, Chula had her puppies in the middle of the night and Nacha got so desperate she completely and brutally tore part of the fence down and scattered the puppies all over the yard. Fortunately she didn’t do anything bad to kill them and we also heard the turmoil inside the house so that we actually got alerted and went to rescue the puppies at four in the morning. It was so not a piece of cake to go puppy hunting in the middle of the night with only a flashlight to go by and puppy’s squeaks to find them. Fortunately and thank the Lord, we reunited them with their mother and tied Nacha to the front of the yard. After the puppies and the very tired mother were reunited we found everybody was just fine.
Nacha got her chance to return to the backyard two weeks later and we found that now that the puppies were a little bit older she herself became the puppy’s second mother going as far as bathing them and taking care of them since Chula didn’t have that much experience as it was her first time and Nacha was already a pro at doing this. Boy was this to our great surprise that afterward Nacha would accept the puppies. I guess I don’t completely understand dogs.
October 8th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Leave a comment
I know this is kinda of dumb but being able to buy pet medecine online is like so totally amazing for me. I mean it can be a really good thing or a really bad thing… first of all, this means that our pets can now get their medications easier. Second of all, how lazy can we get that we really don’t even want to make the most minimal effort for them? Ok, alright, maybe I’m being too harsh. I mean, this is like the wonderful 21st century where we need only to flick a few keys to get what we want online! I did find really cool web sites to get pet medication for pets like vetrxdirect.com and www.1800petmeds.com. I can imagine that these kind of services are wonderful because it also places less stress on our animals since it means they no longer have to physically go to a veterinarian. My dog lucky was terrified of getting in a car so this is especially nice for him. I no longer have to worry he will have a heart attack from getting in a car, just playing! But it is way nicer…
October 3rd, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (3)
My dad has always said that and he always narrates of a story when he was a child. According to him, he had just gotten a puppy and one of his uncles always treated the puppy badly by kicking it and jeering at it all the time. Well, time passed by. The uncle moved away for a while and the puppy became a dog. Years later, my dad’s uncle showed up and the first thing this now huge dog did was chase him around trying to bite him! According to my dad this was a dog that didn’t attack anybody. Of course, he still remembered all the mistreatment he had received from that man and cataloged him forever as evil, of course leading to that violent reaction later when he could defend himself.
Furthermore, I have had first hand experience with this extraordinary memory dog’s possess. Nacha has had many puppies but since she’s a mutt, we’ve never bothered to sell any of them. Instead we give them away to anybody who wants a dog. One of these puppies of course, ended up with my grandpa. Never has that dog forgotten that I was one of the first people that played with him and fed him. When I show up to my grandpa’s house the first person he’s happy to see is always me and no one else.
Now one can only question, just how good is a dog’s memory? One can only wonder…
October 1st, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (2)
No, never, don’t do it. When I got my second male dog I had no idea what problems were going to arise but thankfully, now I have experience and I can safely say that even if a dog has been fixed, he will still have territorial issues. I love both Filemon and Angel and it is because of this I realized I was going to have to give each one of them their own space or they would end up killing each other. Fortunately, we had enough space to keep Filemon in the backyard as he thinks just about any other person, or dog, whose not from the family is an enemy. Angel was sweet and docile enough to go and permanently stay in the front lawn even though its not fenced. It really has been a blessing that when we got Angel from the pound he was already six years old so he wasn’t really an energetic dog. He’s just the type of dog to never leave the front lawn and I guess its because of that that not any of the neighbors have ever protested to our dog not being on a leash. I guess Angel just does not look threatening.
September 27th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (1)
You were always loyal, friendly and true.
You were a fierce and loving mother.
You had a true fighting spirit.
You were intelligent beyond measure.
Your joy was always tangible.
You were undeniably always there for me.
I wish I could have been there at the end with you.
May you always rest in peace.
September 22nd, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Comments (1)
Chula was the last dog to come into my possession. It seems she was lucky enough to not have her name changed by my dad due to the fact that her name was already short and not human. Did I forget to mention what her name means? I’m sorry, it means pretty in Spanish which she is. Chula is also a collie and she’s been privileged enough to have birthed puppies twice already. I guess I was wrong to say though that her name would be lucky enough to pass undetected through my dad’s radar… it seems he still felt the need to give her yet another name, Pancrasia, which is embarassing I might add because it’s a Spanish name that is terribly outdated and therefore only used when you want to make fun of someone.
September 15th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Leave a comment
Did Angel escape my dad’s imaginative name giving just because we got him from a shelter when he was five years old and he was already named? No. Of course he didn’t escape. What could have possibly given you that idea? When we got Angel we didn’t really plan it. It just so happened that the shelter had him on display and my mom and I absolutely fell in love with him. A month later after filling out paperwork and being placed on a waiting list they finally called and told us we could have him! My dad though, being a true Mexican absolutely objected to the idea of Angel being called Angel. He said that was too pretty of a name for a dog so he started calling him Peludo which means hairy in Spanish. Oh the disgrace. How dare he!!! Well it isn’t that bad… quite hilarious actually.
September 12th, 2008 | Category: Uncategorized | Leave a comment
