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Myself and my partner have always been around dogs as family animals and have finally taken the plunge to get our own pup!.. We ended up getting a Old English Bulldog as the breed fits our lifestyle really well, but she's only going to be 8 weeks old when we pick her up, we decided to get a pup from a breeder so we could be sure about not enforcing bad breeding and health issues, which is also why we got a OEB from a reputable breeder than than just a generic English bulldog as don't agree with how poor their health is and their short lifespan. I've quite literally spent the last 3 weeks in full time puppy/dog researching etc to make sure we can do as much right as possible but I'm sure we are still going to end up loving stuff up and god knows it's going to be rough for the first few months but we are well excited.. don't really have too much to add to the thread at the moment as we don't pick her up till Thursday, but yeah, really excited and also a little apprehensive and anxious too but i put that down to wanting to just be as responsible as possible.. Does anyone else here have an Old English Bulldog?.. Also, I'm sure I need to pay the puppy tax: 
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May 20, 2023 14:23
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Have you tried a child gate?.. cats can easily jump over it. Depends on your dog breed though I guess.
Ragnar Gunvald fucked around with this message at 19:34 on May 21, 2023 |
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May 21, 2023 19:29
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hatty posted:Maybe I'll talk to the tech when I go there next and have them do it real quick. I'm there often enough what with her quarterly steroid shots and monthly allergy shot from May to September, maybe they'll cut me some slack and do it for free! Holy crap that sounds expensive. I'm sure it's all well worth it and I'd absolutely do the same but my god, when you read that and the previous about $650 for ear cleaning...
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May 24, 2023 10:00
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Ok, so we picked up Freya today. She's adorable as hell and fitting straight in. She's been so chill and relaxed moving house and meeting so many new people on the trip home. She is a pooping machine though! One meal in and she's crapped all over the kitchen twice already lol. 
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May 25, 2023 19:52
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Riatsala posted:Does anyone have experience/insight into homemade dog meals? My 3 years old is getting Kirkland chow twice a day and I was thinking of replacing one meal with some chicken breast, plain rice, and diced carrots/peas. I can do the math on his caloric intake pretty easily and figure I could whip up a week's worth to portion and freeze each weekend. My coworker swears by it, but I don't want to radically change the pup's diet without a second opinion. Don't listen to by any means as I don't have much experience with it but I've researched it massively for several months now, what I would say, is perhaps look up the dog nutrition guy on YouTube as he comes well recommended and is exceptionally professional/explains everything. He has some very good reviews on various dog foods and what his opinion is on raw feeding etc along with the best composition in his opinion and why he chose the things he did.
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May 25, 2023 21:25
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That breeder sounds great tbh! Very professional and on the ball, I'm actually a little jealous. Our breeder seemed very good to us at the time but we've since noticed a few things missing that should have been done before and we overlooked due to the excitement of picking her up after waiting 3 weeks. We didn't get any of the puppy food she was using before, like we was promised, so she's now got a bit of an upset tummy while she's adjusting to the new food and today I've realised we didn't get told when she was last wormed or had flea treatment so I've had to chase that update and get that all sorted. (EDIT: worked 3 times so far, last time 2 weeks ago at 6 weeks so she was due when we picked her a few days ago. FFS) I'm going to be booking her into the vets for her final vaccination in a week as everything is almost up to date but it's not "perfect" and I''m starting to think we may be making a trip before then as she's not pooped today even though she's usually very regular and she has vomited a few times too over the last 4 days (only once a day and nothing excessive btw) after eating really fast. I'm a little concerned, but her stools are fine when she's gone and she's drinking plenty, she's not lethargic or anything like that but I'd rather be safe than sorry so keeping a very close eye on her right now. We also have one of those indoor grass patches for toilet and she keeps eating the pigging grass so a very good chance that's what's causing her to be sick too. Sorry, rambling a little now!
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May 28, 2023 14:03
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Got her booked in at the vets tomorrow morning to be safe..
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May 28, 2023 16:33
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gently caress me, spent the whole night in the vets..I'm exhausted. I'm going to rant a little. So Freya started being sick in a really bad way last night, like 11 times in a row and pooped at the same time. Expelled the whole contents of her stomach so called the vets, had a referral to an on call vet video call thing (it's out of hours on a Sunday, bank holiday weekend) and she said let the vets know, she will send her report over and take her to the vets right away as she was concerned about dehydration. Called the vets back, their reply was we are very busy right now, observe her for another hour or so and see if she takes any fluids in, if there's any issues call us back... I wasn't happy. At all. After vomiting so much she obviously did not feel great and was exhausted so she went to her bed and fell asleep pretty quickly. We kept a really close eye on her while she had a quick nap for about an hour then we woke her up to try and get some fluids in her, she immediately vomited again so I called the vets back, a lot more pissed off this time and they still tried to fob me off by saying its extremely busy etc, if you do come down she prob won't get seen till around 3am blah blah blah. Basically told them I don't care how long it takes or what it costs I want my pup to see someone and they reluctantly agreed, so we picked her up, bundled her into an Uber and had to travel an hour away to the closest place that was open. On the way there she got really limp and lifeless and stopped breathing a couple of times for like 20 seconds and we were absolutely terrified of losing her. She's only been with us a few days she's such an integral part to the family already. When we got to the vets they made us wait till about 2.30am, keeping in mind my first phone call was at 21.45... but by this time she had really started to perk up thankfully and was almost her usual self. The vet eventually saw her, took her temp, said she's just full of loving gas after all that. She got a shot of anti sickness meds and sent home for a follow up in 48 hours. Today she's been eating a little, we've been hand feeding her very small amounts and trying to get fluids into her, she wants to drink all the loving water but she drinks it so fast she basically inhales it. We've decided to give her a small amount every 15 mins just to make sure she's super hydrated while not inhaling it and making herself sick again. Thankfully she's perked right up again and she's wanting to play etc. We're just going to keep this going for the rest of the day before her check up tomorrow. We've noticed shes also got mucus from her when she pees sometimes which explains why she wants to drink so fast too if she has an UTI. So I'm trying to balance all of that right now and just get through to tomorrow's vets appointment... I'm really not happy with how unwell she's been since we got her. She was so healthy at 5 weeks when we last saw her prior to picking her up only for her to be so sick the whole time she's been here. She stinks too as I don't think she's been cleaned before we picked her up, her claws was all massively long and had never been trimmed and she looked underweight to start with too as we could very clearly see her ribs. Thankfully even though she's not been so well, she has started to put weight on but my god I'm so angry and upset about all of this.
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May 29, 2023 10:49
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I've tried to keep in contact with the breeder as much as possible for that exact reason. She's told me everyone's fine and having no issues and that Freya was fine when she was with her too. So honestly I'm not really sure what to believe but she's been a little sick from her very first meal with us here so it can't have just miraculously started the moment she got home as far as I'm concerned. She's full of beans this afternoon though, running around like a lunatic and terrorising me and my partner on our zero sleep. Thankfully my appointment tomorrow is with a different vet. One that comes highly recommended in the area.. Not sure how it works in the states but here there are only a few 24/7 hour vet clinics here in the UK and they fill in for standard vets during out of hours/emergencies. Basically a kind of pet NHS/GP set up.
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May 29, 2023 12:21
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Freya has been given a thumbs up so long as she takes it easy for a few more days thankfully. Need to keep giving her electrolytes for a couple of days and keep an eye on her UTI as they can't treat it right now due to her recent sickness but all in all, so relieved and feeling so much better with the situation.. Hugh sigh of relief there.
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May 30, 2023 12:51
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Holy poo poo, all this biting is driving me bonkers. I keep redirecting her but nothing is apparently as tasty and appealing as my fingers and forearm. She did bite my nipple earlier while playing tug, trying to get some of that bitey energy out of her and oh my good god did that hurt.
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Jun 2, 2023 19:46
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Thanks for the advice guys, I'll practice my dog yelping. I can't imagine I'm going to sound very authentic but I'm happy to give it a shot! She seems to be getting a little separation anxiety when I leave her alone with my wife now too, so gonna be working on that before it becomes a full blow problem.
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Jun 2, 2023 23:01
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Kaiser Schnitzel posted:Yeah the lesson here should be ‘if you bite, I don’t like it and also playtime ends’ the thing puppies want more than anything is playtime. You don’t have to end playtime for very long for them to learn the lesson. I would get up and turn away or go out of the room and close the door for 30 seconds or a minute. Don’t forget to give lots of praise and pets when you’re playing and they DONT bite too. Praise the good behavior, even if the good behavior is as basic as ‘play like a civilized puppydog’ She's not bad at biting appropriate stuff so long as I'm holding the chew toys etc. She just likes to try her luck sometimes and gnaw on my fingers, it's mainly during play time it's an issue. She's quite fond of trying to chew any stray wires and the sofa too, as you'd expect.
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Jun 3, 2023 09:12
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Funny enough we was discussing this just yesterday but agreed we just aren't equipped to take another on just yet so fast. We agreed she needs to be at least a year old first. Speaking of dishwasher though, my god is she so interested in it. She's a chonky 5+kg already and she's going end up breaking the door if she keeps claiming on it. 
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Jun 3, 2023 12:54
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alg posted:my scruffy dog that passed in March Dude, they're both so handsome. You have good taste in dogs.
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Jun 6, 2023 23:22
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Bless, glad he's coming out of his shell. Do the legs give him any discomfort?.. Mine has her 2nd and last vaccination yesterday and the vet says she can go out on a week so looking forward to enjoying the sun with her on short walks for now and spending the next week getting her comfortable with walking on a lead in some capacity at least. Should help with the toilet training too thank god.
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Jun 8, 2023 16:20
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Funny enough, we have a high probability of ours having the same hip issues. We opted for an Old English Bulldog over a traditional bulldog, which was our first choice, because of all those health issues that have been intentionally added to the dog over the years for show reasons... Show dogs are such a stupid concept, especially when they seem to cause far more health issues long term. Speaking of which, our girls mum is also Merle, which the last time I was looking at dogs was never a thing and holy poo poo does that cause crazy health issues when 2 dogs breed with that gene. I've not gone down that particular rabbit hole too far because I imagine it's just going to make me rage if I find out where it originated from.
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Jun 8, 2023 23:59
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Instant Jellyfish posted:Shows themselves aren't creating the issues, it's the breed clubs of breeds that specifically call for exaggerated and dangerous features like bulldogs, pugs, frenchies, neapolitan mastiffs, etc. They tell the judges what the dogs should look like and then the judges at the shows reward the dogs with those features. If the breed clubs instead decided to put health first and changed their standards to reflect that and then educated judges about those changes then those moderate, healthy dogs would start winning. In theory a dog show is just there to have an unbiased 3rd party evaluate your breeding stock which is a perfectly fine thing to do. Being a show dog doesn't give them hip dysplasia, being from parents who didn't have their hips evaluated and some environmental issues like being raised on slippery flooring can increase the likelihood of getting hip dysplasia. If I could magically change one thing about dog shows I'd make it a requirement to have full health testing done before a dog could finish its championship. No champion puppies that magically disappear into pet homes because they fall apart at 18 months despite being grand champions already. This is a very interesting and Informative post, thank you! After explaining your experiences with that kind of thing I can certainly agree with what you're saying, I'm just a little ignorant and I have never experienced any dog shows etc!
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Jun 9, 2023 11:17
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a strange fowl posted:this is wonderful Apologise for double posting but I'm phone posting, that's a really worrying statistic. Where did you find that from?.. Don't get me wrong, I didn't exactly know how to deal with Freja being sick but I had the common sense to take her to the vets, keep pushing them and also do our own research. Luckily my partner's an ICU nurse so we have loads of stuff here that was helpful, like the oral syringes etc and she was very quick to identify we needed to keep her hydrated and we searched for a dog appropriate formula we could make at home to replace her electrolytes, turns out some water, table salt and honey was all she needed to keep her going while we got her sorted. The vet gave her a glowing review yesterday though, perfect heart, lungs, weight etc so we were over the moon to hear that.
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Jun 9, 2023 11:23
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even accounting for the increase in puppy farms and irresponsible breeders, that seems incredibly high. your baby got sick enough to have been one of those 1/5 if someone less diligent had been looking after her. it makes me wonder what is going on, especially in a case like yours where you obviously know how to take care of a puppy and gave her the best of care, and it sounds like the breeder was also fairly competent. there has to be some sort of environmental factor at play that seems to be affecting the whole uk. sewage in the rivers??
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Again, those photos are amazing! Freja has really started to settle in here and has a nice little routine going, she hasn't been poorly since we took her to the vets either thankfully. She's exhausted at the end of most days now she's fully vaccinated and can go out for the toilet/short walks. She's settled into her new routine really well, she still fights her nap times though, even when she's absolutely exhausted. I try to take her out for at least an hour a day over 2 walks minimum. The vet said not to worry too much about that "5 min per month" rule as there is no actual scientific basis for it, which surprised me considering how prevelent it is online... She just said we know her best, keep an eye on her and don't overdo it. Which is very nice in theory but we also live on the edge of Queen Elizabeth Park in London (where the Olympics was) and every time we pop over for a walk it's impossible to say how long it's going to take as she stops for as many people as she can for belly rubs..  . She was trying to hop on some guys skateboard yesterday too actually. We just keep it to low energy walks and let her have as many breaks as she wants for rest/water and she looks too tired later on or the following day we just take it easy and walk around the apartment complex we live in. These are from her first walk the other day..   
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Jun 18, 2023 09:23
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a strange fowl posted:it is the most triumphant feeling in the world when iris gets a walk so satisfying she falls asleep the moment we get home. it doesn't happen often, she exists on a plane of fitness alien to my goon physique I actually envy you. Freja fights me on every walk the last 3 days, even little 10 min jaunts around the apartment complex and she's lagging behind me trying to turn around and go back upstairs. I get she's only 3 months old, but she was so excited for short walks a week ago and she's over it entirely already. She also doesn't like peanut butter the freak. That's actually worse than my wife who only likes smooth peanut butter.
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Jun 20, 2023 13:59
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I just gotta say, Kepler is an awesome name and I love it.
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Jun 21, 2023 14:50
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 I'm so loving angry right now. Our apartment block had a decent number of people with pets, there's one oval office who has 2 poodles, Leo and Milo (I think they're poodles) and most of the time they're really well-behaved and chill, but the owner never walks them on the lead. He always lets them run wherever they want.... He loves Freja and always comes over the say hello all the time and legit never had an issue till today, I think the heat is part of the issue tbh, but this morning, one of his poodles (Milo) went nuts barking at a cat so I made a mental note to pay attention to that one as possibly being a little reactive or something. Anyway, this evening we went out for a short walk later than usual, once it cooled down a lot and bumped into our neighbour from across the hall, who have a lovely dog (Ambrose) who Freja loves playing with and hanging out so we decided to walk back with them. Turns out the dog over the road, Ambrose loves the other 2 and we bumped into them, they was all playing and Freja wanted to join in, She's done a little off lead training too and knows all of the dogs so I let her off to play with them for 5 mins before we go back upstairs, something theyve all done a few times together now. One of the poodles (Leo, not Milo who I was watching)had a small stick that he got bored of and Freja decided to pick it up as he had done with it, obviously this caused the injury above as the poodle decided it was still his stick. Wanker. Just missed her poor little eye. There's 2 puncture wounds there, one quite deep but small and the other is more of a slash. We got really lucky there and she's unfortunately not going to be let off to play with those poodles again now. I didn't notice the wound at all to start with even after checking her out , not till we was in the lift back up with Ambrose, then I noticed the blood. We've cleaned it with soap and water, then flushed it with saline and put some barrier cream on it for the evening but I'm going to be taking her back to the vets tomorrow I imagine as I can't see them not wanting to see her when I call them tomorrow. She's finally settled down and fallen asleep but she's breathing so fast, I'm putting it down to the heat though as it's so drat hot here right now. She has the fan on her and is on a cooling mat which she's been perfectly fine with the last few nights while it's been soon hot..I don't think I'll be getting too much sleep tonight either if her breathing doesnt go back to its normal rate. I never expected 1 month of puppy ownership to be so eventful or stressful. I'm just glad it missed her eye and she was still happy and playful after so it's likely to not cause any permanent issue once we get her on antibiotics. Does anyone else have experience with their pupper being bitten?
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Jun 25, 2023 22:59
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The plan is to call the vets and take her in first thing, I asked in the vet thread and they didn't indicate taking her in right away and I basically made the same post as here but more succinct and said everything we were doing is fine. I'm gonna be keeping a close eye on her through the night though. Edit: it's midnight here so I'd have to spend £100 on an Uber again like last time on top of the vet and honestly, based on the other thread I think she can wait till morning.
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Jun 25, 2023 23:37
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We've move her into our bedroom tonight and she seems to be settling down just fine and it's a touch cooler in here too.
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Jun 25, 2023 23:51
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Ended up on a video chat with a vet last night and she said there's not much we can do, just keep an eye on it for a few days, then called our normal vet this morning and they've booked her in for tomorrow afternoon as they don't think it's overly serious too. But should get some antibiotics at least just to be safe.
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Jun 26, 2023 12:50
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Pochi looks super happy.
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Jul 1, 2023 20:24
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Just had our first audible fart from puppy and it loving stinks. This is my life now with a bulldog isn't it? gently caress me. I did not think this through.
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Jul 3, 2023 15:26
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Mega Comrade posted:That breed is notorious for sensitive stomach. Our Staffy is the same, switching her to a grain free feed helped massively. She's just starting to have some raw food in her diet and my partner accidentally put yoghurt in the food rather than the lactose free stuff I'd purchased... She thought it was mine as I also can't digest dairy without making GBS threads myself
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Jul 3, 2023 17:23
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kirbysuperstar posted:Yeah and even then you'll get some that hate stuff no matter what. Wren will not tolerate being anywhere near a hair dryer, Henry is fine with nail clippers until he hears them. Dogs.. Freja is the same, she's decided that weekly baths are great fun and she loves playing with the water from the showerhead, she now attempts to get in the shower anytime we use it but thankfully she's not big enough yet.. When it comes to drying her though, she stops being a cute, lazy bulldog puppy and turns into speedy Gonzales when the hairdryer turns on. So I have resorted to towel drying her which I think she loves too as she's a giant attention whore. I don't think I personally could cope with a dog that needed crazy grooming though. We have 2 poodles that live together in our building and they got their hair clipped recently as they ran through a load of grass and got covered in foxtails etc, well, it's growing back so fast. I had no idea till recently! It's kinda impressive. Also, holy gently caress is she growing fast. She's gone from 4.5kg to 10.5kg in a month.
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Jul 10, 2023 08:50
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Flesh Forge posted:Yeah if anyone starts talking about "dominance" or variations on that, that's bad training advice. I started with the same bad notions a long time ago (Cesar Milan's popular show at the time was a big factor) and it was profoundly unhelpful. Mine! is a good book. This is pretty much what we've been doing, we have been playing "give/take" to train her to drop stuff and always reward her. She's not shown any signs of resource guarding at all yet and hopefully it stays that way.
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Jul 11, 2023 18:49
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StrixNebulosa posted:I have been using an apple airtag on Apollo and have been happy with it. It's on his collar, it lets me know if I've left "item Apollo" behind, I can use it to track his location if he escapes the fence. He's also microchipped. I've wanted to do this exact thing but I'm not an apple user and never have been, is there a way to track them without an iPhone?
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Jul 12, 2023 10:12
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Yeah I've found a few decent collars I like the look of, but I was wondering more about hacking an airtag onto android. I'm gonna wait till she's a bit bigger and starts wandering out of sight etc a little more as right now, she freaks out anytime we walk her off lead and she gets out of sight. Which is handy right now but I know it won't last.
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Jul 12, 2023 12:25
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It's a good job this dog is so adorably affectionate. She decided to chew though my fibre cable for my internet a few days ago and I wasn't even annoyed at her... But Amazon shipped me the wrong thing, so I had to wait another day for the correct cable, only to find the puppy had done more damage than I realised and also somehow chewed through the routers power cable under the sofa, where she can only just fit her head in, so god knows how she managed that. Luckily enough I had a spare router on hand but Jesus Christ dog.
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Jul 14, 2023 00:52
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How long did you guys walk your puppy's at the start? I've got a good feel for what Freja is ok with, and our vet has told us the internet's 5 mins per month old has no actual scientific basis and just "knowing your dog" is far better. We do 2 walks a day, when she wakes up and before bed, 12 hours apart. And generally I tailor it to her energy levels. Sometimes it's a quick 15 mins and sometimes it's 30+ but always at her pace.
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Jul 14, 2023 20:38
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HootTheOwl posted:Just two? drat, Brisket is spoiled AF I'd walk her more but she's only 4 months on the 30th and being a bulldog shes lazy as gently caress. I hope she grows into loving a good walk tbh as it's one of my favourite things about owning a dog. How long/far you walking? My partner's a little concerned about the pups joints even though the vets said it's fine. I just want more information for comparative reasons and to put her mind more at ease.
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Jul 14, 2023 22:25
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She's not a morning dog at all funnily enough, she is much like us in that regard..she doesn't start her day till at least 9am. We've been very lucky that she's now sleeping through from about 10pm to 8am/9am with a wake up for a quick pee around 5.30am.. she's doing really well in that regard and my sleep has gotten so much better the last few weeks. It was exhausting when she needed to go out every few hours. Anyway, he walks are scheduled around the heat. We live in London so this week is pissing it down but last week was roasting hot and last month entirely was way too hot for me let alone her.. we were skipping walks if it was too hot tbh and just doing toilet breaks. It was quite nice going for a short evening walk though. I find she's always "fine" once we get 5 mins away from home and she remembers she gets to say to lots of people and other dogs. She's just stubborn and lazy like you'd expect from her breed. It's been a very, very long time since I've been around a puppy and I'd forgotten how hard it can be, she's great though and honestly I couldn't have asked for anything more from her aside from walking 30 meters from the elevator to the grass outside without needing to argue with me. Concierge find it hilarious though so there is that..
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Jul 15, 2023 08:43
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I spot the hammer on the floor behind her, in the first photo, is that just case she was bit by a warewolf or something?
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Jul 17, 2023 18:23
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A squeeky toy?... That's awful. I assume a choking hazard. I'm happy you've got a new dog friend though.i doubt you're in the UK, I also assume it works the same way in the US though, here you just pick one and the microchip is marked as registered on all the platforms. It's just you deciding who to give your money to basically
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Jul 17, 2023 19:39
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All im seeing is we all love our pets a lot and we all end up paying a small fortune for them being stupid and end up getting heartbroken. 
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Jul 28, 2023 10:58
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