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Hello long dog people I’m taking a realistic look to see if I would be a good fit for one of these delightful creatures. I’ve never gotten a pet since I felt it wouldn’t be fair to them if I couldn’t be the perfect owner, but this whole pandemic thing is causing me to reconsider. I’m reading Cynthia Branigan’s book (required reading for my local adaptation service) and I’ve watched a lot of YouTube videos over the years (the Magnus videos are pretty good). Can a greyhound be happy if you’re away at work for 9 hours on weekdays? Would they need a monster walk before I left? Getting a dog walker for the middle of the day is a possibility I would have to look into; there are also some “doggie daycare” places nearby but I’m not sure how a greyhound would like those. Are they OK with traveling? I go to my parents for the weekend (2.5 hour car ride) every 1-2 months and they have a dog. In my current working from home state I think I could do a good job taking care of one, but I really worry about when things go back to “normal.”
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Jun 27, 2020 17:31
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a slime posted:Unfortunately my dog has a total meltdown if you leave her alone for more than ten minutes. It's something I still don't know how to deal with. I'm very lucky to have been in a situation where I can either bring her with me to work, or work from home, for the last three years. It does feel really stupid sometimes, I am basically chained to her and any kind of plan, even as simple as going to the grocery store, requires me to make some kind of arrangement. Let alone going to the dentist or a GP or something. Did you adopt Abby straight from the track or was she fostered? That seems like something the foster parents should note and let any prospective adopters know about.
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Jun 27, 2020 18:33
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Do greyhounds universally wake up at ~6 or can you train them to sleep in a bit?
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Jun 29, 2020 13:45
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How do you guys safely transport a greyhound during longer drives? Shove a crate in the backseat?
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Jun 30, 2020 15:06
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Major Isoor posted:What do you mean by a 'longer drive'? A few hours, or more like a day+? I've taken Taz on some long drives before, but no overnighters at this stage. 2.5-3 hours. I currently have a hatchback but I’ve been considering getting a new car for a while, which will probably not be another hatch. I’m mainly worried about safety in an accident; no one wants a greyhound flying through the windshield.
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Jun 30, 2020 16:03
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I watched some videos of greyhounds effortlessly bounding over tall fences and it kinda freaked me out. There’s a nice 3-acre dog park close to me that I was hoping to take a prospective greyhound to; it even has separate areas for small and large dogs. The problem is that it has 4 foot fences... It’s also between a road and a forested area, so I feel like the likelihood of a squirrel appearing just outside the park is high and I’m having horrible visions of worst case scenarios. Where do you let your hounds run free outside of a backyards with massive fences, which isn’t an option for me right now? Are they likely to bolt over a fence if the prey drive kicks in?
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Jul 4, 2020 16:29
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I’m wondering if fence jumping is more of a problem when A) you train them to jump stuff, since I think they have to work up to clearing enormous fences B) you leave them unsupervised, which I’ll never do I would also take the dog by the park on the outside to see how interested it looks before I get a membership to it (it’s a real fancy park; you have to submit a DNA test so they can trace down owners who don’t clean up after their dog and fine the hell out of and/or expel them).
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Jul 4, 2020 18:09
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Anybody have informed opinions about what the adoption situation will be like in the US moving forward? I know Florida’s racing ban goes into effect January 2021 and some tracks are closing early due to the pandemic. I’ve read that Florida has 11 out of the 17 remaining tracks in the US. It’s hard to get upset about stopping racing, but doesn’t that mean the supply of ex racers will basically dry up next year?
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Jul 14, 2020 15:08
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skoolmunkee posted:Probably some of them might transition to rescuing galgos from Spain, uk racers or racers from australia. It’s a long way but there’s groups who do it already and more dogs needing homes and proper care. How much does importing a dog cost?
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Jul 16, 2020 00:31
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Poor longdog, at least her life is improving Do greyhounds still get fed 4D meat at tracks? That’s the lowest USDA grade and not marked for human consumption - the meat comes animals that are “dead, dying, disabled, and/or diseased.” Apparently the term is “knackery” outside the US.
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Jul 16, 2020 14:00
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VagueRant posted:I've never had a dog, thinking about adopting a retired racing greyhound, but I'd have to put the crate/toys in the room where I currently store racks of clothes/jackets/shoes and laundry airers. Are clothes and shoes prime things for a dog to absolutely destroy? From the books I’ve read it doesn’t sound like a massive problem with greyhounds. They apparently do like to steal things, but don’t commonly hurt them. Out of the two commonly recommended books I would go for Retired Racing Greyhounds for Dummies. Despite the insulting title it’s actually a very solid book. It goes into a lot more detail about the needs of the dog than Adopting the Racing Greyhound.
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Jul 29, 2020 20:03
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I put in my longdog application earlier this week after hemming and hawing about it for a long time. Haven’t heard anything back other than the automated response. Not sure what the likelihood is for getting one, honestly. There are currently only 8 tracks left in the US, and half of those are scheduled to close in 2020. Who knows if the rest of them can survive COVID, since I fully expect things to be messed up for the majority of 2021 even in the best case scenario. My local adoption group cancelled all their meet & greets because there wasn’t a point in risking COVID exposure when there are no dogs available. I can’t imagine imported ex racers from Australia or Ireland will be more than a trickle either.
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Aug 8, 2020 16:58
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Those ears 
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Aug 12, 2020 13:58
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Daaw Anybody do stuff like this with their hound? If I ever get one, I want to look into groups that do stuff like visit nursing homes. Greyhounds are apparently very good for people in wheelchairs since they’re tall enough to be easily pet.
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Aug 16, 2020 04:45
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Aug 26, 2020 16:12
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Meanwhile I haven’t heard anything for a month on my application I don’t think anybody raises greyhounds around here. Iowa is relatively close and has one of the four US tracks that isn’t scheduled to close in 2020, so maybe I’ll have to take a road trip.
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Aug 27, 2020 00:27
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Reached out to my local adoption group since I hadn’t heard anything back on my application in a month. There’s a chance there will be some dogs available at the end of the year when the Florida tracks close for good. The national parent group is planning on importing Irish dogs once all of the Florida dogs have been placed. Looks like it will be quite a while before I get my very own skeleton goblin
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Sep 4, 2020 19:28
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Do the puppies sleep all day too? The books made greyhound puppies sound like terrors.
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Sep 6, 2020 02:01
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jesus WEP posted:When we first got Bonnie, she literally didn’t understand how to walk on a lead and the longer one let us get a few metres away and she figured out that she was supposed to follow us around. How is that possible, aren’t they walked to the starting gates on a lead?
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Sep 17, 2020 17:07
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What do you do when that happens? Wait them out? Try to carry them?
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Oct 10, 2020 20:40
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I like how she can only be bothered to twitch a leg to complain, nothing else 
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Oct 17, 2020 04:15
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pro-tier username & post combo
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Oct 31, 2020 19:51
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Akbar posted:Dog playtime Not understanding fetch or tug-of-war is not limited to greyhounds. I grew up with a collie who you would think would be good at playing, but her philosophy with fetch was “if whatever you’re throwing is good enough for me to chase after, why the hell would I give it back?” Even this keep-away died down after a few years. She would do tug-of-war if you engaged in it but wasn’t very good at it. Contrast that with my parents current terrier mix who seemingly instinctively understood fetch since she was a puppy and will also dump a toy in your lap and stare at you until you play tug of war with her.
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Dec 19, 2020 21:13
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I found out there’s actually another greyhound adoption organization in town and they seem much more on the ball then the “main” one. With the other one I haven’t heard much of anything in the months since I sent in an application. I had a one-hour video chat with my adoption representatives today (virtual home inspection and Q&A) and it seems very likely I’ll be getting a Florida dog on the 23rd or shortly thereafter. It might be their last New Dog Day with all the tracks closing. In The Before Times it was a pretty cool organization - the hounds would be fostered for 8 weeks by inmates in a local prison before adopted out. COVID put a stop to that and by the time the pandemic’s over there’ll probably be like 3 tracks still operating in the US so this might be it for them. My representatives seemed to encourage me to pre-adopt a hound from the next haul since it sounds like they will be getting more dogs than normal and the organization wants to make sure they can find a home (temporary or permanent) for all of them. That means it will go straight to me off the transport when it arrives, which, uh, wasn’t quite how I expected this would go - I figured somebody else would take the initial hit of teaching them stairs and getting them vaguely housebroken  I’m a little bit intimidated by how fast all of this is happening compared to months of no communication from the other org but hopefully it will go fine. It sounds like the other alternatives are to pay megabucks for a show dog or wait and pay almost-megabucks for an imported ex-racer.
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Jan 11, 2021 03:48
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Drunk Beekeeper posted:Is this in Phoenix by chance? We have direct experience with three different groups in our area and one of them was the sponsor for the prison program, which is where we got Jody. We have also fostered and volunteered for two other groups and there is actually a fourth group in our area as well to my knowledge. If so we can help out in any way possible! Naw, Indianapolis I think I can do it, but it will be... a lot at first. I guess I have to try to teach it stairs the first day since the bedroom is upstairs?
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Jan 11, 2021 04:50
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It’s a townhome apartment with carpeted stairs so at least I have that going for me. Don’t greyhounds at the track wake up at some godawful hour?
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Jan 11, 2021 14:16
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Pre-adopted a long dog!!!!!! 2.5 year old fawn female. Shows up in town on the morning of the 23rd. Already vetted (spayed/microchip/dental) so I don’t need to worry about all of that.
david_a fucked around with this message at 02:42 on Jan 15, 2021 |
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Jan 15, 2021 02:34
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Anybody have any tips on surviving the first night? I’m still debating whether to sleep downstairs on the couch or carrying her up to the bedroom (I got advice to wait on stair training until like day 2-3). I would like to not have to move the cage between floors so downstairs she would be in the crate and upstairs she would be confined to my bedroom. Also I’ve heard that reprogramming their wake up time comes down to not rewarding them for waking up early; IE don’t get up until you want to. Not sure how that interacts with housebreaking though... Here’s one of the pictures I have. Didn’t have much to go on for the list of dogs beyond some basic stats and a few spotty photos. Katie here had a comment left on her post by somebody that worked with her and said she was a sweetheart, which is literally the only information I have on the behavior of any of the 16 dogs being brought up. Katie’s Game seems pretty tame for a purebred name so I’m keeping it. 
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Jan 18, 2021 18:26
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I was told it has to do with the age of the dog - young dogs aren’t fans of the crate but older ones love it. Katie is 2.5 which I’ve heard is in the transition period where they may or may not care for it. At the very least I want a crate for some separation training; no way do I want her going around wherever at first. I’ve also heard it might be good when I visit my parents because she might not see that as her den at first. Also - do dogs with fawn coats not get a lot of grey hairs? Hard to tell with Abby but I would not have guessed she was 13 from the pics.
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Jan 18, 2021 22:41
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Ah, ok - I guess it’s just way more dramatic on darker dogs. I’m not used to what greys look like yet  Happy birthday old girl! Anybody here train their hound to be a therapy dog? I’m interested in learning what goes into it. There’s a lot of old people homes around here and I know greyhounds are great for people with limited mobility to pet since they’re so tall.
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Jan 19, 2021 17:59
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Hmm ok; I’m having visions of Katie’s future here I mainly have experience with dark haired doggos where it’s much more pronounced. I always think of things like this (also: lol) when I picture old greyhounds, but that dog was black to begin with I think
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Jan 20, 2021 04:41
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Lhet posted:Remy started limping a bit over a month ago, favoring one leg. After a while he completely stopped putting weight on it, and it got swollen so we took him to the vet, and unfortunately it was confirmed to be bone cancer. We decided to treat it - which meant having the leg removed, and got him back from surgery yesterday. Hope he does ok going forward 
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Jan 22, 2021 01:23
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Aw, poor doggos. Bone cancer does scare me... Maybe as a bit of a counterpoint, I’m 2 hours away from getting my long dog!
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Jan 23, 2021 15:01
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jesus WEP posted:you know about the picture tax for all the advice and such the thread has provided, yes lol like I won’t want to post a billion pics anyway Waiting at the dog wash now Here’s a pic of my wild girl Katie 
david_a fucked around with this message at 20:44 on Jan 23, 2021 |
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Jan 23, 2021 18:41
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Finally home. She’s a lot calmer by herself away from all the other dogs and people. Had a little stroll - so many exciting things to look at and smell! She finally drank some water too - and sure enough when I took her out a minute later, she had to go. She wolfed down a bunch of food when she got off the truck so that’s good. So went up the stairs by herself after like 10 minutes in here! Getting down was a different story; I carried her since I wanted her down pronto to go out. Current status: first nap of the day (well, laying down at least) 
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Jan 23, 2021 20:43
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Double posting #yolo Survived the first night! She didn’t whine or cry at all! She was a bit restless at times though. I had somewhat optimistically set the alarm for 6:30 but at 6 she barked to let me know it was time for breakfast. She has quite the appetite! One thing we will need to learn is table manners - she loves to put her paws on the kitchen counter or dining room table to check out what I’m doing. I think for lunches and dinners I’m going to have to crate her for now because it stresses me out having a giant “helper” in my small kitchen. We did a 40 minute walk last night which I think was a bit much for her, I felt bad. This morning she didn’t want to take a walk - I don’t know if everything looks scarier in the daylight or she didn’t like the temperature. She doesn’t pull on the lead but she does walk a bit randomly so she trips me up or walks so close she pushes me off the path. She also seemed a lot more hesitant today to relieve herself. I don’t know if she suddenly remembered she was shy. I thought about trying to get her into the fenced area to take her off leash but she didn’t want to walk over there. She does not seem to be in need so I’ll just watch her closely and try again later. Edit: image tax, watching TV for the first time last night 
david_a fucked around with this message at 15:12 on Jan 24, 2021 |
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Jan 24, 2021 15:10
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It is indeed cold. I have a coat but I wanted to measure her before investing in something better. I can’t figure out if I’m measuring her incorrectly or if she really needs a custom size because the neck and chest circumference fall into the range for one of the standard sizes but I keep measuring her as way shorter. 
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Jan 24, 2021 17:39
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actionjackson posted:Yeah I would say no more than 10-15 minutes, also you will probably notice after a while that your greyhound will be visibly uncomfortable, lifting up their paws a lot, etc. Those are the coats I’m looking at. Neck and chest are in medium but she seems like 3 inches shorter than their guide. My adoption person just told me that their paws have to adjust to asphalt & frozen ground which is probably part of it. She limps slightly outdoors but is fine inside on the carpet. Currently chilling upstairs before giving another go at going down - seems extremely unenthusiastic about it.
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Jan 24, 2021 20:21
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jesus WEP posted:are her paws pink? they will eventually get calluses and go black, and she’ll be a lot hardier then for walking on pavement Honestly I think she’s just reacting to the cold sidewalk. We walked on the sidewalk a bit coming out and she seemed like she was walking on pins. In a grassy area she was fine, and coming back I think she forgot to make a fuss about it. Is it normal that they don’t urinate as much when they have loose stools? It seems like she thinks about it, changes her mind, and does a #2 instead. With the amount of water she drinks I would have expected more. Also how do you get them to walk down stairs? When we came in she went right up by herself - not sure what she expected to happen once she got up there, I carried her down the first two times. She freezes at the landing and I would have to force her to move to even start going down. I’ve heard mixed things about doing that. Edit: it just dawned on me to not carry her down the entire flight. I may still need to temporarily block them off somehow because I know greys will try doing stupid poo poo like jumping down the entire stairs at first. david_a fucked around with this message at 21:42 on Jan 24, 2021 |
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Jan 24, 2021 21:19
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Katie and I had a very good day! (Hope this isn’t a jinx since it’s not over yet) After talking with my adoption rep, I realized she was probably scared of going outside. I was following the advice of taking them out frequently to get them housebroken but I don’t think Katie thought it was helpful. The “dog expert” neighbor sticking her crazy excited black lab in Katie’s face before I had a chance to say no didn’t help either. I got the advice of trying the rear sliding door instead and giving her treats and praise just for going outside. I also decided to keep an eye on her and not trying to go out constantly. Katie actually decided she wanted to take a walk while outside this afternoon! She also jumped around for like 5 seconds and got wrapped up in her leash, not sure if she was happy or startled by something. Stairs are coming along! Up is no problem. She got her front paws down the top two steps and was this close to moving her rear paws. When I carry her down she has to do the last few steps by herself which doesn’t seem like too much of a problem. My coworkers got to see her in the natural greyhound state: 
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Jan 26, 2021 00:06
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