I’ve been pretty quiet this week because there really hasn’t been much to report (or too much, depending on the way you look at it). I definitely lucked out in the puppy draw, because Jake is already almost completely potty trained. The only times he’s had accidents are when it’s Andy’s turn to watch him (go figure). We had a 4 day no-accident streak, but due to the reason I stated earlier, it didn’t go for a full 5 days. Luckily we have all laminate floors (except in the bedroom) so cleanup is pretty easy.
You remember I talked about how I was using the patio to help potty train Jake? It’s not even necessary anymore. It’s like he knows that, yes, it’s acceptable to potty out there, but he’d rather go in the grass. Every time I/we get the dogs’ leashes, Jake knows it’s time to go outside, and he almost immediately goes once we get down there. It’s awesome. He also knows the words for going on command.
He even let me sleep in on Saturday and Sunday. Seriously! I got to sleep in till 9am. It was marvelous.
Work has been hell lately. I was reduced to tears almost every day at the office last week. I’m working a job that is so stressful that it’s keeping me in a constant state of illness (which is SO fun, since I have a new puppy…), and even though I’ve submitted multiple applications (think several dozen) to many places that are hiring, I haven’t gotten a single callback. From the few people I have managed to talk to, I’m either overqualified or underqualified. Fun, right? I wish companies would decide upon a general standard.
Moving on, I recently changed my dogs’ food over from Pedigree to Taste of the Wild. I had heard good things about TotW before, from my family and from people online, but I never realized how much of a difference it would make in my dog’s appetite (Bear, specifically). He was always a light/picky eater (I’d had him on Pedigree for three years), and I just chalked that up to not needing a bunch of food. I also assumed his constant upset stomach was due to being fed something he wasn’t supposed to be fed (sensitive stomach). Man, was I ignorant the first few years of his life!
Turns out that foamy yellow vomit is generally a sign that a dog is hungry, and the acid buildup in its stomach has become too much for the dog’s stomach to handle, so they expel it. I never knew that until just last week.
The reason I found this out was because I just bought a new bag of Pedigree in early-mid July. It wasn’t until last week that I heard about the huge June recall of the Pedigree dog food.
I’d been considering switching his food over for some time, but this really sealed the deal when I did some research on the Pedigree dog food brand.
I have been feeding my dogs CRAP.
Food unfit for human consumption is crammed into those tiny little pellets, along with corn and grain and all sorts of chemicals that dogs technically can’t digest. The food is then sprayed with fat to make it seem edible and more alluring to a dog’s nose.
I read a few reviews after the recall. Some dogs DIED from eating this food. And not old dogs either; young 2-year-old dogs, puppies, middle-aged dogs…look it up! It’s scary!
You know when you switch over a dog’s food that you’re supposed to mix the new food with the old food gradually for about five days? On the second day, Bear was eating around the old stuff (Pedigree) but chowing down on the new stuff (TotW). Smart dog.
The reason his stomach has been upset for the past three years is because he’s been practically starving himself because the Pedigree dog food is so gross. I’m a bad dog owner for not noticing this. He used to do a “dinner dance” where he’d prance around his food, nose at it, take out one or two pieces and eat them across the room, move his dog bowl across the bottom of his crate…
He doesn’t do that anymore. I’ve never seen him so excited at meal times.
Suffice to say, I will no longer be feeding my dogs Pedigree. Jake’s breeder sent a bag of Pedigree over with him, so he’d been eating it too, but he’s since been switched to TotW as well.
Change of subject: In other news, it’s getting harder for me to take Bear anywhere. Naturally, because Jake is only 13 weeks old, he’s cooed over by every female passerby. He’s a baby, what can you expect? The problem is, Bear is usually with me too. I’m doing my best to make sure he doesn’t feel left out or replaced–he gets just as much playtime, and he goes outside every time I take Jake outside. It’s a chore, but I don’t want him to become jealous.
Apparently, this isn’t enough. Every time someone comes near the puppy, Bear starts growling or snapping. This is a new behavior, and obviously undesirable. Protectiveness is one thing, and I usually laugh it off to whoever attempted to pet the puppy as “oh, he’s just protecting the puppy, isn’t it cute?” But at home, or with my family, it becomes something much more serious. The last thing I need is for Bear to turn into an ill-tempered dog. Oftentimes, if the puppy is laying under my feet (which he usually does), Bear will take up residence somewhere else. If Bear is lying next to me and Jake tries to come lay down next to him, he will get up and find somewhere else across the room to lie down. He’s been spending as much time as possible in his crate.
Yesterday, I had both dogs over at my parents’ house. They were both in their separate pens. My mom, being a female, naturally would walk by Jake’s crate and put her fingers through the bars of his crate to let him lick them and fawn over her hand. Bear, seeing this, nearly rocketed through the bars of his pen, snapping and barking. Of course he doesn’t realize that this kind of behavior makes it less likely that a human being (besides me) will want to pay any attention to him.
When I was a kid, we had a golden retriever named Teddy. We’d had him for maybe a year or two (he was an adult when we got him), when my parents got Austin a puppy (that we later figured out was a Corgi mix lol). Teddy took to Hank like a duck to water. I never saw them fight, or growl, I never saw Teddy get vicious when the puppy got attention. It could be because they didn’t really have anybody but each other (they were outside dogs) so they naturally bonded. I’ve done this with Bear and Jake too. We have supervised playtime, where me or Andy will get down in the middle and play with both dogs, or we have supervised playtime where we watch the dogs play together. During these times, Bear always seems thrilled to have a playmate. The rest of the time though…I don’t know if it’s jealousy or just the transitionary period an older dog has to go through when a new dog is introduced to the family mix.
When we’re at the dog park, Bear has started humping other dogs. He NEVER used to do this. I know it’s a dominance thing, but he’s humping literally every dog he can wrap his paws around (male or female, neutered or intact). Humping is one of the few behaviors I don’t use positive reinforcement on. It is absolutely NOT okay for my dogs to hump anything or anybody. If my dog is humping another dog, he gets a sharp smack on the behind. Jake has already learned that it is not acceptable.
So until he gets used to it, what do I do? I can’t risk him actually biting somebody, that would be bad. I can’t leave him at home because that will probably just make it worse. It might get better once we get Jake neutered (at 6 months) or it might not. But the problem is, Bear is developing very negative behaviors (snarling, humping, moping, etc) that I don’t know how to curb. I tell him ‘NO’ very sharply when we catch him doing it, but two minutes later he’s doing it again. Next thing I know, he’ll be using the bathroom in the house. Is he acting out? Is he jealous? What do I do?
Puppies, Politics, and Paperbacks 