First puppy Post #178 Has Awesome Training Info!

[Brill Weave]

Anyone know anything about this line of dog food: http://www.walmart.com/ip/Rachael-Ra...-Dogs/19720749

It's crap.

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-fo...rish-dog-food/

Rachael Ray Nutrish Dog Food
The Bottom Line

Judging by its ingredients alone, Rachael Ray Nutrish Dog Food looks like a below average dry product.

But ingredient quality by itself cannot tell the whole story. We still need to estimate the product’s meat content before determining a final rating.

The dashboard displays a dry matter protein reading of 30%, a fat level of 16% and estimated carbohydrates of about 47%.

As a group, the brand features an average protein content of 29% and a mean fat level of 14%. Together, these figures suggest a carbohydrate content of 48% for the overall product line.

And a fat-to-protein ratio of about 49%.

Near-average protein. Below-average fat. And near-average carbs when compared to a typical dry dog food.

When you consider the protein-boosting effect of the soy and corn gluten meals as well as the dried peas, this looks like the profile of a kibble containing a below average amount of meat.

However, it’s unfortunate the company chose to include menadione in its recipes. Without this controversial supplement and use of plant-based protein boosters, we would have been compelled to award this brand a higher rating.

Bottom line?

Rachael Ray Nutrish is a plant-based dry dog food using a below average amount of named meats and meat meals as its main sources of animal protein, thus earning the brand 2.5 stars.

Not recommended.

Please note certain recipes are sometimes given a higher or lower rating based upon our estimate of their total meat content.

[Brill Weave]

By comparison this is what what I give my dog.

http://www.dogfoodadvisor.com/dog-fo...ture-dog-food/

Kirkland Dog Food… the Bottom Line

Judging by its ingredients alone, Kirkland Dog Food appears to be an above-average kibble.

But ingredient quality by itself cannot tell the whole story. We still need to estimate the product’s meat content before determining a final rating.

The dashboard displays a dry matter protein reading of 30%, a fat level of 18% and estimated carbohydrates of about 44%.

As a group, the brand features an average protein content of 28% and a mean fat level of 15%. Together, these figures suggest a carbohydrate content of 49% for the overall product line.

And a fat-to-protein ratio of about 54%.

Near-average protein. Below-average fat. And near-average carbs when compared to a typical dry dog food.

Even when you consider the protein-boosting effect of the brewers dried yeast, this looks like the profile of a kibble containing a moderate amount of meat.

However, due its apparently lower meat content, the Healthy Weight Formula has been downgraded to a lower category.

Bottom line?

Kirkland Dog Food is a grain-based dry dog food using a notable amount of chicken or lamb meals as its main sources of animal protein, thus earning the brand 4 stars.

Highly recommended.

[Brill Weave]

Big thing to remember. In most cases the cheaper you go the worse the food is. It's just like buying a steak for yourself. If you drop 5 bucks on a skillet steak and 20 on a filet mignon which one is going to be better? Dogs are not cheap. Your dog is going to be with you for 10 - 15 years if you're lucky. It will essentially be your child. Oh and Kohan was 100% spot on about insurance. If you're a home owner or a renter you need to check to see if your insurance will cover that breed of dog. German Shepherd's are usually listed as a high risk breed like mine. These are the most common dogs that show up on restricted lists.


Pit Bulls & Staffordshire Terriers
Doberman Pinschers
Rottweilers
German Shepherds
Chows
Great Danes
Presa Canarios
Akitas
Alaskan Malamutes
Siberian Huskies
Wolf-hybrids

You can try to keep it quiet and not tell your insurer you have said dog. And in all likelihood nothing would ever happen. But if something did and the dog bit someone they could deny your claim since you didn't advise them of it. Our initial homeowners insurance would not cover a pit bull. We switched to State Farm. They have zero breed restrictions on their insurance.

[Aylee]

We are having to fight the land lord over it atm. After we signed the lease I asked what I needed to do and they said that they don't want puppies because they don't have any landlord references... so they are having to ask the owner if they are ok with it.. really bunch of bull shit since that's why we choose that house and originally when looking at it they said it shouldn't be a problem. Going to ask the breeder if they will give it a reference and say it's not destructive and house broken

[Kaslo]

Something not yet mentioned:

Make sure you get a decent amount of socializing in as he/she grows, ie. dog parks. This will help him/her be well behaved around other dogs and people. (on dog park note: you may want to give your a dog baths after trips to the dog park, they can sometimes be a flea breeding ground)

On a note of my own dog, he's a miniature schnauzer that's 15 months old. He is well house and crate trained but I still have one major issue, when he gets excited by someone visiting my house for the first time (or in a long while) he cannot control his bladder and lets a little pee out, even if he had recently gone outside. This is kind of embarrassing when I bring people over... any ideas on how to treat this?

[Brill Weave]

On a note of my own dog, he's a miniature schnauzer that's 15 months old. He is well house and crate trained but I still have one major issue, when he gets excited by someone visiting my house for the first time (or in a long while) he cannot control his bladder and lets a little pee out, even if he had recently gone outside. This is kind of embarrassing when I bring people over... any ideas on how to treat this?

Every little dog my family has ever had had this issue. I have no idea. We tried a bunch of different things. The only thing that worked was putting them back in their crate as soon as someone arrived, until they calmed down. Then let them out after they had a few minutes to chill.

[Tokitoki]

DO they pee immediately when someone comes in or is it when they are pet? One of my parents' dogs does this, a toy poodle, so when we walk in we ignore her until she calms down. We also do not bend over to pet her because she rolls on her back and pees when we first come in.

One of the links Kohan posted had another link within it that discussed this issue and a few possible remedies.

[Kaslo]

Its usually when he's jumping up to greet someone, and he ends up going on their leg a little bit

[Ksandra]

Its usually when he's jumping up to greet someone, and he ends up going on their leg a little bit

Well stop peeing on people when they show up so he doesn't think he can, too.

Spoiler: show

sorry I got nothing

[BaneTheBrawler]

How would you guys go about reducing the excitement level when visitors arrive? Sounds like that might be a good aproach... but the only solution to that that I've got is to wait until the dog gets older.

[zoobernut]

Echoing what Brill posted we feed our dogs Kirkland too. You have to adjust the food you give your dog if they have any sort of food allergy which is really common in dogs of all breeds as well as mutts. Most dogs are allergic to corn in some capacity. We used to feed our dogs a different type of food when my border collie mix was still alive because she was really allergic to chicken and corn but now our current dogs are more tolerant of various foods.

Cheep food is usually crappy.


Also pee pads are not the devil and they don't guarantee having issues with your dogs. They can be a useful tool but you have to know how to use them as a training tool. From my experience situations where they are bad to use is because people use them just as an excuse to not train their dogs or walk them enough.


My wife and I are foster caring for a pitbull puppy right now that is recovering from a broken jaw. She is mostly potty trained and goes outside with us when we go out but during the night we keep her in a kennel to keep her separate from our cats and 2 other larger dogs and we put down a puppy pad for her. So far she only pees on it every once in a while but it has not taught her to go inside instead of outside at all.


Edit: For the leg peeing dog we had a similar albeit less annoying issue with our queensland healer. He would get overly excited and pee on the floor. The way we trained him out of it was to downplay the situations that got him that excited. When we got home we didn't jump up and down and praise him. We didn't make a big deal out of getting home. Sometimes we would do our best to get him to calm down to. Make him sit and such. This really helped reduce the amount of occurrences where he peed from excitement. Try doing something similar with your dog. Don't let him jump up on people. Make him sit and stay when people come over. Do what you can to make the arrival of guests as boring and mundane to him as possible.

[Acevalefor]

I have a 3-year-old lab/blue healer/rottweiler mix that still pees if you give her any attention when you first walk in. If you so much as say something to her, she pees. All while madly wagging her tail.We have not been able to change this. Scolding makes her cower and pee all over herself as she rolls on her back. Having her sit just makes her pee right where she sits. The only solution we have found that works is to send her outside for the first 10-15 minutes whenever we come home or whenever we have guests over. Then we bring her in and totally ignore her until she forgets about us or the visitors then she is fine to interact with. It's a little bit of a ridiculous game and I would love to figure out a way to make it stop.

[zoobernut]

I have a 3-year-old lab/blue healer/rottweiler mix that still pees if you give her any attention when you first walk in. If you so much as say something to her, she pees. All while madly wagging her tail.We have not been able to change this. Scolding makes her cower and pee all over herself as she rolls on her back. Having her sit just makes her pee right where she sits. The only solution we have found that works is to send her outside for the first 10-15 minutes whenever we come home or whenever we have guests over. Then we bring her in and totally ignore her until she forgets about us or the visitors then she is fine to interact with. It's a little bit of a ridiculous game and I would love to figure out a way to make it stop.

This is great advice and right along the lines of what I was talking about. Each dog might take a slightly different approach but the result is the same. You reduce their excitement and divert it until they can interact with you or guests without peeing. I would just keep up your routine and eventually the problem might go away. Our Healer is 4 or 5? years old now and he only pees very rarely now. For the most part we don't need to do any special song and dance with him to prevent the peeing anymore.

[Ksandra]

Also pee pads are not the devil and they don't guarantee having issues with your dogs. They can be a useful tool but you have to know how to use them as a training tool. From my experience situations where they are bad to use is because people use them just as an excuse to not train their dogs or walk them enough.

I gotta agree with this. I think pee pads take extra training, but aren't as bad as some are making it out to be.

My parents have a toy poodle that they trained to pee both inside and outside the house. My parents are older people and sometimes the snow is just too much for them to shovel a patch in the back yard for him to go (and he won't step in it...pussy). He will do either without any issue because they trained him on both the yard and the pads/paper from the day they got him.

My parents weren't exactly good about training him on anything (can't roll over, shake hands, etc.). Yet they could get him to do that, so I think if they could, anyone can. lol

[Aylee]

So got the puppy home. .. took her strait to the potty site... she peed got a treat and praised and brought in... sleep a bit took her out she popped. Treat/praised took out later pooped after a whole... treat/praise but half the time I take her out she just sits for a few min then freaks the fuck out :/

[Kaslo]

So got the puppy home. .. took her strait to the potty site... she peed got a treat and praised and brought in... sleep a bit took her out she popped. Treat/praised took out later pooped after a whole... treat/praise but half the time I take her out she just sits for a few min then freaks the fuck out :/

Oh another piece of advice, at least with my guy, when he was young and would wake up I needed to take him out then. First few weeks of puppyhood was rough on the sleep schedule.

[Aylee]

Oh another piece of advice, at least with my guy, when he was young and would wake up I needed to take him out then. First few weeks of puppyhood was rough on the sleep schedule.

She seems to be scared of everything... I was just trying to play with her and she freaked out and hidden on the other side of the bed.... then when I turned the light on she flipped out again and sounded like I killed her. She gets scared as soon as we walk of the back pourch... is this normal? Is it just because it's a new area?

[Byrthnoth]

You are huge to a puppy. Sit on the floor and do something passive like reading. Let them be the one that comes over to you, which they will eventually do because dogs looooove yoooooou.

Spoiler: show

Also, WHERE THE HELL ARE THE PICTURES?

[Brill Weave]

She seems to be scared of everything... I was just trying to play with her and she freaked out and hidden on the other side of the bed.... then when I turned the light on she flipped out again and sounded like I killed her. She gets scared as soon as we walk of the back pourch... is this normal? Is it just because it's a new area?

New environment, new person, new scents. Don't force the issue. Just be patient and don't chase after her. Let her come to you. Put her crate in the room you spend the most time in. That way she gets accustomed to the sounds associated with that room. Don't put it in a room she never goes in. It will seem like a punishment to her.

[Tokitoki]

Also, you may want to play/walk with her outside a bit after she does her business. This way she doesn't hold it for a while because she wants to be outside longer.