Dan and I took Oso on an outing to the Vet’s office to ride in the car, get weighed and have treats at the Vet’s. He weighed 19.1 pounds a week ago.
Attached is a photo of him going for a walk with Dan – he is pretty good on the leash and a close up so you can see his color coming in.
He is a very handsome boy..I love watching them mature.
thank you, Karen. I am proud! like I had anyting to do with it
I saw Dan and Kelli with Oso this Sunday. Dan has done a super job with the training…he already has a rock solid stay. I was very impressed. Oso is way ahead of Willa in her training….I have to get going.
Good job, Dan! Julie, you’re a slacker.
Uh-oh, I think Camp Kayla is calling… Kayla says some lady came and took her Batman away, and now she needs a new puppy to raise.
I love to see Dan so involved with Oso’s training – it really looks like a team effort. Is it 50/50?
I’m very happy that Scott lets me take the helm in training. I’ve been studying training methods and preparing for Dutch long before he arrived. The more I read, the more I realize there is to learn. It is such a joy to have a dog that loves his training as much as I do! Every day there is something new to look forward to. I tend to be quite an early riser, and now Dutch is sleeping later than I am. I just can’t wait for him to wake up each morning, and greet me so happily as he comes out of his crate.
Yesterday, I took him to Petco again to pick out a toy. A woman came over to me, and said she had some unsolicited advice for me. First, she said Dutch was one of the most beautiful GSD pups she’d ever seen (she has a GSD at home). She said she was told when her dog was as young as Dutch never to take him out where other dogs could have been, especially Petco, because they are so vulnerable before they have all their shots. She was particularly concerned about Parvo virus.
I was shaken, picked him up immediately, thanked her, and left Petco without the toy. I called the vet from home, and we moved his next vaccination up to the minimum time required between shots. The nurse said not to worry too much about the visit, but to remain vigilant about his exposures. I want to socialize him, but not at the expense of his health.
Later in the afternoon, I took him to our elementary school playground, where he happily played with the children after school. I brought treats for them to give Dutch, and he loved being the center of attention. Some of the mothers, who had been watching their kids from the distance, came over to check on the situation. My friend Christine was among them, and she recognized me as they got closer. Laughing, she said they were discussing the “stranger” who had come to the playground with a puppy to bait the children before abducting one. We all laughed, as they ooooo’d and aaaah’d over Dutch.
Bev, I love the way you care about your puppy. You may want to call Julie for advice about his exposure. She did tell us not to put Oso on the floor at the Vet’s office. Now the Vet was a little offended at this but we still took Julie’s advice any way.
You are doing a great job of socializing him. I never thought of the playground.
Dan is the primary trainer of Oso although I find that Oso will do what ever I want when I praise him. When we saw Julie this weekend he went up and down an agility platform with only my encouragement and no treats. He is easy that way. Dan taught him how to stay.
I wonder if the next step is off leash. Dan hopes to start with the professional trainer this week.
We love our pets so much, and love to see that same deep bond in others. They are so important in our lives, enriching it in countless ways. The way you care about Oso gives me such a warm feeling. I feel confident that all Dutch’s brothers and sisters are all cherished, don’t you?
When I asked the secretary at the vet’s office about allowing our puppy to walk on the floor, she said it was “no problem, puppies always walk on the floor, which is sanitized daily.” I made my appt for 9 am, hoping we’d be the first after sanitizing. After reading your entry, Scott and I have decided to bring him there in his crate to protect him. Scott can carry the crate – he works out!
It looks to me that all of the W puppies are cherished.
When we brought Oso in for this weigh in we carried him in and only let him stand on the scale to prevent an infection. I was worried because he was looking so thin to me. He really started eating today and now he looks like his legs are longer. Oso and Dan have gotten closer now that I am back to work and Dan is the major care taker during the day. I leave for work at five thirty and Dan is the one who takes care of Oso in the morning and is able to come home for lunch. I work long 9 hour days so I have not been the one who is feeding him. By the time I get home Dan has taken him for a walk, all and all Oso seem so much happier like he knows he is home now. I would say he feels like both of us are part of his pack. Going to see Julie this weekend helped us both to relax a little bit – we just want to do everything perfect after loosing our last dog.
When we were at the Vets we saw a woman who brought in her aged Golden Retriever, when he got up instead of standing he fell with a loud bang and it reminded me so much of our last dog that I cried. I did not want that owner to see so I hid my face but ended up sobbing. Funny but I do love Oso very much and the loss of the other dog has not changed that. It is all very complicated.
You’re allowed to love more than one dog with all your heart, and there’s nothing wrong with complicated. We are all part of your pack now!
Oso is so darned cute.
Thank you, Jennie
Those old dogs just break your heart. Kelli, it makes perfect sense to me.
Thanks, Julie
Oh, Kelli, your heart is big enough to hold all the loves in your life. I hope someday to meet you and Dan, perhaps at one of Julie’s reunions. It would be like a family reunion, really; a chance to meet our entire “pack!”
Julie told me that the pups won’t be as pressured to eat once they’re home with us because they don’t have to compete with their litter mates any longer. Sometimes, when Dutch is eating, I sit down on the floor with his dish by my side, petting him, playing with his face, and handling his food. I read that it helps prevent possessiveness problems later on, but I’ve noticed that when I do it, he wags his tail happily, and eats with greater enthusiasm.
I would like to meet you too. We will go through many of the same things together as we have boys at the same age.
For some reason Oso is having diarrhea today. Dan reports this as explosive. I gave him some pieces of cooked chicken from Krogers yesterday so I wondered if that caused it. Otherwise he just ate a lot of his regular food yesterday.
It can and will happen, they walk around bare-footed, they are close to the ground and always sticking their little noses into things and smelling. He is also a puppy and only a short time in this world to build up immunities to what is out there in the world.
I’ve been giving Dutch TINY BITS of raw sirloin as treats, and he does well with it. I thought cooked chicken, assuming no onions, spices, etc, was OK, too. Dutch had a couple of days of diarrhea after we gave him that worming medication, but he’s fine now.
Scott (my husband/MD) says that too much protein may be more than he can metabolize with his pancreatic secretions, and as a result malabsorption can create explosive diarrhea because his colon can’t handle the small intestinal liquid load that was not absorbed. If you fed him a LOT of chicken, that would be the most common cause.
Refer to page 15 of Julie’s puppy instructions regarding diarrhea – if it lasts more than 2 days you’ll need to call your DVM. I hope he gets over this quickly – I freaked out with a few loose stools after the worming!
You know Bev this makes sense to me. He was so hungry last night he ate 2 cups of food at once and probally another cup during the day. I only gave him a few bites of chicken.
Since this afternoon he has not had any more diarrhea and he ate food this evening so I think we are in the clear. Tell Scott thank you for the advice – I feel like I need all the help I can get.
We all need all the help we can get. Can you even imagine what it would be like if we didn’t have the lifeline of help through all the members of this blog? Special thanks to those who have dedicated themselves to researching the health and wellness topics to help us nurture our beloved little pups through all the mire and confusion of shotgun care for the masses.