What is cuddly, fluffy and starts with an E? Sarah Maxwell Gets a Dog

[WonderingInWA]

The liver treats Sarah is giving Ellie are freeze-dried, so hard with a bit of crunch.  I think whichever Maxwell posted the "joke" comment was just saying that beef heart, frozen and then thawed, would be pretty messy and not something you could hold in your hand or put in your pocket while training.  But I thought ti was odd they said anything about it being a joke rather than just explaining the texture of the liver treats.

[blessalessi]

Plus, a lot of what the Maxwells themselves eat seems to come out of a box or packet. They seem to do well for fruit and veggies, so I am not knocking their overall diet, but I doubt that they would handle much raw meat for their own consumption, and generally don't seem to be very well informed about the ways that people live outside their own bubble.

[nastyhobbitses]

19 hours ago, kpmom said:

The response to the beef heart comment was weird, I agree. If they worried it was a joke, why even post it?

Obviously, Sarah, with her two weeks of dog training, knows much more than this person's grandmother.

I'm guessing they'll get lots of responses about how it's not weird or a joke.  Our dogs are the only ones who eat the turkey gizzards from the cavity our Thanksgiving turkey (although we cook them first, of course).

I keep hearing about people giving their dogs such fancy meats and stuff, and I'm over here with a dog who, while he does eat good-quality dog food, gets excited when the Canada Geese migrate back to us, since it means a daily buffet of goose poop. Which makes him barf. But that's OK because he'll eat the barf. My dog is gross.

[WonderingInWA]

Yes, I my dog always got excited when there were rabbits in the yard.  Not because of the rabbits, but so he could go eat their poop when they left.  Dogs are gross but I love them.

[mango_fandango]

My dog is very weird about his dog food. Sometimes he eats it, other times not. Thankfully he doesn't seem to be into eating poop. He does like cheese and chicken and sausage. He also LOVES to lick butter wrappers clean. 

[nastyhobbitses]

20 minutes ago, mango_fandango said:

My dog is very weird about his dog food. Sometimes he eats it, other times not. Thankfully he doesn't seem to be into eating poop. He does like cheese and chicken and sausage. He also LOVES to lick butter wrappers clean. 

My dog LOVES Parmesan cheese. It's gotten to the point where if he sees my mom heading to the drawer where she keeps the cheese grater, he starts doing a happy dance because he knows she'll give him the rind and whatever bits were too small to grate. At the very least, excrement is just about the only non-food item he'll go for. The dog my family had before him ate: my sister's homework (yes, really), $50, an entire roast beef sandwich, a wallet, several tennis balls, a spatula, socks, tax forms, her own medical records, a hot dog she stole from a small child, her own poop, the poop of other animals, part of an ottoman, and a pen.

[Tiny Bubbles]

Lol, we used to have a black Lab that would eat just about anything. Once she crunched up some CDs and gobbled them down. A couple of days later the CDs came out the other end, looking just like when they went in.  A wonderful dog, but a crazy eater!

[MamaJunebug]

A thought about the E name for Ellie: does this signal the end of the alphabetical line for Nathan & Melanie? 

 

I mean, they could've named her Jelly or Smelly or Welly (after the work boots) ... But an E name?? After Abby Bethy Christiny anDrewy??? 

Don't mind me. I've got a minor case of the TGIFs!!! 

2 hours ago, nastyhobbitses said:

My dog LOVES Parmesan cheese. It's gotten to the point where if he sees my mom heading to the drawer where she keeps the cheese grater, he starts doing a happy dance because he knows she'll give him the rind and whatever bits were too small to grate. At the very least, excrement is just about the only non-food item he'll go for. The dog my family had before him ate: my sister's homework (yes, really), $50, an entire roast beef sandwich, a wallet, several tennis balls, a spatula, socks, tax forms, her own medical records, a hot dog she stole from a small child, her own poop, the poop of other animals, part of an ottoman, and a pen.

Nastyhibbitses, can I please ask his breed/s??  That's a chow hound that puts my late great Lab to shame!! 

[nastyhobbitses]

3 minutes ago, MamaJunebug said:

A thought about the E name for Ellie: does this signal the end of the alphabetical line for Nathan & Melanie? 

 

I mean, they could've named her Jelly or Smelly or Welly (after the work boots) ... But an E name?? After Abby Bethy Christiny anDrewy??? 

Don't mind me. I've got a minor case of the TGIFs!!! 

Nastyhibbitses, can I please ask his breed/s??  That's a chow hound that puts my late great Lab to shame!! 

Parmesan cheese lover is a corgi. The Actual Omnivore was a Bernese Mountain Dog.

[MamaJunebug]

May I please also say, your dog stories are cracking me up!  Never before have I laughed whilst reading a Maxwell topic!  Thank you all!  *laughin'til-I-cry!*

[lawlifelgbt]

My parents' Golden Retriever ate:

1. A few library books as a puppy (well, not ATE, but drooled on and ripped up).

2. My slippers (I used to have slippers that were shaped like teddy bears and had heads on the front of them- she would literally chase my feet around and trip me up trying to chew on them as I walked).

3. Literally, homework. My teacher didn't believe my brother or I until we showed her the pages covered with dog drool.

4. ONE expensive Birkenstock. My mom's colleague from Germany was staying with us and had these lovely expensive leather Birkenstock sandals. He left them by the door with the other shoes, and so the dog liked the smell of leather and feet and chewed through ONE of the straps. Obviously, he couldn't wear that shoe any more, and what would a person do with the one undamaged shoe anyway?

5. My math book, in 10th grade. I hated, hated, hated math at the time. I was off school during a normal school day for a quiz bowl meet, so I came home to do the homework from that day, got my math book from by the fireplace (wraparound stone seat about 2 feet high), and found that the binding was totally torn off and the first 200 pages were torn into tiny shreds! After yelling at the dog, I called my mom, who was a teacher at my school. I was frantic because my math teacher knew I hated math, and so I thought he would make me pay for another book because he would think I wrecked it. Also, I would have to pay for the new book myself as I wasn't supposed to leave books in the dog's reach.

Instead, my mom called my teacher and said, "the dog really DID eat lawlife's book! She does that!" According to mom, the teacher laughed and laughed, and said that I should bring in the shreds to prove it and he would get me another book, no cost. So the next day, I brought the book in a plastic bag to school (it was that shredded). The teacher said to the class "I was wrong, sometimes the dog really DOES eat things!" and put the bag o'shreds on a shelf for "evidence."

Also to echo the feeding dogs/pets comments:

I generally do not feed dogs/cats people food from my hand, except with my parents' dogs, raw carrots or a piece or two of popcorn (carrots are good for teeth, reduce teething discomfort in puppies, and my parent's dog I mentioned in my previous comment LOVED popcorn and would bark when she heard the noise of it cooking).

Otherwise, the general rule for pets for me is don't feed them non-proteins, and not from the table. With my cats, and my parents' dogs, I have only ever fed them cooked meat, such as steak portions people cut off, leftover plain cooked chicken, and so forth, and maybe leftover eggs by themselves (the fats are good for animal coats). No seasonings or extra salt, and only table food in their bowl twice a month, tops.

[Casserole]

My newest dog will kill you over some blueberries, apples, or bananas and yet turn his nose up to chicken jerky. Weird, but an added bonus that he will roll the blueberries around with his nose for an hour's worth of entertainment. 

[Bethella]

When I was little our two dogs (yellow labs) loved veggies. They stared by digging carrots and potatoes out of the garden. As they got bolder about it they would get yelled at more. So they started doing blitz attacks where they would dash into the garden and grab a tomato or green bean, then run away so they wouldn't get caught. Unfortunately they didn't make sure their prize was detached from the plant before running off. By the end of the summer all the tomato and green bean plants had been uprooted and killed. That fall they installed a fence around the garden.

[Granwych]

On ‎2‎/‎12‎/‎2016 at 5:33 AM, WonderingInWA said:

Yes, I my dog always got excited when there were rabbits in the yard.  Not because of the rabbits, but so he could go eat their poop when they left.  Dogs are gross but I love them.

Aha!  So that's why my dog likes muddling under our bunnies'  cage...  another somewhat distasteful tidbit of bunny info I learned was that a rabbit will poop a first time and then eat the feces.   Guess it's Nature's way of really getting almost every bit of nutrition.

[WonderingInWA]

3 hours ago, Granwych said:

Aha!  So that's why my dog likes muddling under our bunnies'  cage...  another somewhat distasteful tidbit of bunny info I learned was that a rabbit will poop a first time and then eat the feces.   Guess it's Nature's way of really getting almost every bit of nutrition.

Guinea pigs do that, too.  Some of their poop is poop and some of it they eat straight from their own butts, somehow knowing which ones are turds and which ones they need to recycle as nutrition.  So gross.  My dog always felt so lucky when he could find a stray turd from our two guinea pigs, too!

[mango_fandango]

3 hours ago, Granwych said:

Aha!  So that's why my dog likes muddling under our bunnies'  cage...  another somewhat distasteful tidbit of bunny info I learned was that a rabbit will poop a first time and then eat the feces.   Guess it's Nature's way of really getting almost every bit of nutrition.

That's coprophagy. Guinea pigs do it too. Rabbits and guineas can't absorb everything in their digestive tracts, so they do eat their poop sometimes. It's soft poop as opposed to the harder poops they leave.

[Granwych]

Years ago, my female lab used to eat poop, too.  I bought a product from the vet that I mixed with her food and it made her feces not so palatable.  The vet said that it's common for female dogs to eat feces; a breeding bitch will eat everything her pups put out for awhile.

[Hane]

On February 7, 2016 at 9:54 PM, PennySycamore said:

As  my genetics professor said, if you just left the mating up to the dogs within about 5 generations all dogs would be 35 pound brown dogs.  Not all pure breds are puppy mill dogs; there are responsible breeders.  I've loved all the dogs we've had from the pure breds, the rescues (some of whom have been pure bred and some not)  and the Heinz 57s.

My first pup came from what some purists malign as a "backyard breeder." This family had five healthy Pekes, which got more love, care, and attention than many human children do. The house was so immaculate (these all were "indoor" dogs) that you'd never guess a pet had ever set foot in it. I was able to meet my pup's parents to gauge her probable temperament. All of the dogs had AKC papers and were healthy, except for one that was blind and had thus been spayed.

 This was the perfect first-dog situation for an inexperienced person like me.

[PennySycamore]

1 hour ago, Hane said:

My first pup came from what some purists malign as a "backyard breeder." This family had five healthy Pekes, which got more love, care, and attention than many human children do. The house was so immaculate (these all were "indoor" dogs) that you'd never guess a pet had ever set foot in it. I was able to meet my pup's parents to gauge her probable temperament. All of the dogs had AKC papers and were healthy, except for one that was blind and had thus been spayed.

 This was the perfect first-dog situation for an inexperienced person like me.

My first several dachshunds came from someone who would probably now be considered a backyard breeder.  She was a woman that went to my parent's church and bred dachshunds. She had a litter of pups for sale in the summer of '68 so I got my first, Gretchen.  A few years later, my folks got Hildegarde from her and then Hilde was bred to one of Mrs Ward's doxies and had Missy.  As far as I know, Mrs Ward's dogs were well taken care of.  I have a dachshund currently, but she's a rescue from a hoarder.

[Black Aliss]

4 hours ago, Hane said:

My first pup came from what some purists malign as a "backyard breeder." This family had five healthy Pekes, which got more love, care, and attention than many human children do. The house was so immaculate (these all were "indoor" dogs) that you'd never guess a pet had ever set foot in it. I was able to meet my pup's parents to gauge her probable temperament. All of the dogs had AKC papers and were healthy, except for one that was blind and had thus been spayed.

 This was the perfect first-dog situation for an inexperienced person like me.

I'm not sure how raising litters in a family environment is synonymous with "backyard breeder". Most professional breeders (read: not puppy mills) raise their puppies the same way you describe. My definition of a backyard breeder is someone who has a (usually) purebred dog he or she loves, and breeds it to another dog of the same type but without any consideration toward improving the breed, meaning they have not done genetic testing, OFA or PennHip, and CERF registration, and brucellosis screening on their dog, and don't require that of their stud. Typically they also do not screen their buyers, nor do they require that the new owner spay or neuter unless they plan to show. Unfortunately AKC doesn't really care about any of that.

I'm not saying those dogs can't be wonderful companions, just that amateur breeders who don't do the things I mentioned are responsible for producing a lot of dogs with health problems, making it nearly impossible to find healthy versions of some breeds.

To return to the topic, that photo of Ellie sacked out on Sarah's shoulder is probably  the sweetest thing I've ever seen on the Maxwell blog.

[treehugger]

Honestly, that Ellie looks spoiled, loved and happy.  And Sarah looks so happy - I'm happy for her.  I am dying over the cuteness of all these adorable puppy posts. 

[Sweet Fellowship]

It's good to see Sarah looking genuinely happy in these photos. As someone else mentioned in the plane trip thread, her smile now reaches her eyes. I would love for Sarah to be able to get out of Maxhell and live her own life, but her having her own fluffy companion is a step.

[Foudeb]

She's holding Ellie the same way she'd be holding a baby in that picture.

It's good to see her happy.

[Howl]

On 2/11/2016 at 5:12 AM, mango_fandango said:

 He also LOVES to lick butter wrappers clean. 

Well, who doesn't?

 

ETA:  

@Black Aliss.... meaning they have not done genetic testing, OFA or PennHip, and CERF registration, and brucellosis screening on their dog.....

I had NO idea that brucellosis occurred in dogs or in any animal except cattle!    Now I know:  akc.org/learn/akc-gazette/brucellosis-dog-breeders-shouldnt-skip-testing-for-this-dangerous-disease/

Brucellosis in dogs is transmissible to humans.  

[blessalessi]

On 15/02/2016 at 10:03 AM, Sweet Fellowship said:

It's good to see Sarah looking genuinely happy in these photos. As someone else mentioned in the plane trip thread, her smile now reaches her eyes. I would love for Sarah to be able to get out of Maxhell and live her own life, but her having her own fluffy companion is a step.

I am very happy to have been totally wrong about this one.  Sarah looks fantastic lately and her posts now are a far cry from that awful one in the archives where she was made to confess to her ungratefulness. I am sure she would still vote to have my healthcare and my uterus-related choices whisked away in a heartbeat, but still... puppy steps are still good.

I love that she is being frivolous and posting almost like a teenager, with the too-many-photos of her puppy and the different coloured fonts for her happy words. She had to grow up far too young and I am so glad for her now that she seems to be enjoying life, even (and probably because she is) without a headship. 

Fuck you, Steve, and Run, Sarah, Run!