How old is your dog?

Here's an interesting chart showing how to translate your dogs age into the equivalent human age. It varies by the dog's size, although all sizes are pretty much the same when they are young. (Note that Daily Dog Lick has not verified the accuracy of this chart.)

Pick up after your dog - or else!

Here at Daily Dog Lick, we think it is a serious offense to leave dog waste where the dog left it. It's rude, polluting and makes people less receptive to our furry friends. I love the solution this city has come up with - a DNA database so that dog guardians can be rewarded for picking up and punished for leaving it be. I hope it catches on and other cities follow suit (including my own city!).

An uplifting puppy story

Having a tough week? This story may be a shot in the arm to get you through. I know it made me smile!

Get ready to say "Awwww........." Here is a really cute and uplifting video telling about the Puppies Behind Bars program. Prison inmates raise puppies from 8 weeks of age so that the pups can go on to become service dogs and working dogs. The inmates complete a rigorous application process and agree to put the puppy's needs first 24/7 for the next 1-2 years.

There's a lot to like here. The inmates benefit in many ways, but it is also a cost effective way to train the puppies - imagine if all the training was done through professional trainers! I also like that the program uses volunteers to expose the puppies to outside stimulation during their training. In a win-win situation, the volunteers take the puppies to visit shut in elderly persons and people in hospitals. The puppies get much-needed experience and people benefit from the visit.

Take a few minutes and browse the site, including the video on the "about" page (link above) and come away feeling good.

A doggy shower curtain

No, it's not for modest pups.... it's for people who have gotten soaked head to toe during bath time and shake off.

I am always amazed at the ideas people have.

http://www.helpemwash.com/pet.html

(Note that Daily Dog Lick has not tried this product and this post is not an endorsement.)

Labs serving in Iraq

Here is a sweet story about two black labs Boe and Budge giving comfort to soldiers in Iraq. Both dogs have been giving the rank of Sergeant First Class. The soldiers' experience with the dogs just confirms what any dog guardian can tell you - dogs make you feel good!

A dog who will clean your screen

Click here to see a dog willing to clean your screen.

Daily Dog Lick is up at flickr.com

Check out our photos with more being added all the time (user name: dailydoglick). We're looking to join some groups and connect with other dogs and their people, so we'll see you over there!

Looks like fun!

Sometimes, I want to be a dog.

See video here.

Shake it off

Here is a funny video of a dog shaking off water shown in slow motion. It is really quite amazing to watch. I can't imagine how he is able to move all those body parts separately. I imagine he couldn't do it if he thought too much about it.

A website for well-traveled dogs

Danny made good use of dogfriendly.com when we took him across the country from Los Angeles to Pennsylvania and back on a 3-week road trip. Dogfriendly.com is a city-by-city resource that lists dog friendly places such as hotels, parks, hiking trails, public spaces, pet stores, and restaurants. We were surprised at how easy it was to plan on the fly with our 72-pound dog. As long as we had a web connection, it was easy to find places to stay.

Here is Danny sleeping in the car on one of the many long rides. He was a trooper!

Xylitol is not for dogs!

Here is an article detailing the dangers of Xylitol, a non-sugar sweetener used in all sorts of products from food to mouthwash. Make sure your pups don't have any!

Dog saves person by dialing 911

Amazing! This service dog had been trained to call 911 in the event his person has a seizure. The police tagged the person's phone number with a not saying that a call from a barking dog needs an emergency response.

See the story here.

The world's biggest dog

Gibson holds the record for being the world's biggest dog. He even has his own website!

An injured dog takes himself to the vet

Smart doggie! I often wonder where my two pups would go if they got loose.

Dog goes to vet

Calvin is a jumper

One more thing about Calvin - he is a jumper! We are in the process of raising the fence height around the yard since in some places it is only 5 feet, which he could clearly scale! In this video, he and Danny are in pursuit of a squirrel or other invader in the trees.

Introducing Calvin

I've already introduced Danny, he of the amazing tongue and amazing recovery. Now it's time to introduce Calvin, Danny's fearless little brother. Calvin is also an adoption from the city shelter. We are big believers in adoption and love mutts, so when we found sweet little Calvin we thought he was just a great little mutt. After loving him for a few months, a woman stopped me on the street and asked if he was a Toller.

A what?

A Nova Scotia Duck-Tolling Retriever.

And yes, he is, we think.

He looks just like the breed and displays a lot of behaviors that are typical of the breed. What is so ironic about this is that we went to the city shelter to get a mutt and we end up with not only a (probable) purebred, but he's some rare breed nobody has heard of! How did a cold-weather duck hunting dog end up in the shelter in Los Angeles?

Calvin makes sure that any humans or dogs he comes in contact with get their daily dog lick. He likes to give full-face tongue facials to other dogs. He'll lick whatever human skin he can get to, but his preferences are quite clearly ranked as follows:

lips
face and under chin
all other skin

The thing is, he is sneaky! Maybe stealth has been bred into him for hunting purposes. You can be petting him and he's being super sweet and soaking it up and then AACK! you feel a tongue right on your lips. He gets me every so often when I bend down to serve his dinner bowl. He's not fixated on the food so much as those luscious human lips just begging for a doggy kiss! We warn people that try to pet him, that yes, he's friendly, but he will lick you!

Here's Calvin, ready to charge at Danny:




Here he is on the floor of the car.




Don't let their angelic sleeping forms fool you!




Update 9/18/08: Danny and Calvin now have their pictures up on flickr.com under username dailydoglick.

Tattooed Bikers, a Dog's Best Friends

Here is a great article in the New York Times on a group of tattooed bikers who rescue animals. (Found via Dawnwatch alert).

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/nyregion/thecity/24pet.html

Danny's amazing recovery

In my last post, I introduced our dog Danny and his unusual tongue. Today, I will tell you about his recovery from a dog that could barely walk (and couldn't at times) to a normal, although slightly uncoordinated, dog.

We adopted Danny in March 2007 from the city shelter at age approximately 8.5 months. He was found stray on the street and appeared to be in good health. Pretty quickly, we realized something was wrong. He was a large breed puppy, and we expected him to be high energy and excited. Instead, we got a dog that was exhausted after just a 20-minute, very slow walk. He'd barely make it home and then lay on the floor and pant and sleep for hours. He also stumbled on his front legs and his back legs seemed shaky.

His condition worsened quickly to where he could barely walk. We purchased a back harness from Two Hands, Four Paws where we took him for some physical therapy. I was at my wit's end at what to do with him. I used to load him in the car and drive him around just so he (and I) could get out. Since he couldn't play normally, I would sit on the floor with him and just put various toys in and out of his mouth. One Saturday, I spent all day trying to find a doggie stroller and we ended up going to Home Depot at 10:00 p.m. to get a garden wagon. Surprisingly, he took to it easily and we were able to use it for longer walks.

Here we are on a walk checking out a fountain. He isn't wearing his back harness. We would start out with him walking while we pulled the wagon, and we trained him to put his head in the wagon when he was ready to be put in it.




It's funny to me how naturally he took to something so unnatural as riding in a wagon. You can tell by the picture how calm he is - his head is down and his body is completely at rest.

Here he is in the wagon wearing his back harness. It was such a lifesaver for all the many times a day I had to lift him from a laying down position to a standing one. There were times when I carried him in my arms to the curb and held him up by his front and back harnesses so he could go to the bathroom. Note the tongue sticking out.



In spite of his health issues, Danny was always a playful dog. Even when he could barely walk and needed help to stand up, he still wanted to go to the dog park. I would roll him into the park, lift him out and lay him on the ground where he would swat at other dogs with his paws or playfully mouth them when they played back. Most dogs were great with him - after getting used to his differentness, most of them just adapted their play style to him without ever being told to. My husband and I also received tremendous kindness from other people.

So what happened? Danny was diagnosed with a congenital nerve disorder whereby he has a low number of a certain type of nerve cells and there was also inflammation of unknown cause in his spine. There is no name or information about this condition so the canine neurologist (yeah, there is such a thing) was not able to give us any treatment options or prognosis. What she did suggest is that we try an anti-inflammatory which we started around June of 2007.

Danny steadily improved until he was pretty much normal. He's been healthy since last fall. We don't know if it was the medication or just a natural recovery since he was already a little better by the time we started the medication. He may have been malnourished or under-exercised as a puppy which caused some developmental issues. We will probably never know, but what matters is that we have a healthy dog now.