Mike’s Doghouse

Wow, it’s been six months since I posted anything here.

Mike is now 1 yr 5 mos old. He hasn’t grown much and is still a maniac. But I like that attribute!

My broken leg took forever to heal and now winter has decided to enter with a bang (see links below). We constructed a new dog ramp out back (see links below for that, too).

I’ve continued to do small things with Mike such as “what have you got”, “let me have it”, as well as all the basics we learned in dog class. He’s really good with “wait” although the more excited he is, the harder for me and him. Mike’s also had to learn to live with a kitten which has been a test for all of us.

I plan on getting back to serious work with Mike this week. It is going to be warmer (above freezing for the first time in weeks!) which will mean less pain and more patience for me. My plan is to start with the basics (sit, down, stay, wait, etc) and re-establish communication between us.

If all goes according to plan, I’ll be updating here again with his progress. He goes to the vet for his yearly checkup soon so I’ll have his weight to tell you!

Linkages: (links listed in chronological order)

Snow posts over on my blog:
(basically, it snowed 14-20″ and we were out of power for nearly 5 days)

First Snow
First Snow cont.
First Snow Part 3

Dog ramp building is not for wimps!!
(you can also view all of these in one lump but they are in reverse order: tag – construction)

House Projects: Wash and Ramp
House Projects: Square
House Projects: Angles
House Projects: Planking!
House Projects: Finishing
House Projects: Enjoying

It seems as though every time Mike and I get ready to start service dog specific training, something happens. He hurt his leg then Joella needed surgery on one of hers, and now I’ve broken one of my own! Will the fun never end?

At any rate, we are working with Mike on stopping his biting. He doesn’t hurt very often but will grab a shirt sleeve or pants leg and get skin, too. We are doing the “ouch!” and turning our back. I don’t allow the rough play anymore, either, which is hard for both of us to give up.

His scent-marking behavior is all but gone. He still marks Jo’s raised feeder every few days and recently found a new spot in the hall way after some things were moved around. Do I trust him to not hike a leg in public? Not yet, because we’ve not had a chance to get out there yet, dammit!

As we play, I use cues like “let me have it” and “get it” and others, getting him used to those terms. He releases an object easily which is a good sign.

Let’s see, what else? He’s going through a growth spurt but I don’t think he will be a big dog afterall. The last time we were at the vet’s, he still wasn’t 50lbs yet. If he reaches 70, I’ll be surprised. He’s a tall boy, just not filled out at all.

Oh, as for his hip injury, it was all soft-tissue like a strain or sprain. He had x-rays taken which were evaluated by an orthopedic vet who said all was great! Joella’s recovering slowly from her surgery. She has arthritis fairly bad in her back legs and we’ve started pain management now. Some days she is a puppy, other days she doesn’t want to move. I can understand that.

Mike started marking in the house two weeks before he was neutered. He marked everywhere. The living room, bedroom, bathroom, etc. He marked a lot of things such as the bedpost, the wall, the recliner, Lorna’s bathroom towel (that about got the boy killed). The weirdest thing he marked was Sam and Joella’s raised food-bowl stands.

I asked a positive training list I am on for advice on how to get him to stop. I’d like to mention the ones that seemed to work.

- We limited (again) where he had unsupervised access. The gates in the living room went back up for several days. He stopped marking in the living room and because of various other stuff, I moved the gate that kept him from the rest of the house. We kept the bedroom blocked and the hallway to the bathroom blocked but he (and the others) had access to the outside, the kitchen, and the Cat Room (the room between the living room and the kitchen).

- We were cleaning up the marking with the vinegar and water spray just like we had been his peeing. I was advised to change that routine slightly. The idea for peeing is to put the dog outside or elsewhere so they can’t see you clean it up (I think the idea behind it is so they don’t think you are Mama cleaning the den and that it’s okay to continue). But for the marking, it was suggested I let him see me cleaning it up and to increase the vinegar amount in the spray bottle. Basically, I was showing him I could mark, too. After about 3 days of this, I started seeing Mike back up when he saw the bottle come out. He watched me spray his spots and would run out of the house. I didn’t fuss at him while I cleaned it, but I did talk to him about it. I told him I didn’t like it and marking inside the house was not acceptable. He could mark all he wanted outdoors, but not indoors. This “conversational discussion” worked on Sparky, a Norwegian Elkhound we had. Yelling did no good. But put your hands on your hips and talk to him? He’d hit the floor and act all repentant. I think this is going to work with Mike, too.

- It was also suggested to take him for short walks and praise like mad when he hiked his leg to urinate and/or mark. This is to put a cue word for hiking his leg. We decided to not use another cue word but continue to use “HURRY UP” which is what we used during his house training. We took him out on the leash for a few days again, reinforcing the HURRY UP and him hiking his leg. He never marked when out on the leash but we did catch him marking in the dog lot so we praised him then. For reference, marking is when they urinate just a small amount, usually in several places vs emptying the bladder in one long pee in one place.

Mike now only regularly marks indoors in one place: Joella’s raised food-bowl stand. We’ve moved it, thinking he was really marking the cabinet where it sat. Nope, he’s marking the stand. We’ve started spraying it down until it is soaked and removing Joella’s bowl from it after she is finished eating. No clue as to why he is doing that. Sometimes he will mark Sam’s stand and sometimes he will mark on the front of the dishwasher. We think he does the dishwasher because of Callie, our ancient cat who has decided litter boxes are not for her. He marks the back porch but as I spray those down, the location is moving further and further away from the door.

I also received two pieces of advice that I chose to reject.

- One was that Mike should be considered a “wash out” as a Service Dog. I see the point to it but I wanted to try and fix it, not be told to forget it. That male marking is often not un-learned and with Mike going into public areas, marking behavior is not acceptable. I agree to that last part but not to anything else. Mike is just 8 mos old. His house training was delayed due to his bladder issue. He is so smart that if I just could figure out how to train him out of it, then he and I could get beyond it. If the marking does not stop or if when I start taking him out in public he start marking there, then I will reconsider using him as a Service Dog.

- The other advice was to use a belly band or a diaper on him. The idea was that he would associate the nasty wet on his penis and stop marking. But I don’t consider this positive training. And I don’t think he would have made the connection between the wet diaper and the marking. Then there’s the increased risk of infections and skin irritations. I can see their purpose for older dogs who have lost bladder control. But I don’t see their purpose on an 8 mos old pup he has figured out he’s a male.

I’ve decided to drop out of the Basic Manners II class. Primarily because it requires more physical movement than I can do and I’m not sure I can keep up with the class in my chair. Instead, Mike and I will be taking private lessons from Gail, one of the instructors. I hope to take one class every two weeks. This will give me more time to do the training w/out over-taxing my body.

I think Mike is missing training. We put home training aside for a few weeks so I could concentrate on Joella (who is doing great). I had it in mind to start things up again this weekend. I woke up two mornings ago and couldn’t move my head. I can now turn it more but not much. So poor Mike is back in a holding pattern again.

Mike got neutered today. At 8 mos, it’s the longest we have ever waited to get a dog spayed/neutered. We (and the vet) wanted to wait to see how his bladder was doing. While I won’t bet the farm that Mike is 100% house trained, I do feel his bladder problems are slowing resolving to the point that if he has to go, he has enough time to take himself outside.

Mike wasn’t allowed breakfast this morning. He was in his sleeping crate (which is on the floor on my side of the bed) and was quite irritated. We call him Mr. Squeaky for a reason and boy was he squeaking! He has a nice, deep bark but he still has that high pitched “HEY! You! The one with the thumbs!” kind of noise.

Anyway, I’m going soon to pick him up. We had it done at the vet’s office vs Humane Alliance, a low-cost spay/neuter clinic. The vet wanted to take x-rays of his hips while he was asleep (no official word yet on the hip x-ray results). The cost will be staggering, I’m sure. But Mike is worth it.

We’ve taken almost all of our other critters (an ‘off the top of my head’ count came to 7) to Humane Alliance for spay/neuters. We’ve never had a complication. In visiting their website today, I found their statistics page. Some interesting numbers!

And, no, I am not going to get Mike fitted for neuticles.

Mike’s not been limping since the day after the vet. He sometimes seems to be walking weird, but no limp. We’ve noticed he is growing again, this time starting to fill out in places, like his face. That’s what I like about mutts. Some days they look like one breed, the next day they look like another. Mike’s face seems to change between German Shepherd and Rottweiler. There’s no telling which way it will finally settle although I’m thinking it will be somewhere in the middle. A Rottie with stand up ears, probably. Or a GSD with a short Rottie muzzle.

Speaking of Rotties, Joella is doing good. She’s limping slightly but that’s to be expected.

Maybe Mike is having sympathy pains. They both have injured right legs.

Mike is doing great with training. There are only a few issues such as Loose Leash Walking but even that is getting better. We started Basic Manners II classes last week (then had to skip the second class last night). That class is going to be quite intensive. I’m going to have to do most of it from my chair which will be interesting.

Mike’s DOWN is great! His SIT is solid although on a slick floor, or if we remain in one place too long, he will slide down. His WAIT is good but the length of the WAIT is short. He will remain still most of the time while I move around him but he will almost always get up when I move behind him. His RECALL is excellent, too. I use two different terms for RECALL. One is his name repeated in a friendly, playful, high pitched voice (Mikeymikeymikeymikey!). The other is the usual ‘Mike, Come’ and is done in a deeper, more authoritative voice. He responds to both the same. He comes charging from wherever he was, full speed.

I’ve started switching away from the clicker and more to a voice cue (Yes!). When I use the chair, it is too difficult to maneuver the chair, hold his leash, watch where I am going, and click the clicker. He responds just fine to Yes! as long as I have a treat. He’s not too sure about it if there’s no treat involved. He is very food motivated but I think he will not be too difficult to wean away from that. But I also know I will have to keep treats with me at all times for quite a while.

The one improvement I’ve seen is he is calming down in new situations. I can put him in a DOWN and he will stay there. He’s even flopped over onto his side if I remain in one place long enough. We will be going to different places and getting him used to being calm while at my side. I will have to restrict him getting pets. With Joella, it didn’t interfere with her learning or working. But with Mike, I think it will. I think with him, wearing the cape is going to be a big signal for him. Jo is the same no matter where she is (especially once she matured). But Mike will need that cape to signal it is working time vs “the world loves me and must pet me” time.

I took Mike to the vet today. Yesterday, while we were gone, he did something to his back right leg. He wasn’t bearing any weight on it at first, then slowly was using it at times, mostly when standing still. He was uncomfortable but we were certain it wasn’t a break. He let me manipulate the foot and ankle/hock but wasn’t thrilled when I extended his hip. This morning he was bearing weight on it almost all the time but he walked like he was sitting on the saddle too long. So off to the vet we went.

He let Dr. K manipulate the hip although he didn’t like it. He didn’t cry out so we both agreed it wasn’t a break (such as a “green stick” fracture). She feels it might be a soft tissue (muscle/tendon) injury. We also decided it was time to neuter him so next Thursday (7th) he will get that done finally. While he is out, they’ll do x-rays on his hips and that knee. He is too young to diagnose hip dysplasia but there is a slight chance there may be something else structurally wrong. The chance is very slight but since this is the third or so time he has injured that same leg, we are doing the x-rays just to make sure. If nothing else, we have a baseline set of images for later.

Mike and I will have to miss the second class of Basic Manners II tonight, dangit.

Oh, and just so you don’t think I was mean for not taking him to the emergency clinic last night: if a dog will put weight on a leg, it usually isn’t broken. Sometimes they will for a greenstick fracture, but not often. When we first saw he wasn’t bearing weight at all, we touched him all over and watched him walk while discussing the time and where we could take him. He began putting weight on the leg when standing still and we decided to wait and see. The emergency clinic here is ghastly expensive and I knew I could at the worst drop Mike off this morning for our vet to check when they could. We examined him later again after everything had calmed down. Again, we felt he had pulled a muscle or sprained something. If he had been walking fine this morning, I probably wouldn’t have taken him in but with that odd, saddle sore like walk he had, we decided it would be best to have him checked.

Mike is making the switch from Puppy Food to Big Boy Food. Now that he is (ack!) almost 8 mos, it was time to put him on adult food. He was eating Wellness Just For Puppy and as soon as that bag is empty, he’ll start Wellness Super 5 Mix adult. Our other dogs eat Taste of the Wild. (I discussed protein amounts in another post)

I read a wonderfully well written blog by a vet. Dolittler is wonderful in that it is candid, honest, and revealing both personally and professionally. Sometimes the posts are painful (euthanasia) other times they are a hoot (hen turned out to be a rooster). Today’s post, titled Counting calories in fat dog weight loss and the role of “intelligence”, brings up this delicate subject of calories and pets. We humans don’t often consider calories when it comes to our pets. We gleefully dole out the kibble and assume it is all well and good. Some of us read the labels to find out how much to feed, most don’t.

I admit it: We’ve never paid much attention to the calories. One, they are hard to find on the bags. Two, if a dog gets chunky, we feed less until it’s not so chunky, then maintain that feeding amount. This means one dog will get two full scoops, another may get one and another scoop with a wee bit off the top (yeah, we are oh so precision oriented). Jake, our Damnation Dalmatian, had a big weight problem. She could visibly gain weight just from one treat too many that week. It took us a while to figure out her base amount of food then could add or subtract from that depending on what else was going on. We also raise everyone’s food amount in the summer (more active) and lower it in the winter (slug-o-rama). If Lorna and Sam are going on a hike, we feed him a little more at both meals and she takes high quality treats along.

But how much calories does a dog need? Dolittler gives the following equation (bolding of text is my doing):

Base calories/day (resting energy requirement) =
30 x (your dog’s weight in kg) + 70

Example: So if you have a 10 kg (22 pound) dog, he needs to eat 370 calories a day.

Since this is based on adult dogs, I’ll use Joella as my example. Jo is about 80 lbs. Using my little converter program, that’s equal to 36.28739 kg. Then, using my little calculator program, that means she needs about 1159 calories per day.

But then it gets a little more complicated. That’s because the “resting energy requirement” is only a measure of the amount of energy (in calories) he needs to keep his basic functions going comfortably. So if he’s a busy dog who runs around a lot in your big yard, he’ll need a lot more. And if he’s a neutered couch potato who’s seriously obese he may need no more than his basic bodily functions require to actually lose some weight.

Joella’s not overly active but she’s not a slug either. I went and got out the empty bags (we stuff them into one then take it out when that bag is full) and made notes of the amounts to feed and the calories.

Jo’s weight tends to waver between 78 and 83 so we’ll go by the “60 – 80 lbs” recommendations. She gets two meals a day, 3 scoops each. Our scoop is .5 cup so she gets 3 cups a day. She’s getting the low end of the required amount (Taste of the Wild’s High Prairie = 1110) which comes in just under the calculated amount for her resting energy requirement. Not bad! Since she is recovering from her leg surgery and will be a slug-puppy for a few weeks, I now know I don’t need to cut back on her food any to keep her weight steady. I also know that we’ll need to watch her treat intake during this.

Back to Mike. I’m going to guess he is about 45 lbs which is 20.41166 kg. Times that by 30 and add 70 and he should be getting about 682 calories per day IF he were an adult. The Wellness Adult says to add 25% for pups which puts it at about the right amount using Dolittler’s equation but still low going by their feeding chart of the puppy food. What this tells me is that when we do the switch, we’ll need to make sure he is getting enough calories. Currently, he’s sleek, maybe a little on the thin side, but with growing full breed pups, that can change at any given moment. On the surface, the Wellness Adult food has a weird calorie amount. But using Joella again, her 3 cups is on the upper end of the amount for her weight group so it evens out.

If you’ve followed along, you know that Mike is to be trained to be a Service Dog. He is to “replace” Joella, my current SD who is 8.5 yrs old. Joella is having some difficulty with her back legs and Tuesday (April 21st) she will be having surgery on one of her ankles.

Since Joella will be needing all of my mental attention, Mike’s SD training is on hold for a few weeks. It is Spring and he is happy to be outside playing right now so it will all work out. Starting over won’t bother either of us in the least. He and I start Basic Manners II the day we bring Jo home so we’ll still be working on that.

We’re thrilled Joella won’t be needing the more extensive knee surgery we all thought she’d have. We were concerned we’d not be able to keep Mike calm around her. He likes to sit on Jo which would not have been a good idea. Even with this surgery, we’ll still be keeping him quiet, but not as much as with the other surgery. It may be a good chance to work on SPOT outside of the kitchen, eh?