Ours has just learned stairs after 2 years. We were trying for a while and progressing slowly. Then we were babysitting for another greyhound that could do stairs and it suddenly became much more important to our guy when everyone was upstairs but him. Then he figured it out for himself in about a day. Still have to lift his hind end up into the car though.
I agree about them being very well socialized w/ other dogs. I do notice that they are more interested in other greyhounds than other dogs.
<font color="blue"> Though police K-9's are typically owned by the department, they are usually permitted to retire with their handler's family, since that has been home to them for so long anyway. I can conceive of certain circumstances where one might end up in a shelter, but there is a strong sense of support in that community. </font color>
Hi Hank,
Here is the link to Major's story. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img]
sure thing! lets just see if i can get this to work.
its just a quick pic i took a min. ago of her about to chase one of wild cats we have in the field behind the house. she is a smaller dog almost the size of a whitppet. she generally weighs in at 27 pounds but is a little chunky right now....so we are going to work on this.
kokopelli, It's interesting how so many of the Japanese breeds have curled tails. I guess that's to keep things ON the coffee table. Good looking dog, I had never heard of one before.
I heard the same thing about Greyhounds, too. About being trained not to sit and not knowing common house behavior. I think a mojor part of placing these dogs is just getting them used to stairs, house noises and such. It seems like all sighthounds are couch potatos at heart, once they have had their daily requirement of exercise. My ridgeback will walk the room I am in looking for where the sun is hitting the carpet just right and curl up. If I go to another room he will follow and do the same thing. This isn't saying that he isn't "wound" at times, but he definitely enjoys his basking time.
Here's he is with my Presa shortly after I moved into my new house last Feb. Notice the close proximity to the heat register [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]
We had a part whippet up until 1999. unfortunately we lost her to cancer at 6 years old. She was the fastest thing on 4 legs I have ever personnaly seen. even the brazen chipmunks feared and respected her.
If you threw a frisbee for Shadow and she lost sight of it she would run up to the hill to look for the frisbee. The lab, if she lost the ball or frisbee would put her nose down and make smaller concentric circles until she found it.
I always found the contrast between the two interesting. the chipmunks know the difference as well. They give the lab and our retriever fits darting back and forth right in front of them.
all of the spitz type or ancient breeds have the double curled tail. that would be the shikoku, the shiba, the akita, the kia, and the hokaido dogs. so i guess thats five. there are four more japanes breeds that are considered national shrines....let me think...the tosa inu, the japansese spaniel, um i cant think of the rest but i will look them up as soon as possible and try to translate them again.
my dog is most def. a couch potato! in fact she has 3 beds that she puts directly in the sun and lounges!
<font color="blue"> Here is the link to Major's story. </font color>
Unfortunately, just being associated with dogs professionally (such as a K-9 officer) does not automatically make you good person. There are circumstances where officers become K-9 handlers for the wrong reasons, and this is obiviously one of them. A very sad story.
My fiance has three greyhounds and a Rotty (she was brought in last, as a 6 month old). It was several months before the hounds decided to 'see her' and play with her. Before that they just ignored her. That rotty never gave up though; kept trying to play with them and tussle with them. Good thing because the rotty is now number one. But the hounds are nice, easy going dogs. Her two oldest are from a track in CT, they are going on 14 years.