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The Backstory of Our Dogs

fluffypoptarts

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tka

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I love hearing about your pack! One of my family's dogs was an ex-puppy farm breeding girl and even less used to humans - racing greyhounds are at least handled. Living in a house with humans was utterly alien to her. She's never been a resource guarder but was just incredibly twitchy and scared. She's calmed down a lot but I do talk to her and tell her what I'm doing so as not to startle her.

One of my colleagues has an Italian Greyhound and I ran into her yesterday (while she was being borrowed by another colleague). She's a total charmer. We had some very enthusiastic cuddles and butt scratches and whole body wriggles. Like your guy, she definitely believes that her rightful place is on someone's lap.
 

fashionfobie

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I am sorry fireworks are bothering some doggos. My friend lives in Michigan and her Corgi hates this time of year. Very sad boy, thinks the world is ending :(

I am glad most of your dogs are handling it super well!
 

fluffypoptarts

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I love hearing about your pack! One of my family's dogs was an ex-puppy farm breeding girl and even less used to humans - racing greyhounds are at least handled. Living in a house with humans was utterly alien to her. She's never been a resource guarder but was just incredibly twitchy and scared. She's calmed down a lot but I do talk to her and tell her what I'm doing so as not to startle her.
I’m glad! I love talking about them and sharing the love with all of you. The brood mamas are so sad! :( My girl wasn’t a brood mama, but she’s very skittish and will cry and flinch from any sudden movements, so I am familiar somewhat with that fearfulness. I’m glad you’re so compassionate and gentle towards her.

One of my colleagues has an Italian Greyhound and I ran into her yesterday (while she was being borrowed by another colleague). She's a total charmer. We had some very enthusiastic cuddles and butt scratches and whole body wriggles. Like your guy, she definitely believes that her rightful place is on someone's lap.
Hahaha, they’re very charming and cute! The lap-stealing is definitely a characteristic that most if not all Italian greyhounds share. My wife was just fussing at me earlier because he was sitting on my side with his head in my lap and not between us, lol. So she relocated the poor little thing and he had to re-tuck himself! I wake up in the night to find his head on my shoulder or his little swan neck stretched out across my chest.

Sadly, they are not so easy to find! We’ll have to start looking a while in advance when we’re ready for another iggy.
 
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fluffypoptarts

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I am sorry fireworks are bothering some doggos. My friend lives in Michigan and her Corgi hates this time of year. Very sad boy, thinks the world is ending :(

I am glad most of your dogs are handling it super well!
Thank you...tonight it is bad as it stormed badly earlier, and then when it stopped, people started setting off fireworks like crazy. :angry: I had to give JJ his medication so he could stop shaking in terror. We set up his fort for him against the couch so he could both be close to us and hide. Now my wife is with the dogs and I am with the birds. Birds usually take it well, but they are a little unsettled by the loudness and frequency of the fireworks.

Fireworks are terrible for so many reasons and I wish they’d be banned everywhere forever.
 

fluffypoptarts

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Sweet old man...not sure how long he’s going to stay on this earth with us, but we’re hoping he hangs around at least another couple years.

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Ankou

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What a sweetheart, any idea how old he is or completely unknown due to his horrible past?
I hope you have lots of time left with him and his treatment before you adopted him hasn't impacted his longterm health.
 

fluffypoptarts

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What a sweetheart, any idea how old he is or completely unknown due to his horrible past?
I hope you have lots of time left with him and his treatment before you adopted him hasn't impacted his longterm health.
Even in the Canidrome, they kept track of some things, so we do have that information. We know that he’s 10 now and that he was there for most of his life. (We think the only reason he lived to be 9 at the Canidrome was because he was being used for their breeding program.) He’ll be 11 in November. Greyhounds that don’t get osteo can live to be anywhere from 12-15, but since he’s had such a hard life, we’re not sure he’ll get to be that old. But hopefully he’ll surprise us.

Thank you...he really is so sweet. I tried to make him more comfortable by having the wife lay him flat (his position seemed to make his breathing more labored), but he squidged right back over to lay on me. :heart:
 

fluffypoptarts

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@Ankou We know both of our Canidrome boys were originally from Australia. We know their litters and birthdates as well thanks to noted parentage, etc.

Sai, our brindle, was never even named. He was sent to China as “unnamed” male brindle pup. That broke our hearts. Sent to hell on earth and condemned to die terribly at some point without even a name given to him. We look into his beautiful, expressive eyes and wonder...did no one love this dog at all? This friendly, sweet, funny dog? How? It’s mind-boggling.

Senny’s litter was all named, and there were two black males with minimal history from his litter. Therefore we’re not sure what his name was before he was sent to China, though we suspect which pup it was (Magic Eyes). Again, how does any human being send such a sweet baby to such a terrible life and fate?

Of course, their old names don’t much matter, but we like to know everything we can about them.
 

fluffypoptarts

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I have been remiss - it looks like I did not post Princess Bunny Heart’s “glamor” shot! :D She says the slight greying of her muzzle just marks her as a lady of distinction. :twirl:

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fluffypoptarts

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This morning I was just getting ready to let the dogs out (as I do right before I leave for work), and then I heard it - a torrential downpour unleashed. I looked at them, and they looked at me - and then half of them made a break for the safety of the couch, including the littlest one. “Nooo, come on, guys, come on!” I urged them as I went out on the porch. Half of the greyhounds milled before deciding to come. The tiny one looked back over his shoulder as he trotted in the opposite direction. I pointed to the ground in front of me and demanded, “Come back here, you little weasel!” He reluctantly complied and I was able to get most of them out the door.

I went outside with them and stood patiently under the eaves, waiting for them to go out and do their thing. They clustered up patiently with me - not going out into the weather, lol. So out I went into the pouring rain, but at least the large tree in our yard provides a little shelter. They trotted out to gather around me and I had to shoo them off and insist that they go potty. All except Elsa, who pressed against my leg like a sodden, miserable little duckling! After much coaxing, petting, and soothing, she finally left my side to go potty.

With that done, I get everyone back onto the porch and dried off - only to hear my storm-fearing mama’s boy crying to be let out. So I let him out and continue drying. Two seconds later he is ready to come in and stands at the door whimpering for rescue! Finally get everyone done and have to go in to physically move the old man off the couch and get him outside. He does the fastest potty ever and runs back to me. I dry him, let him back in.

There, dogs done. Sweaty and half-soaked by rain by that point (so refreshing), I run off to start my actual workday!:imok:

They got little tastes of our smoothies tonight, and lots of loves, so they’re happy. Chatters, love paws, and tail wags all around. :D
 

fluffypoptarts

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Mercury has very pretty, very interesting eyes. Pretty sure it’s the crazy. :p It’s hard to get a good picture of them.

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fluffypoptarts

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I’m sitting here mulling over a heart-wrenching thread posted recently about a greyhound that killed a small dog...:(

There is a very serious responsibility that comes with having greyhounds. They are powerful, swift dogs that have been bred for thousands of years to chase small, fluffy creatures. They’ve been used over the centuries as very successful hunters as well, and galgos still are in Spain. A responsible owner must be aware of and prepared for various things with these dogs. I do my utmost to be a responsible owner.

A lot of people use martingales for their hounds, but we only use harnesses. 1) To keep them from getting loose, and 2) for the safety of the greyhound’s neck as they can suddenly spring forward with power and speed, putting all that force on their neck. It can result in a very injured or dead greyhound.

When walking, we avoid getting remotely close to small dogs, especially with Sai*. In vet’s offices, we stay away from all other animals, particularly puppies and small dogs. We use their muzzles as we feel we need to, and we’re both strong enough to restrain the dogs if needed.

*Sai was brought up in Australia and “live bait” trained, which makes greyhounds much more likely to want to chase and kill small animals. So was Senny. Both have sometimes shown interest in small dogs and cats. However, they are now habituated to our Italian greyhound. Senny has shown interest in a fearful chihuahua before, but never our Italian greyhound. Sai, on the other hand, needed to be taught that our wee pup was a member of the family and not to be chased or hurt. We held the iggy in our laps near Sai while Sai was muzzled and then repeatedly petted, cuddled, and kissed our iggy in front of Sai. Then would do the same to Sai. We didn’t trust Sai without a muzzle and direct supervision for a while. Surprisingly, he seemed to understand fairly quickly that the little guy was family. It helps that Ouji literally looks like a mini greyhound, I’m sure. Plus they are very smart dogs. Ours have responded to the training that we have done to discourage this interest and behavior. We never have to correct Sai anymore when it comes to the iggy, but we always crate the little one when we’re not around.
 
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fluffypoptarts

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Sai went to the vet yesterday and I had his muzzle on. There wasn’t anyone in the waiting room, so that was good, but omg the comments from the vet staff. “Why is he wearing a muzzle, he’s such a good boy!” I explained that our good boy has excessive interest in small dogs, especially fluffy ones. I also told our vet tech the story I had read on here and that it’s a definite concern with greyhounds. I told her that we often encounter owners in the waiting room that want to let their little dogs run right up to our greyhounds. Sometimes they’re not even paying attention to what their tiny dog is doing. (They also want to let their kids run up to our greyhounds to harass them. Nice, respectful pets are different and not counted as bothersome.*) People are crazy. We are super alert about what our dogs are doing and pay attention to what’s going on with them. Even when there are no dogs or other animals around.

On the way out, we round the corner, and right there is a woman with a small, fluffy white dog. Sai showed no interest and just wanted to get to the door, but I drew the vet tech’s attention to the situation (she was one of the ones who was shocked that Sai was muzzled). I think she understood at that point.

*I love when we encounter kids and their parents are either coaching them on how to politely approach petting our dogs and/or the kid already knows. Although some smaller children are scared of the greyhounds because of how tall they are. They tend to measure them at the shoulder, but if you measure from their head for their full height, they’re at least 3 feet tall, lol. Most dogs don’t seem all that large to me anymore since I’m around these guys 24/7.

A funny aside - we bought houndy skeleton dog from Home Depot that they have as a yard decoration, and he was only 26” tall. He’s even labeled as a greyhound and we were like, “He seems rather diminutive - maybe he is a small galgo, podenco, or a whippet?” Our dogs were not impressed by him. :roflmao:
 

fluffypoptarts

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Elsa was just being super adorably playful for only the second time since we’ve had her. I was rubbing her and kissing her and she just started acting like a puppy - throwing her head back, rolling in her chair, being silly. Mercury came running up and she was grabbing his body with her mouth with those long, long fangs, but she was being very gentle. I encouraged her to grab my hand to test and she was very gentle with me too and nibbled me. Then she grabbed for Mercury again and got his face (he sticks it everywhere with no sense) and I was like, “No, honey, you don’t want those huge teeth so close to his eyeball!”

She’s very awkward and still sometimes doesn’t realize what’s okay and what’s not when trying to play. She used to make the other greyhounds very uncomfortable when she first tried to make any playful overtures. It was painful to see! I really wonder what she was like as a puppy. I then played with her some more and praised her for being playful so she wouldn’t think she was in trouble or had been a bad girl by playing with Mercury (she’s super sensitive about being told “no”, and definitely about thinking she’s in trouble). Earlier on, I used a very stern tone and called her a bad girl a couple times and she emotionally shut down for a week. VERY sensitive girl. I learned pretty quickly that I couldn’t use the same approach with her that I had to with the confident
sassy boys.

In the beginning, before I was close to JJ and when he was still “disengaged”, I’d scold him and he’d just give me this cold, irritated, moody look - almost like an alienated, angry teenager saying, “Whatever, lady, I don’t have to listen to you, and you’re not my mother.” SO much attitude. He has changed so much, though. Now he gives me this wide-eyed look like, “Don’t be upset at me, Mom!” He’s still a moody, sassy boy, but is totally different with how he responds to me and even with the way he looks at me.
 
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