I think it’s important that puppies get exposed to lots of stuff – as much stuff as possible, in fact. I pop them in the playpen before I vaccuum. I keep them out when I have guests, so that they meet people. I give them crate time. I put little collars on them, and let them drag around a leash. I do as much I can to acclimate them to ‘real world’ situations, other than start their table training (because I’m a slacker, and I suck at training Frenchies to stand for the table).
For this litter, I really lucked out with an item I picked up from the discount section of Pet Edge. It’s a cat tunnel – a simple tube of velour, meant for cats to climb in and out of of. It has a hole in the middle, and the ends of the tube are filled with stiff, crinkly fabric that makes interesting noises.
I popped the tunnel down on the floor, and unleashed the puppies.
Initial response? Trepidation.
Followed by curiosity.
On the heels of which comes the discovery that – hey! It makes noises!
And you can climb on it!
Followed by the discovery that, for the brave, you can climb in it.
Finally, the puppies discovered that, with a team effort, you can roll it across the floor, lumberjack and log style. This proved very popular, especially when it was rolled with Thor inside.
Oh, and if you check on Blip? There just might a new movie.
https://i0.wp.com/www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Brindle_pied_frenchbulldog.jpg?fit=662%2C662&ssl=1662662frogdogzhttps://www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/bullmarket-logo.pngfrogdogz2008-10-24 18:50:452008-10-24 18:50:45Bright Green Tunnel O' Fun
Poor Pixie. As I mentioned yesterday, Princess P doesn’t like her delicate toesies touching the bare floor. Put her on a bare floor and she flattens down, drops her ears and makes herself as teeny tiny as possible. We now put down a towel for her to start out on, and from there she seems to be willing to make forays out into bare floor land. It’s all about knowing she has a safe, no slip base to return to if she feels nervous. When we can’t take the unbearable sadness that is Pixie on the floor, one of us ends up picking her up and putting her on the couch for snuggle time. And so a Princess is born and raised…
Ms. Heart and Rumble, on the other hand, have taken to floor time like champs. It gives them a chance to bark-bark-bark in Tessa’s face, steal Dexter’s soccer ball, and run behind the couch. In other words, typical hellion puppy behaviour.
A full photo set is at the end of the post, or over on Flickr.
Color Controversy, Redux
A storm is brewing in French Bulldog show ring circles south of the border, and it’s all to do with ‘bad’ colors. A certain pioneering Blue French Bulldog breeder found herself summarily dumped from the FBDCA, and it’s served to reignite the controversy over Blue.
Is Blue mouse? Is mouse even a color? What color of mouse are we talking about here, exactly, and what kind? Field mouse? House mouse? Coffee mouse? It’s all terribly exciting, but I can’t help thinking it’s all a bit wrong headed, and that the timing for this is bad, bad, bad.
The UK pure bred dog fancy is in the middle of a world altering crisis. Standards are being forcibly re written, on brachycephalics in particular, and with no apparent logic or reason other than to pander to the general public. Little attention has been paid to real, workable schemes to correct health issues. If and when the BBC special that set off all of this brouhaha makes it onto American television, we have to wonder – will the same thing occur here? Will there be the same outcry? Will we all face a witch hunt in which we’re vilified as being the bastard children of Joseph Mengele (and that’s no exageration – there was a lot of references to pure bred dog breeds being an ‘experiment in eugenics’, with a clear inference that dog breeding=nazi experimentation)?
With all of this hanging over our heads, I can’t help thinking that we need to get our ducks in a row when it comes to cleaning up real, concrete, life threatening conditions — in other words, is this really the time to make the isssue of color one into some kind of sturm und drang, ‘oh, we’re all doomed’ soap opera? I kind of feel that it’s this kind of nit picking, fiddling while rome burns stuff that makes the general public feel we’re more concerned with the cosmetics than we are with the concrete.
If someone can show me a single, solitary, scientific study showing a link between ‘bad’ colors and bad genetics, I’ll be the first to jump into the fray. Until then, this is all just smoke and mirrors, and comes at a very bad time indeed.
Economic Crisis Solved!
And now, Natalie Portman and Rashid Jones present their solution to the Global Economic crisis, after which we do our own bit for world peace and financial stability.
Dexter is exceptionally well natured when it comes to playing with the puppies. He’s unfailingly sweet and gentle with them, sharing his toys, licking their faces, and tolerating it when they bite him on the leg (and other, more painful places).
His tolerance, however, gets sorely tested when it comes to his soccer ball. I’ve mentioned before how much he loves this toy, and it’s amazing to us how close he lets the puppies get to him while he’s playing with it. In spite of this, his patience is stretched to the limit when it comes to Thor, who also seems to really love the soccer ball. Of course, maybe what he really loves is upsetting Dexter…
See for yourself in this video. View it on Blip – or just click the full screen button.
In other news, support SBTCC’s fight against BSL:
The Staffordshire Bull Terrier Club of Canada continues to fight draconian anti-dog legislation in Ontario.
We are hosting a “Celebration of Dogs” Photo Contest.
Grand prize is a Nikon SLR Digital Camera. The second prize is a custom made photo quilt (created just for you.) I have one and it is a work of art – something I will always treasure. Third prize is a digital photo frame. There are several smaller prizes.
Entries are still coming in but we need more! Please enter. Please send this message on to everyone you know and ask them to do the same. Out there somewhere is a wonderful photo that will win the grand prize!
We have assembled an impressive panel of independent judges – including photographers, dog experts, vets and an Ontario MPP!
This contest is not so much about great technical photos. It is, rather, a chance to celebrate our dogs in all their glory. We play with them, work with them, cry with them and laugh with them. This contest celebrates our dogs’ connection with their world, with us and with each other.
All dogs – mutt and champion – are welcome. Old, young, fat, fluffy!
https://i0.wp.com/www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Brindle_pied_frenchbulldog.jpg?fit=662%2C662&ssl=1662662frogdogzhttps://www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/bullmarket-logo.pngfrogdogz2008-10-20 15:21:242008-10-20 15:21:24Dexter and the Soccer Ball, Part Two
Feeding time is fairly hectic with six puppies to wrangle at once. We have it broken down into a fairly regimented routine — clean pen of the nine million pounds of accumulated poop, change pads, put down pans of food, clean up more poop immediately after the finish eating, watch as they burn off crazy dog energy.
The pups eat Honest Kitchen ‘Embark’ in the morning and the evening, split into two shallow foil pans. It’s a given that, however many pans I put down, they’ll all try to eat out of the same pan at the same time, on the theory that whatever the other guy has got must be the best. At lunch, the pups eat soaked kibble, and they usually get a small handful of dry kibble before bed as a snack.
Butters and Jellie are thorough eaters. Both of them finish off the leftovers by standing right in the middle of the pan of food, and licking all around the edges. This inevitably results in little green dog food foot prints on the other puppies. For some reason, Pixie gets most of them.
Immediately after eating the pups usually have about twenty minutes of ‘crazy dog time’. That’s where they all run around the pen at full speed, smacking into each other and having periodic wrestling matches. In mid play, they’ll usually stop for a poop. We’ve learned not to put puppies out into the play pen until well after we’re sure everyone is (literally) all pooped out.
Crazy time is followed by sleepy puppy time, aka “quick, take a picture while they’re sleeping time”. Lately, it’s the only chance I get to take a photo of Heart, as her usual reaction now on seeing the camera is to lunge for it and bite at the lens.
Rumble, on the other hand, has decided he’d like to become a male model when he grows up, and greets the camera with an instantaneous, rock solid pose, complete with soulful expression. Pixie’s reaction to the camera seems to be “Jeez lady, get a new hobby”.
The rest of the photos are below, or over on Flickr.
https://i0.wp.com/www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Brindle_pied_frenchbulldog.jpg?fit=662%2C662&ssl=1662662frogdogzhttps://www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/bullmarket-logo.pngfrogdogz2008-10-16 19:12:522008-10-16 19:12:52Crazy Puppy Dinner Time
Hope everyone is having a great Thanksgiving – at least everyone here in Canada.
I’ll be cooking a full on Thanksgiving dinner, like I do every year. I admit it, I go a bit overboard when it comes to feeding friends and family. I suffer from famine cooking syndrome, the fear that if I don’t cook ten times too much food, someone MIGHT. STARVE!!
This year, it’s a locally smoked ham, which Sean is refusing to let me honey glaze, since he thinks glaze is the devil’s way of messing up good meat. Instead, I’ll do a dry mustard rub, and sneak some demerara sugar onto one side of it. For sides – sweet potato casserole, garlic mashed potatoes, brussel sprouts with chestnuts, dinner rolls and turnip. For dessert, pumpkin pie of course, with a chocolate truffle cake on the side for those idjits (cough:sean:cough) who can’t see the intrinsic beauty that is pumpkin pie. It’s a vegetable. It’s a dessert. It’s BOTH!
A few puppy faces to keep you company are over on Flickr... and my favorites are below.
Peek a Boo Pixie
Snuggle Butters
Emo Rumble Does Album Art
https://i0.wp.com/www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Brindle_pied_frenchbulldog.jpg?fit=662%2C662&ssl=1662662frogdogzhttps://www.bullmarketfrogs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/bullmarket-logo.pngfrogdogz2008-10-13 11:10:212008-10-13 11:10:21Food for Friends and Monkey Faces
