Don't Stop Walking and You're Embarassing Me Methods of Walking

Ruki's been getting stubborn about walking again. I use two methods--one I just discovered today--to keep her by my side and trucking along. The first involves the Don't Stop Walking method--just keep on going and pull her along with you when she pauses. The second is the You're Embarassing Me method: I think sometimes she doesn't like being so close to me, but rather behind me, like an embarassed teenager. So I hold the leash behind my back, and she's a few steps behind me, walking at her own pace, happy as can be.

I wrote to our puppy-sitter about walking Ruki with the DSW method:

She *is* big and stubborn these days. Or, rather, she's tired, cranky,
and scared. I "treat" her out of the courtyard and off of the block--I
go through about 4-5 treats just egging her on and treating her for
walking a few meters. But once she gets going, she's OK. If she starts
to slow down or pull back, just keep on walking. Pulling her is OK;
just don't try and jerk her.

I put the leash around my right wrist, and hold the leash parallel to
my waist/belt, and hold the slack with my left hand--Ruki stays on my
left all the time. When she slows down or pulls to the side of
backwards, when my left leg goes forward--I don't stop--it pulls the
leash and her along. But it's one consistent motion, so it's not
jerking at her throat. She pulls for about a second, but then she
comes along, and then I give her a treat.

Then we battle it out that way about 5 more times, and then she's
fine--a couple more hitches along the way, but most of the time it's a
breeze. Every once in awhile I'll let her stop and sniff around. And
when she's trucking along I'll push a treat in her mouth--don't let
her bite! If she snatches at the treat, pull it away, and don't let
her have it until she's gentle!--just to keep her going.

Grading Commercial Dog Food Brands

From the BullDogDomain forums, I found a ranking system for dog food. Partially from this, and partially from recommendations from books and a pet food store owner, we switched Ruki from her breeder's Eukanuba Large Breed Puppy to Innova.

The ranking system mostly focuses on how transparent the dog food producer is about the quality of the ingredients, the amount of filler (e.g., corn which is indigestible by dogs), and how "natural" the ingredients are. The premises being that if you are vague about something, you're hiding something bad, and how well you pick and choose your ingredients.

Another highlight of the ranking system is deducting points from foods that contain ingredients that many dogs are allergic to, e.g., wheat or soy.

From my2bullies&BTBfoster, http://forum.bulldogdomain.com/index.php?topic=8832.0 :

How to grade your dog's food: (Some brands are done at the very bottom]

Start with a grade of 100:

1) For every listing of "by-product", subtract 10 points

2) For every non-specific animal source ("meat" or "poultry", meat, meal or fat) reference, subtract 10 points

3) If the food contains BHA, BHT, or ethoxyquin, subtract 10 points

4) For every grain "mill run" or non-specific grain source,subtract 5 points

5) If the same grain ingredient is used 2 or more times in the first five ingredients (i.e. "ground brown rice", "brewer's
rice", "rice flour" are all the same grain), subtract 5 points

6) If the protein sources are not meat meal and there are less than 2 meats in the top 3 ingredients, subtract 3 points

7) If it contains any artificial colorants, subtract 3 points

8 ) If it contains ground corn or whole grain corn, subtract 3 points

9) If corn is listed in the top 5 ingredients, subtract 2 more points

10) If the food contains any animal fat other than fish oil, subtract 2 points

11) If lamb is the only animal protein source (unless your dog is allergic to other protein sources), subtract 2 points

12) If it contains soy or soybeans, subtract 2 points

13) If it contains wheat (unless you know that your dog isn't allergic to wheat), subtract 2 points

14) If it contains beef (unless you know that your dog isn't allergic to beef), subtract 1 point

15) If it contains salt, subtract 1 point

Extra Credit:

1) If any of the meat sources are organic, add 5 points

2) If the food is endorsed by any major breed group or nutritionist, add 5 points

3) If the food is baked not extruded, add 5 points

4) If the food contains probiotics, add 3 points

5) If the food contains fruit, add 3 points

6) If the food contains vegetables (NOT corn or other grains), add 3 points

7) If the animal sources are hormone-free and antibiotic-free, add 2 points

8 ) If the food contains barley, add 2 points

9) If the food contains flax seed oil (not just the seeds), add 2 points

10) If the food contains oats or oatmeal, add 1 point

11) If the food contains sunflower oil, add 1 point

12) For every different specific animal protein source (other than the first one; count "chicken" and "chicken meal" as
only one protein source but "chicken" and "" as 2 different sources), add 1 point

13) If it contains glucosamine and chondroitin, add 1 point

14) If the vegetables have been tested for pesticides and are pesticide-free, add 1 point

94-100+ = A
86-93 = B
78-85 = C
70-77 = D
69 = F

Here are some foods that have already been scored. Dog Food scores:

Authority Harvest Baked / Score 116 A+
Bil-Jac Select / Score 68 F
Canidae / Score 112 A+
Chicken Soup Senior / Score 115 A+
Diamond Maintenance / Score 64 F
Diamond Lamb Meal & Rice / Score 92 B
Diamond Large Breed 60+ Formula / Score 99 A
Dick Van Patten's Natural Balance Ultra Premium / Score 122 A+
Dick Van Patten's Duck and Potato / Score 106 A+
Foundations / Score 106 A+
Hund-n-Flocken Adult Dog (lamb) by Solid Gold / Score 93 D
Iams Lamb Meal & Rice Formula Premium / Score 73 D
Innova Dog / Score 114 A+
Innova Evo / Score 114 A+
Kirkland Signature Chicken, Rice, and Vegetables / Score 110 A+
Nutrisource Lamb and Rice / Score 87 B
Nutro Natural Choice Large Breed Puppy / Score 87 B
Pet Gold Adult with Lamb & Rice / Score 23 F
ProPlan Natural Turkey & Barley / Score 103 A+
Purina Beneful / Score 17 F
Purina Dog / Score 62 F
Purina Come-n-Get It / Score 16 F
Royal Canin Bulldog / Score 100 A+
Royal Canin Natural Blend Adult / Score 106 A+
Sensible Choice Chicken and Rice / Score 97 A
Science Diet Advanced Protein Senior 7+ / Score 63 F
Science Diet for Large Breed Puppies / Score 69 F
Wellness Super5 Mix Chicken / Score 110 A+
Wolfking Adult Dog (bison) by Solid Gold / Score 97 A

Good Raw Foods for Treats

So for treats--instead of treats we buy at stores--we've been using slices of baby carrots. Ruki loves 'em. And we see them in her poo a day or so later. I don't know if there's any nutritional value to them, but at least there's no fat, and some fiber content for her.

I recently tried chunks of celery. Ruki doesn't love 'em as much as the carrots, but she'll still do tricks for them.

I gave her a blueberry, too, and she almost died--in a good way. I think she thought she was in berry heaven. Apparently, though, we have to watch out for citrus fruits because they might be bad for her stomach.

Here's a quote I found on a web site:

http://experts.about.com/q/Dogs-701/ok-pup-3.htm

"Besides apples, most dogs also like banana slices, blue berries, carrot slices or baby carrots, peas, broccoli, green beans and cauliflower. My dogs LOVE Clementine wedges, but then who doesn't?

A couple of things to watch out for: DON'T give a dog onions, mushrooms or grapes, they can make your dog sick."

I've also started adding a fish oil pill to her breakfasts.

My Case for Biodegradable Poo Bags

So up until now we've been using the plastic bags we get at the grocery store--and using the self-checkouts and grabbing a few extras on the sly. This at the time was the best idea for us--we give a second use to something that is necessary and will be trash, and they're made from recycled products. Plus they're free!

But we started running short on our stockpile, and I was feeling environmentally guilty about grabbing new ones and about the amount of waste we're creating.

I explored other options--namely buying smaller poo-bags to reduce, biodegradable bags, and flushable bags. Smaller poo-bags make since because at least we're reducing our waste by replacing new, ganked plastic grocery bags with smaller ones. Flushable bags sound great, but honestly it's kind of gross to mix dog poo in the human toilet and anyways they're not guaranteed not to clog your septic system (and we live in an old apartment building). And biodegradable bags? We can't compost our poo and these bags probably wouldn't biodegrade any faster than regular ones in the landfill.

So I decided on biodegradable. Why? Well, at least we're reducing; we're giving them a fighting chance to degrade wherever they might, and if we can sneak the bag into a yardwaste bag, then even better! But mostly, if we're going to choose a bag, we might as well put our money into an industry that is working to save the world, and not one indifferent to it. So I went onto Greenfeet.com and bought us a few packs of the bags.

Check out my post on my confusion and eventual success in figuring out how to use the damn Biobags in the first place.

How to Use the Biobag Dog Poo-Bag

I am an idiot. I just bought two bags of Biobag Dog bags. They're environmentally-friendly, biodegradable, compostable bags made for dog poo. Unfortunately, they're made in Norway--hence the instructions aren't the clearest. Here are the instructions on the box and each bag:

1. Put your hand in the bag.
2. Collect the droppings.
3. Push the top-end through the hole.
4. Pull tip through the hole.
5. The bag is closed.
6. Put the bag in the litterbin.

OK. So I was fine with Steps 1 and 2. But 3? What does that mean "Push the top-end through the hole?" The box and a web site clarify this: "insert film through hole at top of the bag and pull down to secure dog waste." What the hell does that mean?

So now, after much fumbling, experimentation, and imagination, I figured it out.

1. Put your hand in the bag.
2a. Collect the droppings.
2b. Reverse the bag--just like you would when using any other bag.
3. Pinch the *bottom* seam of the bag, right underneath where all your poo is, and pull the pinched piece up and through both holes at the (now) top of the bag.
4. This cinches the lip of the bag through the holes, so now the poo is captured in the "middle" of the bag, and the bottom bit is what you hold onto to carry the bag and throw it away.
5. The bag is now closed.
6. Put the bag in the trash.

Whew. I hope that helps anyone who is as slow as I am!

Bulldog Crack: Rawhides and Booda Velvet Bimples

So we finally took the plunge and introduced Ruki to rawhide chews. I had heard so many cautionary tales about rawhides and bullies: you have to constantly watch your bulldog so that she doesn't tear off a bit and choke on it.

But she was getting too quickly bored with her other toys: the stuffed ones with squeakers, the knotted rope pull toy, the rubber bone, etc.

We started with a pressed rawhide from the breeder. She didn't mind it, but then I watched to see what kind of things she chewed on. Ruki loves sawed off stumps of shrubbery, and I realized she wanted something softer than pressed rawhide. I tried other Nylabones, and finally she found her favorite in a flexible, soft, rubbery chicken-flavored Nylabone.

That was a few weeks ago. Most recently, she's been chewing on the soft plastic corners of her crate. (Also, we just moved her from the small, puppy/cat crate to a larger, medium-sized breed crate. She took to it in a few minutes--no adjustment period needed here!) So I realized she needs something new.

The rawhide? It's like crack. She loves them. She even sometimes cries when I take them away from her--which I try to do so she knows that *I* commence playing and chew-fun, not her. I try to keep her chewing on them in one or two places--I don't want her chewing on the rug so it doesn't assume the smell and taste of the rawhide.

Recently, I picked up a Booda Velvet Bimple bone. It looked soft enough for her puppy teeth and jaws. Wow. She loves that one, too. But I really have to watch her with this. In about an hour, she stripped all the bumpies off the Booda--leaving little plasticy bits all over. I vacuumed those up. Then she really went to town. The Boodas are made of corn starch, so it starts getting white and foamy after a while. I heard in a discussion forum of a bulldog that chewed one of those down and then started puking up white stuff--the Booda corn starch.

Which, on a side note, is weird to put in a digestible bone because corn products, I thought, *weren't* digestible by dogs. Oh well. Right now, she has neither rawhide nor Booda in her mouth, and now she's just exploring...

Ruki-Monster with Her Stick du Jour

We took Ruki to the Boston Common for a play-date with some friends. Damn, she's cute. At least *I* think so... But what else can I do but think she's the cutest thing in the world?!??!?!