Appetite concern - GSD - pics added!

[walkswithdog]

He's not broke, don't fix him.

His weight and activity level are good.

Let it be.

If you want to, explore switching to one of the no grain foods and see if you like those results better. I've had some dogs do better on them and prefer them.

But really as long as he's majorly active and the coat is good and the bones don't show - a lean puppy is proper.

Re: East Ger. Sheps. LOL oh some E Ger / Czech lines are scary. I work with one breeder I trust in that regard and have the dogs shipped to me from Canada. Really picky.

Otherwise I go with mellower lines. A stable Czech dog is a joy. An unstable one too much of a challenge.

My first service dog was E Ger. /Czech. a total joy. Totally stable, totally bomb proof, from airlines, to trains, to escalators and arenas, concerts and fireworks and even inside a punk rock concert. Rock solid grump. VERY doggy face lol. But I like a slightly dog faced grump. I hate a snipe muzzle.

My current service dog is West Ger working and some E. Ger. Nice balance. I think she has a pretty face. Black sable - my favorite. She's much easier than Tanis was, she LOVES being social. Tanis just wanted to work and be left alone - momma's girl only.

I just love Shepherds and after more than a dozen of them I'm getting the hang of it. LOL

 

[Faverolle]

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Ummm not accurate. For one - the Germans have kept, in general a more compact fast moving dog. They've been used there as working dogs for far longer than here and more of them are working there than here.

In general, whether East German, West German - working or show, or Czech - those dogs are smaller, faster and more correct to type and far more capable of a full day of work - including herding than US dogs, whether from German lines or not.

Some of the East German dogs do tend oversized but they're still very agile and not over angulated.

East German and Czech dogs are not from show lines. Since they're from lines maintained at the time of solely working dogs, and why I prefer them.

In the US dogs got longer, in general taller, and lost the working standard. Which in AKC dogs especially meant loss of agility and proper size, and loss of working and herding ability in many cases. In US SV dogs - dogs still bred to the German Standard, that is not the case. While I'm not fond of pure WG show lines, they are at least closer to type and function than strictly AKC show dogs.

Not to say that I don't know AKC show dogs that do work, I do. There are not many and few breeders hold themselves to that high a standard.

I prefer sables, black, red or gray to black and tan, for my own dogs, and Czech or East German lines. Not simple easy dogs but I like that.

I have met several Czech GSDs and Boxers I really liked. Never met an East German I was fond of. The E. German GSDs I met didn't have reliable temperments and you really had to keep an eye on them. But then, I didn't meet that many.

I've been working with GSD'S for over 30 years and E German's for 12 plus years and find them to be the most stable but you will see good and bad versions of both if you look hard enough.

We have 5 E Germans and 1 W German right now and were involved in schutzhund for years, but although we still do a lot of tracking we don't do schutzhund any more, mainly because of time. All 5 that we have are correct in structure, with clear/stable heads. Many of the Czech dogs I have seen and worked with were more unstable and most of the W German lines are a mess both in conformation and psych issues. Our W German is from working lines as well but was also shown for a couple years in the United Schutzhund and WDA shows and did quite well, but overall still not as good as my E Germans. Now without a doubt there are good W German's and good Czech dogs and there are are some E German's that are not perfect but after being involved with and working all three for so long the E Germans have proved to me to be the best. True E German's are very few and far between here in the U.S.

 

[walkswithdog]

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I have met several Czech GSDs and Boxers I really liked. Never met an East German I was fond of. The E. German GSDs I met didn't have reliable temperments and you really had to keep an eye on them. But then, I didn't meet that many.

I've been working with GSD'S for over 30 years and E German's for 12 plus years and find them to be the most stable but you will see good and bad versions of both if you look hard enough.

We have 5 E Germans and 1 W German right now and were involved in schutzhund for years, but although we still do a lot of tracking we don't do schutzhund any more, mainly because of time. All 5 that we have are correct in structure, with clear/stable heads. Many of the Czech dogs I have seen and worked with were more unstable and most of the W German lines are a mess both in conformation and psych issues. Our W German is from working lines as well but was also shown for a couple years in the United Schutzhund and WDA shows and did quite well, but overall still not as good as my E Germans. Now without a doubt there are good W German's and good Czech dogs and there are are some E German's that are not perfect but after being involved with and working all three for so long the E Germans have proved to me to be the best. True E German's are very few and far between here in the U.S.

Well if you met Leerburg Czech dogs of course they were unstable - lol - Ed Frawley has much to apologize for.

I have to go pretty far to get my good Czech/E Ger dogs yes. I was first in Calif getting dogs out of Canada and now TN. It's a ways to go but I've worked with Carmen Dugan for a long time now. And she got many of her dogs from Haus Iris and the Kuhnhof brothers and I liked their dogs - very stable. Spoke with Joe quite a bit before he died. He carried a great deal of Don V. R in his lines and I have loved that dog most of my life and his progeny.

I agree W.Ger working and a good E. Gr are awesome. Won't work with the W Ger show stuff - it's all over the map. Molly Graf is still putting out some nice dogs, so is Adlerstein but beyond that I'm kind of too picky for words. I haven't bought in a while so I don't know who's keeping up with good stable dogs now in that vein but I'd call Molly or Constance first.

And none of them have snipe muzzled grump and tend toward dark sables so it's all good. Carmen even has blacks now. I'd like a black. But color is fairly far down on the criteria list.

Solid, social or aloof, tight built dog that you can whack with a rattle stick and get real bounce out of, ball drive out it's ears, herding instinct preferred. Dog that can handle weird - like escalators, glass elevators, trains, planes and rock concerts a must, odd surfaces a must. Must not react to gunfire.

Heavy, specific, real world criteria - then add pretty, slightly doggy grump, or heavy headed male and very very dark. I pay for it but I get what I pay for.

Knowing what you want in the breed and how to get it - priceless.

 

[gritsar]

I guess all that breeding information would be important to me if we planned to show or breed dogs.
The kennel owners Jax came from breeds with two things of upmost importance - protectiveness and obedience. Jax shows the results of that breeding. Jax has got to be the most obedient dog I've ever known (barring none, including my Charlie Girl) and from the day we brought him home he's shown that he understands that mama is to be protected and its his job to do that.
He's also shown a fondness for tracking, but we lack the knowledge and resources to develop that skill in him.
I'm very happy with this dog.

 

[Cara]

Tracking is not hard to train, so long as you have someone willing to run for you

 

[Brindlebtch]

Well OF COURSE your happy with him gritsar, he's a geeeeeeenius!

My Shepherd, Gelly, came out of W. German working lines. The man who gave her to me was a very very harsh trainer and washed her out of Schutzhund training at 9 mos. old, which I thought was awfully young. This guy wanted a extremely hard dog and was finally satisfied with one that would actually turn and attack him (probably when he did something unfair). In the pictures I posted Gelly was about 1 1/2 yrs. She was a heck of an AKC tracker and agility dog and extremely sweet and loving once she settle in to being a house dog, as well being very protective. For a long time I had to watch her very carefully around strange men but after extensive socializing she did just fine.

walkswithdog, in reference to the rattle stick - our first male AmStaff, Burbus, LOVED the stick, whip and pistol shot. It really jazzed him up. We were at an AmStaff National in PA and had arranged to do a BH with an Indiana Shutzhund group. Nice folks. The guy who fired the gun was wheelchair bound. We were heeling along and Bang goes the gun - they used a real .38 w/ real bullets - VERY loud - louder than Burbus had ever heard before. He left my side and headed toward that sound absolutely convinced a
guy with a sleeve and the biggest whip in the world was hiding behind that wheelchair. The guy in the wheelchair had an 'oh no I'm going to die ' look on his face. I was envisioning headlines saying "mauled man in wheelchair" the crowd just about had kittens. I turned and started heeling the other way and yelling in my most absolutely convincing voice to come back and heel dammit!
He stopped about 20ft away from the wheelchair, looked him over, and came back to heel. We turned around and started heeling the pattern again. He passed with flying colors. Lot of crazy stuff goes on in Schutzhund.

 

[Faverolle]

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Wow, too see the look on that poor guy's face must of been priceless!

 

[gritsar]

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I occasionally let Jax run loose on our walks, especially when I know the cows are on the other side of the farm. He never fails to lead me to spots where something has obviously bedded down for the night - circular patterns of smushed down grass.
We play hide and seek with him and he always finds Mama.
I guess those are signs that he enjoys tracking, but I'm no expert.

 

[citrusdreams]

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Oh he's perfect IMOHO and gorgeous too!

 

[lildickens]

I have a 3 yr old female GSD who when a pup was a very picky eater. She would just "pick" at her food or just turn her nose up. After a visit to vet thinking maybe she had a chicken allergy we tried lamb & rice food, turned her nose up. Vet said shes just picky we finally found mixing fresh pet select in with her Eukanuba large breed dry food was the perfect combination. She gets fed twice daily, we break her meals into 2 portions, 1 in the morning and 1 at dinner time. Now she eats like a "champ" with the fresh pet select mixed in with Eukanuba.