German Shepherd owners...*update*more pics

[sunket77]

ok since I am a new mommy and want to show off and maybe these will give you guys a better idea what Sammy looks like here is my beautiful daughter and Sammy! ...

waving hello!

I am a big lug of a pup!

those ears kill me! We nick-named her Dobbie like the house elf on Harry Potter! one stand strait up when she's running around the back yard

 

[ruth]

She's gorgeous and you're right her hair looks a lot different in these newest photos and she looks a lot larger than she did in the first pics. I only meant her coloring reminded me of my Min Pin mix. My Min Pin is a stray and we don't really know what she is. Started out small, kept getting bigger. She is also good around the freeranging chickens, ducks and peacocks but LOVES to do a "run by" every once in a while and watch them jump, run or fly.

She and Scarlett are best of friends. Here they are playing tug-of-war the other day.

And here's our big man, Rex. Always watching the sky for hawks which he chases off (and buzzards which he thinks are hawks but we don't tell him any different).

German Shepherds are simply the best. If your girl has any shepherd in her, she will be easy to work with and a joy to own. Just put her on leash and take her with you as you go about your chores with the chickens. Go sit quietly in the coop or run with them. They are smart dogs and they quickly learn that chickens are part of the family. Pick up a chick or chicken and sit and pet it and let the dog sniff it. Pet the chicken, pet the dog, repeat. So far, for me, this procedure has worked on 6 dogs of different breeds.

 

[ruth]

Quote:
Thanks Cyn. I got all weepy the other night when I realized that he's probably getting up there in age for a GSD. He's even going grey.

 

[sunket77]

"Ruth" your dogs are just gorgeous all of them! My sister has two min pins, yours looks very close to her pure breeds, one is bigger than the other but for mini dogs they can get pretty big, I guess with all dogs it's a matter of breeding for size.
Do you play fetch with your dogs? I noticed Rex had a tennis ball, I was wondering if it was okay to teach fetch?
I am still so grateful for everyone advice hopefully one day I will be posting pics of Sammy with the chickens! Rex is just a doll, he is obviously a well bred GSD! I love the pics of him with the little chicks!

 

[wombat]

Fetch is good. It's exercise and play for the dog, and bonding for the two of you.

Fetch the easy way:

Start out using two balls, or fetch will be "chase" and the dog will train you.

You can work some obedience into the game too. Make your dog sit, then toss the ball a short distance and say "OK" at the same time to release the dog from the sit.

Once the dog has the ball, praise the dog, call them back with "Bring!" ... they won't know what to do, and if you have only one ball, you're out of luck.

Since you have that second ball, turn away, start tossing the ball up and down in your hand, talking to yourself, having a great time with the "good" ball. The dog will now want *that* ball, and when she comes to you, praise her, get her to sit, and when she drops the "old" ball, tell her "Good Bring!" ... wait a few seconds, toss the 2nd ball with another "OK!" (or FETCH! if you like). While she's after the 2nd ball, pick up ball #1.

Repeat.

Soon you should have her racing back with the "old" ball to begin again, and if you then start timing "BRING!" with what she wants to do, she'll have that down.

Keep it short at first, young dogs have short attention spans, and one bad turn erases quite a few good ones if you are at it too long!

Soon you can be down to playing fetch with one ball, and no "Chase!" ... and that's when to work on "Drop it!" after the "BRING!" ... (keep that second ball in a pocket for backup for quite some time!)

Keep it calm, work the obedience / sits in, and the tosses short at first. You can work up to longer, more exuberent throws later ... if you over-stimulate that "play drive" early on, you will have a ball chasin' fool!

... mine is!



BTW - We use "AUS!" (out!) to release a bite, and "Dropit!" for letting go of anything else ...

 

[BluegrassSeramas]

I love GSD and crosses! My dad is a PO and we had one when I was a kid! Loved them.

I have a GS/Heeler cross now. Have to share! He is on the right.
Blue merle shepherd! He was too cool to leave at the pound!

 

[Lucycollie]

Quote:
As my user name suggests, I have Collies - Smooth Collies to be exact (they are the exact same breed as the more common/popular Rough (long haired) Collie. They are basically Lassie with a crew cut).

Anyway, your Sammy could well be part collie. Most people don't realize that under all that fur, the collie is a slender dog. My Smooth Collies are often mistaken for greyhounds, especially when young and leggy like your Sammy. I don't recall if you said how old Sammy is but she looks like an older pup/young adult.

 

[guesswhatchickenbutt]

Thanks SO much for the kind words on my big goofy dog. Even though he's a chicken-chaser that we can't let out with them, we're so glad we've still got him. A little less than a year ago he started acting "off" when my DH was out of town on business. I got into quite a panic and told DH when he gets home he needed to take him to the vet b/c I was convinced something was wrong. When he got home, he agreed something wasn't right. Vet looked at him and said he thinks he's swallowed a toy or something and had an obstruction. When he opened him up he discovered that his spleen was enormous and engorged with blood which was filling up his abdominal cavity. He actually called us 1/2-way thru surgery to tell us that he didn't think he'd make it through the surgery. But he recovered and he's a happy, healthy spleenless GSD now! (If you're interested in the story, you can check out my blog in my siggy and then scroll down to the lower left for the categories and click on "The Recovery of Rom).

 

[cmjust0]

Quote:
I think I might be able to give you a clue as to what your "MinPin" mutt is... I've done quite a bit of looking, because...well...we apparently have her twin sister.

Ours was a stray, too.. Those tiles aren't quite a foot across, and she weighs probably in the neighborhood of 25lb..

She literally showed up on our front porch one morning, crying at the door. Her feet were cracked and bleeding on account of walking from who knows where.. She'd obviously been nursing a litter, though there was no sign of the pups anywhere.. We feel pretty confident that someone bred her, let her have her pups and raise them, and then promptly drove her out to the sticks and left her for dead.

What intrigued me the most was that someone took the time to dock her tail, which indicated to me that she had a purpose at some point. It told me that she was a "breed" of dog, and probably not just a mutt..

After a couple of years of looking off and on, I ran across the "feist dog", which isnt so much a breed as simply a type or category of dog.. There's a lot of crossbreeding in feists, so they're all fairly unique....though there seem to be quite a few of them that look just like our Gracie -- and your mutt, too!

Check this out and tell me what you think.. Especially, look at this pic from the site...

Eery, huh?

 

[daisy_dukers]

Here is a picture of one of my 2 GSD's...

FYI that is a TOMATO plant in the rubbermaid container.....

And here are the two of them playing in the pond behind the house...aka "the pool"...