Our perro de presa canario, Lily

Summer Update!

2010-06-06T19:42:00.004+02:00

Here is a update from Lily!
She is 1½ years old and doing great!

***

Pictures of Lily 1yo

2009-10-19T21:05:00.005+02:00

Here's some pictures!

***

Oh and, Lily is getting really independent, she goes on adventures without us more and more (not too far away though).
Also, she reaaaally likes doing agility with us! And she LOVES jumping! Jumping on and over everything! :-D

Lily 1 year

2009-10-19T20:51:00.002+02:00

It has been forever since I have written... We have been very very busy. First of all, I got into Lund University and it has just been hectic with a big H!

Alot has happened. First of all, Lily turned 1 year last week! Congratulations :-)

In beginning of August Lily got attacked, and that has kept us very busy.
Bo was walking Lily around our neighborhood - I was in Finland visiting friends and family. A woman lives here nearby and she has 4 - FOUR - fullgrown german shepherds and she was walking them too. The woman + 4 german shepherds were further ahead on the road and Lily and Bo were walking quite far away behind them.

The woman says she leaned to pick up a dog poop, and that is when one of her dogs turned around, saw Lily, barked, and 3 of the dogs totally charged and started running towards Lily!! Bo did what he could, what else is there to do? But Lily got bitten and scratched by the dogs.

The effect of this attack was more mental than physical. Physically her wounds got better. But it has been right until ~ 2 weeks ago that she has turned back to normal. She has been VERY nervous around other dogs, she has been unwilling to greet other dogs, she freezed and turned into a statue in horror when she had to pass other dogs on the street... It was very very sad :-(

But our dog trainer was very helpful and we got to attend her classes a little more and we also took her to the beach with a bunch of other dogs (usually ~ 20 other dogs) and she has been socialized well. Now she is very happy-go-lucky, greets other dogs normally, is happy, confident.

Sometimes we can still feel on her that she is nervous about some type of dog, I dont know what the pattern is = what is it that she is still a little afraid of on other dogs? But we just give her ' a little push' and she is back to normal!

Now to more fun things...!

She is totally growing now! :-) She got over her ghost period, where she was afraid of everything and almost everyone. Everything that used to be normal was her WORST nightmare! That is passed now too. Only to be followed by her puberty time. She has some pimples here and there, just like a teenager hehe! She is also a little pushy lady, she does not listen to us right away, and she wants to have the last word with everything!

She even went as far us, disobeying us! We leave her food and tell her to wait and not touch the food, and still sometimes she will just go and have the food by her own permission!

But we have only been stronger pack leaders and it takes alot of energy from us (let me say again, ALOT OF ENERGY from us!) But it is better now. I think she is getting the point now... Which is that she is _not_ the boss around the house.. Or anywhere.. :D

Also she has developed some guarding instincts, she got a habit of barking at everything she hears in the hallway, but thankfully we taught her to not bark at everything. She is also very aware, if she sees a picture of a dog on the screen, she will bark couple times! We are still working on this, it is not too fun... :-)

Now, to even more funnier things, Im gonna put up some new pictures!

Lily is now 37kg.

Enjoy!! :-)

Lily 9½ months

2009-07-28T15:26:00.002+02:00

Some update about Lily now!

Her first heat is over now, it lasted 2½ weeks. She was extra super calm and tired while she had it, didn't really feel like walking at all. It was also very hot weather during it so I don't think she felt like going out at all.

She has done enormous progress after attending to the obedience class with me! The first three weeks we really had to work hard, but now she is really there!

She is giving eye contact to us just most of the time, walking outside and she likes to look us in the eyes while we're walking, it is soooo sweet! She is much better with passing by other dogs, usually she looks at them alot, but with maybe 1-3 quick corrections on the leash and she is like she never saw any dogs!

It is so easy walking her now, she still walks like an angel on the leash, nowadays she also walks behind us when we walk! How nice is that?

She also has grown alot of respect for us, and takes us much more seriously now than in the beginning. You can still see that she is in a growing age, she does sometimes some mistakes and bad things, but we let her know what we want of her and what we don't! It is also very important to let your dog know all the good things it is doing, and not just give attention when you are correcting your dogs bad behaviour! It is part of respect towards your dog, and that is something we have learned!

We have grown to learn alot about what to do and how to be around a dog.
For example I realized that in order to make her understand what I want, I have to talk dog-language to her;

like, we sit on the floor in the living room sometimes and have some food on our low living room table. Sometimes Lily comes close and sniffs on our food and it is hard to get our space when we want to eat. We have told her off and pushed her and told her million different things, but we haven't achieved it. I realized once that when I give her the dog treatment, she really gets it!! As soon as she comes close, I look her in the eyes and start growling. Yes growling... In the beginning she didn't back off, so when she still came closer, I snapped at her ("bit" her [using my hand] on the neck), and she quuuuickly walked away!

Nowadays when she gets too close, I growl just for 2-3 seconds and her head lowers down, tail starts wagging and she turns her head and walks away. She doesn't even give a GLANCE at my food after that!

She is soo good nowadays, so easy, so nice, so calm. She is the nicest dog around! Every day me and Bo just talk about how easy and good she is. She doesn't have any problems.

She sleeps in her crate all night, no problem.
Stays alone at home, no problem. (We don't even use music anymore when she is alone)
She is good outside, she gets along with every person, small or big, child or adult ...
She is even learning a new come command (we use a whistle when we want her to come), it takes alot of time to build up the command and make her learn it, but it is going to the right direction :)

I have some pictures, and I will upload them soon!

She is 36kg, ?? cm tall (I'll check that too)

***

At the age of 8½ months...

2009-06-30T15:25:00.000+02:00

... my girl became a woman!! :D

Pictures 8½ months

2009-06-29T10:41:00.001+02:00

New weighing this morning, Lily is 35,1 kg!

Lily 8½ months

2009-06-25T11:32:00.005+02:00

[Scroll down for a new edit]

There is so much to tell this time! Good and bad.

First of all I want to say that now I know why it says "Only for experienced dog owners!" and "Not as your first dog!" next to the breed description of presa canarios... She is giving me (or us) a hard time. Mostly me because I've been the one most interacting with her recently.

The first problem we had couple weeks ago was I noticed her being a bit tense with some other dogs around her, and it caused into little fights that us the dog owners had to split up the dogs. First little with was with another female puppy who was in heat. The second one was with Champion, our friends pit-amstaff mix puppy male, but they have always had problems getting along just together. And one was with an unknown dog at the beach. I would not say that these have been dogs literally fighting each other, as in aggression, because they've all had their 5-8 seconds of fighting and no blood has been shed, it just looked very very bad but really nothing happened.

I studied a little about these, and I think they have been just fights for dominance. But anyway, I put it on my schedule to socialize Lily even more with dogs. And this time I corrected her every time she was tense, showing unwanted excitement etc... Now I do not worry about her anymore. She apparantel just had a time when she wanted to explore her limits, and I set my foot down.

One thing that is still very problematic, is that we have started an obedience class now. And she is way too excited around the other dogs. She has this way of greeting which looks like charging or jumping on the other dogs. Normally when we meet other dogs outside on or out of leash, she doesn't really do that. But surrounded by 8 other dogs she is pretty difficult. I shouldn't use the word embarrasing but I am embarrased when almost all the other dogs are puppies too, and they don't have this issue, but Lily does. The class instructor just said she is an excited puppy, I guess I just have to do my best to distract her.

Today we are going to the class again, and my strategy is to keep her hungry, and make her really tired before the class (a little bicycling trip, long walk with her backpack on, and mental draining by training all the things she already knows...), to then see if she will be a little better?

We are also seeing signs of her getting in her first heat. She is more apathetic, tired, just laying around all the time, also excessive licking downstairs, and when she doesn't lick it I can see some liquids coming out. Plus, I really hope that the fact that she has given us a hard time is just because of her incoming heat or just the defiant age she is probably in now.

But she is a very very nice girl. I've learned some tricks in the classes and now she gives us much more attention, and we have practised giving eye contact too and it works amazingly well.

Her crate training has gone well, but nowadays when she is alone we just keep her in the living room. Last night we tried giving her space and not locking her in her crate while sleeping. And I don't think that turned out well, she was changing places all the time. She didn't apparantely know where to sleep. She looked like "Tell me what to do mom and dad!"
So I locked her back in her crate and she immediately started sleeping :-D And I did find a pee in the kitchen floor this morning. But she hasn't done anything inside day time! So I'm gonna crate her again in the evenings.

Im not gonna hold her mistakes against her, she is still a dog, and dogs live in the moment, and I'm doing that too!

She is 58-59 cm high, and her weight has been jojoing the past 2 weeks from 32kg to 34kg. I think she is on a diet to look good for the men when she does get in heat! ;-)

[Edit]

My plan for making her tired before the obedience class worked! I was bicycling with her for a half an hour, then she wore her backpack and we walked. I also took with me the ultimate treats; sausage and boiled chicken breast! :-D At the class she was MUCH better, giving the other dogs less attention and more to me! And at the end of the class when we all sat down for theory, she just layed on her back and relaxed too!

She is now 34kg by the way! Even though she is now not eating as much as she could (because I think she is getting in her heat now), she is still growing nicely!

***

Lily 8 months in one week

2009-06-07T16:40:00.005+02:00

Lily is now totally cratetrained. She goes to her crate to sleep voluntarely, whenever she feels like it. Also during night she sleeps locked in her crate and has no problems with it.

Her housetraining is also going nicely, we still have to keep an eye on her, we can't trust her totally. But she does know what she is supposed to do and where, only sometimes rarely she does a bad surprise for us... :-)

Her temperament has improved alot. She doesn't really care about other people, or things. She is much more calm, very athletic and active, but easygoing indoors. She follows us blidnly, and respects us.

We have started doing some freestyle agilitytraining with her. She has some problems still, and won't do some tracks but we and she is getting better and better.

And she almost swam for the first time. That was very sweet! We also tried bicycling with her a little. Worked perfectly.

She is back on raw food, and she was a diva in the beinning and didn't touch her food. After what felt like an eternity, she know eats it happily!

Lily will be 8 months in 1 week.
She is 56 cm high and weighs 32 kg.

***

Lily 7 months

2009-05-12T12:43:00.003+02:00

It's been a few weeks since I've last written something. Things have been a bit hectic!

Lily had kennel cough, and after talking to the vet, we decided that she is not going out for anything else than relief trips, because the cough is very contagious (but not dangerous). We didn't want to give the cough to every dog in the neighourhood.

After a loong time she got better. She has alot of built up energy and we try to drain it every day.

She sleeps nicely in her crate at night time. It didn't work when we made her go in there and sleep, but we were tricky and out-smarted her by putting her in a situation that she was actually forced to either stand up all night, or crawl in her crate and sleep there. As soon as she made the decision to sleep there, she was fine. :-)

She is rather housetrained now too, occasionally she gives VERY little signs and just relieves herself indoors, but theres always a sign that we missed. And I'm proud to say she holds back on pee's and poo's easily all night (12h) and daytime 2-5h.

In the past couple weeks she has also matured alot. Firs of all she doesn't put up with anything from other dogs anymore, for example humping. Other dogs humped her (don't in the right place though...) before just as they saw fit. But now Lily tells them off. It's nice to see she has boundaries, and they are just alright.

She also is more ignorant, other dogs and animals and people are less attractive. She can walk past them much easier. She walks on the leash much better now too, very rarely needs to be corrected for going ahead of us. It is mostly going sideways or walking behind me.

She has also grown enormously. She is now 28,5kg. I can not lift her with me on the scale anymore...

Here's some pics.
Enjoy!

***

Lily 27 weeks

2009-04-24T15:04:00.004+02:00

So we have been trying to get Lily housebroken for a few weeks(?). And we had problems with her during night time, the collar with bells didn't work that well. So we read about crate training and because crates cost a fortune we made a little fenced area next to the bed and she's been held there during the night time.

So keeping her fenced at night time has been a marvellous thing. I've learned SO MUCH about her and dog "training" during the past week. The crate area has to be good sized but not too big. The idea of the whole thing is that she will not be able to use the other end of the crate as a toilet and then go sleep on the other end. And dogs don't usually soil their bed areas.

So Lily has held her pee's and poo's all night long being crated. The first three nights I felt bad because she cried so much, and I took her out at 4AM. But that only taught her to cry and cry (because she knew I would take her down). So I stopped that. We listened to the crying for 2 more nights and then she stopped crying.

The thing is that when my boyfriend goes to work at 2AM, Lily woke up too and she would cry after she heard Bo go out of the door. And she would cry for an hour or so. So we learned one other thing; last night Bo woke up normally, and got out of the room quietly and closed the door. He did his things and left. Lily looked a little but didn't make a sound.

It was the first night she slept without any noise at all!

We have also changed our daily routines with her a little. Her water bowl is taken away around 18-20 o'clock in the evenings. (Unless she is very active afterwards, then she gets a good sip of water.) This way she won't have a full bladder in the night time. It has worked VERY nicely. Also, I've told you that Lily asks to go out if she needs to go, by scratching the door. She does it nicely but too much. She would ask to go out maybe 5-10 times a day. So now we ask her to wait and take her out approximately 4-5 times a day. That is not bad at all!

People, we're getting into a normal dog life! It feels so good!

***
She daily routine is pretty much like this:

TIME ACTIVITY

7:00 We wake up. She gets to go out.
[She sleeps]
10.00-11.00 Morning walk (30-60 min) + Morning training outside
[Breakfast]
14:00 Possibly a pee-trip here.
17:00 Evening walk (30-60 min)
[Dinner]
21.30-22.00 A goodnight-pee-trip

***

She has soaked in this plan pretty well. She doesn't even ask to go out that much.
But today I'm gonna go meet a guy who sells a real crate. The size of the crate is 120x90x80 cm. That should be good enough? It is very decent priced too. And when I get it for her, she can make it her own little getaway! :)

She is also possibly a little sick. She has been coughing a little for a week, mostlly when she gets excited. It sounds like she is throwing up a hairball. So I googled a little and it sounds to be kennelcough. So we haven't taken her out too much because it is very contagious, but not dangerous. Just a virut infection. But she's been resting at home for a few days, so that she won't be in contact with many dogs but also so that she won't get excited and cough, and just for her to rest. But she isn't getting any better. She drinks and eats normally but sleeps extra alot. So im gonna call the vet today to see what he has to say. Maybe some antibiotics?

***

A personal comment

2009-04-22T10:24:00.002+02:00

People complain so much about dogs around here. And I am way too nice and I let people say and do anything and I don't even stand up for myself. That is something I really have to practise!

I was outside with Lily taking her for a quick pee, and while doing that I noticed a poo on the grass. The area is the same area Lily always goes for quick pee's or poo's, so the poo on the grass could've been Lilys. We always pick Lily's poo's, and the rare occassions we don't or can't, we go back later and always pick it. So I didn't know if it was Lily's laying on the grass or not, but I thought I could still be nice and pick it up since I had an extra bag in my pocket.

We went to the trash can and threw the closed bag in the can. Then some guys walking by start complaining to me in swedish how I am not allowed to throw dog poo's in normal trash cans, but that I have to find the nearest dog poo trash and throw them there. I understand the logic there, when there are dog trash cans, then doggie poo's go there.

I, just to be nice, picking up, LITERALLY, shit from the ground to allow other people to enjoy the greens of the grass without stepping or seeing uncomfortable brown stuff on it, and they complain!

***

And, how many people have complained to us (we who have medium/big sized dogs) about not having your dog off leash, even when they are just minding their own business, not even showing interest in anything or anyone else, and then you see tons of people having their little chihuahuas running on the grass, barking like there's no tomorrow, without a leash mind you. Some even snap and growl, but hey, that is just cute, right? Because it is small, right?

I know it is most likely to be in a general code that no dog should be off leash in a public place, and I respect that. We got a complaint once about having Lily off the leash but we still do it at evenings in a more distant place.

It should be according to the training of the dog, and not the physical size of the dog, if it is okay for it to be off leash or not. Go out and check the owners and their chihuahuas and how they walk outside. I can promise you that it will be really difficult to find a chihuahua that see's its owner as a leader and walks nicely next to the owner or behind the owner. And also many of them have issues and growl and bark enormously.

I say, when you see a miniature dog next time, multiply the size of the dog by 10, and see then if it is appropriate for it to have that certain kind of behaviour.

All I have to say for now.

Lily 26 weeks

2009-04-17T07:41:00.006+02:00

Lily is almost housebroken now. Almost, because she has been housebroken at daytime for couple weeks now. But occasionally at night time she may go potty indoors. So I've wanted to catch her doing it at night so I can tell her off, and she will understand that it's not okay to go at night time, either! So I made this adjustment to her collar, which we put around her neck before going to bed:

The bells make sure that we hear her move at night. So now I've been catching her three times already, and after these three times there hasn't been accidents at night time either!

Lily is 26kg now. We have had her on dry food diet for a week or two, and she seems to grow more while eating dry food. Maybe we did something wrong with the BARF or maybe "it was so healthy that she growed in a slower pace"... Anyway, we want her to put on some weight and size and then get her back on BARF.

She also knows few commands now:
* Sit
* Down
* Stay
* Jump
* Up (standing up with paws on my belly)
* High five (giving a paw)
* Bus bede (its farsi and means to give a kiss, and she licks back!)
* Go to bed (she walks to her corner and sits, almost taught!)

We are now practising with a flexi-leash:
* Come

And after it planning to teach:
* Drop (whatever in mouth)
* ?

We have also started PPT (positive puppy training), which means trying to catch your puppy do good things, and praising them. Usually you catch your dog do a bad thing, and you tell your puppy off. But all the good things your puppy does, goes un-noticed.

But a behaviour you praise your dog for is more likely to happen again than a behaviour that goes un-noticed. So everytime Lily does something good (walks nicely, ignores a dog/bird/plastic bag outside, plays with her toy, waits calmly to go for a walk, sits nicely in her own spot etc).

Try it! It gives your puppy more confidence, and gives you a better behaving puppy more of the time! :-)

***

Funny dog links:

Poor dog having a bad dream
&
Maggie, the counting dog

***

At Kungsparken

Playing with pitbull, Leo

Lily

Lily 25 weeks

2009-04-06T08:32:00.007+02:00

It's been one week now since we started getting her really housebroken. And I'm glad to say, IT WORKS NOW! She goes to sniff her leash (by the door) when she wants to go out. Last night around 1 AM she came wining by the bed, and we didn't understand the message. So after wining a while, she went back to the living room and made a big one.

So it's just a matter of if we are listening and getting the messages she is trying to send us. It's amazing. I'm so happy. So happy.

Couple days ago me and my friend Aida, we took our dogs to the beach. Aida has a 5 month old pitbull-amstaff mix boy, Champion. The beach was amazing. It was a 500m x 500m grass area, with an access to the sea. And there were tens and tens of dogs, all loose, running around, greeting other dogs, other people, kids, runnin to the sea... It was amazing.

Check out videos of Lily on my YouTube page! I will be adding videos of her from when she was young, also. The address to my page is added to the Link List!
>>>> http://www.youtube.com/user/Naginiiii <<<<

Some shots of Lily and Champion (+ other dogs).

And happy to inform, Lily 25kg... :-) :-)

***

In this first picture, Champion is in the left corner.

***

Champion and Lily were playing rough and Lily got a cut. You can still see it, under the nose on the right side! But no worries, Lily didn't even notice that. :-)

Lily 11 weeks versus >> Lily 25 weeks

Lily 24 weeks

2009-04-02T09:48:00.006+02:00

We are trying really hard to get Lily housebroken. For three days now we have kept an eye on her 25/7. She apparently thinks is perfectly alright to do in the house (our mistake, can't blame anyone else...) Now we are telling her off big time when she does indoors, and having a party when she does outdoors.

We have seen a little improvement already, but today she did 2 pees and 4 poos inside, and it is only 9:49 AM omg!?

Lily changed back to dry food yesterday morning. We want to see if she would put on weight with eating dry food. Maybe we are doing something wrong, giving something too little / too much with BARF? Anyway, we are giving it a go with dry food. But not a permanent change, she will be on dry food just for couple weeks / a month? Just to see possible changes.

The reason for so many poo's today is the change in food yesterday, her tummy is loose and I don't think she has been able to hold back.

Lily is 5½ months (12 days of full 6 months) and weighs 23kg.

***

Lily and Bamse (4 years old golden retriever) playing wednesday 1.4.2009.
Thank you for the pictures, Louise!

Lily by herself.

Lily 22 weeks

2009-03-16T14:09:00.004+01:00

[Edited on Saturday 21/3]

I have to tell two things Lily is consistantly doing good now.

First of all, putting music on when going out and leaving her alone, well, it works. And it's so NICE! We close her in the living room and put some music on, she barks a little when she hears someone go out of the apartement. But then it stops. She has been alone max. almost 3 hours alone at once. We can actually leave her alone in the apartement without closing her in one room. She just needs some music, and hasn't nowadays even barked in the beginning when she hears and sees that someone is leaving. I guess she knows what happens when she is alone, and it isn't that bad anymore!

:-)

And she has gotten this habit of going to sniff the door when she has to "use the toilet". Sometimes she does still do it without any hints at all. But most of the time she goes sniff the door before and then we have couple minutes!

She also learned a trick to jump. And now we are working on dropping whatever she has in her mouth. After that we will practise with "come" command, because she thinks that everytime she does come to us, we do something negative (unfortunately :-( ) by either taking her toy away, putting her in the leash etc... Thats next. I have practised "Come" with her, and she finds it very nice and comes now when asked! But it does need more practise.

I think she is in some fear period, she is afraid of the scale, the broom, skateboarders... Just for no reason at all. Sigh.

Some pictures.

Lily 21kg.
***

Links

2009-03-11T09:50:00.005+01:00

I added some links to the sidebar:

* DogoCanarioNorway
The norwegian kennel we got Lily from.

* Presa Canario Forum
Presa Canario discussion forum. All presa canario people around the world in the same place!

* Dog Breed Info
Dog Breed Info Center® , your one stop shop to dog information.

* Dr. Billinghurst's BARF DIET
Getting down to natural ingredient specifics and benefits...
A very good page to read about B.A.R.F.

* Top 50 FAQ about BARF
Most Frequently Asked BARF Questions
Newcomers Ask! +++++

Lily 21 weeks

2009-03-11T09:31:00.003+01:00

Yesterday was a very interesting day...

Around 12 o'clock, me and Lily dressed up and we took the buss close to the Malmö Djursjukhuset. She still doesn't like to jump on the buss. And the bussdrivers are usually in a hurry, so I can't really take my time and try and make her jump on the buss herself. So I carry her to the buss. (We have to fix this somehow though.)

Anyway, at the hospital we had a full check-up and then she got her first rabies vaccine! I also did some paperwork for the pet-passport.

She gets so much attention outside, at buss stops, in the buss, at the hospital, and its just amazing.

And also what's amazing is that how many people let their dogs control them, without noticing it. All tiny dogs were just pulling their owners at the hospital. Some people told their dogs to sit, but thei didn't finish it and just looked away, and the dog ofcourse didn't obey and didn't take the owner seriously. Sigh... :(

Anyway. We came back home, I went to the grocery store, I came back, made some food, then I had some grapes. Lily was very quietly sleeping, she had been sleeping for 1½h already. I left my plate of grapes on the couch (the other end from where Lily was sleeping), and I left. Honestly I was gone maybe 1½min.

I suddenly realized in the kitchen that I left GRAPES WITH MY DOG!

I ran back and I was hoping she was still sleeping.

But she was all over the plate and chewing and the plate was empty.

:-(

And for all of you that don't know this: grapes & raisins, chocolate, macademian nuts are poisonous to a dog. Also nicotine and caffeine.

I didn't know what to do. I quickly called Bo and this another dog owner I knew here. Then I tried calling the animal hospitals around here, but they all put me in queue!!! Finally I got through on one, and they said that when you don't know how many grapes your dog had, and its a puppy and doesn't weigh that much, you should bring in it and let the doctors take care of it.

So I called the taxi and hurried to a hospital, they took her in immediately. She was acting very very normal though, but the vet said you rarely see symptoms immediately. Anyway, they gave her a shot that would make her throw up all her tummy. The also gave her some food which she ate. They put us out in a kennel and she threw up 6 times. Then she layed down and slept :-( It takes alot of energy from a little pup to go through that.

Then the vet checked her again and she seemed okay and we went home. Apparantely grapes can ruin the kidneys. But if she seems normal for the next couple days, then theres nothing to worry.

And she's okay now too. She's been resting but she's very normal. :-) I feel really really bad, but, I know I just made a mistake. I will not make that one again!

Some pictures rom last week

***

She's waiting for the permission to go eat her veggie-mince mix

She likes sticks big!

She was around 17kg few days ago and we talked with Bo that we should give her more food, maybe she needs more in order to grow. So now we are giving more and she is stable at 19,5kg, and growing!
In this picture her head looks big compared to the body. :-D

Oh! And I forgot to say that we cropped her ears, crop crop!

Lily 20 weeks

2009-03-03T13:29:00.003+01:00

It has been almost a week that she has been on B.A.R.F. food!

She started easy, with just some chicken for two days, and she threw up once. We learned that she is a gulper. So we have to keep an eye on how she eats, and sometimes assist her by holding the meat for her. But she is getting good now, and she has learned some tricks on how to chew on the bones and meat herself! :-)

After two days she started getting some veggies, and now some fruits. Soon she will get some offal and eggs and such. Veggies and fruits she eats just like that, no problem at all.

She is showing much more interest in eating the food. With kibble she sometimes left some of it in her bowl and just walked away. But this food she eats and seems much happier. Also we are happy, it feels very natural feeding her meat and bones, dogs are born to chew!

Lily throwed up for the second time today, but this time she started eating it again. Slightly disgusting for us, but it seems logical to eat it again when its mushed up a little. It is amazing how nature works, huh?

Some changes we've noticed on her: A) Her stool is very solid, much whiter, and much less stinkier! B) She drinks much less (and pee's for that matter) C) She sleeps a bit more, especially after meals D) She doesn't smell that bad anymore, not in her mouth nor outside

Another thing we noticed. We have left Lily alone almost every day, we started in 5-15min periods, and now she is alone ½-1½ hours. Yesterday she had been alone for an hour when my boyfriend came home, and some people in the stairwell told him that our poor poor dog has been howling and barking for an hour straight... Let's face it, we do not neglect our dog. We knew she barked and howled a little when we were out, but we thought she would learn by herself. But I started reading more about leaving puppies alone.

Apparantely a good start is to close the puppy in a certain room, and make that puppy friendly, resembling her being alone. And then just do something and see (+ hear) what the puppy does when left alone.

I did this today and she barked for a long time. I went back in living room (that's where I had her) and turned on the TV, to see if some human talking from the TV would make her calm down. No affect. :-(

Then I took my laptop infront of the closed living room door, put some pretty loud music on, and left it infront of the closed living room door. She calmed down immediately!! I'm telling you, I was so amazed, that I came and took a peek, and she was sleeping right outside the door...
Apparantely human voices calm her down. Thus feeling less lonely.

Happy happy! :-)

***

Lily and Nova (9 month old rottweiler)

Lily 19 weeks

2009-02-27T11:29:00.003+01:00

Lily scored 19kg this morning! She is definently growing.

Alot has happened during the past week. She tried traveling in a buss, and going to the city for the first time. Jumping on the buss wasn't something she wanted to do, but in the buss she sat nicely and very normal. The city was full of people and cars. She handled that very nicely too! She made pee's in every corner though, and that was a bit embarrasing. But nothing bad in that... :-)

And the big milestone; last night we switched her to B.A.R.F.!
For few days she will only have some meaty bones, to detox and let her tummy get used to it. Then we'll start with the rest of the stuff but slowly.

She seems to like it very muh until now.

***

My brother Daryoush with Lily, in the city.

Others

Lily 17weeks

2009-02-11T06:47:00.006+01:00

Lily dropped most of her front-babyteeth this week! For a day she was all toothless and looked very sweet. But already she has grown new teeth right there, they look big and strong!

Also, apparantely her littermates weigh almost double than her. Eroz seems to be around 24kg, and Jennie was 19kg couple weeks ago! Lily weighs 14kg now. Some suspect that because she was sick she weighs this little now. But when was she sick anyway? It feels like it was ages ago, and she got better just few days after seeing the vet. So I doubt thats the reason. She just might be a slow grower! Thats not very unusual for big dogs and females also, so I've heard. :-)
(Edit: She is putting up weight fast, being 16kg now!)

If Lilys littermates owners read this, please comment on how your puppy is growing! It's interesting to know.

I have to comment about Lilys behaviour and training. She is just amazing! Very amazing!! It seems that she doesn't have ANY problems at all!

* She knows the basic commands by heart (sit, down, stay, come).
* She is also taught, that we enter every room first, and she must sit until we invite her to come in.
* Food can not be touched until we say it is okay to go and eat.
* If we don't want her to come on the couch, we simply say so and she obeys. She does very often put up a little barking scene when it is denied from her, but she doesn't do anything else and goes quiet very soon. Also if someone for example drops a glove, one "No!" is good enough and she will not touch it.
* Fully socialized, doesn't mind other people, kids, trucks, traffic, places, things......

and my favorite...

* Walking on the leash. Without pulling. Walking next to me and not going infront of me. It works now! I think I've been doing this for few days now, but it works 90% of the times now! She walks on my right side, sometimes behind me, and ears are usually all back, submission? But I don't feel bad admitting that she does sometimes go and pull, to go and sniff a bush or some other dogs .. markings on a pole etc. Things like that. But she follows very nicely.

Like Cesar Millan says, getting a new puppy is a chance to do everything right. Puppies are not born with some fobias and problems. They are all born pure and ready to soak up like a sponge. So its up to us people to get everything correct! I have a feeling we are really getting there with Lily if we keep up going like this!

We plan on starting her on BARF diet very soon. I'm going to Finland next week, so when I come back would be a good time to really start it. She eats almost 600g of kibble every day. The package says 450g for a 4month old puppy, who will grow up to be +45kg. It is much more what we give her, yes. But she looked too thin before, we had to give her more! Now she looks good. So, it also costs us ALOT feeding her on kibble. So we might aswell use the same amount of money on meat and veggies!

Some pictures again!

* * *

We had some snow, she looved playing in it! I mean looooved!

Going & being outside.

We gave her a lamb shank, just a taste of what BARF will be like. Yes, it might upset her tummy a little because we're not gonna start on BARF just yet, but it won't hurt her. :-)

And some pitures from outside!

Lily 16 weeks

2009-02-05T10:36:00.005+01:00

Lily has done amazing progress during the past few weeks. She is now fully socialized, and gives us alot of her undivided attention and respects our orders (mostly :-)). We've just started on training her to walk nicely next to us outside. After just two days you can see a huge development in that!

Yesterday she dropped two of her babyteeth. Will soon take pictures of our toothless toothfairy!

***

Some pictures

Lily 15½ weeks

2009-01-31T15:43:00.005+01:00

On tuesday Lily will be 16 weeks, this is 5th week we have her.

She already knows the commands: 1) sit 2) stay and 3) down! She just learned the command down, and today was the first day she did it perfectly and many times in a row. She does need some treats in order to obey at times, but sit & stay she can do without any bribing!

We make her sit and wait for us to go through every doorway first. And she does it very nicely. Also she sits at every red light, before crossing the street. No problem at all.

She has been socialized pretty well with things too, such as other dogs, other people, cars, big trucks, the traffic, places etc. We are still working on it every day but she isn't too worried about things like that anymore.

Oh, and she can jump on the couch herself now!

***

Outside at a park

At home

Lily 14½ weeks

2009-01-24T09:50:00.003+01:00

I took some great pictures so I had to put them up again! She is doing perfectly normal now.

On monday we are taking the newspapers off the ground (we had them there so that she could do her sudden diarrheas on them), and we will get back to our normal routine with taking her down for pee-pee's/poo-poo's. We are also planning on starting to leave her alone for daily basis starting on monday, just for minutes at time so that she learns that it's OK to be alone. I left yesterday for couple of hours and Bo told me Lily howled after me for a half an hour... Also we will make her acquinted with the bath tub and water too on monday - maybe we could soon wash her for the first time!

I ordered Dr. Ian Billinghurst's BARF DIET, I'm really into all of that now. And I found a Presa Canario -forum too, http://elpresa.com/forums/ .

***

Two pictures from last week, but they show her pretty good!

And some from last night! Still a bit too thin but we're getting there :-).

And here she looks like an old lady, hehheh!

Letting you all know...

2009-01-22T15:14:00.002+01:00

So just so you know, Lily is already doing much better! She isn't having that much diarrhea anymore, and she only threw up once since yesterday - that's a quite an achievment compared to what she did couple days ago!

She is much more energetic now and enjoys playing, running, teasing, the usual. Also eating and drinking are back to her top priorities again. We are giving her abit more food now, her ribs are showing very much, thats not good. Lily is still sleeping alot, we are just letting her rest so she can recover faster.

We are studying on BARF (Bones And Raw Food) diet now, it should be really good for her - or for any other canine. We would feel much happier if we knew any shops that sell all that kind of food, especially raw meaty bones. It kind of feels disgusting we are just giving her dry food, since most pet foods contain a long list of additives, preservatives and grain products. It seems to be the most natural diet to give her, BARF that is.

If anybody knows any places in or around Malmö that sells that food, please let us know!! :-)

Lily 14 weeks

2009-01-21T11:16:00.003+01:00

We started having some problems with Lily couple days ago. We noticed it when she started to not finish her food at meal times. Then after a while she wouldn't even show much interest in the food at all. After that she's been having some awful diarrhea and vomiting. We we're lucky enough to have a healhtcheck at the animal hospital yesterday. We had booked the healthcheck a week ago and conveniently enough Lily got sick right around that too.

So at the hospital the vet told us that we have to go acute queue. We waited for almost 3 hours for our time to come. Lily did not mind the least being in such environment (see pictures below), she sniffed the place alot and tried to eat all the animal hair she found on the floor, then we made a chair comfy for her and she took a nap.

The vet said she seemes pretty healthy and her temperature was okay (38,6 C) so she didn't have fever either. She seems to just have a dog flu of some kind. But you can easily notice that she has alost alot of weight! Her ribs are showing and such. Her weight last week was 11,3kg and yesterday it was 10,2kg, so she has lost one kg which is almost 10% of her total bodyweight!!!

We are giving her some Pro-Kolin (treatment of vomiting and diarrhea, for the normalization of gut peristalsis) and some special food she can digest easily. She should be okay by next week! Lily is already showing that she has energy and appetite to eat and drink something, so we're not worried anymore.

Here's some pictures again! Enjoy :-)

***

Lily relaxing at the vets. We are quite lucky to have a happy-go-lucky dog, who doesn't mind the least being in a place like that!

Lily this morning.

And whole body pictures from last week to show off her beautiful body!

Lily 13 weeks

2009-01-17T11:53:00.007+01:00

We went to the vet yesterday to get some vaccines. She weighs 11kg now at the age of 13,5 weeks!

***

You can see her muscles ;-)

Relaxing in mom's lap.

Sleeping, what a position...

Just being adorable!

Update

2009-01-09T11:04:00.004+01:00

Hi again!

I got some really nice pictures so here's some again! I know I just published one post just yesterday but she is just so amazing. She is getting big fast, its been only a bit more than a week but I could say that she is growing almost hourly. Soon she won't fit to walk under the table anymore! She is already bumping her head alot under it. :-)

She has found something really interesting outdoors, and that is leaves. When she sees a leaf moving in the wind, she just goes nuts and runs after it and catches it! That is pretty sweet (or gullig like the swedes say around here), but I don't know how healthy it is for her to eat leaves as snacks, so we always take those away from her. Also she isn't too keen on the weather being windy. Everything else is okay now, cars and bicycles and elevators. But when its windy, she hides in the bushes and won't move.

One other sweet thing is also that she has hiccups several times a day. Adorable. Now I'm gonna show you the pictures I got!

***

Here she is in all of her glory. Im sorry for those freaky eyes. In the background you can see a red toy called "Kong". This one you can put food into and then she will have to try hard to get it out.

Two treats in the kong. Look at those flappy ears :-)

She got the kong in her mouth and now wants to bring it up on the couch...

Playing with it now!

This is a pretty cool picture, look at the drop of water falling (over the paw on the left) and more water dropping from her mouth.

Here are some extras.

The first week

2009-01-08T14:22:00.001+01:00

So we've had Lily for over a week now. I've tried taking pictures often but I feel like I haven't taken enough! Anyway.

Lily has been such a nice treat. She does quite alot of accidents indoor, but we're getting better at noticing when she's about to do it. At first she was very afraid of the elevator, cars, bicycles, other ppl etc, but now she is much much better. She is full of energy and plays with almost anything you give her. The favorite toys are a brown fox and a pig tail (you might get a glimpse of those in pictures down). The fox has almost torn to pieces, but not quite! Lily is trying her best though to kill it!

She sleeps at nights very quietly, no problem at all. And overalll, she is quite an easygoing pup. She can almost jump on the couch herself too (we've counted 3 occassions where she has been found on the couch without any of us helping her there). So we are very proud of her :-)

Here are the best shots of the newest pics!

***

Lily outside in the sun, with her dress on naturally, and her pink Marimekko collar!

Lily caught biting on my wireless mouse!!

This is her reaction after I told her off...
(she always growls at me a little after I deny something from her, as she did in this picture too)

And after 10 seconds she found something more interesting...

And lazy-Lily watching TV and just relaxing!

She's here!

2009-01-08T14:21:00.000+01:00

She arrived home to Malmö on Monday evening 29th December 2008. It was a really long trip to get her in the first place, I had to go all the way to Oslo! We took three different trains home, and she behaved really nicely throughout the whole trip! Not a single accidental pees or poos in trains. She just slept and played with some toys. Nice huh?

Here's a taste of what she looked like in the train (and a bit of extra after it)!

Sleeping very nicely and quietly... :-)

And some pictures of her at home!

She is so sweet and small, and her belly is hairless and so warm!!

She has a really hard time going out without this dress on, she will freeze without it! (And it is a very good reason for me to have a dress on her!) Even tho the dress is blue, she is still a girl...

Docanor's Lily

2009-01-08T11:05:00.005+01:00

Hi everyone!

So here I made a blog as a tribute to our beautiful dog, a quality presa canario, Lily! This is a strong and powerful dog, that is very suitable as a guradian but it is also an excellent family and show dog. Even though some may think Lily has a tough look into her, she is the sweetest and most lovable dog I've ever seen.

This blog is made so our friends and family (and anyone who wants to keep up with her development) can see her as she grows up. Hopefully this can make up for the fact that especially my family won't get to see her as a pup.

Anyway, I want to start this blog with the earliest pictures our kennel DogoCanarioNorway has taken of Lily. (The address to Docanor is http://www.dogocanarionorway.com ) Thank you Docanor for the pictures!

So here we go!

Presagaute's Rocla (Kayla) and Egon had a litter of 9 beautiful pups. One of them is our little princess Lily, but which one? :-) (Date of birth: 14.10.2008)

This is the first picture we got of Lily. After seeing this picture, we knew it was this puppy we wanted!
Lily 5½ weeks

Here are some other first pictures we have of her.
Lily still 5½ weeks in these pictures.

And Lily (I think is..) around 10 weeks old (still living at the kennel).
Look at that excellent red brindle pattern!