[saidso]

A shout out to the experienced dog owners here.

It's becoming clear that one of the many changes that will be made in my life when I relocate is becoming responsible for a dog. There has been a huge amount of excitement and longing inside me about dogs for several years, and that has come to the point where it's a priority.

I used to have 3 dogs when I still lived in the country before but wasn't solely responsible for them.

I (or some of the "me's" inside) have already contacted a licensed dog breeder who has pups. There has been discussion about training methods and classes. We already did the financial side of the responsibility (= vet fees and dog food/ accessories) to death. There is ongoing discussion about what big things in our life will need to change, at least temporarily, to focus on bringing up a puppy.

I am still looking at the option of re-homing a dog rather than starting out with a pup, but re-homing centres in my area are almost obsessively strict in their criteria for re-homing disturbed dogs (with behavioural issues). I cannot promise to not invite friends to my house. I cannot promise to walk a dog in a place where there will be no other dogs. I cannot promise a Huge Private garden, just a small garden.

My main unresolved queries are about whether to get a strong, lively breed - because I will be moving to countryside and am an outdoorsy person - or to get a cross breed which might give me a more peaceful quieter life. I don't want a delicate dog that is going to break it's leg the first time that we walk up a mountainside. I don't want a dog that is so preoccupied with sniffing that it falls off a cliff edge.

Apart from breed there is the question of personality. One of my previous dogs was very attractive but too stupid to be interested in learning much. I would like a smart dog that could enjoy participating in some serious training classes. On the other hand... a dog that is too smart will never give me time to get on with the more peaceful occupations in my life.

When you go to meet a litter of pups for the first time, what questions do you ask the owner and yourself? Do you compromise, or do you wait a year for another litter if you can't find the perfect dog friend for your dreams?

I am confident that this breeder has taken care of the health and basic social needs of her puppies.

Any tips would be appreciated, as the need for a dog is so strong right now but this will be a very long-term "relationship".

[rechu]

Hello. Congrats on being able to get a dog soon. I have a few thoughts that I hope will help.


There are some websites out there that can help you find a breed that fits with your lifestyle/living situation. This is one - https://www.selectadogbreed.com/find-your-matches/. They might help you to narrow down to certain breeds.

I have had only rescued dogs from the street, so I don't have experience with dog breeders. Most were mixed breeds although one was likely 100% poodle and another was very cocker spaniel. One thing to consider is that purebreds often have breed-related health issues. Mixed breeds have less of a problem there. If you decide on a purebred, definitely investigate the breeder. Reputable ones should do health testing, to reduce the incidence of these health problems:

Purebred Dogs: Health Testing for a Stronger Breed

I hope it works out for you!

I would recommend finding a good dog rescue organization. There are many great dogs out there desperate for good homes.

[saidso]

@eskielover
would it be ok to also ask your advice please? no pressure - just I am also moving a distance from the city in order to start over in the countryside. a lot is changing, and each time I see you signature it's an inspiration.

[seeminglyreal]

Don't buy, adopt.

[eskielover]

Originally Posted by saidso

@eskielover
would it be ok to also ask your advice please? no pressure - just I am also moving a distance from the city in order to start over in the countryside. a lot is changing, and each time I see you signature it's an inspiration.

Glad to talk this over with you. Thanks for flagging this or I might have missed your post.

I would probably start off with a new puppy since the need you have is to connect & I have found that can work best to start with when you get a puppy (you can always add a rescue to the mix when you have established your relationship with your puppy & when it is older & bonded to you) However along those lines I had problems having the same quality time for all the dogs I had & Leo was the one with the bond to me so he was always with me. I think JoGI would have had a similar bond because now that Leo is gone JoGI is connecting with me but we just don't have the lifetime connection though I have loved him since he was born.

With my eskies I have found that the males are much more connecting than the females. Would be interesting to see what the breeder thinks about the breed you are thinking of getting.

With a new litter it is hard to know personalities until after they open their eyes though you can observe the ones that push past the others to get to mom's milk. After eyes are open some tend to be more interested in people than others though this breeder sounds like a hands on breeder that works with handling each puppy.

A lot of a dog's personality they are born with BUT a lot is the quality time we spend with them after we bring them home. Leo was the only male in his Christmas litter & no one wanted a male so we ended up with him. I remember thinking how lonely he must feel after all his litter mates were gone.....so he came up to my bedroom with me & we spent every minute together. I even have a picture of him with me feeding him a string of spaghetti from my bowl. We shared everything & he was with me constantly from that point on. He traveled everywhere with me & that strengthened the bond. So it is a combination of nature & nurture for dogs too.

I agree that training is very important BUT again, my first eskie (Excell) was trained & we spent hours practicing & even showing, then went on to just having fun with agility classes. The interesting thing was that I never trained Leo & I had a more special connection with him than I ever had with Excell. My love was equal but the bond wasn't. Lol....both would still come when I called if they didn't have something else on their mind (training ir no training) I know the bond connection with Leo came with all the time together.....& he had a heart that honestly you can't just see or pick out in a litter of puppies but I think develops at home together.

When I moved to my farm with Leo alone for the first 6 months, he just wanted to explore. I let him mostly until I caught him thinking that chasing my neighbors cows was a fun thing to do. That ended his freedom to explore freely. His freedom was then limited to wandering on a long leash when we took walks through my woods. I couldn't fence him in because there wasn't a fence he couldn't climb over. Something one never knows until it happens. None of my other eskies were like that.

Please ask questions because I could go on with things I have experienced & learned but thought the highlights of what I have experienced (at least with my breed) might give some insights

[Calla lily12]

How wonderful for you ! There's nothing like a dog! I would, however adopt, rather than buy a puppy. We just adopted the most lovable smart little girl. She's part Scottie/wirehair terrier. She was transported up north from a high kill shelter. Which ever you choose, I wish you many happy years with your new family member.

[saidso]

Thanks to you all. Am hugely disappointed because the breeder that I wanted to buy from didn't contact me back. On the other hand, buying my new home is going slowly, and the pups are already 8 weeks so... the time frame would have been awkward.

I want a particular breed, border collie (purebred or cross). Not obsessively, I do look at other dogs in rescue. I like large dogs and have trained one aggressive large dog who I adored BUT I am being realistic about the fact that I'm getting older and might suddenly become not strong enough to hold a huge dog who had set his mind on something. Medium size but lively seems perfect I look at small dogs, but I'm relocating to rocky hillsides and cliffs with very strong winds. I know that border collies (often) can be (very) demanding personalities to live with, but they are strong built and thrive in mountainous environments. They find a variety of rough environments interesting, they are tough and savvy enough not to get themselves into trouble (with the big exception of herding instincts).

I am going to have my hands full training a pup with herding instincts to recall in the countryside, let alone a strong adult dog. I totally get what you say about no fence high enough Eskielover!!! I have been reading through all the literature available about training 8-16 week collies. Apparently this is the time when training should be a priority = accustoming them to different experiences, and starting to let them know what is and isn't permitted, even if have to carry them around before they are fully vaccinated.

Thank you so much Eskie-lover for talking about the bond. That makes me feel so much better. Yes, I want a bonded dog as well and... if it's a border collie... a well-behaved one. Border collies share my trait of disliking boredom - so we will both need to do some fun dog-social training, some agility and practice lettiing each other relax quietly!!!

I've done quite a lot of reading about older border collies and the illnesses they are liable to as well. Am preparing myself for all the responsibilities!!! A collie probably needs to have it's hair groomed as often as I brush my own.

Reaching out to all you dog owners: I'm having moments of difficulty imagining that this big change in my life will happen successfully. There are people to persuade, hard physical work still to get done, and my own inner darkness to constantly enlighten. I do not have control of other people's slow timescales, so patience is a virtue!!!

Thank you so much for all the responses!!! Saidso


I look at rescues constantly, but it's a fact that collies in rescue these days mostly are there because they have severe behavioural problems - or they are 13 years old and blind. I've decided that I can't take on a dog that is homebound or unsocial to other dogs and people. The point of my new life is to make new friends (doggy and human). Also I don't yet have a car and rescue dogs with behavioural problems require frequent befriending visits to remote locations which I can't manage.

[saidso]

P.S. It's the herding problem that is at the back of my mind looking at rescue dogs. Round here are lowland sheep who can be guaranteed to do the most stupid thing possible when confronted by a herding dog, and farmers understandably will sometimes shoot without question a dog that puts their herd at risk. I've heard that the only chance of teaching a herding breed to be uninterested in sheep is to teach them that very young, and repeat, and repeat. You cannot always avoid sheep because they change pastures. Sure it's in a collie's nature to herd, but we are in the 21st century so perhaps they need to learn to use smartphones? I am hopeful can discourage this.

[sarahsweets]

Does anyone else feel that dog training can sometimes come naturally? I don't mean for showing dogs I just mean generally speaking around the house. We have two dogs and I delivered both of them. They are glorified mutts. I had to deliver them. They are also brothers a year apart. Same mama different baby daddy! They would be considered small-ish not really medium but not tiny. They are very good dogs and listen to as always I don't know how we got so good at it but I think we just lucked out on a good mutts.

[eskielover]

I agree with natural dog training. The difference I have experienced is that the dogs I obedienced trained did what I commended (most of the time...eskies have a mind of their own) I even played with them in my back yard so our relationship was more than just training & showing.

My eskies I have connected the most with & who want to connect with me are the ones I did train just naturally. Males connected closer with the natural training but I had a toy female eskie that at a very young & untrained age followed right by me when my car broke down & I had to walk several miles across the desert to get to my horse trainers ranch. Leo would go off investigating but always had to know exactly where I was & when first on my farm he would bring me back gifts he found. First one was a road killed raccoon tail. I thanked him for bringing me such a gift & then when he wasn't looking, bagged it up & put it in the trash.

I had a friend with a border collie. Her neighbors cows got out when she was in her horse feed room & her collie felt she was being threatened. He actually herded the cows together & layed down giving them the "evil eye....don't you dare move" until the neighbor came & got his cows. Her collie was never herding trained. It was natural & his connection with her made him want to protect.

I think some dogs connect in ways others just don't. Guess that us why some successfully train as service dogs & others don't. Not sure how to tell until that connection develops.

Leo always had a desire to be with me while still being very independent. Always a problem solver & a clown. His last year he was very sensitive to me. I had a bad coughing fit when on my bed & he came right up to me & started hitting his head into my chest. I didn't realize at first what he was really doing. The month before he died I was laying on the floor trying to get his blind older sister out from under my bed. Leo got on top of me & in my face & started kissing me. I told him I was rescuing his sister. He looked under the bed & saw her then got off of me. I never lay on the floor like that so he thought something was wrong with me. He was never trained...everything he did came from his heart. I am not sure a connection like that will ever happen again with another doggie.

From the time he was 2 months old I talked to him in sentences & he understood & did what I said. I remember wondering if there was a little human inside that white fur coat.

JoGI is blind too. I have to talk to him constantly so he knows where I am & there are times he extends his paw to see if I am there. Both my eskies are blind now & it is a challenge being "seeing eye mom" but we find a system that works.

I like working with the dog's personality rather than forcing them into programmed training. It is a lot more fun for them & me

[Velvet Lounger]

My best advice is get your doggy pet insurance. Vet's bills otherwise can be horrendous! Getting our puppy insurance while he was young was, with hindsight, the very best decision we ever made.

[saidso]

At the moment neither the house I wanted nor the puppy I wanted seem to be available, so we will see.

I never did formal dog training before, but I have worked with collies and they like to have their mind occupied all-the-time. I figure dog-training would be a social thing for us both. PLUS where I had dogs before was only the occasional upland sheep, mostly indifferent to dogs. Lowland sheep seem to have a death wish (farming people say this not me). If they are herded by an unfamiliar dog they will drown or jump off cliffs en masse in panic.

The only cure for adult dogs with herding habits is to put them with an angry ram. Thus - the dog-let is somehow going to get formal anti-sheep training from week 8 onwards, and I don't care how unnatural people think that might be - it's better than getting shot or gored by a ram.

Lowland sheep are masochistic creatures "by nature", or perhaps they know instinctively that their life isn't going anywhere good. Dogs are herders "by nature". Footpaths with hedges do not have warning notices about where sheep are grazing, hence the dog-let gets trained to "cease", "lie" what have you when ordered.

Collies are unusually happy to train anyways, it's in their nature as working dogs.

[eskielover]

Originally Posted by Velvet Lounger

My best advice is get your doggy pet insurance. Vet's bills otherwise can be horrendous! Getting our puppy insurance while he was young was, with hindsight, the very best decision we ever made.

I didn't.....I had 7 dogs I finally brought to my farm after leaving Calif (had 13 but more than I could handle so I kept the 7 closest to me & sent the other 5 back to Calif after giving my (now ex-H) a chance over that first Christmas here.

7 dogs have been expensive but insurance for all 7 would have cost too much too. In the US we have a CC called Care Credit. $200 + they give you 6 months to pay off....over $800 a year. Have used it to pay for my glasses & my dogs vet bills. I also have required return visits added into the cost so it qualifies for the extended payments without paying interest.

Next best thing when one's vet requires payment & no account with them. (I keep their practice going this last year)

[saidso]

Oh, Eskielover, I admire you for coping with the blindness in your dog companions. I'm a little scared of that - deafness ok, but with blindness so much harder.

As to vet's bills - my dog-let is going to have his own 10 year investment plan, lol. I guess that's a bit like doing Care Credit in advance.

[eskielover]

Blindness is not too bad except one can't let them roam unsupervised. JoGI has great hearing & I constantly talk to my dogs anyway....even when I had Leo. He was like my little human soul mate & chatted with him constantly. I handle JoGI the same. The difficult one is Tawny. She is not only blind but mostly deaf too & has some doggie dementia (possibly had a mild stroke sometime this last year.)

I was always able to let her just hang in the front yard with Leo the one on the long line. I came home from shopping late one night & was letting them potty walk while I took the stuff into the house. When I was done she was totally missing at 11pm in the dark & this area has coyotes. I went into panic mode. Called her & told Leo to bark for her. Decided to jump in my truck & check the road before heading into my woods. Just after midnight I found her 1/4 mile away in the neighbor's farm front yard totally lost. That happened one more time but during the day when I was working on my lawn tractor repair. She was hanging close to me then I got distracted on the repair & she disappeared on a HOT day. I drove around but nothing. Then I decided to head into my woods & she was walking in circles in the middle of a grassy area. That was her last free roam time. Now she just stays in the house with puppy pads because she just gets too disoriented when there is a change in her surroundings.

I became a doggie nutritionist last summer trying to fight Leo's cancer. I actually pureed his food & when he had problems I fed him with a syringe. He got pretty much 24 hour care from me from last Aug to Dec. Exhausting....yes, but they are my family & as long as they are not in pain I give them the best care their whole life....it just changes with age just like it does for all of us.

My house right now is a doggie nursing home....but I am ok with that. I miss what I had with them in the past but life is all about stages.

My first blind eskie was Chinook. Had no idea he was blind until I was walking him on a leash out to my mail box & he ran into the tree. That was my learning experience about doggie blindness. Chinook got lots of hugs & kisses so he didn't feel bad about what happened. Leo struggled adapting to older age & then illness. He was so used to being active he would get embarrassed when he couldn't do things he was used to doing. I gave him loving & told him it was ok & gave him a mom hand to do what he wanted.

Even my first horse ended up going blind. He lived until 33. I had to be his seeing eyes when riding him too. So I have had lots of practice caring for my blind fur babies. We adapt just like they do.

[Velvet Lounger]

Originally Posted by eskielover

I didn't.....I had 7 dogs I finally brought to my farm after leaving Calif (had 13 but more than I could handle so I kept the 7 closest to me & sent the other 5 back to Calif after giving my (now ex-H) a chance over that first Christmas here.

7 dogs have been expensive but insurance for all 7 would have cost too much too. In the US we have a CC called Care Credit. $200 + they give you 6 months to pay off....over $800 a year. Have used it to pay for my glasses & my dogs vet bills. I also have required return visits added into the cost so it qualifies for the extended payments without paying interest.

Next best thing when one's vet requires payment & no account with them. (I keep their practice going this last year)

I'm so sorry to learn that. Of course, insurance costs are such an enormous payout....I had a horse, too. Lived 27 years. Would rather not talk about as it's another tug on the heart.

I'm sorry you went through such difficult times.

[saidso]

I just looked up eskies - never heard of them before - sure are beautiful, friendly looking dogs! Must have been hot in LA with that coat however?

I suppose you learn to be an elderly dog carer as you go along like anything else. I'm glad you talked about blindness because that was one thing I kind-of worried about reading about older rescue dogs being blind. Because I love to walk, and where possible - like on rocks by the sea - I like my dogs to be far-ranging. Your farm sounds ideal for older dogs because they can be safe with a medium range . Hugs to all the family! Saidso

PS I had a lost dog when I was six and my dad made me go out alone to find him. It was terrifying, but I had to find that dog, and it taught me a lesson in being responsible for animals.