Canis erectus

Maybe the daogs were upset because someone else got to the garbage before they were able to. JK :D My first guess would be a random act of vandalism like Alan said, except that for all the time it took fot the vandals to open your gate, they would have just hit some other more easily accessible house. Sounds like someone's out to cause you grief, unless... I dunno, I guess it's a long shot, but can an animal be a possible suspect?

I'm going to throw myself out to the wolves now by saying that I find little wrong with tail docking. Is it really that much more painful/inhumane than clipping off dewclaws? One can think up as many reasons as they like as to why one should crop a dog's tail, I think that's kind of grasping for straws of rationality. It pretty much all boils down to tail cropping being a traditional vestige left over from tax reasons, hunting reasons, using the tail as a handle, etc., etc... Reasons that in most cases no longer has any relevancy in modern times. So if the only reason to dock tails is tradition, is that reason enough to keep doing it? In my opinion, tradition is enough to have preserved so many breeds that no longer have their origional functional role to play in society, so tradition is good enough for me. On another note (you can call me a hypocrite now if you like), but I don't really condone ear cropping as a whole. The exception being in some mastiff breeds that traditionally have cropped ears in order to make them look more fierce or intimidating than they really are to indruders, a part of their guard dog ancestry that they still fulfill today (though even on this point I'm not sure how I really feel about cropping). Other than that I view ear cropping as unneccessary surgery, primarily due to the dog's older age plus the use of anestesia etc. Going back to the tails, there's the obvious risk of infection but that is not a problem with proper attention. I personally compare tail docking/dew claws with circumscission. Seems like something of a double standard to think it's OK to do that to babies (even though they are evil and probably deserve it :D ), but it's not OK to do a comparable procedure on puppies. Well, that went on longer than I intended as I'm sure there's already been several threads covering the topic quite thouroughly. With regards to Bob Tail Boxers I think it's an OK idea. That is of course taking Aroura's word that it was done responsibly. Selective breeding for different types of the same breed has been going on for a long time (either for good or ill), and I don't find Bob Tails to be any different. Dogs are after all, in the image that we design them to be, even if that means generating a new line of dogs in order to keep the traditional look of a breed where tail docking has been illegalized. I think the only point of contension I would have is if there is a temperment difference from the origional breed.

I've seen a number of 'quillings' first hand (nothing anywhere near this bad though) and that looks pretty authentic to me. I would bet that that the clinic staff took those pics, there would have been some'standing around' during anestesia prep when photos could have been taken. I had someone show me this picture earlier this week and although I don't remember the write up per se, I do remember that it was different than the one here. Something about the lighthearted commentary from the owner about a situation like this doesn't make me buy it.

Signed

You bet, though all I did was just help you find a direction to look in. I've thought about it before, and it's amazing how many times we, as the owner, inadvertantly can throw off the heirarchy balace by the simplest little things that we normally don't think about. Anyway, I hope you're on the right track and can get the peace back.

Today one of the vets from work performed a post mortum for animal control on a young Pit Bull. Sad part is that the poor dog died from sadistic abuse, sadder still, a neighbor saw someone doing it and then waited a couple days before calling the cops and reporting it. Can't really say much else about it because this will be going to trial, but if it hits the local paper I'll post more details. Kinda hits a whole nasty new level when you get to see this kinda stuff first-hand.

Courtnek, what are their ages? Free doesn't look very old but I wonder if she is slowing down some and feeling her position somewhat threatened by Laurel. I'm starting to see a little bit of this at my house, though my girls only live with the heirarchy that I set for them (China gets her leash on first, gets a treat first, gets brushed first etc...). Otherwise they don't practice any heirarchy between each other. All the same Zoey is now starting to dominate their playing sessions and generally being more assertive toward China, and China in return shoves back a little harder (though this is slowly becoming less common). At some point I'm probably going to decide to 'promote' Zoey, though I don't think that sounds like a solution in your case. Maybe if Free is feeling insecure of her rank the best thing might be to reaffirm her rank?

Very Nice job CC! This is going to be a nice looking project! :D Feel free to use either of my two dummies for anything you like, though I don't think thaere are any good pics of them anywhere.

[quote name='Rowie-the-Pooh']Court, its better than finding a camel tied to your gate. :o Thankfully, the owners came back in the next two minutes to untie him. Turned out another camel had run off or something and they needed to keep that camel there. It was really weird. Glad the cow was reunited with her owner!![/quote] OH... MY... GOD... You have no idea how happy I would be to come home and find a camel at my house!!! :D

[quote name='courtnek']I'm easy (NOT cheap though) :lol: :lol: :lol: I can go with all of that. I agree that blurbs for"first time owners" is a good idea. too many people buy/adopt dogs by the "cuteness factor" and dont realize what they're getting into. I liked the idea of "before you adopt this dog, know this" 8)[/quote] Oh yeah, this just reminded me of something I thought about earlier but forgot about until now. With regards to pics, I think we should definately stay away from puppy pictures of any kind, for the simple fact of avoiding people being hooked on a breed due to the cuteness factor. Just a thought.

[quote name='pyrless']Also, what should i do, write up a blurb on the Pyr and email it to you? do i need to cite sources or anything? :wink:[/quote] That's a good idea. Maybe better yet, if you can write it out in a post so that everyone can get a look at it. That way we''ll better be able to fine tune a format that we all like. Courtnek- I was beginning to think that we ought to catagorize breeds by type, that would better show their historical relationship to eachother. That way someone looking for a small flushing dog might look under a "Sporting Dogs" heading and see a sublist for 'Retrievers', 'Setters', 'Spaniels', and 'Pointers'. Said person would look under 'Spaniels' and get a list of all the spaniels, dogs which are similar and historically bred for a similar purpose. Maybe we should put all the 'not pet' breeds into some sort of working breed catagory. The only problem I see with that, is that whether or not a breed should be kept as a 'pet' is entirely subjective. For example: I beleive Border Collies should not be kept as pets, but I know that there are thousands of people who will fully disagree with that statement. I guess my basic thought is that we should try to keep things organized and easy to find. I'm not sure what is the best way to do it. I did really like my idea of having a [b]best type of home for this breed[/b] section under the breed description, maybe right at the top of the page- in great big moly letters. Hey that's another idea: A great honkin' warning for the 'non pet' breeds right where you can't miss it. Something like "Warning: this breed is not for average households or inexperienced dog owners"- or somethinh along those lines.

Definately all of the above I should think. In that regard we'll attract more visitors to read the information that we provide for them. I think we're going to end up with something rather unique when we're done. On another note, I've begun to start thinking about pictures (there's nothing I love more than pictures). I guess we should start collecting those as we go along. I don't know a whole lot about internet copyrights and such, but basically we're free to use our own dogs as well as free google images for example. Am I right? That won't be enough, so will we need to contact breeders and such for permission to use their pics? I'm thinking amybe 3 or 4 good pics for each breed, unless anyone hasother ideas. That should give a good visual of different coat and color combonations for each breed. Maybe if there is anyone who doesn't feel up to doing breed research might want to start helping to collect pics.

That's the question I pose. Do we need to weed out some of the more obscure or not quite yet developed breeds? I think there ight be a couple rare breeds that need to go, but we have to keep in mind that the internet is international, and just because a breed is rare in the US doesn't mean that someone in another country would thin kit foolish to leave out such a relatively common breed. Another thing I was keeping in mind is that when I'm looking at a breed index I like to see a large list of breed names. I'll skip right past any web site that only has the run of the mill AKC/UKC breeds on it. So far, I think I've only edited out the Labradoodle and the Akbash.

I don't think anyone has 'officially' been chosen for anything (though I did nominate Mei- Mei as head admin). Sorry, I do get really enthusiastic sometimes, for right now I'm just trying to make some sort of temporary order where we don't have any yet. Also when I come across something that interests alot, I tend to hound after it. ESS- I put you down for the Clumber, as well as the English and American Cockers, as well as the Field Spaniel. All of those spaniels have an inter-related history.

Soooo!?! That just means you could have cheeze-smothered ribs. :lol:

... I bet she looks delicious... :wink:

Holy crow on a craw! They're like football hooligans, only worse, I don't think hooligans ever used tear gas and attack dogs. :-?

Well thankfully it was something relatively minor.

Poor dog my @ss, she deserved what she got. I swear she's got bricks for brains, it's only been 5 days since the last time. :roll: Oh well, in the light of morning things don't look so bad. China at least smells decent enough to come in the house, and there's nothing dead out in the yard.

Guess what I just got done doing................. Yep, I was de-skunking China!!! Again!!! :D YAY!!! :D I guess it was partly my fault in a way... sort of... No it wasn't, that skunk had no buisness being in my backyard! Rrrr, what happened was that I left the back door open so that the dogs could hang out outside because the house was pretty hot after my err in judment when I decided to turn the AC off a bit too early. So anyway, here I was scooting around on the computer when I heard Zoey on the back porch barking at something. That didn't register entirely until I heard China behind me charging from the bedroom and out the back door. Uh oh. I was hoping it was a cat, but somewhere deep down in my heart, in the sadistic, sarcastic world that I live in , I knew better than that. And sure enough, back came China with her nose in the dirt. Thankfully Zoey was brigt enough to just stay on porch where she was ([i]my[/i] puppy is the smart one), this time she will be staying inside for the night while China camps out in the backyard. Being a hound, one might pick Zoey to be the one skunked again, oh no leave it up to the survival instincts of a husky. :roll: Speaking of which, I just looked out the back door to check on her and noticed her doing something at the back part of the yard. I better go see... :-?

LOL, Don't worry courtnek, I put you down for Labs too. Or at least I think I did, I better double check...

[quote name='courtnek']for your own safety? they have been doing this for pets, for years...would YOU allow it to be done to you? my take is NO. I dont want Big Brother watching me..what's yours[/quote] That's a BIG NEGATIVE for me. :x If one day someone says we all have to do it, then I'll show them where they can stick that great moly needle of theirs.

Courtnek I put you down for the American and English Foxhound unless you tell me otherwise. I think adding personal experiences is a great idea. Maybe we out to include that as part of the history/description field instead of giving it it's own field as between even all of us, we can't say that we've owned or worked with each of these breeds. It's also worth noting that we should probably be very careful when writing about individual dogs that are atypical of the breed, as such information could prove misleading to the uneducated. And that led me to another idea that we should look into... but... uhhh... I don't know what that is because I forgot the idea between thinking it up and writing that last paraagraph. :oops: Oh well, it may yet come back to me. Maybe next week.

Done and done. Also I don't see any reason for more than one person to collaberate together on one breed, if you so choose.

I've added the names of those whos have specifically stated they'd be interested in writing about specific breeds. You can find the names or initials in front of the breed names. Rowie, you might be interested in doing the Sloughi as well since they are very similiar. I'm not sure what the popular opinion is anymore regarding whether or not they ARE the short-coated variety of Saluki, or if they are a diffrent breed altogether. You also may want to look at the Caravan Hound (if it's worth doing), it's very similar to the Saluki, and is probably in fact only a regional variety of that breed.