Doing Some Catching Up:)

We have been given this award not once but twice in the last week:)  A week that has been so busy that I hadn't been able to do a post to thank the lovely Caron, Zephyr and Astro at Hiking Hounds for the first award.  Caron is an inspiration in herself the way she is handling Zephyr's struggle with encephalitis and very scary seizures.  Please go and visit if you haven't already and say hi.

The second award was given to us just a little while ago by the talented Sue and her beautiful Greyhound, Song at Graceful Greyhounds.  Sue makes the most amazing crafted cards.  They have to be seen to be believed.  I am in awe of her talent and imagination!  She and Song love visitors and comments and if you pop over you'll be made very welcome.

Now I'm in a bit of a quandary.  Most awards come with 'rules' attached and this one is to pass the award on to 10 blogs who inspire you.  Well, there are lots of blogs who inspire me and I passed on my last Versatile Blogger Award to 13 of them and this award has been doing the rounds and has pretty much been passed on to every blog I read at least once!  But I think I can find a few that have slipped through the radar:)

Karen and her gorgeous Visla, Jersey, are at Doggie Stylish.  Karen manages to post at least once, often twice a day.  She must spend hours scouring the WWW for wonderful photos and videos to entertain us. Karen also makes stunning dog collars and Beryl has her eye on a particular one that I think she'll be wearing not long after I get my tax refund, lol!

Next is 24 Paws of Love who write wonderful, often thought provoking posts.  Always from the heart and todays post I really wish I had written myself, except I couldn't have done it nearly as well.

Then there are the 3 gorgeous Rotties, Bart, Gizmo and Ruby over at Rottrover.  The beautiful Ruby has entered a competition to win a cyber-date with the Relentlessly Huge Mango the Mastiff who is having a few seizure problems but has recovered enough to think about getting his glad rags on and taking out a very lucky 4-legged lady on the adventure of a lifetime:)  I think that's pretty inspirational!

And some new friends at Love and a Six Foot Leash deserve the award for the work they do fostering and sometimes rehabilitating Pitbulls until they're ready for their forever homes.  Aleksandra takes wonderful photos that really capture the character of their fosters:)

So there you are.  I know it's only 5 blogs instead of 10 but if I don't stop now this will be all the post I get done tonight!  And I haven't even put in a photo yet!  But that's easily fixed:)

Yesterday we came across an old friend of Frankie's who we hadn't seen for about 18 months.  He and Tigger hadn't forgotten each other and they had a wonderful reunion:)

Tigger is a bit of a funny chap and doesn't like every dog he meets.  I was hoping he'd like Beryl but she gave him a look that spoke volumes and he quickly decided that he'd stick with Frankie:)

Don't even think about messing with me Shorty!

Next catching up is our DWTDS competition has been judged and while we didn't win a prize we are so glad we were a part of it all:)  It was a lot of fun and again I'd like to thank Honey and Hsin-Yi for coming up with the idea and hosting it.  I think they're going to have a bit of a well deserved rest for a while now!  The winner chosen by the judges and also viewers votes was an absolutely delightful miniature dachshund, Prana.  Here's his video if you'd like to check his performance out.  It's worth watching just to see his little tail never stop wagging!  You can't help but smile the whole way through:)


Today on our walk at the river Frankie made another new friend, Lucas, a lovely young Irish Terrier.  Frankie quickly became his hero and Lucas had a lot of fun tagging along with him.

Wait for me Frankie!

Beryl got sick of Frankie having all the fun with other dogs the past couple of days so she thought she'd show him she was still fun too ...

I'm not so sure he thought it was fun, lol!

I've been really busy working the past couple of weeks but one night the week before that Beryl and I managed an outing to the opening of a new horse equipment shop along with a few other GAP Greyhounds.  Beryl really wanted to let rip around the shop and steal food off the table and grab some stuffie toy horses off the shelves but she restrained herself and everyone kept commenting how laid back and well behaved all the hounds were.

My eyes are going to burst if you don't let me at the food!

We also found time to try out a new walk we'd been told about.  It's not as good as down the river but it's not too bad.  I kept Frankie on the lead seeing as we hadn't been there before.

The walk is about 5 kms long and leads to the patch of bush you can see in the photo above which has a walk through it.  I was surprised how long it took us.

There wasn't anywhere for Beryl to let rip and have a run but it made a change to go somewhere different.

They both went on the lead when we walked through the bush reserve.  I didn't see any playing fields, lol!

Frankie got to go off lead on the way back.  So much to look at:)  We've only done this walk the once so far, but we'll go back again.  The kids have missed out on a few walks as I've been going to work in the dark and getting home in the dark but they've been good and not pestered me too much:)

Tomorrow we've got a GAP Greyhound walk in the afternoon so hopefully I'll have some good photos. I'll have to take Frankie for his walk in the morning so I'll be getting plenty of exercise too:)

Something else I've been researching and working on the past few weeks is shifting my blog over to Wordpress.  Being me I've decided to start at the finish and have it self hosted.  But boy, can I see lots of potential for me to stuff things up!  It will be a while before I make the move and any words of advice from those who have done it already would be appreciated.  I have already got my domain name and signed up with a host but it's dealing with themes I have to contend with now.  How do you shift over all the blogs you follow, one at a time?  I'm hoping to import this blog to my new one so have to find out how to do that.  It all takes time and reading through forums and stuff.  Oh well, it's keeping me out of mischief and giving me a challenge:)

Oh, and it's Saturday so it's time for the

It's hosted by Life With Dogs, Two Little Cavaliers and Confessions of the Plume and you can find the rules on any of their sites.  Why don't you join in?

Have a wonderful weekend:)

Wordless Wednesday - Beryl's New Friends:)

Wordless Wednesday - It Was SO Cold The Other Night!

Nah, just kidding!  I defrosted my little fridge/freezer and put the chunks of ice in the kids paddling pool and they had a lot of fun removing them:)

Our DWTDS Entries Are A Wrap, Yay!!

Yep, all done and dusted, whew:)  Before I show them to you I better explain the background to our costumes and music.  Most people know Beryl and I are both Australian but New Zealand is home and I thought we'd have a real fair dinkum (oops, sorry, that's an Aussie saying!) Kiwi flavour to our routine.  And you can't get more Kiwi than Footrot Flats which is an iconic cartoon strip that ran for many years in the papers, was published quite a few times in booklet form, and eventually made into an animated movie.  Footrot Flats 'starred' a farmer called Wal and his faithful Border Collie sheepdog called Dog.

The author, Murray Ball, was born in Feilding where we live.

OK, so I'm Wal and Beryl is Dog and we're performing (dancing isn't the best description for our routine!) to Slice of Heaven which was the hit song from the movie.  If you want to check Dave Dobbyn and Herbs singing it have a quick look at this ...



And here is a close up of Beryl modeling part of her costume

Beryl and her bandana

Some more excuses background ... most of you know I get lost going around Rally O and Rally Zoom courses where the stations are not only numbered but also tell you what to do at each station.  So I confess to not having done any choreography except for the beginning and end of our routine.  Funnily enough they are both the same!!  And we nailed them, lol:)  The rest involved a lot of improvisation on both our parts.  At times I go wandering off without Beryl, I've got our next moved planned but forget to tell her what it is.  Other times she'll chuck in a move that she thinks is appropriate.  And I totally forgot to include her marching, duh, and I filmed about 5 different versions.  Enough of my babbling, here is the World Premiere of Beryl and Sue DWTDS - and I think I deserve a medal for my costume, I couldn't have flung anything less flattering together, but I look more like Wal than Wal does lol!


But wait - there's more!  We can't leave Frankie out.  The excuses background for his video is that he had not 1 second of training, no run throughs of things he can do and the choreography is pretty much all his:)  You will notice he isn't wearing the angel wings, they would have been shredded in 10 seconds, lol.

Without further ago here is the World Premiere of Frankie and Sue DWTDS (insert drum roll)


We'd like to thank Honey and Hsin-Yi for coming up with the idea of the competition and all the work they've put into their training tips and videos and the encouragement they've given to those of us who are feeling less than adequate:)  You two are a really special team!

Beryl and I had a lot of fun and we haven't finished yet, I'm determined we'll get the marching thing down and who knows what else?  Frankie had lots of fun just being himself and participating:)

Now we can relax and look forward to watching all the entries roll in and seeing lots of lovely dogs of all shapes and sizes having fun with their people!  You/we all ROCK and are winners because we participated:)

More About Muzzles - And Passing on The Award:)

My last post about muzzles and tails provided some very interesting comments, thank you:)  I'll answer a few questions here.

A Couple of Misfits wonders if Beryl ever seems at a loss without her tail.  She is used to not having a tail now but in the early days she often looked around as if she was wondering where it was hiding!  And her balance was off for a while, her turns weren't as slick and she crashed into me a few times til she worked out how to adapt her running.

Her tail hair has grown back into a cute little point ... but only on the bottom, lol.  I'm very tempted to even it up with scissors but I'll leave it and see what happens:)

Hsin-Yi, Honey The Great Dane's Mum, wonders how Beryl gets on playing with other types of dogs and if they hurt her skin.  She doesn't actually play with other dogs like she does with Frankie and her BFF, Lucy.  She tends to keep her distance as I don't think she really knows how to play.  And she plays rough so I'm glad she is a spectator:)

Beryl playing fetch with smaller dogs.

Beryl dealing to Frankie!

And this question made me think about Greyhounds being adopted by people who already have another dog or dogs.  Obviously nobody wants to keep their other dog muzzled so they don't hurt their Greyhound.  There are many, many people who have a Greyhound with other dogs, and I would say injuries are extremely rare.  I know in Frankie's case he has extremely good bite inhibition and also if a tooth touches Beryl he gets told off in no uncertain terms!  I'm sure he's got a lot more loose skin around the neck and throat from it being grabbed and pulled, lol.  

One thing I didn't mention in the previous post and House of Carnivores brought it up in the comments is a muzzles' usefulness when bringing in a new Greyhound to a house with a cat.  Even if the Greyhound is cat friendly it is advisable to keep it muzzled for the first week or so when the cat and Greyhound are together (never unsupervised, of course!).  Everybody is relaxed then and it makes introductions and acceptance much easier:)

Also, if your Greyhound does have an injury that normally would require an Elizabethan collar to prevent it being licked or stitches pulled out then a plastic muzzle is probably even better.  I did read somewhere that the Elizabethan collars aren't a great success with Greyhounds due to the shape of their head and it being so narrow.  Has anyone had experience with them and could shed some light?

Then there are those dogs who eat their own poop!  Thankfully I've never had one but a plastic muzzle would be useful in that situation.  Never Say Never Greyhounds has a post here showing Riley wearing a plastic muzzle with a 'poop guard' to stop her licking an injured foot.

I think that's enough about muzzles unless someone comes up with a new query:)

Remember in the last post I told how we'd been given 2 Versatile Blogger awards?

Well, the rules that come with it are that you are to state 7 things readers don't know about you.  I'm going to cheat and change it to 7 things readers might not know and that can include the bits about muzzles and  Greyhounds with other dogs and I'll add 3 things you probably don't know about us -

1) I really don't like making phone calls.  I don't mind people ringing me though:)

2) Frankie enjoys lying on my lap upside down and looking at us in the mirror opposite where I sit at the computer.  He can also see out of the lounge room window at the same time.

3) Our DWTDS videos are taken, won't inspire anyone to have a go but may get a few giggles:)  I might have another go tomorrow before I put all the furniture back in my dining room and see if we can improve things a bit:)

And you're supposed to pass the award on to 15 other blogs you consider to be Versatile Bloggers.  The recipients who pick up and pass on the award can choose whichever colour award they prefer:)   So here goes in no particular order ...
BZ Training - lots of great photos, photography tips and 2 gorgeous Golden Retrievers
Little Dogs On Long Leashes - possibly the only other blog that includes a pig dog, Frankie admires Georgia Little Pea from afar:)
House of Carnivores - Argos, the Greyhound, who lives with quite a few cats!
Pet Blogs United - who do a great job bringing attention to lots of pet blogs and feature Oskar, the Schnauzer
Cult of The Greyhound - wonderful photos of lots of lovely Greyhounds
Loving Life With Hounds - who I see have just shifted from Blogger to Wordpress and this is the link to their new site.  Fun with 4 Greyhounds, great photos and quite a few adventures
Something Wagging This Way Comes - featuring Honey, another Golden Retriever.  Lots of thought provoking posts here.
It's a Greyt Day - simply stunning photos of Greyhounds and other dogs.  But check it out soon as this site is going to move in the near future!
Terri's Knit Blog - 2 beautiful Greyhounds, scrumptious cooking and interesting knitting.  Truly a Versatile Blog!
Why Greyhounds - hopefully an award will spur WG to post more often;)  Adventures with Rex, a Greyhound, and his young brother Rastus, a Kelpie
Genjis Corner - it amazes me how these bloggers get time to blog!  They go to the most wonderful wine festivals that let them include their Greyhounds and put up great photos of dogs and people having the best time:)
My Little Dog - lovely photos and stories of the very handsome and clever George the Whippet.
Dogs Rock!! - a very stylish blog with more wonderful photos of 2 gorgeous Whippets and a lovely Greyhound, and tales of their adventures.

I know that's only 13 but I've got lots of new blog posts to read from looking at my blog roll and I'm going to do that after I've joined in on the Saturday Pet Bloggers Hop:)

Details can be found at Life With Dogs, Two Little Cavaliers and Life With The Plume.  Enjoy your weekend everyone:)

From One End of A Greyhound To The Other!

Every so often someone asks in the comments section about why Greyhounds are wearing muzzles in some of my photos, usually when I post about a GAP (Greyhounds As Pets) walk.  So I thought I'd do a post about the reasons behind this.  I'm no expert and while I did some Googling around for references on the subject in general I didn't really find anything comprehensive and decided I could either keep Googling all night or write my post ... and I'm writing my post:)  I did find an article at Wikipedia which seems to cover Greyhounds in general quite well and it includes this -

Temperament

The Greyhound is not an aggressive dog, as some may believe due to muzzles worn during racing. Muzzles are worn to prevent injuries resulting from dogs nipping one another during - but more likely immediately after a race - when the 'hare' has disappeared out of sight and the dogs are no longer racing but still excited. The thin skin of the Greyhound can tear easily from a small nick from teeth so even a minor skirmish can result in stitches and time out from racing.

If a Greyhound is aggressive then it won't make the race track.  The Greyhound's job is to chase the lure, not fight with it's fellow competitors.  But Greyhounds are no different from any other dog in that when they are playing and tearing around they get excited and can mouth and nip each other.  Where Greyhounds do differ from other dogs is that their skin is extremely thin and easily ripped under these circumstances.  So basically they wear muzzles as a precaution.  Shortly after getting Beryl and before I started blogging and I had more time I used to spend a lot of it reading the Greytalk Forum and saw some pretty horrific photos of injuries sustained by Greyhounds playing.  These were always written by owners who wished they had muzzled their dogs!  

The law in New Zealand for pet Greyhounds is that they don't have to be muzzled when out in public.  In know they still do in some states of Australia and that will hopefully be changed soon. The policy on our GAP walks is to have all dogs muzzled.  On our last walk Beryl was in her wire racing muzzle which they come with when they are adopted, or she can wear her plastic muzzle.

Hanniberyl Lecter!

It's not a real good look for photos, I don't think even Beryl can make a muzzle rock!  I did take Beryl's wire muzzle off after the free running in the fenced area on our last walk, not that she participated in the running around.  Everyone else went back on lead so there was no need to take precautions.

Which leads me to the other end of the Greyhound, Beryl's tail or lack of:(  Some new followers (welcome, lovely to have you here!) have wondered why Beryl hasn't got a tail.  I won't bore 'old' readers with the whole saga again but it was an on-going saga.  Briefly, Greyhounds (and other breeds with thin, bony tails) can be prone to 'happy tail' which happens when they wag it and hit the tip against something hard and the skin splits and it bleeds.  And boy, can it bleed.  A little blood goes a long way.  My house has looked like a battle zone more than once because they keep on wagging it!  The first few times it happened I managed to bandage it up myself and it would heal, then it would happen again, lather, rinse, repeat.  If you want to read up on the fairly recent events that lead to me having no choice but to have Beryl's tail docked the posts are here, here and here.  There are no gory photos, but in the second post I did put a selection of photos of Beryl and her tail, which I still miss anyway!  It's hard to believe it's been almost 3 months.

And almost finally, Frankie, Beryl and I are honoured to have been presented with the Versatile Blogger Award not once but twice recently. 

Thank you My Life With Flyball Dogs

And thank you Rescued Insanity

I'm still surprised than anyone bothers to read my blog, it's nothing fancy, just 'Life With a Greyhound, a Pigdog and Our Friends' as my header says.  So awards are lovely:)  Of course there are the conditions to fill when getting one of these awards but I'm not going to do that tonight.  I am going to finish off by joining in on the Saturday Pet Bloggers Hop and wish you all a wonderful weekend:)

It's a Bit Sad ...

On Sunday we went on a GAP (Greyhounds As Pets) walk with our local group.  It was wonderful to see some new people and dog faces and make some new friends and catch up with old friends.  The past few walks haven't been well attended with only 3 or 4 Greyhounds there but we had 11 this time and hopefully will get back up to the 20's before long!

The weather person smiled on us with a lovely late autumn afternoon and everyone enjoyed themselves:)  So you're probably wondering what was sad?  Well, since Beryl took a spill while running with her best Greyhound buddies a few days after she had her tail docked she hasn't and won't run with other Greyhounds.  While the other hounds were having a wonderful time on the walk doing this ...

Greyhound gallop

Beryl watched but wouldn't join in:(

She wanted to run with them and at one stage took off towards them but thought better of it and came back to me.  At least she will still run when she's by herself at the park and beach.  And I guess she had the last laugh in a way as only she, Monty (the Corgi pseudo Greyhound) and Babe were off lead most of the time:)  The other Greyhounds were newly adopted or foster dogs who went back on lead once we left the enclosed area.

A few of our new friends are

Cara (why can't I get a photo like this of Beryl?)

Troy(foster dog) meeting Beryl - shame the photo is a bit fuzzy.

Stanley with Monty

Stevie

And here are some of the group in the fenced off area

After most of them had had a tear around we went down to the river

Then headed off back to the park area

Monty spent most of the time following Beryl around:)

I don't think she minded:)

The queue waiting to squeeze through the little hole in the fence - Chase and Stevie in front.

After the walk we were able to take our dogs to a local pub and sit in the outside area.  There used to be a wonderful cafe at the Domain where we do our walks but some idiots burnt it down late last year:(  So it was good to be able to have a sit, a chat and quench our thirst again.

On the right, Graham and his lovely girl, Tina

Cara, Horse and their Dads:)

Obviously this has been a fairly 'wordy Wednesday' but I thought I'd better get this written while I had the time and am in the mood!

Does anyone else find that they have to make a choice sometimes whether to write a blog post or go around and read other blogs?  I'm a bit behind with reading blogs but hopefully will catch up tomorrow night.  Seeya then!