Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
I trust you are doing better than me today. I have come down with a bad cold and a pounding headache. You deserve better than what I can provide today, Therefore, I will post again as soon as I recover.
One quick note, I apologize that you must now log in to post, but the spam had become unmanageable, and this is the easiest way to slow it down.
Sincerely,
KeystoneGermanShepherds
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
To wrap up yesterday’s discussion regarding neutering and how this could change your German Shepherd Dogs personality and physiology. If you neuter after maturity, the personality of your German Shepherd Dog may change very little, if not at all. However, if your German Shepherd Dog is neutered as a developing puppy, it is likely that their personality will be changed significantly.
If an aggression problem towards other males existed as competition for breeding rights to females, this behavior may be abated to a large extent by neutering. However, if your German Shepherd Dog has aggression problem towards other dogs and people based on fear or lack of confidence, you will likely see little change in this behavior. Correction of this behavior takes extensive training and most likely the assistance of a professional trainer.
In addition, it is common to see a slight decrease in energy levels. This may lead to weight gain in your German Shepherd Dog. Decreases in metabolism and increases in appetite may make your German Shepherd Dog fat without proper diet management. Overweight German Shepherd Dogs are susceptible to diverse diseases including diabetes. Research indicates puppies neutered before five-months-of-age are at greater risk of becoming obese than puppies neutered later.
A slight increased risk for neutered German Shepherd Dogs exists to develop cancers such as osteosarcoma and hemangiosarcoma. I would argue that this negates the decreased risk of testicular cancer after neutering. In addition, research has shown that German shepherd Dogs puppies neutered before the age of five-months are more likely to develop hip dysplasia.
I would never neuter a male German Shepherd Dog unless there was a good medical reason or in a situation where two males living together are competing for breeding rights.
Heidelberg’s Hagan
Ask me a question and I will provide my opinion.
Sincerely,
KeystoneGermanShepherds
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
Today I would like to discuss whether to neuter and more specifically when to neuter. Today, more pressure is brought to bear concerning neutering your German Shepherd Dog. Your veterinarian more often than not wants to neuter your German Shepherd Dog puppy as early as six months of age. However, you should hold on and think about it before proceeding.
The Testicles produce growth hormones and are instrumental in proper development of your German Shepherd Dog puppy. It is quite simple, if you neuter before your German Shepherd Dog is physically mature, they will not grow right and they will never reach their genetic potential. For example if by disease or accident a human male child is castrated before puberty that child will never reach his full height or grow a beard unless the hormones produced naturally by the testes are replaced. The same is true for your German Shepherd Dog puppy. Therefore, if you plan on neutering, you should wait until age two to ensure that your German shepherd Dog has reached physical maturity. Actually, there is research that shows neutering your German Shepherd Dog before maturity may make them susceptible to various disease processes later in life.
Neuter! WHAT?
I am fully supportive of neutering in certain situations, one being access to random bitches. This situation is most likely to happen in the country, where your German Shepherd Dog has free roam of your property. If he is not breeding quality, you should consider neutering to stop random breedings with stray bitches. Neutering should be considered if your German Shepherd Dog has genetic or inherited defects. If you have more than one male German Shepherd Dog, you should consider neutering one or both males to ensure they do not fight for dominance. In addition, you may consider neutering for health reasons, if the condition would be improved if your German Shepherd Dog was neutered.
Other than the above reasons, I really see no reason to neuter your German Shepherd Dog even if you do not plan on breeding him. If you never breed your intact German Shepherd Dog, He will not miss it, and will not become a wanderer or fence jumper every time he smells a bitch that has come into season.
The worse thing in regards to breeding that you could do for your German Shepherd Dog is to breed them once. This literally could make your dog miserable. Guys seem to be guiltier of this than the ladies. I have heard it several times that they want to reward their male German Shepherd Dog with a breeding because they love them and want them to be happy. Do not do it! If you do plan on doing only one breeding, then you should strongly consider neutering after you do the breeding.
Tomorrow, I will continue this discussion focusing on what exactly neutering does to the mentality or personality of your German Shepherd Dog and what type of physical changes that you could expect.
Ask me a question and I will provide my opinion.
Sincerely,
KeystoneGermanShepherds
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
Today I am going to discuss Crate Training. Crate Training is not just for potty training your German Shepherd Dog puppy. Crates, well after your German Shepherd Dog puppy or adult has been house broken, provide a secure place for your German Shepherd Dog to nap or to just take a time out.
German Shepherd Dogs are extremely clean animals and have a natural reluctance to fowl their dens, and you can use this natural instinct to help potty train your new German Shepherd Dog puppy. To appropriately crate train your new puppy, you should feed, water, and make them sleep only in the crate for at least the first two weeks at their new home.
A 12-week-old puppy being crate trained
For the first two days the German Shepherd Dog puppy should be in the crate anytime, you cannot give them your full attention. The reason for this is to catch them in the act of trying to poop or pee in your house, so you may take them outside before they go in the house. You will not be able to do this without giving them your full attention. In addition, if they do go in the house you will be able to catch them in the act and apply a gentle but firm correction.
Puppies can stay in the crate for up to two hours during the day, during normal family activity such as cooking dinner. If the house is quiet, puppies can stay in the crate for four hours. When you do decide to let the puppy out of the crate, take them immediately outside so that they can relieve themselves. If they go to the bathroom outside, tell your German Shepherd Dog puppy how wonderful they are in a silly high pitched voice. Go overboard with this positive reinforcement and make it fun for them.
For the first two weeks the crate should be in the room where the family spends the most time. This means at night the crate should be moved to the bedroom so the German Shepherd Dog puppy does not feel alone. If pottied right before bed, a ten-week-old puppy can sleep through the night in the crate .
As your German Shepherd Dog puppy becomes house broken, you may start feeding and watering them outside the crate. Once you have complete confidence in their potty training, you should have a designated place for their crate in the house. You will be surprised by how often your German Shepherd Dog will continue to voluntarily utilize their crate for naps and time-out from the normal hustle and bustle of daily living.
Mom is crated while a puppy prepares to go to its new home
This will make it very easy for you to crate your German shepherd Dog when you have guests over for a party, when you travel with your German Shepherd Dog at a hotel, etc. German Shepherd Dogs are big and many people are extremely afraid of them if they are not familiar with the true German Shepherd Dog temperament. When you come in contact with these types of people, a well crate trained German Shepherd Dog is invaluable. For example, while at a dog show several years ago, a customer had her two grown German shepherd Dogs in the hotel room. While she had two crates in the room, she felt it was safe to leave the dogs loose in the room because the room had been cleaned. What she didn’t know was the cleaning lady ran out of fresh towels and returned later. When the cleaning lady opened the door, she screamed and ran off at the site of these two German Shepherd Dogs leaving the door open. These two shepherds were almost killed as they left the hotel and crossed a busy highway. Fortunately, we returned to the hotel shortly afterwards and were able to get the two shepherds back to the room.
Please crate train your German Shepherd Dog, and utilize the crate in the appropriate situations. You will be a more responsible owner and your German Shepherd Dog will love you the more for providing them a safe place to den.
Ask me a question and I will provide my opinion.
Sincerely,
KeystoneGermanShepherds
Exploring the vast prairie of the Washita National Wildlife Refuge
Hi Everyone,
Today I answer a question about why we use Victor dry-food.
Just curious, why do you feed Victor Premium Beef & Rice? How long have you fed it to your dogs? I have been doing a lot of research on feeding. Have you ever considered feeding the Victor grain-free formulas? Do you have any opposition to it being fed? I have kept feeding the regime you feed your dogs to Rain. This is what has prompted my researching thoroughly how to feed dogs and commercially prepared dog food. (By the way OMG!!!) Just in doing this I am switching my other dogs and my cats food also. My Local feed store is able to get me the Victor kibble at a great price which I am very happy about. Wanted to know if you had any pros or Cons on the Grain free formulas provided by Victor?
Hi Alicia,
We have used the Victor Super Premium Beef Meal & Brown Rice for All Life Stages formula for approximately four years. We are very happy with this dry-food. However, first I must explain what dry-food means for us and our German Shepherd Dog puppies and adults. We view dry-food as caloric base for our German Shepherd Dogs’ diet. We believe that all macro and micro nutrients essential for growth and maintenance and good health must be supplemented. The reason is because dry-food is cooked at such high temperatures and extruded at such high pressures that most nutritional value is lost. Therefore, we want a dry-food that is safe and with no harmful or indigestible ingredients, such as calcium carbonate or harsh chemicals preservatives like ethoxyquin.
Victor Super Premium Dog Food Beef Meal & brown Rice For all Life Stages
The Victor Super Premium Beef Meal & Brown Rice for All Life Stages formula is basically grain free with the exception of the brown rice of course. We believe brown rice is safe and healthy for German Shepherd Dogs. Actually, if we have a sick or recovering German Shepherd Dog puppy or adult, we would feed it home cooked brown rice and cooked ground beef or ground venison to help it recover, just as we feed chicken soup to humans recovering from an illness.
We are strong advocates of grain free dry-food diets for German Shepherd Dogs. Especially avoiding corn gluten, which many German Shepherds Dogs may become sensitive and potentially develop allergies, hotspots, and certain autoimmune diseases.
The Victor dog food is preserved with vitamin E as an antioxidant. Any dry-food considered should be free of artificial chemical preservatives that could potentially cause cancer in German Shepherd Dogs.
We believe any of the Victor dry-foods are safe and of good quality so please use the type you and your German Shepherd Dog puppy like. But, as always with any dry-food, you need to constantly check the ingredients because dry-food companies do at times change their ingredients and an excellent dry-food today may be a horrible dry-food the next time you purchase it.
Because, we at Keystone German Shepherds feed a safe healthy dry-food that is readily digestible our German Shepherd Dogs have no “Doggie Odor”. This dog odor that everyone recognizes that is most readily noticeable when a dog is wet is from poor quality and indigestible forms of protein in the dry-food. Over the years, when our German Shepherd Dogs have developed an odor, we check the label on the dry-food that we were using and have found that the dry-food company has changed their formula and ingredients, forcing us to scramble and find a new dry-food to use for our German Shepherd Dogs.
Victor ingredients
Thank you, Alicia for your wonderful questions and I hopefully have provided reasonable answers for you.
Ask me a question and I will provide my opinion.
Sincerely,
KeystoneGermanShepherds
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