Dutch Shepherd Forum

I'm always surprised by poor Dutch. The weather has been cold -30 ish here for a few of days. Usually an outdoor dog, we've decided to keep him in. Capped with the fact that everything is frozen and iced over we haven't tried walking. Ok I haven't, my husband tried a couple of nights ago and of course he fell. Timber. Dutch not understanding stood by him. I've been sick at home sleeping and I don't think he should be out at all in this weather.
I thought that he would drive us nuts but he's been very good. Finally he's been out side more today with the temperature going up to +2 and still no t bugging for his walk.

Heather

your DS lives outside?

No he prefers outside when we\re not home. he does have a dog house up insulated with a flap out of the wind. He's outside when we are at work or go out. He loses it if we try to keep in inside if the weather is nice. We use to keep him in the kitchen during the days if we keep him in but I discovered he just lies around and touches nothing when we're not around. He's awesome that way he could reach food if he wanted too but doesn't. So I just leave him.
He's with us the rest of the time. Sleeps either under the bed at night or in the livingroom with Pearl.
So really it's up to him unless I don't like the weather or conditions.

Heather

Heather...

Is your Husband OK after a "Timber" fall?

My thoughts are with your family.

As an aside.... when I had my GSD I tried those "traction booties" for by GSD. I don't know if they make those husband sized

Regards...Greg

Thanks for your thought; I’m a bit ahead of you. I’ve been looking on line.
Greg is fine he's not complaining about the massages. He didn't break any thing. He's a little hard to shop for size 15/16 generally I get a stare a giggle and a no. Any he never thinks he needs anything. I go on line to get him stuff.
As for Dutch I found some stuff for him, namely a back pack. This way we can go on longer hikes. We're going to have picnics on our hike this summer. I need to figure out how to get him to sit on a kayak.

Heather

Snow and cold temps are not usually a big deal, here, pretty normal VT winter... but the weeks of being icebound in a solid sheet, everywhere has been awful. Even worse was when we'd have a partial melt and re-freeze... we'd go from ice, to wet ice, and back to ice. Especially treacherous at the barn! (Trust me, "Horses on Ice" will never become the next Disney Must-See! )

Thankfully, even with all the ice, I've been able to get the dogs out regularly, in the backyard, or at Uncle Joe's or, if not many people are around the barn where I board my horse, I've taken advantage of the indoor-arena there to let them really just go nuts. With Moko's manic energy, I can't even imagine what our house would be like if I wasn't able to give him these opportunities. Maiyou and Freyja could manage a little forced downtime, but Moko would go insane, and by extension, so would we...

Trying to get up and down the iced-hill in the backyard has been comical to watch. Moko created his own game, taking a chunk of ice in his mouth, doing a "run-in-place" cartoon scrabble to make it up the hill, then drops the chunk of ice and chases it, skidding and pouncing at it to make it fly faster, down the hill, then repeat.

I love the second photo where you can see Moko's toes spread out for traction! I love the way DS's use their prehensile toes.

I thought it was funny when you said Burlington, I thought you ment Ontario then I saw Vt. But we share the same weather line. We're in for more snow here. I just hope don't we get another vortex.

I'm usually dress for the weather and get out there kind of person which attracted me to the breed in the first place. I'm just not washing him then taking out in this weather.

Heather