Posts tagged "dalmatian"

Each week, Ben Westhoff shares the ups and downs of owning Pippi, the dalmatian mix he and his wife Anna adopted as a puppy in late 2009.

Can you believe it? "The Doggie Diaries" is a year old. This column kicked off last October, just a couple of weeks before Anna and I got married. Back then we lived in a tiny apartment in Hoboken, and Anna wanted a dog with all her heart. I was on board with the plan, though a bit nervous that it would chew up our possessions, poop all over the place, and require a lot of walking.

Most of that came to pass. But guess what? These days I count myself as a dog lover, and if Anna is to be believed, Pippi has taken quite a shine to me. (She's taken a shine to Anna as well, though it may be harder for her to see. She's the medicine administrator, after all.)

Let's take a brief look back at some of our most popular (and controversial) posts of the past year.

What Breed Is Pippi? Shortly after adopting her, we delved into determining Pippi's heritage. To this day, folks insist that she's a German shorthaired pointer, but we have two DNA tests proving that she is almost purely dalmatian.

Each week, Ben Westhoff shares the ups and downs of owning Pippi, the dalmatian mix he and his wife Anna adopted as a puppy in late 2009.

Anna wrote this week's column.

They say no man can serve two masters. That may be true for dogs too. You see, Pippi loves Ben more than me. Even though I faithfully conduct her early-morning walk, feed her twice a day and engage her constantly after I come home from work, it is clear that Ben is Pippi's first master, and I am running a distant second.

I can't blame her. The truth is, Ben's a sweetheart of a man and takes excellent care of all his girls, including Pippi. He works at his computer all day with Pippi by his side -- either at his feet or in her chair -- where she is alternately snoozing and chomping her bone.

But I must say I was a little surprised when I noticed this distinct affection differential. I mean, I'm supposed to be the "dog person" in his house! When we first adopted Pippi, Ben -- who had never had a dog of his own -- sometimes wondered out loud if we had bitten off more than we could chew. I reassured him that dog ownership would be tons of fun once we hit our stride, and lo and behold, it is. I just assumed that Pippi's primary bond would be with me.

Each week, Ben Westhoff shares the ups and downs of owning Pippi, the dalmatian mix he and his wife Anna adopted as a puppy in late 2009.

Anna wrote this week's column.

We've previously alluded to the difficulties in performing routine grooming and health maintenance on our precious pooch, Pippi. Another thing she loathes is having her nails clipped. While I'm all about the mani-pedi, she wriggles and struggles, sometimes aggressively. Usually, she absolutely refuses to let me hold her paws and get into position to carefully clip them with our little black dog-nail trimmer. Our first, unfortunate trip to the vet didn't go much better, with Pippi panicking during the trimming.

Pippi's dewclaws are intact, and I recently noticed that they were overdue for a clip. But this time around, anticipating an adverse reaction, I tried a new tack. Instead of immediately going to work, I nonchalantly brought the nail clipper to Pippi in the kitchen, and let her see it and smell it. I held it for a while while I did other things. Later, when we were both back in the kitchen, I broke a milkbone into lots of little pieces and then, when I was all set to start the clipping, placed the treat bits on the seat of a kitchen chair.

Each week, Ben Westhoff shares the ups and downs of owning Pippi, the dalmatian mix he and his wife Anna adopted as a puppy in late 2009, and the first dog Ben's ever had.

Pippi needs a ton of exercise. At barely more than a year old, she's still a puppy, and a dalmatian puppy at that. When my "little brother" Jorell was here, he was good about giving Pippi some extra running-around time every day. Now that he's gone, she tends to get more rambunctious, particularly in the evening when Anna and I are both home.

Pippi regularly needs new forms of stimulation. We used to take her into our neighbor's fenced-in backyard to run around, but one day she seemed to tire of it for no apparent reason. Instead of chasing her ball around, all she wanted to do was chew on wood chips and anything else she found lying on the ground.

She loves to gallop, but she needed a new venue. In that relatively small backyard, all she can really do is run around in circles. Recently we had the bright idea to let her run around in our nearby park at night. Suburban outlaws that we are, we let her do it off-leash. We unlatch her, throw a stick, and she goes after it. Though she's good about retrieving it, she's not so great about bringing it back. But she has a fun time tearing around, and usually returns to us without much delay.

Each week, Ben Westhoff shares the ups and downs of owning Pippi, the dalmatian mix he and his wife Anna adopted as a puppy in late 2009, and the first dog Ben's ever had.

Anna wrote this week's column.

Last week, on Pippi's first birthday, we basked in the glory of her many strides forward. Today, we're focusing on her few steps back.

But on Tuesday morning, after her romp outdoors and her breakfast, I turned my back for five minutes and Pippi proceeded to rip out the seam of her new bed, unzip it, yank out the stuffing and spread it all over the kitchen. I found her rolling around in the stuffing like Demi Moore rolling in cash in the movie "Indecent Proposal."

Each week, Ben Westhoff shares the ups and downs of owning Pippi, the 11-month-old Dalmatian mix he and his wife Anna adopted in late 2009, and the first dog Ben's ever had.

Anna wrote this week's column.

After we revealed the results of Pippi's DNA test a few weeks back, a lot of you wrote in saying that many of these doggie DNA tests are bogus, based on your own first-hand experiences with them. So when a company called Wisdom Panel Insights offered to test Pippi again, we jumped at the chance to compare the results, learn more about our little Pippi Longstocking, and gauge the trustworthiness of the tests themselves.

The first test said Pippi's primary breed was dalmatian, with some Staffordshire bull terrier "in the mix." But we weren't completely satisfied. For one thing, we weren't sure we saw the bull terrier, and for another, we wondered exactly how much of each breed she had. Once again we swabbed out Pippi's mouth with a brush that looked like a mascara wand, sealed it in a plastic sleeve and mailed it to the lab for analysis.

Three weeks later, the breed certificate came back. Pippi, the results said, is a dalmatian. That's it. Nothing else! This too seemed odd, as we didn't think our rescue was a purebreed. I spoke with Dr. Angela Hughes, Veterinary Genetics Research Manager with the lab, who helped me decode the seeming contradiction.

Name: Dalmatian

Personality: "Playful, happy, easygoing and very dedicated," chirps Dog Breed Info Center regarding one of the reigning breeds of American cinema, if not Americana iconography. "Temperament is stable and outgoing, yet dignified," states the American Kennel Club. "Shyness is a major fault." The Web site Dalmatians.US (formerly called "The Dalmatian Information Station") agrees on that last point. "Since the Dalmatian essentially came from working temperament, they should be confident, alert the family to strangers, and, if need be, protect their family."

Grooming: Some say the dalmatian is such a tidy dog, it will even avoid puddles outside! Despite this and the breed's being doggy-odor free, "The Dalmatian sheds all year round but does so profusely twice a year," warns Dog Breed Info Center. "Brush frequently to help manage the constant shedding," and "bathe only when necessary."

Common Health Issues: Deafness is common among dalmatians. Dog Breed Info Center notes that about 10 to 12 percent of dalmatians are born deaf. The site also says that, due to the fact that "uric acid levels in Dalmatians are in general higher than in any other breed," urinary tract stones are also common. The Dalmatian Club of America's Web site mention skin allergies, sensitivities and conditions that are prevalent in the breed including "dal crud," (yes, you read that right) or Dalmatian Bronzing Syndrome.

Dalmatians and firefighting have gone hand in paw since the days of horse-drawn fire carriages. (The breed gets along extraordinarily well with horses, forming a tight bond). And while a wagging tail, cute spots and friendly face go a long way in making people happy, one Dalmatian has gone above and beyond the call of duty -- Sparkles, the Fire Safety Dog.

Sparkles was rescued from a home along with 62 other dogs and soon found his calling after being adopted by firefighter Dayna Hilton, who joined the fire service in August 2000 and currently serves as the Fire and Life Safety Educator for Johnson County RFD #1 in Clarksville, Arkansas. She also acts as Executive Director of the Keep Kids Fire Safe Foundation.

Since then, Sparkles and Firefighter Dayna have become well-known across the nation through appearances on "PBS KIDS Sprout" and "FOX and Friends." Additionally, Sparkles has been the subject of a children's book about fire safety ("Sparkles the Fire Safety Dog"), has assisted Hilton with fire safety education in schools, and is credited with saving numerous lives, including the lives of two little girls from the same school.

Our apartment is not getting any bigger, but Pippi is. Anna and I are wondering: How big will our puppy get?

I was recently out of town for a few weeks, doing research for a book I'm writing, and when I returned she looked bigger. It was not my imagination. When we adopted her in December she was about six months old and weighed 30 to 35 pounds. Now she's closer to 40. Of course, many dogs don't stop growing until they are two years old.

As previously discussed, Pippi seems to be either a Dalmatian, German Shorthaired Pointer, or both (we're going to send away for the doggie DNA test soon). Her paws were (and are) too big for her body in that classic clumsy cute puppy way, but I've heard from numerous sources that it's not a good idea to guess a dog's full-grown size based on the size of her paws. (This can be deceptive.)

I've read that a good rule of thumb for small and medium-sized dogs is to take her weight at four months and double it. From talking with Pippi's foster dad, it's safe to assume she weighed about 25 pounds at four months. That would predict a full-grown size of 50 pounds, which would put her in the range of dogchannel.com's estimations; they say a full-grown Dalmatian can weigh between 40-65 pounds, and that a female German Shorthaired Pointer usually weighs 45-60 pounds as an adult.

Do these seem like good guesses? Have your rescue puppies ever turned out to be much bigger (or much smaller) than you expected?

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With so many puppy videos and so little time, we've gone the extra mile and begun cataloging some of the finest YouTube offerings, separating each collection by breed in a feature called Puppy Party!

Today's round-up features the delightful Dalmatian!

Unless you're Cruella de Vil, you are guaranteed to love the new "101 Dalmatians" musical -- especially since all of the animal actors are shelter rescues.

"The script for the musical is based on the original 1956 book by Dodie Smith in which the story is told from the dogs' perspectives," the show's producer, Lee Marshall, tells Paw Nation. "Nothing in the musical is related to any of the motion pictures," he says, referring to the 1961 animated Walt Disney movie and the 1996 live-action film starring Glenn Close.

To illustrate the world as the dogs see it, all the human actors will be on 15-inch stilts surrounded by an extra-tall set scaled to show a dog's eye view of the world. The lead dog roles of Pongo and Missus Perdita -- whose Dalmatian puppies are stolen by the evil Cruella de Vil -- will be played by human actors dressed in fashionably spotted suits, and child actors will play the puppies.

But Marshall sprinkles each performance with real Dalmatians. Fifteen fortunate pups bound on the stage at the end of Act 1 and during the show's finale, performing choreographed movements set to music written by Dennis DeYoung, founding member of the legendary band Styx.

Source

A member of the Non-Sporting Group, the Dalmatian is the 74th most popular breed in the United States, according to 2008 American Kennel Club® registration statistics. As dogdom's only spotted breed, the Dalmatian's short white coat, dotted with hundreds of black or liver (brown) spots, stands out in a crowd. When the Dalmatian is not being chased down by Cruella de Vil in 101 Dalmatians, he stars in Budweiser television commercials and serves as a mascot for many local firehouses.

A Look Back
Spotted dogs have appeared throughout history in Europe, Asia, and Africa, credited with a dozen nationalities and as many native names. The Dalmatian is believed to have developed over centuries by nomads wandering through Europe. The breed was named after an area in the former Yugoslavia called Dalmatia. The dog we know today as the Dalmatian has been a dog of war, a draft dog, shepherd, ratter, fire-apparatus follower, firehouse mascot, bird dog, trail hound and retriever.

Did You Know...
The Dalmatian's spots range from as small as a dime to as large as a half-dollar. Puppies are born white and develop their spots two to six weeks after birth. The Dalmatian is also the original and only coaching dog. When people used to travel by horse-drawn carriage, drivers would keep "Dals" alongside their coaches. If any loose farm animals wandered onto the road, the Dal would herd them out of the way. He also served as a companion to the horses and guarded the carriage when the coachman stopped for a rest or a meal. Today, this instinct is tested in "road trials," where the dogs must accompany horses over a certain distance and perform obedience exercises as directed by its rider.

Is a Dalmatian the right breed for your family?
The fun-loving, people-oriented Dalmatian thrives in a family environment. The breed is polite around strangers, but does possess some guarding instincts due to his history as a coaching dog. Very high-energy, Dals require daily exercise on leash or within a fenced area. The breed is great for runners, but owners should hold off on long jogs until their dog finishes growing at around the age of two. The breed's short coat sheds almost year round, but regular brushing helps minimize the shedding.

Thinking about buying a Dalmatian?
Additional information for those considering a Dalmatian – including things to know before you get a dog, tips on how to find a breeder near you, or a list of training clubs in your local area – can be found on the American Kennel Club Web site. Meet the Dalmatian and 160 other AKC breeds at Meet the Breeds.

© The American Kennel Club, Inc.

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