Are you a Greyhound, Whippet or Lurcher owner? Come and have a seat on another new Pointy Hounds cushion!

[TheCunnyFunt]

Pointy hounds include-
Greyhounds (Grunds)
Whippets (Whippys)
Lurchers
Italian Greyhounds (Iggys)
Salukis
Afghans
And any others I have forgotten. If you are a new pointy hound owner, an old and experienced owner or looking into getting one of these fabulous creatures, come and have a seat (that's not taken up with a hound :o).

Share stories, advice and shopping tips!
AK Creations
Dog O Nine Tails
Doggy Bags Bakery
Kitsch Collars
Meggie Moo
Milgi Coats
Silver Peacock

Come The Day
Come the day I take that final bend,
Can I count on you to be my friend?
To see I?m treated just and fair,
It means so much to know you care.

For, what the future holds in store,
Now that I can race no more,
Should be addressed for every hound,
Who parts the punter from his pound.

Tell them I don?t ask for much,
A kindly word, a gentle touch,
Somewhere warm to lay my head,
A meal each day to keep me fed,
Not just life- but quality,
This is how it ought to be.

Do not see me swept away,
I long to live another day,
With peace of mind, tranquillity,
And those who care surrounding me,
So tell them all- you have that choice,
I beg of you to be my voice.

By Denise Dubarbier.

Cinnamon, I guess the rescues are pretty stretched and might not have time to follow up on every dog.

I've had the opposite experience though. We rescued oldgirl from a small local rescue when we lived in the North West and we literally couldn't move for constant emails and phonecalls to see how she was doing, as well as nagging to get me more involved in working for their rescue group.

Good to hear Peanut is settling in and starting to relax.

Lurcherboy is in a strop with me because it's too hot to walk him and he's having to wait until this evening. He was the same yesterday. In fact I started to get a bit worried he might be ill, until I tested my theory by picking up the fling'n'fetch and he shot out of his bed with a propeller tail and daft grin on his face.

Our lurcher is from Dog's Trust. DS2 was just 3 years old when we adopted her. DS2 is teeny tiny for his age, but they did not have an issue with us adopting from them. Whippy was from RSPCA and we got him when DS2 was 2 years old (DS1 was 6 years old).

We also spoke to: Scruples, GRWE and our local RGT all of which said they would be happy to let us adopt from them. Not a single one brought up the ages of the children as an issue. The only reason we went with dog's trust for lurcher girl was that we were waiting for one of the rescues to have a dog available who would fit well with us and she came first. RGT were happy for us to adopt one of their smaller, younger greyhounds, but we felt that Woody seemed a bit intimidated by her.

Betsey also has two hounds and small children.

my post should have read 'people give up and fail to read the less easy to find info ...'.

I do think the RSPCA and Dogs Trust are more cautious about homing adult dogs with young children these days though - they do do it, but don't advertise it or make it obvious.

Of course I can only go on the reactions of people I know who've gone for a rescue dog, but I don't think any of them are particularly unusual, in fact if anything, they're fairly typical of people in this area. They will consider a rescue, having watched the tv ads and programmes etc, but only if it doesn't put them out too much.

Dogs Trust near us has some lovely lurchers in, but they are all listed as children over the age of 12 only. The reason they give is that they're young, tall dogs who may bump/knock over younger children.

That's such a shame! It's the same as people who have children and expect their lives to stay the same and te children to mold around them. I guess with some children it can be done but why would you want to? The point is they enhance your life and although Nelly was much happier home alone than out and about peanut wants to be with us and we are doing our best for him to do as much with us as is possible.

I'm sure peanut will knock my littlest over at some point but that's not really a reason not to have him just a mild inconvenience! He gives them so much more in retune for that inconvenience

We found that if you went to the Rescue with a specific idea of, "I want this dog", you were unlikely to find a dog the rescue would home with you because, "that dog would not be suitable for a home with children". If you go to a Rescue and say, "this is me, this is my family, here's information about our lifestyle, we need a dog who can cope with young children/being left for 4 hours each day/wants to go on long walks (insert specific requirements you cannot or will not compromise on), what dogs do you have?" Many rescues might say, "we don't have a suitable dog at the moment, but we'll let you know" and you might have to keep asking back and be flexible about breed, looks etc. We would never have considered a whippet when we got whippy. The RSPCA steered us away from a highly unsuitable collie/springer cross (I love collies, my previous dog was a collie x). We didn't know anything about whippets, but my first reaction was, "yikes" - we went away and read all about them and came back to reserve him. They were right of course, he fitted exactly with our needs.

Hi y'all. I think Magrat is right. We went to Whittingham saying 'this is us, do you have a dog who might be able to live with us?' and Billy was perfect in every way.

Our second, Roxy, would not have been suitable as a first dog and I'm certain they wouldn't have suggested her to us. She's bright, lively, confident and playful; while she loves the DCs and has been a natural with them from the off, she needs DCs that are confident with dogs and happy to give her a gentle shove if she's being too kissy or jumpy.

And she's moulting her fluffy kennel coat everywhere at the moment and it's gross. We're working hard on her coat but it's not very rewarding at the moment and she looks an awful mixture of fluffy and bald.

WRT staying in touch; ours never called or checked up on us but if we've had any issues they've been back to us immediately, sometimes within the hour if we've had to leave messages. I don't always agree with their advice but they are extremely helpful and knowledgeable. My oldest (6yo) wants to run a rescue kennel now! Or be a dog warden. He'll want to be a dj again tomorrow though.

MissBetsey, my dd (who is 4 and a half) regularly sets up a rescue kennels for all her cuddly dog toys in the middle of my living room floor.

They all have extra comfy beds and get the full work-up, health-checks (including vaccination and worming) nail clipping and toothbrushing, grooming, going for walks, clicker training sessions etc.

Aww, now that's cute.

Seriously, Rox looks awful. Just looking at her on the sheepskin now. Her new coat, while shiny, is so sparse and coarse, it's horrible. Don't remember this bit with Bill. I can't feed raw, for various reasons, so we've been topping her up with fish oil and lots of pilchards. And rubbing oil into her really dry bits.

Black dog experts, tell me it's going to get better. Bill's all sleek and shiny, will she get there too?

I read something on another pointy forum where lots of people were saying this year's weird weather has played havoc with their dogs' coats.

Lurcherboy's coat is very weird as well. He usually gets a lot more sleek and shiny over the summer and returns to being a proper scruff over the autumn and winter months, but this year he has really coarse tufty bits on his back legs and here and there around his chest and neck, so he's sort of sleek in the middle with tufty scruffy bits both ends.

We've been using a zoom groom on him reguarly and it is helping, but he still doesn't look like he normally does at this time of year.

He's not a nice sleek black dog by nature though, so probably not the same.

Woody looked fairly bad for a while after we got him. He sort of became dark brown and got dandruff. Although we do feed him raw when we have time, he has significant periods where he is fed dry food. He has fish oil religiously and I think this is the biggest factor in keeping his coat nice. He has seaweed extract too (but we have to mix this with things - he doesn't like it), which is supposed to help the pigment in their coats and of course, weekly pilchards/mackerel. Oh and they both also get vitamin B12, which is supposed to be good fit their coats. I remember when we first got him he needed brushing almost daily and lost a ton of fur. She'll get there. The two of them must be quite impressive together.

Mmm, these black dogs. Y to the dandruff. I want to hoover her. In fact, I nearly tried the other day, in a moment of weakness. I did actually approach with our hand held Dyson thingy and she gave me this look like 'WTAF. Just you try it human.' and I realised that it would be plain wrong to hoover my dog.

I'll keep plugging away with the fish.

And yes. My gorgeous black dogs look lovely together.

Roxy was meeting and greeting at our front gate the other day when a guy walked past and was all 'Whoa, big dog'.

I felt proud to say 'I've got a much bigger one indoors if you'd like to meet him?'

Is it very wrong to admit I actually have hoovered Woody with the handheld dyson ?

Luckily he is a very compliant dog.

Betsey, yes, keep persevering! It goes through an awful getting worse before it gets better cycle, if that makes sense. From what you've described, you are at the worst bit. Kennel coat has fallen out, new coat is not yet in, so you are left with a half bald patchy looking scruffball. Keep grooming regularly and YY to the pilchards - another month or two, and I promise she will be a vision of sleek ebony loveliness. I reckon it can take up to six months to get the coat up to perfection, but it will get there.

Phew, glad I'm not guilty of deviance with the Dyson then.

She does look dreadful. She's so boisterous and gung ho about everything her legs are covered in cuts (nothing major) too. She tried to jump a pond at the inlaws again the other day and almost made it but managed to collide with the rocky bank instead and tore her legs up (again). Nothing seems to bother her though.

She also loves poo, balls, and, seemingly, other dogs. Seem to have got a real dog this time, not the dog/cat/human hybrid Billy seems to be.

We did that and she said all of these should be fine and which did we like the look of. She was very honest that she had no idea with cats for any of them.

Peanut doesn't have great fur at the moment, he is such a beautiful colour but he's very fluffy which kind of looks on the verge of matted even though I am brushing him every day and he has the dandruff stuff too. He's been scratching the last two days so I've made him an appointment at the nurse clinic to get some flea treatment (as there is no consultation fee for that) on Thursday but haven't found any fleas so far. I can imagine the weather has been so cold for so long they must all have very thick kennel coats :)

I posted last night but it hasn't shown up! Second go!

What's the story with MT? I've a friend who has rehomed from from there. Are they not who they say they are?

We've recently submitted an application for a rescue whether we will be considered I don't know as I have to DC under 3. However they are dog savvy as we have a dog already. DC1 often gets knocked to the ground on a dog walk due to the dog having a mad five minutes where she runs in very fast loops which clearly means she is unable to use her eyeballs at the same time!

We took peanut on a greyhound walk this morning! It was lovely apart from ds2 who whinged and cried through the last half. There was a very cute 4 month old lurcher who I could have just taken home! And another young looking lurcher who's owner was moaning the whole time about how much work she was but otherwise everyone seemed very nice and peanut was a huge hit, by far the biggest dog there. Would guess there was 15-20 dogs but mine where the only dc

We were hoping to go to Bark in the Park in Derby this afternoon, but it is too hot for the dogs and even when we walked them this morning at 9am, lurcher girl almost collapsed whilst taking a wee. We're going to stay home so the dogs can get a bit of shade instead.

PeanutPatty - read the blog linked to in my post from last Friday at 19:12:52. That's all I know, plus some anecdotal stuff from various online dog forums.

We took Lurcherboy at 8.00 am this morning luckily, as it's even warm in my house today - so it must be sweltering outside.

I've been reorganising my bedroom, so haven't actually made it outside yet.

Lurcherboy is definitely not enjoying the heat - he's always a lazy lump, but I've never seem him this leathargic with it. He's usually got one eye open for possible food drops from the worksurface etc, but he couldn't even be bothered to get up and grab some toast crusts I dropped this morning.

Ds1 has come down with dd's virus, so between that and all the transition stress he's an absolute joy to be around - not - hence me hiding out in my bedroom all morning.

Moose is that 28 June? If so I can't find it.

Our girl has stayed in the kitchen most of the day and occasionally popping out to the garden.

Walked her earlier with the DC but through the lovely cool shady woods so the heat didn't bother us which was nice.

No, Friday just gone. Will redo the link here.

My bedroom is now a palace - but as the room is south facing and has 3 external walls it's a bit like being in a brick oven. So while my room looks lovely, I resemble a cross between a wilted weed and a boiled beetroot.

mistlehound appears to be happy to have a swim, just because the water's there, when its hot. It is quite helpful during this hot weather.

We sent an essay about what we wanted from a dog and what the dog could expect from us when we approached various rescues... the fact we had a child of 8 didn't stop us being offered dogs - although we were only offered the choice of 2 where we got ours from due to having a chinchilla in the house!

My news tonight is that Lurcherboy has finally worked out how to throw toys for himself.

I think he's been a bit puzzled about how to play now he's on his own, as when we had our other dogs they all tended to zoom around and snatch toys off each other.

He has been wanting me to chase him instead but this weekend he's sussed how to throw his kong and make it bounce so he can bounce on it again - it's only taken him nearly 8 years to work it out!

We have had to get loads of 'light' toys and ban the heavy, solid rubber balls etc as mistlehound is lethal with things - everything, including chews, gets thrown around a lot. Things hit the ceiling at times (and its not low) and we'd have broken pictures (and bruised heads) if we left her with the heavier things.

I now know why she failed at 'working'. We went early for a walk this morning to catch the cool and before work - I pointed her at the rabbits and told her they were rabbits (she now has worked that word out). We walked in that direction - her a little in front, and she stopped and 'pointed' whilst all the rabbits scurried away into the wood. If they're in more copse/bushes / wood situation she does properly run and chase though... so perhaps its just because she's not hunted out in the fields before? Despite the rabbits she had a good gallop around and a swim and some more galloping, so I think that she should be fine until its cooled down a bit later.