Greetings, my wife and I are the parents of a 10 week old twanny colored Neopolitan Mastiff pup named Claudia.
First the bad, the pup was an impulse buy, so her parents health is unknown. The wife always wanted a mastiff and I have a hard time telling her no, so when Nikki saw Claudia it was game over.
Now on to the good,
Claudia has been to the vet and seems to be in good health and confirmation. She is crazy smart for a 10 week old puppy and learned her name and has begun to learn the come command in 2 days. She is rapidly bonding with my wife, the 3 kids, 3 other dogs and 2 cats as well as myself. Each day she is more inquisitive. Her potty training proceeds apace mostly good but some slip ups. She is also in a forever home, we are home owners and once an animal is in, its in. We have a geriatic pitbull, a severly inbred lab (found in a ditch by our house) who needed stomach surgery after injesting pine needles, a lab mix we had to nurse back to health with a syringe fed diet of honey, milk and egg, and a flea allegic half hairless cat. The other cat is the only normal member of the family with 4 legs.
The biggest problem right now is convincing Claudia to eat kibble and to take to her crate.
Part of the good is after I bought her I swarmed the net looking for information on the breed. I got a good chuckle when I found out about the slobber, gas and other bodily functions of the breed, the wife hates slimly, stinky or drooly. But she agreed to take care of Claudia and so far has been hard at work living up to it. I think with time, drool will be like baby poop, just one of those things.Me, I don't mind it, dogs are dogs and I have a pit and 2 labs.
Besides the vet and post-purchase net research we've also gone out and bought her quality toys and ropes, crate, quality food etc. We''ve also begun teaching her where she can sleep and sit, researched training classes etc.
Ok back to the kibble issue...
She doesn't like it, hopefully she will grow into it.
Our plan is to use a mix of natures choice large breed puppy and natures choice large breed adult both are lower protein premium foods. This should be about half her diet by weight (adjusted upwards as she grows). This should not risk her growing too fast. To this will be added liberal portions of mixed veggies and a daily raw egg. I've read that using low grain kibble with mixed veggies like this can seriously cut down the risk of GDV. Its not a BARF diet, but hopefully it will let her reach her potential.
First the bad, the pup was an impulse buy, so her parents health is unknown. The wife always wanted a mastiff and I have a hard time telling her no, so when Nikki saw Claudia it was game over.
Now on to the good,
Claudia has been to the vet and seems to be in good health and confirmation. She is crazy smart for a 10 week old puppy and learned her name and has begun to learn the come command in 2 days. She is rapidly bonding with my wife, the 3 kids, 3 other dogs and 2 cats as well as myself. Each day she is more inquisitive. Her potty training proceeds apace mostly good but some slip ups. She is also in a forever home, we are home owners and once an animal is in, its in. We have a geriatic pitbull, a severly inbred lab (found in a ditch by our house) who needed stomach surgery after injesting pine needles, a lab mix we had to nurse back to health with a syringe fed diet of honey, milk and egg, and a flea allegic half hairless cat. The other cat is the only normal member of the family with 4 legs.
The biggest problem right now is convincing Claudia to eat kibble and to take to her crate.
Part of the good is after I bought her I swarmed the net looking for information on the breed. I got a good chuckle when I found out about the slobber, gas and other bodily functions of the breed, the wife hates slimly, stinky or drooly. But she agreed to take care of Claudia and so far has been hard at work living up to it. I think with time, drool will be like baby poop, just one of those things.Me, I don't mind it, dogs are dogs and I have a pit and 2 labs.
Besides the vet and post-purchase net research we've also gone out and bought her quality toys and ropes, crate, quality food etc. We''ve also begun teaching her where she can sleep and sit, researched training classes etc.
Ok back to the kibble issue...
She doesn't like it, hopefully she will grow into it.
Our plan is to use a mix of natures choice large breed puppy and natures choice large breed adult both are lower protein premium foods. This should be about half her diet by weight (adjusted upwards as she grows). This should not risk her growing too fast. To this will be added liberal portions of mixed veggies and a daily raw egg. I've read that using low grain kibble with mixed veggies like this can seriously cut down the risk of GDV. Its not a BARF diet, but hopefully it will let her reach her potential.