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In Reply to: (But once they kick-off this mortal coil.....)... You'll get some other dogs?.... posted by feet's too big on February 16, 2007 at 15:05:22:
True words, Bill, but I have had it "up to here" with dirty floors, old carpeting, dog hair everywhere, and the ever-present "dog-home smell". Our dogs are most certainly housebroken, but now that they are getting older accidents tend to be more frequent (and sometimes very hard to find until one of us steps in a "wet spot"). Due to the smell we had to rip-out the carpeting in the spare bedroom last fall, this being the room where the dogs stay during the day, and it would be nice to be able to replace the carpeting w/o having to worry about it suffering the same (smelly) fate. In fact, I refuse to replace any of our carpeting until the last one passes. Abby is 18 now, and the Collies are both 8, so it's only a matter of time...I realize that this sounds heartless but I have told Gayle in no uncertain terms that we will never have three dogs at the same time ever again. Sure, we will get another dog eventually once these pass on, but I want to fix the damn flooring, and enjoy it for awhile, before introducing another dog into the house. In other words, I want to come into my own home, take off my shoes, and enjoy the feel of clean, soft carpeting on my feet w/o having to worry about what I'm going to step-in (or on) for once in my life. And I would like to be able to walk through the house with my dress pants on w/o picking-up 2 pounds of dog hair on them. And I would like for our furnace filters to last for more than 2 months before becoming hopelessly plugged. And I would like to sit in my own damn chair and read my own damn book w/o having to get "de-furred" afterwards. Are these asking too damn much?
My sincere apologies for the rant, but I had a rather shitty day at work and when I came home just now I was welcomed by dirty dog paw-prints all over the entryway and kitchen floors, not to mention the fur that clung to my dry clean only pants as I walked up the stairs.....
Follow Ups:
Yes Jim, sharing one's home with dogs will always involve some form of compromise, though your listed problems do seem rather severe!...That said, as with children, if a person has any compulsive need for a surgically clean "showhome", then IMO they would best avoid having either pets or children in the home... Eating out, and discouraging visitors (especially those with children and/or dogs) should also be built into the lifestyle of such folk...
And I hope that those folk enjoy the lives they lead!...
Having multiple long-haired dogs is always a challenge, and currently appears to provide you with a number of continuing problems, though twice-daily use of a "stripping comb" (it looks like a looped, thin one-sided saw-blade with a handle!) removes both loose undercoat and hairs on the topcoat that would otherwise be likely to be shed during the day, radically reducing potential problems...
Yes, if you have aged dogs whose bladder-control is suspect then obviously a garage-style space and floor surface is likely to be ideal to keep the dogs both warm and safe during any fairly lengthy times you are out during the day, especially as you can train dogs to use a strip of astro-turf as their "ablution" area... In the absence of this facility, I would recommend a sealed surface (linoleum?) - rather than carpet! - for any area dogs left for any time that is likely to exceed their bladder control, as any "accidents" can be easily mopped up, leaving the room smelling of pine or other chosen aroma...
Though mentioned with some reservations, a weekly shampoo for each of the dogs will radically reduce any notably "doggy" aroma for those with oily coats...
Any other problems you'd like addressed?... No, I'm unable to undo those scratches on your garage-sale LPs, but I can handle most queries!...
I wish you a happy George Washington Day...
Bill.
I have (somewhat) gotten over my rant of last evening, and I think I may have overstated things a bit there.Some (good) issues you bring-up, in no particular order:
1. Daily grooming. It saddens me to day this but neither Gayle nor I have the time to do this. Without going into our daily routines, suffice it to say that were we to be given a mere spare hour or two we may be able to squeeze this in, but until the Earth slows sufficiently or one of us retires (whichever comes first), daily grooming just ain't a-gonna happen. And you know as well as I the volume of hair that one long-haired breed dog can produce in one day, let alone two (not to mention the "old timer"...)
2. "Showhome". I am not comfortable either when I find myself in such a place, nor would I ever wish for my home to be like that, but I sure would like to replace our carpet that is going nigh on 30 years of age. You can only imagine how matted down, uncomfortable, and thread-bare it is....
3. Bladder control issues. We don't really have any "issues", per se, and the dogs do get plenty of exercise/opportunities to relieve themselves, but the level of smell due to undiscovered accidents in that bedroom just got to be too much. The smell got into the carpeting, and the padding, and even into the sub-flooring. I cleaned the flooring and covered it with "Kilz", a product you may be unfamiliar with, and the smell has gone.
But we still have an area in the living room where there is a definite "aroma" if you pay attention....
4. Tiled and linoleum flooring may indeed be the answer, but the only enclosed space where we have such a thing is in the bathroom, and Gayle simply will not stand for that. I won't even raise the issue with her. We do have a utilty room in the basement, but neither of us would feel like loving and caring pet owners were we to shove them in that space.
5. Bathing. Yes, they get bathed quite regularly (although not weekly) and have healthy and shiny (though un-groomed) coats. It's not the dogs themselves that smell but rather the urine smells that remain in the carpeting that one notices.
I cannot see living w/o a dog either, and I think this would absolutely crush Gayle. I just want to scale back and get things under control- the hair, the smell, the dirt, the expenses (!!!), etc, etc, and it is for these reasons that I have "bad dog days". Thankfully they go away.
Grooming sounds rather more time-intensive than it actually is, with a Husky-sized dog (eg hairy Husky "Hoki" - one of Cass's play-fighting friends who has sometimes seemed to moult sufficient hair each day to spin a cardigan from!) taking less than 5 minutes to give a thorough (outdoors!) top-to-bottom treatment, using a proper "stripping comb"**... After the initial week (when about two carrier-bags/treatment of dense hair and fluff were removed), Hoki has often only required a brief daily "going over"...The main point is that if a dog's hair is going to resist coming away with the stripping comb, it is not going to be loose enough to fall on your carpets or chairs!...
** IMO it is vital to get an effective tool here, in that before I lent Hoki's owner my stripping-comb, she was almost tearing her hair out from having unsatisfactory results from lots of supposed grooming aids and was desparate to find a vaguely effective, speedy excess dog hair removal method... She purchased her own the day after she had a chance to try the stripping-comb I had loaned... The fact that Hoki and brother Storm now LOOK groomed is simply a welcome bonus, as of course is the absence of hair at home!... So if you find that you have difficulty sourcing one to match the description in my previous posting - since I have a "spare" in the car - if you email me, I'll post it on to you...
Regarding any smell in the living-room, I can only suggest fairly regular carpet-cleaning (as the problem is probably likely to be a cumulative effect of a number of small "accidents"), together with an appropriately aromatic post-cleaning "powder"... "Kilz" might be a bit extreme for this application!... As dogs tend to repeat bladder function at locations where previous release has taken place, the absence of such a scent may minimise the problem...
Sadly, apart from suggesting keeping a bag in the porch containing towels to clean mud off their feet before they enter, there may not be much to be done about keeping paw-marks out of the house during periods of wet weather, though thankfully any paw-marks are both easy to clean from an insulated surface at any time, and easy to hoover from carpets (after they've dried!)...
I don't think I can do much about the expenses(!), so I think that's about it, in terms of addressing your posted problem check-list!...
Bill.
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