Quote: aaron crawford

*breed

*age ( of the dog, haha)

6 dogs total at the present time: 2 Labradors (ages 11 and 4), 3 Malinois (2- ages 7 months, 1- age 8 years), 1 "Shepinois" (age 3 years)

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*aspects you are working towards, or have reached and time spent daily doing so.

The 2 older dogs are retired USAR dogs. They are allowed to self-exercise in our dog yard all day. Time spent weekly training/exercising = less than 1/2 hour.

The younger Labrador is my operational USAR dog. He spends the bulk of his day in our dog yard and is good at "self-exercising." Time spent weekly training/exercising = maybe 3 to 4 hours total. We do spend one entire day a week with this dog and our "Shepinois" traveling to/from and participating in USAR training.

The "Shepinois" is my USAR dog in training. I exercise him every day either by running him in the woods/fields nearby or on a treadmill. I also practice his USAR skills training every other day. In all, I probably spend an hour-and-a-half to 2 hours a day total (broken up into 2 or 3 sessions) working with him.

The 2 Malinois puppies require the most training/attention from me at this point. I am keeping one of them permanently and am training him for French Ring and maybe USAR if I need to. The other one will likely end up as a patrol or USAR dog. I take at least one of them everywhere I go, and I try to do something short and constructive with them at my destinations (environmental exposure, agility, fun obedience, tug work, etc.). I spend a few minutes with each of them in the morning working on scent pads for tracking. I also exercise them at least once a day in the afternoon for a few minutes each. Otherwise, they are crated or in an outdoor pen.

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*do you have a job that requires your being there at least 8hrs (you don't have to disclose what you do), and if so, is the dog in a crate until you get home? Is it in a back yard? etc

I am currently a stay-at-home mom with a 2 year old, although I do own a small dog-training business (approx. 1 client per week). Our dogs spend most of the day outside, unless its pouring or extremely cold (then they are inside in their crates). I never leave my dogs out when I am not home though. Being at home makes it easy to focus on the dogs.

However, I used to have a 50+ hour a week job. At that time I had 3 dogs - 2 were SAR dogs. I made time to train/exercise them. I took at least one of them to work with me each day and took breaks to exercise/train.

I firmly believe that most people can make the time to train/exercise their dogs if they're really passionate about having a working dog.

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*do you have a family or are you single; and how does this play a role on your goals with your dog? A spouse/etc maakes things demanding with time if you have a job. MOst homes both work. If you have children it complicates the situation even moreso.

I am married, and fortunately for me, my husband is involved with dogs and USAR as well. The older Labrador is his, and we share the younger Labrador. This definitely makes things easier! Having a baby only slowed me down for a few months. Sure, my husband and I have to alternate who goes to training or hire a sitter, but we're making it work. My husband also takes care of our child when I take the puppies to protection training.

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*So how do you realistically find time if your not a canine officer or something equivalent in having a dog with you for many hours a day? I mean, yes, you can work for 8hrs, drive home for an hour round trip, go home, work the dog for another 8hrs, then use the remaining 7hrs to eat, spend time wit your family, get ready for the following day, sleep, wake up, shower, and get ready to drive to work which would then be included in the hour after the 8hr work day.

As you can see from most of the posts (even from those of us who have working dogs with "real" jobs), it doesn't take that much time per day to exercise and train a working dog. The dog should bring much of what you need in its genetics alone. If the dog is genetically suited to its job, then training should be easy, right?

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So how is it physically possible in the time allotted in a given day to work a dog as much as some profess?

I think after reviewing all these posts, you'll see that you don't need 6 hours a day for one working dog. If that were the case, then I'd need a few more hours added to each day!

I'm really digging this thread. I like hearing out everyones point of views and what surrounds their lives aside their dogs.

So its perfectly possible, reasonable, and realistic to own 1 working dog, and then still take care of business.



So what about this?

Has anyone had a working dog "before" kids were born?

I mean, I am not married, have no kids, and before I leave, will prob get a Dutch or a little Mal this weekend (maybe, still thinking). This dog will stay with me for a long time to come. But I do plan on getting married and having kids. So would it be realistic to say that the dog will get a little neglected when the times comes as it may be a potential threat to the new child?

Obviously, no dog alone with any child, period, but this is uncharted territory for me and want to know your experiences.

was it difficult? Did you have any close calls? And so on....

Thanks everybody. This makes me feel SOOOO much better.

Also, if you work more than 8+hrs a day you can't possibly leave the dog indoors the entire day?

My friend is a disbatcher for a police dept in the next town (which I believe has finished his training and is a police officer now). He's been wanting a shepherd for some time now and trying to figure out how to make it work.

Well, he works 4days on for 12hrs, then he gets 3 days off.

So in his case, there would be no possible way that he could have any sort of dog let alone a working dog right?

In his case, how could he make it work in your opinion?

Aaron, I don't have kids...yet. My dog hasn't started any serious work yet, but she is a working breed and who knows? If and when we excel at our goals, we might try a little in some other area. That will be in a few years and we'll have to see. Also, by then, hopefully I will be a father.

I'm not too worried about how my dog or dogs will be with my kid(s), because I will take any and all precautions to make sure theres little to no chance of them hurting my child. Thanks to this site, I have learned so much which I can put to use at that time. Don't get so ahead of yourself, enjoy the moments and work with things when they come.

I work from 9-5 at full time job, and so does my wife. Luckily though, she works close to home and comes to let our dog out at lunch. I'm grateful for that because coming home to lunch everyday can be pretty boring. My dog is at most in her crate for about 5 hrs. We try to limit the amount she spends in her crate, so when we are home, she is always out, unless we need her to be in the crate for a short time. Ie: cleaning, short errands, company afraid of dog, etc. We try to take her w/us as much as we can. I also own a snow removal business and in the winter I take her with me on my routes.

I think a working dog can be in the crate for 8+ hrs a day *IF* that is your only option and you excercise the hell out of it on those days. That means before and after crate time. If you must do that, try to find someone to help you let it out at least once a day.

It's not as complicated as it seems, especially if you only have 1 dog. My respects to people w/multiple dogs and my God Angelique, you are amazing!

Aaron, how old are you? and where are you going to be leaving from?

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Has anyone had a working dog "before" kids were born?
...

I do plan on getting married and having kids. So would it be realistic to say that the dog will get a little neglected when the times comes as it may be a potential threat to the new child?

Obviously, no dog alone with any child, period, but this is uncharted territory for me and want to know your experiences.

was it difficult? Did you have any close calls? And so on....

Before my son (4 wks old) was born, spent pretty much all day every day training - after I finally got off of bedrest, that is! But even before I was pregnant, that was about all I ever did - train the dogs.

I was really worried about one of my dogs. He's not protection trained like I mentioned above, but he's a dog with too much drive to be safe in a pet home. I was worried enough that he almost ended up in doggie heaven, but we decided to give it a go, see how it worked. My husband and I decided that we would euthanize without moment's hestiation (yeah, right! :roll eyes if he couldn't be handled safely. (BTW, this is a rescue dog that was going to be PTS last July, if we took him back to the shelter he was from, he'd be PTS. If we put him in the county shelter, we felt he would be a danger to the adopter because of the way the shelter handles adoptions/screens adopters.)

It ended up OK. If I bring him in the house, he goes nuts. So I put baby down for a nap and and close the door before bringing him inside. (a leash would work too...) When he's worn out completely, he's a nice enough house dog for 10 minutes or so and then he goes back outside. (Surprisingly simple!)

Babies sleep a lot and there's lots of training time during the naps. (Assuming you can sleep at night!) I'm a bit worried about finding time during the toddler/preschool/kindergarten years, but I'll figure it out when it happens.

I recommend the book "Fatal Dog Attacks" by Karen Delise. It's sold on the main leerurg site. It will scare the crap out of any dog owner or parent, but tells you everything you need to know to keep dogs and kids safe.

I gotta applaud you for thinking before you act on getting a working dog. As long as you remain committed to your goals and your dog, I'm sure you'll find time for training and be able to keep a future wife and kids safe and happy too.

 Quote: aaron crawford

Has anyone had a working dog "before" kids were born?
...
So would it be realistic to say that the dog will get a little neglected when the times comes as it may be a potential threat to the new child?
...
was it difficult? Did you have any close calls? And so on....

Our dogs were only slightly "neglected" immediately following the birth of our baby. I was able to exercise them by taking walks with baby in stroller and train them when the baby was asleep. Baby monitors are a wonderful thing! Now that our baby is a toddler, I either bring her with me to train them, or train when she's napping/asleep.

I didn't take any chances with my dogs and the baby. Although they are all friendly and well-socialized, I didn't let them anywhere near the baby. None of them are truly house dogs, so this didn't pose any issues for us. I strongly believe that, if you are the "leader" your dog will go with the flow and accept any lifestyle you present to them.

We have not had any close calls since we keep our child and the dogs pretty much separated.

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Also, if you work more than 8+hrs a day you can't possibly leave the dog indoors the entire day?

I know people who do this with no problems, but their dogs get a lot of exercise outside of the crate too. I also know people who have runs in their basements to allow their dogs a little more movement during the day. Personally, I would hire a dog-sitter to at least let the dog(s) out once in the middle of the day.

Hi,

I have a malinois and she is 2 years old.I had that luck that i use to run an pet shop so when I bought "Funny"(my girl) I took her to the shop and she was there in a kennel. Every hour or so I took her out for 10-15 minutes.
When I changed job and moved to another town I use to wake up in 5 or 5.30 in the morning spend a hour and a half with her and then go to work.Then again when came back from work 1 or 2 hours depending on other obligations.So I have full time job, going to college in another country and playing a lot of gigs with my band but point is there is always time enough for your dog if that is important to you.
Im single (divorced) and yes sometimes my ex wife use to nag about spending a lot time with dog but we had a long conversation before we bought "Funny" and I explained her what oblagiations you have when you buy a dog and I wouldnt bought it if she didnt aprove that.
Question is how pro do you wanna go in dog training? And the i think the most important thing is a quality of your training because I think every contact with your dog is kind of training , for you and your dog)