No special occasion. Once a week, normally on weekends because it's when I have the time, I like giving them a treat and it's Kuma's "no kibble" day. He goes crazy, hehe :-)
We went to the vet this morning to get Kuma's fungus thing checked. It is improving, and fur is starting to grow back. He'll take another two week course of anti fungus pills. He's now 29,05Kg (64lbs) and 61cm to the withers (24in).
Kuma looks great, he is getting big! He was so stoked for his dinner. )
Glad his fungus is clearing up!
Great spam!
As for the throwing up, Michelle taught Jen and I to "burp" Hilo after he eats if he starts to seem like he has some gas. We just pat him firmly on the side of his ribs - he will burp and then stop with the strange burpy noises he makes if he eats to fast. Maybe that would help Kuma?
Thanks Brad, I definitely have to try that. That day he wasn't burping much, that was another thing that got me worried. My guess was he really pigged out since I didn't do what I should have, and that was break that meal in two and use it for both breakfast and dinner.
That day he ended up finishing that fr dinner and then having a plain yoghurt mixed with apple and banana puree and a bit of peanut butter. I that made him even more crazy :-)
wow! nice meal! our pups had squash and carrot baby food mixed with their fish today. and I'm glad his fungus is getting better. any idea how that happened?
Jen - I assume he picked it up during one of our walks. The vet says they're pretty common and the dogs may or may not get. I assume it depends on their immune systems at the time of contact.
Yesterday we went to Arraiolos to help my parents pick olives. Turns out we were a bit too late, because all the olives were already withering and there weren't many. Seems there's something up with the olive trees this year and we should have done this last week or 2 weeks ago. So the actual olive picking took 15 minutes or so and the result was about 3/4 Kg of olives. The good thing about this was we had more time to hang out around the village and even went on a hike in the afternoon. It was a nice Autumn day in Alentejo.
Photo spam...
"Are we going already?!"
A bit of the view
Kuma and my sister on this one you can see how his fungus is going
Kuma and sheep, he was pretty interested in them :-)
Kuma and my sister playing tug of war
After lunch we went on a hike of about 6km
My dad helping Nat take a photo... ...of this mushroom
we went all the way to that pond
Here we are
Kuma liked the water, I think it helped him cool down. He would have gone in deeper if I let him
Resting a bit before heading back
we met some sheep and a cow on the way
The map of our hike, with the path outlined (who doesn't love Google Earth?)
Nanook, the husky. He wasn't thrilled to see Kuma and he made a big fuss about it. Kuma wasn't making a fuss but he looked ready to give Nanook a piece of his mind. This was taken after the fuss
On the way back we had a very tired pup and two very tired humans. The pup was so tired he didn't eat much for dinner and slept from around 9pm to 7am straight.
Looks like you had a great day!!! I think there's something weird going on with crops this year. I heard on the radio that there was a shortage of pumpkins this year.
I am so fascinated by the idea of olive picking. I could eat olives every day of my life. Kuma is growing up to be such a handsome boy! And the smile on his face is positively heart melting. I just want to SQUEEZE him!
Rui; Again thanks for sharing your pics and the discussion of them. Oh how I would a trip to Portugal about now! I guess each country/area of the country has its harvest traditions... no olives here, but it's apple and pumpkin pickin' time in Minnesota! Kuma is a beauty and hope his fungus goes away completely, soon. Love Nanook too -- too bad they didn't get along, or maybe he just wanted to go for a wild Nihon-ken romp?
Thanks guys! We did have a great day, and we got pretty tired which was nice too. We all slept like babies last night :-) Even Nyx and she didn't go.
Barbara - For what our neighbours and friends there told us, if we had gone 1 or 2 weeks earlier we'd have got much more than we did, but yeah it still wouldn't have been much.
Jess - On normal years it's a job that starts early and takes a few hours (my parents have 13 olive trees, not much). But it's fun and someone always gets hit with a bad olive (or several)
Bev - Nanook is a beautiful dog that is not very much socialized, living the typical (maybe a tad better, but really just a tad) life of a dog in the country side of Portugal. He wasn't aiming to have a good time there and I'm not sure if Kuma got the message completely. Thankfully I was holding on to his leash and had his bottle of water in my left hand, so I just sprayed Nanook and things got quieter and he moved on on his walk.
Brad - I didn't grow up there in the sense that I was born there (I'm a Lisbon native), but I spent large parts of pretty much every Summer of my school years there. It's a beautiful place although it gets way too hot in Summer.
I agree, Kuma is really handsome and oh so huggable! Sorry to hear about the poor olives, but it still looks like you had a good day. A long hike with the dog makes for a great day in my book! :-)
We went to the vet this morning to have Kuma's fungus checked out. It's healing up really well and he just has to finish the pills he has (only 3 more). The vet told me to start rubbing the scab with Betadine to try and peel it out slowly. The fur is already growing back which is great.
I started transitioning Kuma to Orijen last week, on Thursday if I'm not mistaken. He went crazy over it, he was liking the smell a lot. I started slow, and gave him 10% of Orijen to start and see the reaction, and then on Friday I gave him 25%. He did very well on it, no loose stool or anything. Then came the week end and it was kibble free day on Saturday, so no Orijen, and on Sunday I raised the Orijen to 40%. He didn't want to eat much for breakfast, but for dinner he had half of his kibble. All of the Orijen plus the bits of Acana he couldn't separate, I'm supposing. This morning he did it again. So basically he's eating only Orijen, pretty much.
Since he's doing so well so far, should I consider giving him Orijen only? I know it's a fast transition, but that's pretty much what he's eating now, with the difference his eating half the kibble he should be eating. Of course I would still be monitoring him closely, and probably give him pumpkin if his stool got soft.
I wouldn't rush to give him only orijen just yet. Even though he appears to only be eating it, he's eating less of it than he would if you were feeding it to him 100%. Similarly to humans, if he eats something in moderation its unlikely to upset his stomach as badly as if he eats a lot of it. I would give him a few more days before he gets an entire meal of just orijen.
Yesterday we went out to the usual park for a long walk and we played fetch for a whole two and a half throws. Then Kuma thought it was enough :-P I have videos, but they need to be edited and since I had to format my computer, I don't have any editing tool on it. I'll have to do it tomorrow.
Since the nights are getting colder, the kids are looking for more comfort to sleep...
Nyx looks so tiny when she's sitting next to Kuma, so she always looks like a kitty to me. Seeing her in a pic of her own, I can see she's full grown! And looking beautiful, of course.
Kuma smushy face!!! Such a beautiful boy. I absolutely love his coloring! It's a nice deep red.
Comments
He's now 29,05Kg (64lbs) and 61cm to the withers (24in).
Glad his fungus is clearing up!
Great spam!
As for the throwing up, Michelle taught Jen and I to "burp" Hilo after he eats if he starts to seem like he has some gas. We just pat him firmly on the side of his ribs - he will burp and then stop with the strange burpy noises he makes if he eats to fast. Maybe that would help Kuma?
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Glad he is doing well.
That day he ended up finishing that fr dinner and then having a plain yoghurt mixed with apple and banana puree and a bit of peanut butter. I that made him even more crazy :-)
The good thing about this was we had more time to hang out around the village and even went on a hike in the afternoon. It was a nice Autumn day in Alentejo.
Photo spam...
"Are we going already?!"
A bit of the view
Kuma and my sister
on this one you can see how his fungus is going
Kuma and sheep, he was pretty interested in them :-)
Kuma and my sister playing tug of war
After lunch we went on a hike of about 6km
My dad helping Nat take a photo...
...of this mushroom
we went all the way to that pond
Here we are
Kuma liked the water, I think it helped him cool down. He would have gone in deeper if I let him
Resting a bit before heading back
we met some sheep and a cow on the way
The map of our hike, with the path outlined (who doesn't love Google Earth?)
Nanook, the husky. He wasn't thrilled to see Kuma and he made a big fuss about it. Kuma wasn't making a fuss but he looked ready to give Nanook a piece of his mind.
This was taken after the fuss
On the way back we had a very tired pup and two very tired humans. The pup was so tired he didn't eat much for dinner and slept from around 9pm to 7am straight.
Kuma is growing up to be such a handsome boy! And the smile on his face is positively heart melting.
I just want to SQUEEZE him!
Kuma looks great, as usual. I just want to hug him!
Nanook is the perfect name for a husky.
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Kuma looks right in his element, too.. a big, happy (who's quite stunning!) boy.
We did have a great day, and we got pretty tired which was nice too. We all slept like babies last night :-) Even Nyx and she didn't go.
Barbara - For what our neighbours and friends there told us, if we had gone 1 or 2 weeks earlier we'd have got much more than we did, but yeah it still wouldn't have been much.
Jess - On normal years it's a job that starts early and takes a few hours (my parents have 13 olive trees, not much). But it's fun and someone always gets hit with a bad olive (or several)
Bev - Nanook is a beautiful dog that is not very much socialized, living the typical (maybe a tad better, but really just a tad) life of a dog in the country side of Portugal. He wasn't aiming to have a good time there and I'm not sure if Kuma got the message completely. Thankfully I was holding on to his leash and had his bottle of water in my left hand, so I just sprayed Nanook and things got quieter and he moved on on his walk.
Brad - I didn't grow up there in the sense that I was born there (I'm a Lisbon native), but I spent large parts of pretty much every Summer of my school years there. It's a beautiful place although it gets way too hot in Summer.
The vet told me to start rubbing the scab with Betadine to try and peel it out slowly. The fur is already growing back which is great.
Kuma is now 30,1Kg (66 1/3 lbs)
He's a big guy!
----
I started slow, and gave him 10% of Orijen to start and see the reaction, and then on Friday I gave him 25%. He did very well on it, no loose stool or anything.
Then came the week end and it was kibble free day on Saturday, so no Orijen, and on Sunday I raised the Orijen to 40%. He didn't want to eat much for breakfast, but for dinner he had half of his kibble. All of the Orijen plus the bits of Acana he couldn't separate, I'm supposing.
This morning he did it again. So basically he's eating only Orijen, pretty much.
Since he's doing so well so far, should I consider giving him Orijen only? I know it's a fast transition, but that's pretty much what he's eating now, with the difference his eating half the kibble he should be eating.
Of course I would still be monitoring him closely, and probably give him pumpkin if his stool got soft.
I have videos, but they need to be edited and since I had to format my computer, I don't have any editing tool on it. I'll have to do it tomorrow.
Since the nights are getting colder, the kids are looking for more comfort to sleep...
Kuma smushy face!!! Such a beautiful boy. I absolutely love his coloring! It's a nice deep red.