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hooker
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hooker
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PostSat Jan 03, 2015 9:30 pm 
smile.gif Lets see them! Mans best friend can carry a little right? smile.gif

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Bedivere
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 2:58 am 
You tryin' to stir up some kind of controversy? wink.gif

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LichenHiking
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 3:55 am 
Tilla doesn't mind carrying her weight for a long trip or a day hike. Those booties however, are another story. She tolerates them, but they fall off constantly and she often licks her paws when we stop like they're hurting her.
image
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treeswarper
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 7:14 am 
The Used Dog is retired now. He's got arthritis so I pack his stuff. He used to be part of my trail maintenance crew and carried wedges and small tools. Here he is, ready to go and then on the job.
Taking a break.
Had to stop at the bottom of the rocks to wiggle toes on the way back.  Problem toes can be a problem.  The Used Dog soon moved into the shade.
Had to stop at the bottom of the rocks to wiggle toes on the way back. Problem toes can be a problem. The Used Dog soon moved into the shade.
Back on the trail.
He's got a lot more white on his face now. I wish dogs aged slower.

What's especially fun about sock puppets is that you can make each one unique and individual, so that they each have special characters. And they don't have to be human––animals and aliens are great possibilities
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olderthanIusedtobe
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 2:09 pm 
Great pics of trail doggies! They all look so happy. Yeah, the dog booties don't tend to go over so well with the pups. I knew one dog that literally ate part of a bootie to get rid of it!

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hikermike
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 6:58 pm 
Pink? You put pink on a trail dog? Is this to get hunters to laugh so hard they forget o pull the trigger? Seriously! I know that dogs can pull 40x their weight but don't know how much they can carry. Our yorkie and our chihuahua couldn't carry anything as there were no packs small enough for them. (Both gone now, I'm so sad.

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Bedivere
Why Do Witches Burn?



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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 8:27 pm 
LichenHiking - try these: https://www.dogbooties.com/shop/330-denier-cordura%C2%AE-booties-2/ They're thin and light and will wear out fairly quickly, but at $3/each, so what? I buy 'em 8 at a time. They stay on great and let your dog's foot work more naturally. Thing is, I'm wondering why you need booties on Tilla? Only time I ever use them on Jack is spring/crusty snow conditions or areas with very sharp rocks (shale, lava, etc.) A dog that gets out a lot should have pretty tough paws. Has she been having problems.?
hikermike - I've always gone by 25% of body weight for max load. Jack weighs 68 lbs and I've never been able to load his pack up with more than 16 lbs of stuff so have never quite reached that limit. I imagine a lot depends on the dog, too, but a compact and muscular dog should be able to carry that much with no problem. I once saw a guy with a Pug that had a pack on at the beginning of the Foss Lakes trail. That poor little dog was overloaded and Pugs are not athletic anyway and are prone to overheating because of their short noses. Fortunately the dog had more sense than his human and simply refused to move.

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treeswarper
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 10:02 pm 
There's nothing wrong with pink. You can call it salmon if you want it to be more manly. I don't think my boy ever carried more than 5 pounds. When not packing saw gear, he'd carry a couple quarts of water and dog biscuits. My friend the dog talker said to always put dog treats in the pack. The dog then looks forward to the pack. A friend and I took our two golden retrievers along on a hike. She also brought a baby. We only had one dog pack. We alternated dogs. They carried diapers and formula. When one dog started misbehaving, we put the pack on it and the dog slowed it down. The pack didn't weigh very much either, but the dogs weren't used to it so they slowed down and heeled.

What's especially fun about sock puppets is that you can make each one unique and individual, so that they each have special characters. And they don't have to be human––animals and aliens are great possibilities
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nuclear_eggset
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 10:22 pm 
treeswarper wrote:
A friend and I took our two golden retrievers along on a hike. She also brought a baby. We only had one dog pack. We alternated dogs. They carried diapers and formula.
This is a brilliant plan! I will be using it next August. Thank you! Neo may not thank you for the idea, however. :P

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Bedivere
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 10:40 pm 
treeswarper wrote:
There's nothing wrong with pink.
A salesman at a menswear store told me the same thing as he tried to get me to buy a pink dress shirt. tongue.gif One of the (many) good things about dogs is they're not usually self conscious. I'm sure the Used Dog didn't care what color the pack was as long as he got to go out with you. I sympathize where you're at with him now. Tor's last hike just about broke my heart. He could barely stand after a relaxed 5 mile day hike and I realized he just couldn't do it any more. Jack is 8 now and starting to slow down but still pretty energetic and strong so hoping I have a few more good years with him. My dogs have always carried their own supplies plus beer. It's real easy to take beer hiking if you have a dog to carry it for you.

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LichenHiking
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 11:18 pm 
Bedivere wrote:
Tor's last hike just about broke my heart.
Awww, this made me tear up. I don't look forward to that day with Tilla - hopefully it's a long way off.
Bedivere wrote:
Thing is, I'm wondering why you need booties on Tilla? Only time I ever use them on Jack is spring/crusty snow conditions or areas with very sharp rocks (shale, lava, etc.) A dog that gets out a lot should have pretty tough paws. Has she been having problems.?
In the summer picture above, I brought them in case she hurt her paws on the White Pass/Pilot Ridge Loop. At the end of day 2 she started limping (with all her exploring she puts in way more mileage than me) and I noticed her pads were getting worn so I stuck them on so she wouldn't get worse. After a day and a half of on and off wear she wouldn't get up when we stopped for water breaks, it scared me because I thought I would have to carry her out. I think it was more because the booties rubbed her dewclaw raw - I didn't notice until later. I hadn't put them on her since until our Annette Lake hike on Saturday (location of the snow pic above). I didn't know if the snow would ball on the fur between her toes like it did on our only other snow hike together in July. No snow balling but I didn't know if hiking for miles on the cold snow would hurt her feet, so getting her to wear them was a precaution. I gave up on the walk down though because they just kept falling off. I looked into it and turns out they don't get cold feet the way humans do. http://phys.org/news/2012-01-dogs-ice-paws.html I try to keep her toughened up, but our late fall hiking was very lackluster. I think she is much tougher now than the Pilot Ridge hike because she hasn't limped or shown paw wear since.
Bedivere wrote:
They're thin and light and will wear out fairly quickly, but at $3/each, so what? I buy 'em 8 at a time.
Thanks for the suggestion. Looks like the spendy Ruffwear booties may go back to REI.

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wolffie
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PostSun Jan 04, 2015 11:27 pm 
I've seen some dog packs that don't look very ergonomic -- wobbly, impede the dog in brush -- and rather heavy. Moot point for corgis, who can't carry significant weight anyway. My guy got hurt one bad day, and it might have been while struggling through thick brush (usually I find the path of least resistance, but that day I was sometimes scouting ahead to find the trail). I would not want my owners impeded by baggage. They make me carry everything anyway.

Some people have better things to do with their lives than walking the dog. Some don't.
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ranger rock
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PostMon Jan 05, 2015 1:14 am 
Patches thinks nothing of crashing through all kinds of brush and she jumps into almost every body of water that she sees, so I decided that it would not make much sense to put a pack on her. Anything her her pack would get soaked and she might rip her pack off in the brush. As it is she is always getting her doggie coat stuck on something.

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tmatlack
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PostMon Jan 05, 2015 3:58 am 
The title of this thread made me think this was gonna be some recruitment for an off leash, poodle posse to patrol Si and Mailbox! hockeygrin.gif

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wolffie
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PostMon Jan 05, 2015 10:51 am 
tmatlack wrote:
an off leash, poodle posse to patrol Si and Mailbox!
What a concept. We gotta do it. A horde of salivating, frothy-mouthed Chihuahua mixes, toy poodles and Bichons terrorizing hapless hikers, lead by a pair of meth corgis on bad acid:

Some people have better things to do with their lives than walking the dog. Some don't.
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