The Dog House
After the money and effort that went into my wife and I finally building our own house, I do wonder whether we are becoming senile – because we appear to have allowed our lovely home to be taken over and gradually demolished by a pair of furry demolition experts - our two Bullmastiff dogs. Don’t get me wrong here, the dogs don’t intentionally set out to destroy all of our fixtures and fittings – at least not since they grew out of their puppy chewing stage – it is just that they have this ability to destroy things without even trying. As an owner, I must accept that this is a common trait for large dogs, especially Bullmastiffs, and it is just one of the thingsBullmastiff owners learn to accept when their house becomes a home to Bullmastiffs. Bullmastiff Traits
From more than five years of living with Bullmastiffs, watching 10 puppies grow and constantly dealing with their little idiosyncrasies, I feel any owner would agree that every Bullmastiff has its own specific character. However, certain traits can be seen in the breed, probably the most notable being their wish to be the boss. As such a strong willed breed, Bullmastiffs need good, early training, and part of this must be their acceptance of you as the boss.
Happily for such large dogs, Bullmastiffs are not aggressive dogs, in fact quite the opposite (at least the 12 I have had close contact with over the years). They are very friendly, family dogs that love following their owners around and seriously love attention and playing with children. The only worry I have had with my grandchildren and the dogs is that the sheer bulk of a Bullmastiff moving around can knock over small (and not so small Children). And of course, I do sometimes worry that my granddaughters are now getting a bit too big to keep riding the dogs like Shetland ponies – no matter how much the dogs seem to enjoy it.
With their short hair, luckily Bullmastiffs need little grooming, and they are surprisingly quiet dogs – at least when properly trained. Some dogs do tend to drool rather heavily, (reminiscent of the dog Hooch in the movie Turner and Hooch), but other than that they are relatively clean to have around the house.
One thing about Bullmastiffs is that they can, however inadvertently, cause damage around the house. We had lovely wood floors when we moved in, but they now have the patina and look of an overused ice skating rink full of scratches. Our lovely, three-color hardwood doors also now have many deep grooves from the dog’s oft repeated ‘I want in ‘ and I want out’ scratch demands that seemingly no amount of training can prevent.
Living in the Tropics, we did have fitted fly screens on every door and window, but not now. After the third replacement in a year, when one dog ran straight through our patio window fly door chasing after a cat that had been arrogant enough to wander into our garden, we gave up. We simply could not afford to keep replacing such ‘fragile’ items, at least fragile when it comes to dogs with 60 and 70kg of weight behind them.
So, as I sit here typing this, pushed back from my desk because one of my dogs is tucked under it snoring annoyingly loudly, I have to wonder, why do we put up with all this? Then I think back to the problems we had when Trixi (our old bitch) had puppies, how we felt when we lost two of them, and how we felt when Trixi was very ill after finding and bring us a cane toad. I also think about, annoying as it is, how I really enjoy the big ugly head that suddenly rests on the edge of the bed each morning telling me its time to get up – and how I miss that wake up call when I’m away working.
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It must be that my wife and I are soft, or maybe it is because now our human kids have grown and have families of our own, the ‘show house’ we built couldn’t really be a home unless we were prepared to share it and put up with family making a mess now and then. So, I guess that troublesome as they are, our dogs are really part of our family. And what parents can’t forgive the odd little problem caused by ‘the kids’.Copyright © 2012. Able Ads Publishing and Media