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Post by rhosyn on May 11, 2012 9:30:26 GMT
I am the very proud new owner of a super blue brindle boy whippet, 14 months old. You can see his entire ribcage and quite a few of his vertebrae but none of the bones in his tail.
He's mostly to be a pet and go on the odd rabbiting jaunt with OH (I refuse to let OH take him ratting!) and gets loads of exercise haring round with our other dogs in the fields.
My little girl would like to show him - now, he's got to be a good 23" so is obviously not Crufts material (not that we're the slightest bit interested in that). We go to our local terrier and lurcher events and she;d just like to take him in these.
Soo we get to the point eventually! How much weight should he have on him from the point of view of his health and to give my littlie a fighting chance against the big boys lol. He is very well bred, from Mike Brown's 'Sooty Sam' lines.
Interested to hear others' point of view as regards healthy weight on their whippets!
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gbik
Newbie
Posts: 38
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Post by gbik on May 11, 2012 9:47:22 GMT
Ive got two whippets, my bit*h is 6 and my dog is 7. They are brilliant dogs! My dog is a retired show dog, he was shown with great success up until he was 18mths with his previous owner but his nerves did not stand up to it.  Ive shown both my bit*h and him at local fun stuff with succcess, more so with the bit*h as the dog's nerves are fried after his professional showing career and he now hates it poor lad. I personally only weigh them when I need to worm them. I tend to go by eye as with my horses. You will see a lot of variation within the breed, the proper working whippets are VERY thin whilst the pet ones are a lot more substantial. Your lad is just a baby, he will be a slip of a thing for a couple of years yet.  Sorry that is probably no use!! Pics of mine so you can see their weight.... bit*h-Talaria Dotterel aka Pimms  Dog-Hillsdown Xavier aka Casper  |
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Post by sarp on May 11, 2012 10:16:07 GMT
I have always kept greyhound & lurchers as rescues rather than from working or showing purposes, to see the entire rib cage when stationary is in my opinion too lean, generally they don't want to hold too much weight, a good coverage of the ribs when stationary is about right, when they are running you can usually see the outlines. The leaner types, like to see the last few ribs showing, but not protruding.
Some of the spinal processes can be quite prominent esp when growing but these will normally cover with muscle.. depending on the curvature of the spine you will sometimes always see bumps of a few of the vertebrae.
The pics of the dogs above are in lovely condition :-)
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Post by rhosyn on May 11, 2012 10:56:19 GMT
They are lovely gbik!
Yes, think I will stop worrying about him - as you say he's only young and still growing - he eats like a horse I don't know where he puts it all!
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Post by amumwithapony on May 15, 2012 10:52:39 GMT
My little whippet girl is 13 months rhosyn, so a similar age to your lad. Shes a dainty little thing, about 18 inches I would say and from show rather than working stock so a different build to some.
I've never weighed her, but is due her jabs soon so I will get the vet to have a weigh whilst I'm there.
She goes up and down a bit with her 'covering'. Some weeks you can see 4 ribs, some weeks non and seems to regulate her own weight. When she going through a lean stage she eats more, whereas last month she was quite well covered and ate less.
She arrived with us about 8 months ago quite lean. You could see every rib and her spine was also quite pronounced.
Have just tried to take her piccy for you and shes having non of it LOL, thinks its a lovely game called 'eat mummies phone'.
As long as he's eating well and been wormed I wouldn't worry too much. I feed her Wainwrights dried food in a morning and then she has more at tea time with a pouch of their stuff to make things more interesting and it seems to be keeping her in good shape, with a nice shiny coat.
However, she would much, much rather have people food, and gets scraps if she can. She'll eat pretty much anything if its off our plate, including veg and potatoes.
They are lovely dogs to have around the place though. Just naughty enough to be fun, and very loving and affectionate. Though we do have 'mad half hour' to cope with in an evening. Which involves lots of hysterical running around at 90mph, pinging off the sofas, barking and squeeling and squeeking and chewing OH's hands and feet to get him to play rough!
And they can climb and jump and are very, very good at stealing things! pmsl.
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Post by amumwithapony on May 15, 2012 15:12:16 GMT
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Post by rhosyn on May 16, 2012 8:07:35 GMT
Ooh AMWAP she's lovely - let me try and take some of my lad  Is she a blue brindle? Know what you mean about the mad few minutes in the evenings, I just take mine out for a roughouse with the other dogs then do some dummy work with him, he's an amazing retriever and I've managed to get him to bring things straight back to me now instead of haring in circles round me for 5 minutes with it in his mouth lol |
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Post by amumwithapony on May 16, 2012 9:04:11 GMT
Shes red brindle Rhosyn. And loves to do big laps with her ball or frisbee in her mouth. Til she gets fed up and then drops it as far away as possible. we need to work on retriving lol.
Put some piccys up of your boy, I love blues and thats what colour I originally wanted or fawn if I couldn't get a solid blue. But was very taken by her colouring when I saw her photo so went to look at her and fell in love. ;D
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Post by rhosyn on May 16, 2012 11:51:24 GMT
Hang on, I'll add them onto my FB, much easier |
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Post by darcy11 on May 29, 2012 16:38:57 GMT
this is my show whippet he done very well showing he even went to crufts but you can see the weight of him |
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dazycutter
Happy to help
The reason a dog has so many friends is that he wags his tail instead of his Tongue.
Posts: 7,933
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Post by dazycutter on May 29, 2012 19:03:13 GMT
all the above pics look fine... seeing every rib is too thin, you should be able to see the last 2 ribs when running.... get some breast of lamb and fatten the little pup up a bit
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dazycutter
Happy to help
The reason a dog has so many friends is that he wags his tail instead of his Tongue.
Posts: 7,933
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Post by dazycutter on May 29, 2012 19:04:31 GMT
ok, so now I have a question for all you greyhound and whippet folks... why the big collar!
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kayjayem
Happy to help....a lot
Posts: 10,046
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Post by kayjayem on May 29, 2012 22:06:35 GMT
They have the wide collar as they have a long neck and wide airways. It prevents tracheal injury and they can't slip the collars easily. It is also(allegedly) offers protection against any prey they are chasing.
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Post by amumwithapony on May 30, 2012 5:42:52 GMT
Cos if you put a normal collar on they can slip easier! and whippets are quite quick to try and catch and have a good prey drive so whoooosh and they are off! There heads tend to be not much thicker then their necks so very easy to escape.
And like KJ says because they have such slender necks its easy for them to damage their necks and airways in a narrower collar.
I keep a little thin band on her with her ID tag on in the house. Its something to catch a hold of if someone comes to the door as well.
According to what I've read you should be able to see their last 3 ribs when stood normally at rest. But the show whippets tend to be much beefier. Which is why I haven't shown Maggie as I can't see her being that fat unless I stuffed her full of food and didn't let her run and play.
Thought it would be a change showing whippets from the welshies lol, but apparantly fat is good! pmsl. So no change there then!
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Post by Sam on May 30, 2012 6:48:08 GMT
I think she looks fine, I got a few whippets and lurchers and she looks just great to me, i got one pup who is super hyper and she looks a bit thin but she is non stop, bit like Tigger on ecstacy.
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Is she a blue brindle?
