A bit about my little furry friends. Those little guys had a hard life before coming to me, they are true rescues from a bad situation and while obviously not litter mates and Buddy is about 3 years older than Sandy they are incredibly bonded because they are all they had -- but they really wanted human attention. A lot of dogs give up on humans when they are banished to the back yard and garage and have no interaction, but I could tell these guys had not given up. My good dog Charlie was a great dog and died very quickly and unexpectedly from bladder stones (on Monday he stopped eating, on Tuesday he went to the vet, and on Friday he died), I got these guys just about 2 weeks after Charlie died which was a little fast, but you never forget the good dogs and these dogs needed me as much or more as I needed to have a dog in my life and they just touched my heart. While Charlie was a great dog, as was Rio before him, these are just "average dogs with issues" but they love me and I love them.
We've had them about four years now I think... You can notice the bits of bald spots on Buddy's ear, poor little guy is an itchy dog and neither of them ever had any vet care. Poor little guy couldn't go so far as down the hallway without stopping to scratch. He also has what I call "baboon butt" with no fur on the back of his legs, and zero fur at all on his tummy or little doggy armpits. We changed his diet (several times, he is doing well on Costco Salmon/Sweet Potato), we gave him extra fats, tried all sorts of things. He now takes Apoquel an anti-itch medication on a daily basis. You can also see his nails are extra long, when we got him they were almost a 3/4 circle and the quick was way up into the nail, so we've been nibbling away at them for quite awhile now. Almost to normal
His fur has grown in as much as it is going to, he does now have light fur on his tummy and armpits which makes him less sticky in the summer.
Sandy is very sweet and very dumb. Poor little thing is the dumbest dog I've ever had and I've had an Irish Setter! But she is kind and gentle and wants to please so she is actually trainable if I can get across what I want her to do, she does it. She could have been a fantastic dog with the right owners instead of the people she got... They never even bothered to potty train her which was a real issue because she is very submissive and will go potty to show what a good dog she is... She has a form of separation anxiety and while she doesn't tear up the house, she goes crazy when we come home again -- including peeing. I can certainly understand where you don't want to come home to a jumping and screaming dog that just as it settles down makes eye contact with you and then goes potty. When we got her she would jump up on us, that just took about a week but it took a long hard year of potty training with every day clean up which I've never had to do with an adult dog before. She had obviously been hit and would scream and cower if we even picked up the TV remote. Poor thing didn't even know that face petting was a thing or that it was nice -- but now she knows! We got a kennel that they go into after eating and then it's basically "potty on command". They also stay in the kennel when we are gone because Buddy is naughty and would get in the trash and such. They love the kennel (they get treats each time for going in) and watch to see if we put on our shoes because that means they need to go into the kennel, they will open the door themselves and then wait for their 3 each little cat treats.
I've typically had larger dogs but I am really enjoying this knee-high/25 pound dog size.