Owning a Bloodhound

 After writing about what it is like to own a staffie, I thought it would be great to expand this and focus on other breeds as well. SFL rounded up a few other bloggers to tell us about what it is like to own their dog.

 This will be a weekly feature, each week showing a different breed.

 ..............

Hi SFL readers, I’m Kate from a Peony for your Thoughts where I blog about being a newlywed, my puppy, and just life in general.   When Megan asked me to blog about my puppy I said of course, because talking about my adorable puppy is what I do best! 

“Why a Bloodhound?”  It’s probably the single most asked question we get about our pup.  We don’t really have a good answer, other than I love hound dogs (we had a beagle growing up) and how could we resist a face this cute?  

But people do stop to ask what kind of dog Henry is every time we go anywhere.  At first people thought he was a basset hound, we were tempted to tell people that he was but that he just kept getting taller and we didn’t know why! ;)   My other favorite thing to joke is that we’re combing the park for missing people because he’s got his nose to the ground most times when we walk.  

Besides being completely adorable, hounds can definitely be stubborn.   Henry can be really bull-headed once he gets set on something (jumping on the couch – which we don’t allow, trying to steal items off the counter, etc).  But for all his stubbornness he definitely looks to us for direction and wants to please us. 

 So I know we need to just keep at his obedience training, and be persistent.  With a dog who could potentially reach 140lbs we need him to be well-behaved.   Already, at 6 months and 70lbs, he can pull me around when we don’t have him in his Easy Walk harness.  

We’re having a tough time with his teething, he gets crazy at night – we call it his terror hour – and he nips relentlessly.  We’ve tried many different distraction techniques, with not much luck.  It’s just typical mischievous puppy behavior, but he’s a huge puppy so it can be daunting.    We’re also working on him not jumping on us and guests.   But for all his bad puppy habits, he has one of the sweetest personalities.  He is a totally love bug, and a real people “person”.    

Oh, and how could I forget the one characteristic that we didn’t really bank on: SLOBBER!   We have designated drool towels, and he has to be wiped after he drinks or strings of water/drool follow him wherever he goes.  If we’re on a walk I worry that people might think he’s rabid, since he’s foaming at the mouth!  He especially likes to wipe his face on the couch after drinking – it’s lovely.  We did research bloodhounds before we got him, and most things we found said the amount of slobber depended on genetics.  I guess Henry had some slobbery parents!  

We keep joking that a baby will seem easy after this!  At least a baby won’t be trying to eat the couch (we hope)!  But for all his quirks and bratty antics we love this puppy a whole lot. 

..........

Thanks for sharing Kate! Henry seems like such a lovebug!

Would you like to participate?

Drop me an email or comment here.