revtothelimit - motorbike forum

The wife working from home full time and me moving towards retirement has made having a dog is viable so we've taken the plunge.

On saturday this little bundle comes home, he's a tad sheepish in the photo as he was very tired when we visited but they say the dog chooses you and he wandered over to us with the others, however when they got bored and went off to sleep he stayed, choice made.

20241123_153109 by crust, on Flickr

Lots has been spent on stuff - cage, blankets, bowls etc etc, signed on with vet for jabs more etc

The next thing is insurance, so who's recommendec and who's to be avoided? Over to you RTTL doggie crew

You missed the most important bit. What's he called?

Dogs/Cats with normal human names are the best

Cute. Looks like a Terry. Or a Raymond.

We (I say we, the wife ) have gone with Ludo.

I'm not bothered, as I said to Weeksy as long as I can shout it in a park without getting arrested or battered I'm ok with it.

Ludo!

Kennel Club name: Eric
At home: Aloysius Bonegrinder Geronimo III

I imagine, once he realises he has such a marv billet he'll look at lot more chipper.

Your life is fucked.

We use Napo for our French Bulldog. High risk breed o over is £58.05 a month with a £8k single claim limit.

Affiliate link https://www.napo.pet/join/ILFPuzhO

cool and very cute.

it's good to see a cage on your list because they make life soo much easier for all of you in the short and long term (If he ever gets injured and needs cage rest he's already happy with the cage)

Insurance is something that we haven't had since about 1998. £50 a month into a savings account, aiming to get the total up to £1500 will cover most bills. We have 4 dogs and have had to pay out for a couple of very expensive operations over the years and this has always covered the bills.
IMO Expensive Monthly flea and worming treatment is a load of unnecessary bollocks.

Taff wrote: Thu Dec 05, 2024 7:05 pm cool and very cute.

it's good to see a cage on your list because they make life soo much easier for all of you in the short and long term (If he ever gets injured and needs cage rest he's already happy with the cage)

Insurance is something that we haven't had since about 1998. £50 a month into a savings account, aiming to get the total up to £1500 will cover most bills. We have 4 dogs and have had to pay out for a couple of very expensive operations over the years and this has always covered the bills.
IMO Expensive Monthly flea and worming treatment is a load of unnecessary bollocks.

We put £40 a week away into an account to cover any vet bills - we usually get a good amount saved up then get a decent sized bill, we currently have 9 dogs, so the odds are stacked against us!

You’ve made a wise choice with a Labrador, best family dog out there imo.

In the spirit talking about your own bike/car/ dogs.










That’s Stanley and Peggy. Ludo looks adorable. Labs, in my opinion, make exceptional dogs.


Insurance: been with Animal Friends for years. Comes with ‘free’ virtual consultations which we’ve used a few times. Stanley is nearly 9 and his insurance is about £100 a month. Pegs is 4 and it’s half that. I like the idea of sacking off insurance and saving.

Did the cage with Stanley, didn’t with Peggy. I’m warm to both arguments but I’m not the best role model. Our dogs are on the sofas and beds etc. they are the very best with family stuff.

Neither bark with the exception of being let back in.

Worm and flea stuff : waste of money.

Food: we went with what the vets and local farmer recommended: Jr Johns Silver. It’s very cheap- about £12 for 15kg but they both thrive; great coats, energy etc. they get the occasional raw meat treat.


Dunno what else really. Oh- they may or may not eat everything in sight. One of ours does, the other doesn’t.

Re insurance: avoid anything with E & L in the title ( eg Equine & Livestock, Entertainment & Leisure etc.). And beware - insurance doesn’t cover routine stuff like worms/fleas , vaccines, neutering - you’ll still have to pay for them. Beware the size of the excess for each treatment, which is often around the size of the bill so it’s not worth claiming, and exclusions. The definition of a “ recurrent problem” is often wide, eg dog has an episode of mild diarrhoea (in its vet history) can >> all digestive problems excluded.

I’ve seen all these scenarios - they can wriggle. The main purpose of pet insurance is to cover you against the large unexpected bill eg fractures, abdominal/other surgery, which can easily run in to thousands - not minor day to day issues.

PS : sorry! Enjoy your lab - they make great pets!!

At least I can chase him down the trails

He looks lush

We're with PetPlan insurance for a couple of reasons:
lots of vets work with them so will bill them direct to save you having to pony up and then claim back;
if you stick with them they provide 'life-long cover' aka you don't run into the 'pre-existing conditions' issue

Grumble is now 10 and it's gone up to something eye-watering like £140 a month, so we'll probably sack it off at the next renewal and go with the savings account approach tbh.

Food-wise we were told that stuff like Purina is the equivalent of MacDonalds, so he gets Royal Canin dry food, and did get James Wellbeloved wet sachets but they recently made them smaller (shrinkflation fail - I won't be paying the same to starve my dog ), so now he gets Royal Canin wet food too.

We give him wet food because we mix in:

• YuMove for joints

• ProKolin to help anal glands (poor sod used to have one squeezed every three months as it blocks, we're now down to once a year)

• Seaweed supplement for his teeth (not entirely convinced it does anything, but...)

We give him worming treatment too cos he's a hunter and will catch, kill, and eat, given the opportunity

Oh, and we recently bought an ultrasonic toothbrush to try and help his plaque/tartar build-up. Also expensive, but hopefully worth it - we'll see.

My lab is nearly 5 years old, he’s currently insured with Petsure.

He’s crate trained and his crate is his safe space which is good as he’s a big softie and gets spooked by loud noises which is wholly down to not getting him properly desensitised when he was a pup (lockdown puppy) so there’s a big hint there.

He does well while in a pack but dog walker packed in last year and I’ve not replaced her but that is planned for the near future. It should help with desensitising him against noise again.

Foodwise, he’s on Chappie original, canned and biscuits and not a lot else as a fair few foods go straight through him. I can always tell when he’s had alternative foods, as it upsets his demeanour as well as his guts. It was recommended by the vet and he’s thriving on it, I tried all sorts of foods and combinations including raw but this solved gut issues overnight.

(Just reread Sunny’s post, prokolin is on subscription with Amazon, helps massively when his guts go rogue )

Gratuitous photo of the ginger goon

We've used More Than who are so so for claims, they do have to chased for payouts. Mainly have it for dickhead young dog doing something stupid and hurting themselves bills. Only had one claim bounced and that was me not reading small print.

Wouldn't use Pet Plan again as after Drax had a lump lanced and analysed (it turned out to be a large "teenager" spot) they decided they would exclude treatments for any lumps or tumours after that!

It gets very expensive as the dog gets older so as they age we stop insuring them and have a premium bonds fund with a minimum of 10K in for emergency bills rather than the large amounts of cash disappearing into an insurer's profits.

Food wise ours are "raw diet" fed, it takes a bit more effort but allergies are lessened, coats are better and poo's much more consistent. Ours are also on yumove or an equivalent.

Bryn is 7 months old



He's insured with the Post Office for £20/month. We've never had to claim so can't offer any comments regarding their service.

He's also crate trained and is quite happy in there. He's very chilled and it only took a couple of nights before he was ignoring fireworks, and he gets on well with other dogs, he loves to play. As I'm now semi retired I am the dog walker, morning and evening, about an hour and a half a day. It's usually a longer walk in the morning because of the dark evenings.

We feed him Beta puppy food and worming tablet once a month. We used Beta with both our previous labs and had no problems. I wish I could stop the bugger trying to chew stones though

gremlin wrote: Thu Dec 05, 2024 6:31 pm Your life is fucked.

Well, our house is.

The little sod has had a great afternoon doing zoomies, trying to eat anything and everything within jaw reach. As soon as he's told not to eat something it becomes a massive puppy magnet, be it power cables or the mat under my exercise bike.

20241207_170406 by crust, on Flickr

A huge thanks to all who've responded, really greatful for all the info.

The mayhem has only just started....

Dog looks awesome!