This page is for the "New Puppy Owner To Be". We would like to bring up a few things of importance, for you to consider for the well being of your puppy.
Please read, so you are aware of the responsibility of dog ownership. Many of you may already know these, but some of you may not.
Things To Do Before Your Puppy Comes Home:
Get Your House Ready - Boxers are family house dogs, so you need to decide where the pup is going to eat, sleep & play while you are not home (work, shopping & etc). Also while you are home.
Get The Yard Ready - Boxers have a lot of energy & like to run & play. Is the yard fenced? Is it easy for some one to steal your dog out of your yard? Can a dog dig under the fence or jump over? Are there things your dog can get into to chew, eat or get sick from? What about stray dogs or the neighbor's dogs? What about poisonous plants?
Who Is Your Vet - If you don't have a vet already, shop around. Call different vet clinics & ask some simple questions; like: are they a walk-in clinic, cost of office call, do they board & how much, what the cost of a health certificate is, what is the costs for a full set of shots including the rabies shot. If you ask these things for general information, you can compare. If you go to the closest vet, or the ones in your town/city, they may be very much alike because they work together. Check with some vets in nearby towns & compare. Talk to other people to see what they think or how they feel about other vets.
Health Issues - Some pups get stressed out and/or are afraid when they go to a new home. They can come down with a bad case of diarrhea; some won't eat, others shake & others just have a good time. Don't let that pup get dehydrated. Make sure the pup is drinking water. A pup can get dehydrated in as little as 6 hours.
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Dog Food - Do some research on dog foods. Look at labels. What about corn, animal by-products & soy? Are the old time dog foods really as good as they use to be? Check out what companies bought out who.
Anyone Could Have It - Does your dog need to be on special food because of a sensitive stomach? One dog out an entire litter or one in several generations may develop a problem like allergies, demodex (look at our "Demodex" page) or some other issue. This can happen with people too. Your sister, brother, aunt, uncle or cousin my have had a bad case of allergies, but no one in the family history ever had. Maybe your grandfather had a health problem as he got older, but your parents or you didn't have, but it then shows up, in maybe one of your kids or your sister's kids. Does that make your parents or grandparents bad? NO! Things like that can happen with dogs and cats too. Looking back to where you searched for your pup, does that make the breeder "Bad"? No, they would have no knowledge of it.
So Do Your Homework - Check things out. We have on our "Dog Links" page, several different topics and places for information, where you can find out things from training to agility to vet websites. We want to help you with your new puppy. That's why we added this page, for you and your puppy.
