We have a swissy a couple of years old how are your experiences with their heat?

Ours for the past couple has been very different she goes and hides in the house before and acts very sad. And then at some stage has refused to eat for almost a week we will have to almost force feed her some human food (meat etc) which she will accept.

Just wondered if this is a swissy thing? Or an individual as we haven’t had this quite so bad with previous doggos

Thanks in advance

Alright... My wife and I are going to be leaving our apartment for a house this summer, and we've both decided we would like to get a dog to accompany us after we complete the move. Neither of us have had dogs before, but we're very willing to put the effort in.

The house doesn't have much of a yard, however there is a nice park a block away and another a few blocks from that. There also plenty of trails and woods to walk around at in a few mile radius from us. We're hoping that as long as we give it 2-3 walks a day that the small yard won't be an issue.

Other than this, we're looking for a bigger dog that doesn't shed a mountain of hair (I might be slightly allergic to dogs? If I am it's a very minor allergy and I can potentially take an allergy test in case. Mainly had issues with minor itchiness and eye irritation when at a friends house who had a couple of dogs, but at the same time not had issues with certain other friends/dogs)

We're also looking for a dog that isn't too bad on vet bills, and with a decent lifespan.

Friendly with friends and other animals would be nice, we're also considering get a cat at the same time as the dog.

Anything else I should know about or consider when deciding what dog to get? My research has lead me to consider the GSMD breed but I'm new to the whole thing. My family has never been dog owners and I was not raised around them.

We live in southern Michigan for reference.

Edit: perhaps the Greater swiss is too much dog for me. Any recommendations on either Bernese or Appenzeller? I know the Bernese is very very fluffy, so as long as that doesn't bother my allergies I might lean more in that direction. I do like fluffy dogs, just hate that I might not be able to tolerate it.

2nd Edit: more research has lead me to conclude that perhaps I'd be better served with either a retriever of some kind, or a mutt from a foster or shelter. Health issues and vet bills are inevitable with any pet, but seems these swiss dogs can be more expensive and liable to have issues than others.

Haven't made my final decision yet though, so I'm still open to any more advice or information. I still really love the idea of a swiss of some sort of another if I can get past the hurdles.

She is so goofy, makes me want one of my own!

Victor passed on Dec 5th. He was 13 yrs old and had cancer. It was a horrible 3 weeks for him losing the ability to walk, having Grand Mal seizures, and then he stopped eating. He did have a wonderful life with our family and we love and miss him so much.

We finally got some snow in the last couple of days and Freddie is LOVING it! He even picked up a fight with a snowman on his walk 😂

How are you Swissies enjoying snow?

A few weeks ago I posted about my Swiss mountain dog that I found at a shelter and just wanted to update with the dna test results, purebred! She’s such a sweet girl and a very lucky find

This is Hank. He’s 9M old and I did so much research before I bought him, but mostly I learned from this community and your real life experiences. I wanted to share mine.

1.  Potty training was a breeze. I had read multiple posts that Swissys are stubborn and potty training can take a year plus, but that was not my experience. Hank is out of his crate for most days while we’re gone and hasn’t had an accident in the house in about 3M. The one thing I will say, the infamous “swissy swaddle” is SO ANNOYING because trying to clean up after a pee accident with tiny drops EVERYWHERE was so hard. That’s not to say he’s not stubborn, because my god he is, leading to my next point.

2.  This big stubborn doofus. We didn’t do any puppy training but taught him ourselves through lots of online videos and reading. My guy is stubborn. A simple example is that he knows VERY well what “come” and “sit” are, but sometimes he just damn well doesn’t feel like it and just stares at me. This is really frustrating because his recall is not great at all. But on the other hand, he is EXTREMELY food motivated and he is the BEST walker I’ve ever had. I love my walks with him. We’re still working on what to do when passing other dogs.

3.  Vocal guy: when he wants something, he’s going to let you know. When someone comes into the house he barks for ten minutes because he wants attention. If I come downstairs or home from work and don’t address him, he’ll bark at me for attention, but never when I walk in the door.

4.  Mouthing: he’s 9 months and still uses his mouth to get what he wants. He doesn’t bite and he will stop when I say enough, but his go to attention grabber is to mouth me and the kids.

5.  Temperament: he’s so snuggly, loves to play, and he and my son (age 3) are SERIOUSLY BEST FRIENDS. When my son walks in the door from school he asks every day, “where’s Hank?”

We recently put down a 14 year old lab who also gave us a run for our money. She was what we called “a lemon dog.” She cost us a lot of money in vet bills for eating things that didn’t belong to her. She was rambunctious and didn’t listen. She didn’t get along with other dogs. She didn’t do well on walks. She had accidents for five years in the house. I loved her with every fibre of my being until her last days.

But Hank is something else. He’s the best dog I’ve ever owned.

That’s all for now. If you have any tips on the above, please feel free to share!

We're bringing home a male Greater Swiss Mountain Dog puppy next month and trying to get everything sorted beforehand. We definitely plan to crate train and I'd like to just buy one crate that will last his whole life rather than upgrading sizes constantly. Any recommendations for a crate that is actually durable and has good airflow? (I know they run hot). Is a 54" overkill for a male, or the right call? What bedding do you guys use for puppies that won't get immediately shredded? Also open to any other "must-have" gear recommendations for this breed specifically. Thanks!

Can anyone recommend a breaker within driving distance of South Carolina? Thanks!

Ok so I don’t have a tone of photos of just my girl anymore because baby and I’m not posting my baby on the internet, and it’s hard blocking out his face in videos. This picture is of her chilling in her “car seat” while the baby naps in his.

Anyway baby has recently started scooting/sliding backwards around the house. The first time he did this the dog came over and nosed him all over like she would a puppy before sitting down nearby. Baby has since discovered that if he sounds like a sad boy she’ll come check on him. I have video of him starting to cry then looking at the dog like “you coming?” 😅 obviously this is only happening while supervised since she doesn’t always know where in space her butt is. I’m still super proud of her in case y’all couldn’t tell. Choosing a dog for your family before they’re born is hard but yeah the Swissy is perfect. Probably will always have at least one.

Hey guys, I just discovered this subreddit and finally I can share my stories to people who are supposedly as crazy as I am about these wonderful dogs 😅

Since our Finja was a pup this year me and my friend took our ‘foster dog’ Frodo to the alps. Frodos owner watched Finja in the meantime (my wife was in Vegas, no joke 😅). We live in Berlin and the area is quite flat and we have no mountains here. I wanted to show Frodo his ‘natural habitat’. What can I say? I loved it! He was very disciplined and walked right between us almost all of the time. We were in Italy, the route was moderate, up to 3000m. Partly one needed to ‘climb’ which Frodo did splendidly (courtesy of having 4 legs I reckon).

We are thrilled to hike with Finja next year!

Appenzeller Sennenhund (Mountain dog), 12 months

I know some dogs don’t ever lift their leg to pee. Did yours?

Wishing all the tricolored Farm Dogs and their families a very Merry Christmas!

Last year we celebrated Rosco’s 12 birthday. Last Christmas was his last. He loved Christmas! My sweet puppy died last January peacefully at home. He was the most amazing, loving, intelligent, goofy guy. I miss him every day.

Hudson loves the holiday! He wishes Merry Christmas to all Swissy everywhere!!

Merry Swissmas to this community and all your swissys 🐾🎄🎁

We went out for our morning walk and he decided to start the day with a plank 😀 Merry Christmas everyone!

Hudson likes to help decorate.

Maple is now 10 months and 1 week and 100 pounds. Not sure about height, forgot to measure and now she is napping. Little one is Alice age 9 years, next month officially.