How big is this dog going to be?

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How big do you think he's going to be? He's four months and 35 pounds. He was the runt, but he has apparently caught up with his sister Cab, who reportedly weighs 32 pounds.

How much do dogs grow after four months? The vet guesses he'll be 50 pounds, but we don't put much stock in that -- when he was six weeks old and weighed 6.7 pounds, the vet thought he was 14 weeks and was some kind of small terrier. Our vet is a dummy.

50 pounds sound pretty good to us, though. Medium sized dogs are good.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999

Answers

I would tend to think that when you have cats and a dog living together, it's not so bad to have the cat in charge= maybe Rudy figures Doc is his and is simply trying to be a good dog parent and point out the proper behavior.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999

I have a black lab mix and that looks very similar to Doc. He is 19 months old and weighs 72 pounds. I'm not saying Doc will get this big but it could happen. It's not so terrible because Tonka is tall and slender with lanky legs and a good meaty middle. And whats more is he's the perfect hiking dog and walking dog and winter snuggler!

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999

You can tell by the paws. The bigger the paws, the bigger the dog. At least, that's what I've heard.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999

He's got long legs but his paws don't look enormous. Fifty pounds, maybe sixty.

And Rudy will probably get close enough to him one day to rake his nose open. It's happened with almost every dog I've known that crosses a surly cat.

We don't have a dog, here at the Treehouse. Two cats are enough for us, and we'd argue for weeks about what to get -- K. tends to little, goofy dogs with pushed in faces or elaborate hair, and I like terriers.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999


No, his paws aren't particularly enormous. The only thing that makes me think he's going to be well over 50 pounds is I just can't believe that he's not going to gain more than 15 pounds in the next eight months or so.

As for having his nose raked open, Sally does that on a regular basis. She kind of likes him, actually, and will play with him, but sometimes she just goes nutty and attacks him. She's teaching him that cats and women are unpredictable, so he should be prepared for anything.

Rudy's nails are being trimmed once a week because he's much bigger and meaner than Sally, and he could really hurt Doc.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999



Ohh, he's so cute. I love that white tummy.

I agree with the others, it's all in the size of the paws. His don't look particularly enormous, so I'd guess at between 50 and 60 pounds.

My vet tells me they grow in length, width, and height till they're about a year old and then for the next year they fill out in the middle.

I saw that to be true with Brandy. We found her at about 6 months old, malnourished and with visable ribs. She was about 26 pounds. She grew to be about 40 by her first birthday, and in the next year grew to about 50 pounds by filling out. Fifty pounds is a nice sized dog -- she's big enough to play and wrestle, but small enough that I can let her lay with me on the couch.

Now Ginger, she's a monster puppy. She's just about 5 months and already 43 pounds. I originally thought she'd be 60-65 pounds, but now I'm starting to think she might be as big as Mack, who is about 75 pounds.

That means I'll have nearly 200 pounds worth of dog living under my roof. Yowza.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999


Dearest Beth or is it Lizzie...my answer is not about how big your dog will be but about something else that has been on my mind for several days (I even wrote about it in MY journal). Anyhow, the other day you said that the day that your cat died was the worst day of your life...I thought how young you are...and how very fortunate you have been up to this point. Now don't get me wrong, I have been devestated by the loss of pets before. But never was that ever the worst time. I don't even try and classify the worst. It was more than sad when I lost each of my grandparents, and awful when we lost my father-in-law at age 51 then my husband's uncle 6 weeks later (think of his poor aunt her husband and brother in 6 weeks--at Christmas at that. Losing my oldest and dearest friend a few years ago was tough (she was 42 and died of leukemia--3 kids two in college one was a high school senior). And I still mourn the death of my 22 year marriage to divorce. Oh, did I mention how another dear, dear friend lost her son to suicide? He was 17 years old. No, I don't live in an underprivledged area. Nor is my life out of the ordinary. Typical middle class america. We all have our tragedies. God Bless and best wishes. I enjoy reading you. Jan

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999

Jan: I think you will find that life is a lot better if you don't play the "let's compare tragedies" game. Of course things have happened in my life that to an outside observer would sound a lot worse than a cat dying. I was just telling the story of the particular thing that affected me the most. If that makes me a dreadful and superficial person because I was more wrenched and devastated by the loss of my cat than I have been by other events in my life and the lives of my family members, then I am a dreadful and superficial person. But that's not something I can help.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999

Right on.

Okay, that didn't contribute much. I just felt the need to endorse what Beth just said.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999


...jan, i'm sorry to hear about your losses, but to try to qualify someone elses experiences seems inconsiderate...pain is pain, and no one but the individual can define that for themselves...it would seem more considerate to either express your empathy or simply not say anything...

...but, to get back to the very adorable puppy, i agree in the "paws" or the general gangly limbs theory: part of the body grows to it's 'final' size and then the rest of the body catches up...and watching the "catch-up" process is always fun....*run*run*trip*THUMP*BOOM*CRASH*run*run*run...*pause*...*sniff*

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999



I would like to endorse Vic's endorsement of what Beth said.

And I do think Doc'll get to be more than 50 pounds, unless you stop trading him in for larger models every time I see him.

When we got Bridget, Sheila would flip out and start barking and growling at her whenever Jeremy (or anybody else, actually) started to play with her. After a few months or so, I think she got used to Bridget being around, and decided either she wasn't actually going to hurt us, or that she didn't care one way or the other. We like to assume it was the first one. Anyway, Rudy might mellow out a little once he realizes that is how Doc plays. Or maybe not, he's an odd kitty.

-- Anonymous, August 19, 1999


I've got some *Bad* news. Our dog was roughly that size at 4 months. He might have been closer to 40 lbs. He now weighs 110 lbs at 1 year and 8 months. We thought we got a "Small dog". Then we hoped for a "medium dog". When he hit 80 lbs we had to look for a house. The one bedroom apartment wasn't cutting it. Hopefully,your puppy won't get as big. Our dog was also the runt. He's now the largest of the litter. How does that math work out? Buster doubled in size every month it seems like, until he hit 8 months, then it seemed to be about 10 lbs. a month for a bit. Granted, he *IS* a rottweiler, german shepherd, pit bull mix. That could be a little of the reasoning behind his size. The other dogs from his litter maxed out at 80 lbs. Go figure! There's not an ounce of fat on this dog, and supposedly they can grow up to age 2. (Although after age 1 weight is supposed to gradually slow down, and they should start to broaden in the chest area.) If you get a dog "fixed", supposedly it cuts down on growth. We had Buster done at 4 months. I'd sure hate to see how big he was *GOING* to get.

One last note, generally dogs "Grow into their paws." Your dog looks like he's got a lot of growing to do to fit into those things! If you want to know what 110 lbs of dog looks like, email me, and I can't send/point you to a pic!

Best if luck!

-- Anonymous, August 20, 1999


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