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Believe me after what happened to our last little chap Farrah will never be:
- Trusted to a dog walker
- Walked off a lead
We got her from Battersea and they've given us a few bits of info around raised feeding platforms and not training them to sit etc. Also to not walk her without a muzzle. I'd be interested to hear any other info.
- Trusted to a dog walker
Colm89-
Cool, did they give you signs to watch for bloat?
Caleb our boy hound basically inhales food, so we had to put a massive stone in his bowl to force him to eat around it and slow him down a little. Also try to avoid feeding before excersize (or straight after) and feed two smaller meals rather than one a day.
We kept the muzzle on ours for walks for about 6 weeks, until we were comfortable that they were ok.
Top tip for leads - NEVER use an extender lead - if they take off after something they will be doing 40mph and then come to the end of the lead - either dislocating your shoulder or breaking their neck.
Lots of good hound specifc advice here:
http://www.foreverhoundstrust.org/advice-support/fact-sheets/
danb
Ex racers will not normally know what to do when they catch something. When they were younger our hounds would chase squirrels etc but would just look at them when they caught them with a wtf, that never happens expression.
Greyhounds and lurchers that have been trained to course (ie hunt) are obviously a different matter.
I would certainly adivise keeping a greyhound on a lead until you are very sure of what they will do (and that they will come back....) We didn't let ours off until we had them over a year, and still only let them off in enclosed fields.
@Colm89 did you get her from a sighthound rescue? If not there may be a few things that are specific to greyhounds you should be aware of.