Kat's Perfect Puppies

Food that the breeder has weaned your puppy off on (please see coming blog about food and food quality)

Food/Water bowls

Collar and Tag with your phone number on it. Even if you don’t have a name picked out for the puppy yet-most pet stores will allow you to purchase the tag and put some information on one side, and then come back and engrave the other side at no extra charge.

24" wire/metal crate and fitted pet bed.  I can not stress the ease and happiness you will feel if you crate train your puppy. Not only will this help teach the puppy with house breaking, it will also provide a safe enviroment for your puppy to be in while you are away, so that it can not chew on furnature or wires. If you don’t allow your dog to sleep with you in your bed/room, it gives a safe place to sleep. I also usually feed in these crates as well since I have multiple dogs. It makes everything easy and stress free.

Travel Crate for travelling to the vet, friends house, new places, vacations, etc. Although we all do it from time to time, allowing a dog, especially an untrained puppy, to free roam the car while you drive is not a good nor safe idea. They cost little (especially for small dogs) and come in handy in emergency situations. I can’t tell you how much I underestimated the importance of these with the icestorm of 2006!

TOYS! Chew toys, plush toys, small tennis balls, old socks for tug of war, puppies like to play! And this should be enriched and encouraged.

Grooming Supplies. While you should take your Shih Tzu in for grooming every 4-6 months for a professional groom and anal flushing, you should also have a variety of grooming supplies at home since Shih Tzu’s require a lot of grooming. When you get your puppy, it will have a ton of fluffy fur. Once your puppy gets to be a year or so old, it’s fluffy fur will turn into silkie, finer hair, which will tangle easier than the fluffy fur. It is important to accustom your puppy to grooming before it gets to be an adult so that grooming is not a negative, foreign situation. If you are not fond of grooming on a daily, bi daily basis, consider keeping your dog in a "puppy cut", where they trim up the legs and body but keep the face and tail longer.

   Supplies you should have on hand are: Detangler comb--usually has four or five blades and go through the fur and cut through the mats. Wire Comb, two sided fine wire/corse hair comb to fluff out fur, grooming shears to trim the feet and anal area, nail trimmers. Cotton balls and Peroxide for cleaning the ears. Whitening or basic shampoo for bathing in case of emergency or if you wish to bathe at home. Creame Rinse.

Flea Repellant (high quality). Shih Tzu’s have sensitive skin, and I do not recommend grocery store flea repellants such as HARTZ, which tends to cause skin infections and a few years ago, even killed some dogs and cats before they recalled and reformulated it. Flea collars do very little but protect the head region. Flea shampoos often dry out the skin.

  For my adults,  I use Frontline Spray, which is less costly than frontline drops. I can also treat more dogs and my cats with it than I get out of the drops. It is water proof and is quite effective. Advantage/Advantix is really harsh on the skin and I tend to avoid it if possible. DAWN handwashing soap works really well to kill fleas if you have an infestation and is gentle on the skin, as opposed to a flea shampoo. Also, Zema and/or Adams makes good Prytherin dips for protection, although the smell is less than desireable. You can view these and purchase these products through www.petedge.com, or call your local pet stores and/or vets.

Most vets carry Revolution, which kills all fleas and worms as well as heart worms,  or Sentenal, which does the same as revolution but comes in a pill and is virtually nonabrasive to the skin, but both you can only get through a vet since they contain a heart guard.

Puppy Pads- Most my puppies are already using these pads before they are placed in a home at 8 weeks old. Puppies are generally easy to train to use these pads, and makes house breaking/training that much easier. Petsores, even Wal-art, carries these.

Vaccination records--a good breeder should give your puppy shots at 6 weeks. Your puppy will then need these shots every 2-3 weeks hence forth until he is 16 weeks old, and then again at 6 months for rabis. Which brings us to our next must have...

A GOOD VET!--if you dont’ currently have a vet, ask your friends and family that have puts who they recommend, or don’t recommend. If you don’t know anyone who is using a vet, call around to your local pet stores. Stores that have pets should have a vet on call they use in case of emergencies. Managers and employees who have worked at a single location for a while, generally have the ’inside’ scoop as to which vet is good and which one is considered incompetent. Just because the store uses a vet, doesn’t mean they like him/her! Older vets tend to not keep up with the changing and conflicting information that is constantly coming up. Newer vets sometimes aren’t as good with client relations and leave the human feeling left out, confused, or neglected. Some vets are always booked and need atleast a ten day notice before getting you in, and aren’t very good in emergency situations.  Vets that charge more, don’t necessarily mean you are paying for better service.

   When you consider what you are investing in your puppy, then please set up an appointment for your new puppy as soon as you get it. Never take a breeders word or your own eyes as the final say. There are many things a vet can tell that most people can’t--problems with eyes, discoloration in mouth, if the pup is deaf, hernias, fecal samples for worms/parasites, etc. A vet visit with a fecal exam (atleast here in Missouri area), should cost under $35. It does wonders for peace of mind. Even if you plan on administering most your shots yourself, getting the vet familiar with your dog and on record in case of emergency is very important.  Even though I believe I hold myself to a higher standard than most breeders, I still tell my customers NOT to take my word for it and to PLEASE set up a vet appointment!