Green Dogs Archives - Puppy In Training

Have You Used Green Dog Poop Bags?

Apr 4, 2012 By Colby 4 Comments

Sorry if you don’t like talking dog poop then this article may not be for you…for the adventurous readers only!

I’m not talking about literally green dog poop bags, but dog poop bags that are eco-friendly and not as much of a burden on the environment. A while back I purchased some biodegradable dog poop bags from Amazon.com and found that they were not all that different the bags I get from my local PetSmart.

The one thing I did notice is that they feel much thinner (they are thinner) then the blue bags I was used to at PetSmart. In fact, if you weren’t careful you could penetrate the bag with your finger. Actually penetrating the bag was never a problem until I one day I thought now that I have these biodegradable poop bags how can I be even more green and eco-friendly. After all we want to be the top green dogs in the neighborhood (shouldn’t be to hard considering I see dog poop in front of my place about every other day).

In my attempt to be the ultra-green dog parent in the neighborhood I found out that the biodegradable bag while eco-friendly was not ultra durable.

Green Dog Poop Bags

As I mentioned you really won’t have a problem with penetrating the bag if you are a normal dog poop bag user. However, if you want to go ultra green like me then you may have some issues (yep, I said it…I have some issues). Here was my ultra green dog smart idea:

I’ve always picked up my dogs poop, but picking up after your dog is definitely step 1 to becoming a green dog
Purchase Biodegradable Dog Poop Bags was my second step to making my dogs be more green.
Get all my dogs poop into 1 biodegradable dog poop bag.

Step 3 is where I ran into trouble. Now you might think that 3 poops 1 bag shouldn’t be a problem if you have Chihuahuas, Maltese, or a Bichon Frise. However, that’s not the case with me. I have 3 large dogs:

Linus – He’s a 60 lb Australian Shepherd mix
Stetson – He’s a 70 lb Labrador Retriever
Apache – He’s an 85 lb Golden Retriever

Green Dogs! - Stetson, Apache, and Linus — Green Dogs! – Stetson, Apache, and Linus

And I thought it would be a good idea to take my boys out on a walk and fit all 3 dog poops into 1 bag. You’d be surprised, but my plan worked. It was a little more difficult to get all the poops in 1 bag, but with a little bit of planning, some dexterity, and of course a lot of courage I did it. 3 poops 1 little biodegradable bag!

Everything was going well until one day I was careless and while trying to pick up poop #3 I had some issues…can you say poop on the hands. Another few days passed and I had another miscue. Finally a day or two after that while trying to work poop #2 into the bag…BAM…my finger penetrated through the bag exterior and disaster struck. Poop on the hands, poop on the ground, it wasn’t a pretty sight.

Am I Still Trying To Be Ultra-Green?

From time to time I will try to fit 2 poops in a bag, but I no longer try to squeeze 3 giant dog poops into 1 dog poop bag. While it’s not usually a problem things can often times go terribly wrong and I’m not a real big fan of walking around my neighborhood with dog poop on my hands.

If your looking for hints on how to raise a green dog then check out Johann’s green dog blog for some green news, tips, and product reviews.

How about you? Is your dog a green dog? Tell us about it in the comment section below.

Green Puppy? Is Your Puppy Eco-Friendly?

Apr 22, 2011 By Colby 5 Comments

When it comes to raising and training our puppy we make sure we do our best to raise a green puppy. Not literally “green” of course. We do what we can to be eco-friendly and reduce our carbon paw print.

As many of you know today is earth day so we decided it was a good idea to take a look at the things we are doing with our puppy to keep the environment healthy.

Green Puppy?

So here’s what we did: We took a look at the things we currently do that embody raising a green puppy. Then we thought about three things we could do in the future to help minimize our impact on the environment.

The puppies in the image above were up for adoption at the OC Pet Expo. The two in front looked a lot like purebred Labrador Retrievers. The one in the back looked a lot like a purebred Husky. The Humane Society estimates 25 percent of dogs in the shelter are purebred.

Without further adieu…here’s today’s Earth Day list:

Things we do to raise a green puppy:

Puppy Adoption – We encourage everyone to visit your local animal shelter or rescue. Adopting a homeless puppy/dog does not add to the current population while purchasing from a pet store or breeder encourages more breeding. We adopted Linus, an Australian Shepherd Mix from the Carson Animal Shelter. Take a look at Linus’ Puppy Adoption Story.
Use That Dog As A Heater – In the winter Linus my Aussie Mix and Stetson my black lab make great heaters. We rarely turn the heat on in the winter I just cuddle up next to the two dogs and they keep me warm during those cold winter nights.
Buy Dog Food In Bulk – This is a no brainer for us. We have three dogs and always buy the largest bags we can find. It saves on our own gas and packaging waste. If you have a smaller dog you can still buy in bulk. Just make sure you get a nice Airtight Pet Food Container to keep your dog food from spoiling.
Pickup the Poop – One of my biggest pet peeves is when people do not pickup after their dogs. Dog poop can pollute water and spread disease. Obviously this is bad for the environment, but on top of that I seem to always find the unscooped poop with the bottom of my shoe…grrrrrrr
Spay And Neuter Your Dog – to help prevent overpopulation make it a point to spay or neuter your dog. This will help keep unwanted puppy litters out of the shelter. As an added bonus you may receive a significant discount when registering your dog if he is already spayed or neutered.
Reuse Your Dog Toys – We admit that we love to buy those furry new plush toys. However, we do our best to keep them in use by stitching up the seems over and over again an do our best to keep each toy in use until the very end.

Things we can do to make our pup a more eco-friendly and green puppy:

Use Biodegradable Dog Waste Bags – We’ve long talked about using biodegradable poop bags, but haven’t yet tried them. We have three dogs and the poop bags can really add up. We need to do better and start using earth friendly biodegradable dog poop bags. There are many options on Amazon.com for biodegradable poop bags. We’re going to give these Gotta Go Green Biodegradable & Flushable Earth Friendly Dog – Pet Waste – Poop Bags – 50 Bags (aff link) a shot and we’ll make sure to let you know how it goes.
Make Your Own Pet Toys – We have tons of old toys and we do our best to stitch them back together and keep them in use as long as possible. However, we’ve also long thought about taking some of our old clothes and turning them into doggy toys for the boys. We’ll add it to our list of things to help our puppies go green!
Purchase Eco-Friendly Supplies – We’re not great label lookers, but moving forward we plan on looking for eco-friendly supplies to clean up puppy messes, organic shampoos, and keep our eyes open for green alternatives whenever purchasing new puppy products.

There you have it! Six things we currently do to raise a green puppy and three things we plan on doing in the future to become better green puppy raisers.

What about you? Are you raising a green puppy? What eco-friendly things do you do to reduce your puppies impact on the environment? Let us know in the comments section below.

Are You Ready For Earth Hour?

Mar 27, 2010 By Colby 4 Comments

Earlier this week we celebrated National Puppy Day in hopes of bringing awareness about the thousands of puppies in shelters needing a home.

Today we were checking out the Raise A Green Dog blog and found their article We Are Ready For Earth Hour. So what is Earth Hour? Its’ a time (1 hour to be exact) when homes and businesses come together to make their stand against climate change by doing something simple like turning their lights off for one hour.

Are You A Green Dog?

Linus, Stetson, and I have been focusing our effort on becoming green dogs (and people). So at 8:30pm tonight (March 27th, 2010) we’re going to make sure we turn off all the lights in the house for an hour.

Unfortunately, we didn’t have much time to prepare for this years Earth Hour. However, Gracie over at Raise A Green Dog learned a cool new trick to kick off Earth Hour.

Take a look at the second video in the post We Are Ready For Earth Hour…and actually I embedded the video in this page for everyone to see:

Yep, that’s Gracie from Raise A Green Dog learning how to turn off the lights to kick off Earth Hour. Pretty cool trick Gracie!

How about you? Are you going to participate in Earth Hour?