julie wrote:Somebody on the board a few months back posted a link to little nail covers that were plastic so you can but them over the nail(like fake fingernails). They had pretty colors to. Maybe somebody has the link or I will try to search and find it to give you another alternative when the time comes and you get a dog.

Softpaws - found it - this board is fantastic!

http://www.softpaws.net/instructions.html

shudog wrote:I dont' have a dog yet, just reading & posting on here to learn as much in advance. My house has hardwood floors on the 1st floor dining/living room area. At the risk of sounding silly, I'm rather particular about the floors being clean & looking nice. Will a full grown Weim destroy the finish of the floor with his nails? Even if I keep the nails short, will the floors be scratched up?

HAHAHAHAHAHA, WELL, let me tell you, we have two weims, my husband is or was very particular about the floors as well. We put new cherry/mohogany wood floors 9/2008 and I will give you one guess at what happened!!!!!!!! They are all dinged up, we bought oak, with a gloss that would avoid scraching. It was over $6 per square foot and my dad installed it, you can imagine it was not cheap. Anyway, for a while my husband would come home and walk through the house looking at the floor and couting scraches and other damage, after a few months there were to many, so he just gave up, LOL. Then we got June our 2nd weim this past year, and the two of them will slide all around the house chasing each other 1-2 times a day so you also imagine what that did to the floor. I am fine with it myself, but for a while though I though my husband would drive himself literally crazy over it. Having a weim, things like these come with the territory. Also, you will hear some people say that Dremeling their nails will help keep your floors well, we have been dremeling the dogs nails from day 1 and it has not made a difference. To be honest with you, if you are very particular about the floor or other belongins in the home, a weim, or any other big dog would not be ideal. Just the other day, June pucked liquid rabbit poop on my persian rug!!!!!! But we love our babies WAY to much to care. Weims do that to you, that have that effect on people.

shudog wrote:

julie wrote:Somebody on the board a few months back posted a link to little nail covers that were plastic so you can but them over the nail(like fake fingernails). They had pretty colors to. Maybe somebody has the link or I will try to search and find it to give you another alternative when the time comes and you get a dog.

Softpaws - found it - this board is fantastic!

http://www.softpaws.net/instructions.html

Perfect. I have problems finding past posts all the time. Thwy look pretty nifty

iris wrote:We put new cherry/mohogany wood floors 9/2008 and I will give you one guess at what happened!!!!!!!! They are all dinged up, we bought oak, with a gloss that would avoid scraching. Then we got June our 2nd weim this past year, and the two of them will slide all around the house chasing each other 1-2 times a day so you also imagine what that did to the floor.

Well thanks for the perspective. Certainly seems to be the worst case scenario, I'm sure the damage could be minimized with rugs and some other approaches, but also sounds like scratches are unavoidable.

Dogs, weims & puppies especially, can do some major damage when they want to. It's a good idea to think about the everyday damage that will occur, but please thinking about how you would feel if your dog did some major damage to the floors and how you would react to that before getting a weim. Please don't take this the wrong way... it just sounds like your floors are something which you are very serious about taking care of and a weim definitely could do some damage. One of my dogs thinks that it's really fun to run and slide on the hardwood floors in our house when I'm in the bathroom.

Just as most folks have said, the hardwood takes a beating. We decided to rip up the rugs because of the damage my four had done and put real hardwood down about a year ago. The only place though that really took a beating was the long hallway leading to the laundry room where the doggy door is. We finally put the money out and got a very very long runner for them to get a better grip on. Of course the runner is in pretty bad shape now - and it's only a couple of months old - but it's better than always hearing the nails digging in and looking at the scrapes and dings. Area rugs are the way to go - and at least my dogs prefer getting the grip on the rugs as opposed to slipping and sliding on the hardwood.

DoubleTrouble wrote:Dogs, weims & puppies especially, can do some major damage when they want to. It's a good idea to think about the everyday damage that will occur, but please thinking about how you would feel if your dog did some major damage to the floors and how you would react to that before getting a weim.

I think there's a lot of great info that's been posted, both by folks describing the damage done to their floors and how it was minimized, and also how little it mattered because they loved their dogs so much...

Your floors are toast.
But you will always love your dog more than your floors.
For some reason some of the new finishes scratch easy.
(the finish tend to sit on top rather than soaking in.)
My home was built in '62. Oil and old fashion wax. They still look great but vintage. I don't really see any
scratches. Just lots of character. I imagine on a new floor everything shows.
They do shed as well. Not like some breeds.
I have the robot. It runs on an every day schedule. (i have two -another downstairs)

Dogs are hard on things.

I have a soiled couch, ruined carpet (been through too many puppies), and even dents in the drywall where 2 dogs have been playing too hard and slammed a piece of furniture in to it.

It's just the nature of having a dog... I have just come to terms with it and do my best to work around it.

Best of luck to you!

I would assume that your floors will take a beating.... and my question is, if the floors DO, what will happen to the dog? We just had someone move into a new house (with their 8 year old weim) and then decide they had to place the dog, because he was scratching the flooring. If your flooring is more important than the dog, I'd suggest just waiting until your flooring has more character before adding a dog. I'm glad you are asking this BEFORE you add a dog!!

My house is 65 years old with blond oak floors, they were refinished by the previous owner before we moved in (4 years ago) and now they're really starting to show the wear (Lincoln's 2). But on first glance they still look pretty good.

My coworker has a new house with new hardwood and got a lab pup. She's 1 year now and unfortunately her floors are very scratched up. They had a bit of a shiny finish which seemed to show the damage more, whereas our floor had more of a matte finish.

Try not to get too upset about it!

My house is quite old and has random-width heart pine floors throughout. Over time these have certainly acquired "character!" The exception are the back stairs and upper hallway that have Berber carpeting. This makes for better traction for the doggies - and in fact made it possible for my late elderly Dalmatian Annie to go up & down at all. In the "public" rooms downstairs I have variously sized Oriental rugs that show off the floors but protect them somewhat. But do the dog thing, please! It's a living, loving thing - vs. some wood.

The damage is what is. We have three heavy treaders. They had trashed our carpet to NO END! Ask Lunabrown, they have seen it first hand and it was NASTY!!! We switched to hardwood, well engineered really but we have one small nick so far. Other than that they do well. We dremel them twice a week keeping their paws nice and rounded. That will help a lot! Really I'll take a few nicks or scratches in hardwood over carpet with paw prints that embed into the pad eventually and are a real nagging pain to remove.

Good luck!

Kids do as much if not more damage than dogs and both bring more joy than we'll ever have on our own.

Phoenix1705 wrote:Kids do as much if not more damage than dogs and both bring more joy than we'll ever have on our own.

Now that's the best advice I've heard yet!

As someone who recently got a pup and is a bit ocd about her house, I would say be realistic. Yes there will be scratches and more dirt, so can you handle that? We have pretty new hardwood and honestly there are more scratches from shoes and furniture than the dog. I do stay on top of her nails though, as soon as I hear a little clicking they get clipped and filed with an emery board. I would say be prepared for scratches but realize that you can minimize them with nail care and a rug or too. Also set some rules, like big treats/kongs on her bed or a rug only.

Also a sidenote, I've grown up with hardwood in every house, have an uncle and brother who install and finish them. The best finish to hide marks is a satin one. And you can do a process called screening (not sure if that is the technical term, just what we called it) to shine them up again. They put a fine screen on the buffer over the floors which lightly scuffs it up. Then they put on another coat of poly. If you need to refinish this can be an easier, quicker and cheaper way to freshen them up without sanding down to the wood.

All this being said it is really fun to watch them slide and zoom around the floors!