What's Your Dream Dog Park?

Enter it into the Purina Beneful Dream Dog Park Contest for a chance to win a $500,000 makeover at your favorite dog park.

Largo certainly loves its dogs.  And Purina Beneful is giving you a chance to build a doggie wonderland as a part of its third annual Dream Dog Park Contest. How it works: Between now and Aug. 22, answer this question from Beneful in 250 words or less:  "If you had $500,000 to create a Dream Dog Park where you and your best buddy can PLAY together, what you would do?"  Submit your answer, along with a photo of you and your pooch, for a chance at the $500,000 grand prize dog park makeover (for Paw Place, maybe?), $10,000 cash prize and a year's supply of Beneful dry food.  Here is Beneful's contest overview. Here's a look at last year's winner.

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Largo Residents, and Their Dogs, Enjoy the Wonderful Weather

The perfect weather this week proves that Largo is a great city for dogs too.

The past few days have been Chamber of Commerce-type weather. It’s why we live here. It’s why so many part-time residents escape winter each year. So it was no surprise to see residents and part-time residents alike outside, enjoying the weather as it hovers around or surpasses 80 degrees under sun-kissed skies. One of the favorite pastimes of residents is, naturally, their pets. So it was not uncommon to see citizens outside at one of the many parks within the city, walking their dogs. Madeline Wade of Largo was among them. She was at Eagle Lake Park, a Pinellas County-managed property, at 800 Keene Road Monday with a handful of love. She had her two pets, Maui and Sookie, with her. Maui, named for the Hawaiian island, is a robust eight-…

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Rescue Me

My Rowdy Dog is Starting to Respond to Training

It took a couple of shouts across the dog park, but Grayson has finally learned to come when he's called.

I have told many stories about Grayson. The one that seems to come to everyone’s mind is him standing on the coffee table and throwing lint around like a fool. Well, these are funny stories, and I laugh, but to be honest, they also wear me out. Like one of my friends told me, “I was worn out just reading about what happened.” That made me chuckle, since it is an everyday experience for me. I hope every day that Grayson will learn something new and become more like Kaiah. Kaiah is my baby girl, 4 years old and wonderful. Kaiah does great under voice control. When I say, “Mommy has to go to work," Kaiah runs into hers and Grayson’s room, lies down and waits for me to shut the door. Side note: This is something I have had to do because of …

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Go, Dog, Go

Discovering The Dog Park at Fort De Soto

What do Floridians do during Christmas vacation week? Take the dogs and children to the beach, of course.

TIERRA VERDE - Our trip to the only dog park in the Tampa Bay area with a designated beach for canines started with a few complications that made the day interesting. My wife got called in to work, which threw a wrench in my gears. My question: Did I really want to drive all the way out to Fort De Soto Beach with my daughter in charge of the dogs in the back? Answer: Why not? We kidnapped my nephew, Josh (he prefers the term 'surprise adoption'), for the day, and off we went. I'm probably going to get in trouble with my sister, but our breakfast consisted of Pringles, Snickers with almonds, Funyums, Pepsi and Diet Coke with lime for me. Yell at me for bad parenting later; we were on an adventure, not taking a test. We arrived about an hour…

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Go, Dog, Go

In Search of a Pub to Hang Out With the Pups

The tables were far from heavy enough for me to anchor my Siberians, so I had to hold onto my little titans while doing my impersonation of a dog sled.

My family and I were all packed up and ready to head out to Fort DeSoto Park's well-regarded, dog-friendly beach when my wife, a U.S. postal worker and weather hound, informed us of nasty, impending weather on the St. Pete side of town. One thing about living in the St. Petersburg-Tampa Bay area, there is no shortage of things to do with our little fur balls, no matter the weather. So we dropped those plans for some indoor activities with the dogs. I decided to check out O'Brien's Irish Pub, at 701 W. Lumsden Rd., in Brandon, and meet friends, who head there for the Yappy Hour. There were a few patrons having a cool one while their dogs socialized with other Canine-Americans on the patio area. I asked when Yappy Hour started and got a few …

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