Weekend

If I don't get this girl adopted pretty soon, she's going to be mine. 


I took Gigi, Hank, Rex, Daisy, and Dixie to Gainesville on Sunday for an adoption event. 


Rex was going to move to another foster but proved to be too cat-aggressive.  We got some great pictures of him though as you can see here, and he was basically pretty good.  He barfed in his crate last night and isn't feeling too perky today, I'm not sure why.


I thought I had a good prospect for Daisy too, but that didn't pan out.  All in all, it was pretty much a bust, a full day and $50 of gas up in smoke. 


Gigi was scared, didn't want to even get out of the van.  When she did, she stuck very close to me.  She would let other people touch her and even hold her leash if I walked away, but when I was with her, she kept herself in contact with me.  This pic of her with her paw on my leg pretty much sums it up. 


She was popular, lots of folks liked her, and I've had a couple more inquiries about her. 

Mother's Day, 2012

I'm heading off to an adoption event in Gainesville soon with five dogs, but before I hit the road, I wanted to wish all the dog moms, kitty moms, and human moms a happy Mother's Day. 


Here's a link to a post I did about this time a year ago, My Mother, My Dog, along with a picture of my mother and Gypsy from that post.  It's always risky comparing your mother to your dog, but if you know me at all, you'll understand.

 The other picture is Thora, a dog mom, who was reunited with one of her pups, Jasper, at an adoption event.  Both have long since been adopted. 

Puppies

The mother is a golden/lab mix and puppy daddy is a Great Pyrenees.  They are ten weeks old.  Two females and one male.  Very cute.  Name suggestions, anyone? 

Things that make me feel better

I have been more stressed out about the Nero situation than I realized.  Particularly in the last week I have shut off certain aspects of my life that I simply couldn't deal with on top of everything else.

Friday afternoon I was emotionally and physically exhausted and had that churning, roiling pit of acid in my stomach.  My efforts at work were largely ineffectual.

Few things in rescue, or perhaps in life generally, are all good or all bad.  Having something bad happen on a good day seems like a bummer, but the flip side is that good things can happen on bad days as well.

A good friend stopped by with this beautiful hanging basket to bring some beauty and joy into my life on a pretty dark day. 

Earlier in the day I stopped the car to let this family of geese cross the road.  There's no way not to smile when you see something like that.

After delivering Nero's body to the SPCA for cremation, I brought home Toby, f/k/a Vincent, future name TBD.  He's probably nine years old and currently has some issues affecting both ends of his digestive tract, but he's a nice old guy and he needed me. 

I found this poem on Facebook, corny but touching, and a needed reminder of why we do this.

And finally, just before dark, I took Gigi, Rex, Radley, Daisy, and Lana out to the pasture for some running and mowing. 

I don't know if it's the Prozac kicking in or what, but it was the most normal behavior I've seen out of Rex.  He ran too close to the mower so I rode with one foot on the brake and one hand ready to shut down the blades if necessary, but at least he ran forward instead of chasing his tail.  He even engaged in play with the other dogs to some extent.  It gave me hope. 

Daisy, Lana, and Radley probably ran five miles in the time we were out there.  They tore across the field, back and forth, up and down, disappearing for a while, and reappearing in a flash.

Gigi and Rex mostly stayed with me, but they played with each other a bit and Gigi played with Daisy as well. 

Nero, RIP: Good dog, bad disease

I've been struggling with this for a week or more, ever since I was no longer to give Nero the daily injections.  He learned that what I was doing was going to burn or sting and he started screaming and fighting to get away from me.  He was trying very hard not to bite me, clearly didn't want to, but he also clearly didn't want me to give him the shots. 

I'm not a believer is putting dogs with cancer through chemotherapy because they can't understand that you are making them miserable in order to try to help them.  Also, it is generally not going to work and at most you are prolonging the inevitable at the expense of their quality of life.  There's a cost/benefit calculation to be made and in most cases, I feel that the costs outweigh the benefits. 

I guess I came to the same conclusion about Nero.  The medication was clearly imposing a cost on him.  It was painful; not the injection itself, which was a minor and temporary discomfort, but the medication would sting once it was in him and he knew it.  I couldn't explain to him that this was the only thing that stood a chance of helping him, as far as he was concerned I was just doing something awful to him.  The benefits were a long shot.  This drug would likely have shut down his kidneys before we made it through the full course of treatment.  Even if we did, it was likely that some new strain of MRSA would have then taken over that was resistent to this medication, which was pretty much the last drug left in the arsenal.  That had been the experience with the prior rounds of antibiotic treatments we had tried. 

After a week to ten days without the medication the infection was coming back with a vengence, as we knew it would.  So today was the day I took him to the vet to be euthanized.  After a good pasture romp yesterday afternoon and again this morning.  A big breakfast of canned food.  It was all I could do.  It's not enough, but it was all I could do.

Nero was a good dog. He drove me crazy with his barking for attention, but he was just so desperate for attention he couldn't help himself and he didn't know any other way. 

I finally decided I would have to come to terms with the dog and we developed a relationship, I took him hiking and we played ball, and it helped us both.  He would have been a very good dog for someone, he was extremely attached and devoted.

He came out of a terrible situation and so I guess his life was much better here, but it was never what it should have been.  I don't believe in the christian heaven/hell thing, but I would like to believe in something like reincarnation, and hope that this guy has a better go of it the next time around.  The Rainbow Bridge myth is beautiful and comforting for us dog people, but in that scenario, I wouldn't want this guy waiting for me, he deserves happiness and a person of his own now.  I hope he will latch onto the next rescuer to die and lead him or her across that bridge.

Nero was a good dog with a bad disease.  Aside from the barking, he was an easy foster in many ways.  He knew the routine around here and he loved it.  He learned things quickly.  He would come when called, he would go back to his kennel when I asked him.  Even when he was loose in the yard, he stuck around.  I guess that tells me he wasn't too unhappy here.  By contrast, the woman who picked him up from the original owner said that he threw himself at her and lept into her truck, ready to get the hell out of there. 

He would have been a wonderful companion.  I'm sorry he never got the chance.  He loved his tennis ball. 

Guard duty

Trooper, Hank, Daisy

I don't really have anything to say, but I have a few pics. 

This is a 6' high platform I built in the dog yard a couple years ago.  It's been Trooper's spot for quite a while.  He eats up there and it's his guard tower, his sentinel post, where he surveys the world and keeps us safe from marauding birds (a big threat in his mind), and home invaders, (basically anyone who isn't Clay or me).

There are steps going up to the top of the platform, but  Trooper has pretty much always had that place to himself.  Until lately.  Hank and Daisy have discovered Trooper's hideaway.  I don't think he's overly thrilled about it, but Trooper is very tolerant of other dogs.

Same pic, cropped to a close up. 
Hank looks like a junior Trooper, very similar markings.
 Daisy looks really leggy here.

This is one of my favorite pics and probably my absolute favorite picture of Trooper.
He is shepherding his guard tower, alert to everything going on over the entire property.
He inherited that job from Gypsy, and I think she would grudgingly admit that he's pretty good at it, for a boy.

A friend posted this on my Facebook page a couple weeks ago.  Trooper could have posed for three of these at least. 

He's the fierce, in-your-face bad ass,

the nobel sentinel and guardian,

and the big goof who sleeps on his back with all four legs in the air. 

New faces

I've got a good group of foster dogs right now and because of that I haven't been too aggressive about trying to move them.  The last few weekends haven't been great for adoption events either.


I've had a couple inquiries about Daisy, one that I liked but haven't heard back from, and one that really wants her badly, if I'll waive the adoption fee (because he's a "wounded warrior" on a limited income).  Now, I'll waive an adoption fee in many cases, particularly if the dog has medical problems that will be costly down the road.  But when I'm asked to waive the adoption fee on a young, healthy dog (and I wasn't really asked anything else about the dog), that tells me that they simply can't afford the dog.  No deal. 


But I need to work on moving some of these dogs (Daisy, Dixie, Gigi, and/or Hank being my top prospects), because I've got more coming in.  Rex is going to move to another foster home this coming Sunday, and that will be good for him and will help me out as well. 


The puppies (Dog help me), are Pyr/Golden/Lab mixes.  Mom was a golden/lab cross and the dad was likely a Pyrennees, judging from the size and look of the pups, and from the fact that the other paternal possibilities were a hound and an aussie. 


Toby is a senior shepherd mix that I'm taking in because he's a nice guy who's had a few bad breaks and I'm a soft touch. 


I was contacted about the rottie and need to get back in touch and make arrangements to meet him.  Isn't he handsome?