A Heart-to-Heart, Species-to-Species

As you read this, you may be tempted to think I’m putting humans down. This is not the case. Quite to the contrary, over the years, Dad has taught me a lot of stuff that not only makes me a better dog and better companion but improves the quality (and undoubtedly length) of my life. I would be remiss if I passed by the opportunity to point out what looks to these doggy eyes to be somewhat of a character flaw on the part of you humans and make suggestions as to how it can be overcome.

Okay it’s a no-brainer, you humans are the uncontested pinnacle of creation. Over the millennia, you have not only learned to survive on an ever-changing planet but you have thrived. You have learned to manipulate your world and have, in doing so, accumulated a testament of wondrous achievements while my kind still walks on all fours and chews at their fleas when they become bothersome. You are responsible for the nice warm houses in which we live and the doggy doors in them so that I don’t have to poop inside my nice warm house. You’ve made cars and trucks so I can go for a ride. You can cook a steak for us to share. I couldn’t do that if my life depended on it. Left to my own devices, I’d probably just chew on the cow’s leg until it decided to kick my head off. Let’s not forget about Cheeze nips either! The list goes on and on.

In at least one respect though, your dog is far superior in that he/she is ever so much the more noble species. Although there are exceptions on both sides, overall, the dog is the more leal of the two. When you get a dog, you can trust that he will not abandon you or throw you out when you get old and sick. Actually, the opposite is true. If you’re sick, hurt or even just sad, your dog will do their best to improve your lot in their own doggy way. Your dog will stay with you for life. Your dog doesn’t come home one day having decided that you’re “inconvenient” and out you go, probably going to have to have you put down ‘cause no one else would want you. Your dog won’t have puppies and decide that there’s no longer any place for you in the family. Nowhere on this earth exists a shelter for humans that have been discarded by their dogs. Nowhere! The landfills are not full of humans in black garbage bags, dumped there because they were unwanted by their dogs. You almost never see a dog stop the car, throw their human out into the middle of the highway and haul ass headed for the house. The list goes on and on.

We’re spending our Christmas eve with a little dying Yorkie. He was discarded by his family ( had him all his life) because his teeth are bad. Okay, his teeth are real bad, they stick out at angles like fangs gone wild. I can just imagine the kids going “ewwwwwww!”. Honey, dog’s gotta go, he’s grossing the kids out. In spite of his dentition, Munch is the sweetest little baby in the world. Mom and Dad dote on him and Lil and I let him sleep on the bed with us. Mom had him to the vet but they can’t do anything for his teeth because he’s old and has congestive heart failure. The procedure would kill him. And so our Munch will live out his remaining days as a valued member of our family.

When we woke up this morning, he wouldn’t take his heart medicine or anything else for that matter.  He was on his way down. Dad filled him full of medicine and fluids, tried to tempt him with some scrambled eggs, but he probably won’t last the night.  He’s got no more fight left in him. At least he’ll die with soothing words and kindness, knowing that he’s loved. Meanwhile his loving family, freed of the inconvenience of him, is surely busy celebrating their holy day that’s all about God’s love. Doesn’t seem right, does it?

As you celebrate your Christian holiday, please contemplate the fact that you are the dominant species because your god made you so. When he created the beasts of the earth and the birds of the air, he gave you dominion over them all. In the same breath, he also charged you with the responsibility to exercise a proper stewardship over them all. It is my sincere hope that at least one person takes this message to heart and applies the Christian principles of peace and love to their companion animal(s) thereby displaying the loyalty that is just part of being a dog.

To Munch’s (our name for him) family from my Dad; “Your precious little boy is spending Christmas eve dying but not to worry, I’ll stay with him and keep him comfortable and when he dies, he will leave this world surrounded by those who truly love him. Oh yeah, and Merry Christmas.”

A Small Gift for You and Your Friends

I have a small but useful gift for you and your pet(s). It was actually my dad’s idea but I thought I’d use this forum to pass it along to you and yours.

Our house probably isn’t all that much different that yours, 200 or so dogs not withstanding. Dad’s usually wide open in one direction and mom’s wide open in another. Dad works 12 hour shifts at the mill, which means that he’s gone for about 15 hours on workdays and mom’s always running. Either she’s pulling dogs from animal control’s death row, picking up owner relinquished pets (a number that seems to be constantly on the rise as the economy stagnates), making vet runs, picking up shelter supplies or conducting mobile adoptions. During those times when they’re both gone, they always plan ahead for our safety, comfort and well-being. Some of us have kennels with igloos, fans, pools and plenty of food and water (I still hate mine) while others are segregated into homogenous groups in the house with access to one of several fenced yards (that way, if the power goes out, they’re not trapped in an overheated house). They seem to have it all pretty much covered but, what if something unexpected were to happen? Let’s take right now for an example. Mom’s off at an adoption and dad’s working nights. Mom won’t be home for a few days yet but dad will be rolling in come morning to let us out of our kennels so we can take a big old nap with him but……..what if something were to happen to him? What if he got hurt at work or got into a wreck? I know that humans, like dogs, eventually die and to be honest, the old boy’s not getting any younger. What would happen to us if he didn’t come home?

Nowadays, most everybody has their emergency contact information on their cell phone (or if they don’t, they should) but, to the best of my knowledge, there’s no place there to enter information about your pets who are depending on you. Even if you have listed as emergency contacts people who know that you have pets at home, they may not stop to think about them in the moment. Usually when emergencies happen, everyone gets excited and anxious and it may be some time, if ever, before someone thinks to check on the dogs on a 103 degree day. Fortunately, there is a low tech solution available and this is my small gift to you and your furry friends. By clicking on one of the following links, You can download and print two different emergency notifications informing authorities that you have pets at home and that they may need help too.

http://www.2ndchance4pets.org/idcards.pdf

http://www.potterleague.org/Portals/0/Uploads/Documents/Emergency%20%20ID%20Cards2.pdf

You’ll need Adobe Reader to view them.  If you don’t already have it, click here; http://get.adobe.com/reader/  for a free download.  The bigger form is for posting in a likely location in your home and the wallet-sized one is for, well, your wallet. I would recommend printing them on some durable paper and either laminating them or using some kind of document protector. I know that the last thing that you’d want is to get into a wreck and spend a few days in intensive care and then, finally getting back home, finding all of your best friends dead so please, for your pet’s sake and yours, take a minute and get this done. If you have difficulty downloading or printing or whatever, drop me an email and I’d be more than happy to assist in any way that I’m able.

“Hey, when you hide under the bed, you hear things!”

                                     Alf — Circa 1988

 

One of my pet peeves in life is that not enough people quote Alf. He’s one funny guy. That and the fact the Dad says I look a lot like him, especially when I hang my head out of the truck window. So I was eavesdropping on my dad’s conversation the other day (I don’t actually fit under the bed) and I was pretty disturbed by what he was saying. He was talking about going out with Mom to pull dogs a while back. This is something he doesn’t do very much any more, seems he’s always on the computer or some piece of noisy machinery these days. In their travels, they stopped at a county animal control some miles to the west of here to pull what dogs they could. He said they had done an agency transfer of about 8 dogs, all of whom had euthanasia tags on their doors (means they’re fixin’ to have a real bad day) but had to step over several bags of dead dogs just to get to them. Then they were told they had to wait a bit before they could load up because the loading dock was being used. They went out back and waited for the men to finish loading the truck. The cargo was suspended over the truck in a big wire crate about the size of a pickup bed and they were dumping out bag after bag of dead dogs to bring to the local landfill. Dad said he returned home a bit more zealous and committed than when he’d left out, says he’s been out and about and knows that what’s out there isn’t pretty but if you don’t experience it every day you tend to suppress it. He says it’s just one day in one town in a great big state in a big old country in an even bigger world. I guess that’s why Mom always seems to act like someone’s just lit a fire under her all the time, that’s just another day for her.

For my part, all I can say is OMG! I had no idea! I’ve always wondered why we had all these other dogs here when they already have me. I guess I’m a little spoiled, I’m daddy’s little princess but, just like you humans, I’m never quite satisfied with things the way they are. The other day I had a fit because I had to go into my kennel and I had to trash my brand new kiddie pool (why do they call them kiddie pools if they’re for dogs anyway?). I was so upset that even that didn’t help much but I guess that my problems don’t even begin to compare. I honestly had no idea that other dogs endured such misery and such ignominious fates. I figured I was safe so what’s the all the fuss about?

Over the last year, dad’s been doing a lot of work on the sanctuary and even though he almost always lets me come out to supervise him, he’s been spending a lot of time on the tractor tearing and digging things up. He’s taught me and Lil how to hang out at a safe distance but honestly, I’m terrified of the thing and when he drags around that big blue thing with all of the sharp wheels that dig up the dirt, I find it to be a harrowing experience. Now I finally understand what all of the commotion is about. In the last year, the sanctuary has been transformed from impenetrable jungle to a very pleasant, shady area that houses around 35-40 dogs in large enclosures where the dogs run around and play with each other or dig holes and play in the water. I think I’ve come to understand that, if these dogs didn’t have this sanctuary, they’d have ended up just like those being unceremoniously dumped into the truck like so much trash. I’m chewing my foot just thinking about it. Oh wait, no It’s just a flea.

The dogs in the sanctuary (did I mention that it’s named “REDDAWGS” after me, Lil and Dougie?) are there because no one else wants them. They have a pretty decent life, certainly better than the other fate that almost claimed them but it’s not as good as a real home with a real family. Almost everybody comes to the shelter looking for a puppy or one of the other “special” dogs like the Poodles, Schnoodles, Shephards and Dobies. They usually have a home within days. The plain Jane’s are not as lucky. Old Bubba the Walker who looks like he’s got a gob of dip in his lower lip has never been fortunate enough to find someone willing to give him a real home even though he’d be more than willing to warm their front stoop.

I’ve been hearing dad say that with one more enclosure to go, phase one is almost complete which I took to mean that he was almost done with that smelly old tractor and we could move on to bigger and better smelling things. I guess I didn’t know what “phase one” meant. I’ve seen him lately looking into the woods past the clearing and am beginning to strongly suspect that he’s nowhere near done. Had I not have been listening in on his conversation, I’d have probably had to chew up another doggie pool but now I understand. Sometimes late at night, I lay there thinking that I could have just as easily ended up in one of those bags before my life had hardly begun and I have to go out onto the back porch and bark until all of the other dogs start barking just to reassure myself that they’re still all right.

If you happen to find yourself, one of these fine spring days, out in our neck of the woods, stop in to visit. The shelter is open every day from 2-6 PM and our staff would be happy to take you for a tour of the new sanctuary. You might just wind up falling in love with a good ole boy hound who’d be more than happy to share his dip with you. When and if you do though, please take a moment to reflect on all of those poor dogs in the trash bags. Bet they would have loved it here.

Dougie

I thought I’d give Miss Cocopuff a break and write this post for her.  Haven’t posted in a while, it’s been a hard year already any it’s barely started.  We lost Dougie, the youngest of the Reddawgs, on New Years day to, of all things, distemper.  Dougie was young, healthy, robust and vaccinated but took sick on Christmas eve and was dead a week later.  We hadn’t had any distemper here at the shelter but, come to find out, there’s a major outbreak among raccoons across the country with the south, and particularly the southeast being hard-hit.  Even with that, Dougie should have been safe and even when he did get sick, he had at least a 50/50 chance of making it but we watched the disease destroy our handsome little imp over the course of a week.  We have been, to say the least, devastated. 
One thing about distemper, it plays by it’s own rulebook.  Normally, it starts out looking like any other upper respiratory illness and, over a couple of weeks, progresses into a gastrointestinal issue.  From there, it may or may not go in to the neurological phase where the chances for survival diminish dramatically.  With my Dougie, he looked a little tired when he curled up in the bed by my desk the night of 23 Dec but that wasn’t all that unusual for him as he’d often play so hard during the day that by 9 or 10 o’clock, he’d crash and burn.  He looked tired but did not appear sick.  I had him and the girls out on the morning of the 24th and Dougie was his usual self, off and running and full of mischief.  By mid afternoon, I was working in the sanctuary and heard Dougie in our backyard sounding like he was going to throw up so I came over to check on him.  I noticed that one eye was a little runny but mostly, I noticed that his flanks were twitching rhythmically.  Not having seen the signs of distemper in over 50 years and never in a dog, I was unaware of the significance of this but a quick search on Google suggested that we had a problem.  I got him on supportive therapy and called the vet who was just walking out the door on the way to church.  I had him at the vet’s as soon as they opened the doors and he stayed with them until Thursday.  They didn’t say they were sending him home to die but I suspected.  The progression continued until, like I say, he lost the battle on New Year’s Day.  Had I known, I would have spared him the gruesome end but the odds were in his favor, at least by the book.  Fortunately, he was comatose for the worst of it and at least he got to see his friends and family first and die at home rather in the vet’s office.
Dougie was still so young and healthy, I’d never even given consideration to his mortality.  I hate to say it, but I’ve had to consider that Coco isn’t getting any younger and Lil, only a year younger, may not be blessed with a long life considering the horrible start she had.  I always tell people that they’ll have to wrap me in bubble wrap before they put me in a rubber room when I lose my girls.  Given that my relationship with Dougie was more of a guy thing I would have anticipated, had I thought about it, that losing him would have been somewhat less traumatic than parting with one of my two sweethearts but that has not been the case and I’m still a mess over it.  I’ve gotten to the point where I don’t automatically look for him when I come in or look over to his bed when I’m at my desk expecting him to be there but it still hasn’t really hit home that he’s gone.
Our sanctuary has been dedicated to all the little Reddawgs who have left their pawprints  on our hearts and Dougie is buried in what is to become a little park in the center of it.  I brought the girls out there to show them where their Dougie was buried and  Cocopuff’s reaction was more of a “Okay, so what are we doing next?'”  She’s so full of herself!  You could tell though that Lil, always having been the sensitive, caring one, understood that that’s where her “brother” was although I’m sure she doesn’t understand why.  The girls, when their time comes, will have their own place of honor here although I’m not anxious to see that day arrive.
Since all of this took place, we’ve seen distemper here at the shelter as well as everywhere else along with some horror stories along the way.  We, like many other shelters, have done a voluntary 2 week lock down with the associated deep cleaning and disinfecting but we’ll all probably be fighting this until warm weather arrives to stay as the virus, outside of the host, is killed by heat and sunlight.  The following link provides a little more insight into this insidious killer: for those who would like to know more:  http://bakerinstitute.vet.cornell.edu/animalhealth/page.php?id=1088 .
These days, there’s a lot of controversy over vaccines in general but, if your dog is not vaccinated, there’s a good chance he or she will get sick and die.  As we’ve seen, being vaccinated is not a guarantee that they won’t but, until recently, distemper was almost nonexistent in dogs due to extensive vaccination.  Limiting opportunities for exposure would also be helpful if you can.  This is not an option here as hundreds of dogs depend on the service we provide and we live in terror that this is not over yet.
I’ll always feel badly that I had to say goodbye to my handsome little man just as he was learning to be a good friend and companion.  When he was young, Dougie, as a typical Boykin, was so full of fun and mischief that it was impossible to have him just come hang out while I worked and, as we’d written in earlier posts, was just starting to “get it” and come be a part of what we were doing beyond the fenced yards with increasing regularity.  Of course, now I’m thinking that it’s too bad I didn’t have more time to work on this with him but then, we never do, do we?  Love your dog while you can, he may not be here tomorrow!
Goodbye my little Dougie boy.  We love you and will never forget you.