Over the years we have always shared our home with cats, dogs or a combination of both. We not only have a great love for these creatures, but also a respect for their intelligence, trust and devotion. We all miss them when we have occasion to leave home and live without them for awhile. Granted, they do have their drawbacks, and there have definitely been days each of us would gladly have called the local animal shelter to come and take away the entire menagerie but, for the most part, they give as much, or more, than they take. By far, the greatest gift they offer us is laughter. Nothing is funnier or more endearing than a kitten, puppy or even grown cats and dogs. Their antics are a source of constant amusement in our home and we always seem to be telling each other yet another silly anecdote about our pets. Now I will share them with you.

The Canine Clipping Crisis

New Breed Discovered!

The following link leads to a disturbing story about dogs who have been committing suicide by leaping from a bridge. I can fully relate to this as our smallest dog, Scottie, made an attempt to take his own life last week by leaping from our deck onto the cement below.

http://www.rense.com/general63/canine.htm

At the time I was in the process of giving him his spring haircut. I started clipping our dogs when I found out I could buy a professional style clippers for what it cost to have three haircuts done by a groomer. While the clippers may be professional I am far from it, however I manage to get the job done. They often come out looking a bit more “scalped” than clipped but hey, none of them is a show dog.

I can get their top half done by myself but I need help for the lower regions. For Scottie this means flipping him on his back and holding him steady while I clip his legs, tummy, neck, etc. My helper is one of the boys and part of their job is to murmur soothingly to Scottie while I clip those delicate areas. This worked very well when they would quietly tell him, in sing song baby talk, what a wonderful little doggie he was. However, now that he has lost most of his hearing I find the idea loses some merit when you have a kid shrieking, “GOOD BOY, SCOTTIE!” in your ear.

So, anyway, spring comes and Scottie is matted up so time for his usual haircut. I decided to get started clipping him on my own figuring one of the older boys could help me finish up later. Normally I keep two clippers to work with. They have different blades and the blades tend to get pretty hot. I switch back and forth as they get hot, I need a different blade or I need more speed (one is a two-speed clipper.) The blades, though, are getting dull. I had them sharpened but it didn’t seem to help much so I decided to just go with the one clipper with the new blade I had just bought.

I got quite a lot done on Scottie – his back, sides, around his head and was just about finished. I thought I would get a bit more off his neck and was working on that area when all of a sudden he yelped and leaped out of my arms. I think what happened was the hot blade touched his skin there and burned him as there was no cut or anything I could see later. It probably startled him more than hurt him but he went ballistic. Yelping at the top of his lungs the entire time he ran around the deck five times. I was sitting near the stairs and he was avoiding me but I thought I would just stay there and keep him from running down so I could check him out once he calmed down. I was trying to talk in a soothing tone but he was having none of it.

Suddenly he ran to the opposite edge of the deck and began crawling UNDER the boards that fenced it in. I thought about jumping up to grab him but figured that might startle him and he would fall. I decided it was better to let him get back out himself once he realized what he was doing. Well, next thing I knew he was GONE! Yup, he leaped from the deck. One of my son's said his theory is that the little guy decided he was having a bad hair day and decided to end it all.

I sat staring in total shock and disbelief before jumping up and running to the edge of the deck to look over. There was Scottie on his side lying on the cement under the deck not moving. I ran down quickly to his side sick to my stomach. When I got down there I found he had voided both his bowels and bladder and knew that was it for him. I figured there was nothing I could do but sit there with him until he died. I didn’t dare move him as I was sure his back was broken.

We sat there for a few minutes with me talking to him and feeling horrible. His breathing began to slow down and all of a sudden he partially sat up. I was completely astonished and felt some hope that maybe his injuries weren’t as severe as I had thought. I ran upstairs calling for my youngest son, the only other person home at the time, to come and sit with him while I changed my clothes and figured out where the emergency vet was located (did I mention this was a SUNDAY?)

When I got back I looked over the side of the deck and both of them were gone! I yelled for my son and, when he came, I started to chew him out for leaving Scottie. We had had old animals wander off when they were ready to die before and I was sure that was the case here. But Geordie told me Scottie had gotten up and walked upstairs. Incredulously, I went looking for him and found him on his little bed behind the chair in the living room where I usually sit. He looked sore and a bit out of it but otherwise really not too bad all things considered.

Luke had gone to work that day but was feeling awful and we had decided I was to take him to Urgent Care after I picked him up from work. I had no choice but to leave Scottie and go get Luke. I kept trying Bill on the cell phone and eventually reached him. I explained the situation and, when he got home, he checked on Scottie first thing. He felt there was no internal bleeding or anything serious or obvious at that point so we decided to wait and see how he did. We kept a sharp eye on him, though, because, after all, he IS eighteen years old!

He refused his dinner and pretty much just stayed in his bed all evening. Later that night we had a thunderstorm. Since losing his hearing he is terrified of them shaking like a leaf when the thunder booms. The vet said maybe he feels vibrations from it but, for whatever reason, he comes to find me when a storm starts up. I heard him coming down the stairs and went to help him up on the bed. I wrapped him up in his little blanket and he cuddled up and went to sleep.

In the morning Bill got up and saw him there. Normally when he acknowledges Scottie’s presence with a pat and a word there is some movement but nothing happened. Fearing Scottie had croaked on our bed during the night he made the intelligent decision to visit the bathroom before worrying about it. He said he thought about just leaving him for me to find and going off to work! (It is great having a supportive spouse.) Coming back, though, he noticed Scottie had begun to move and that decision was taken out of his hands. (Thankfully for him!)

Scottie showed no interest in getting up that morning so I just left him there until he started to cry around noon. He can’t get off our bed so I went down to help him off and let him outside. I watched him walk around and he seemed just fine. He came in and drank a huge amount of water and I thought perhaps he would be interested in some food by then. Sure enough he ate a big helping of his food.

This dog is unbelievable. He has been shot with BBs (they are still inside him as the vet decided to leave them), he has had a lung punctured, and a rib broken when attacked by a larger dog and now this. I tell people how he leaped off the deck and walked away 100% fine and they can’t believe it! However, I still haven’t finished his clipping job and, when I do, it will be sitting on the grass in the front yard.

No sense taking chances!

UPDATE: In January 2006 Scottie suffered a stroke. He went downhill from there. He was around twenty years old - ancient in dog years. When it became clear he was getting a little worse each day, I made the decision to take him to the vet. He couldn't walk, eat or get up to go outside. When it gets to that point, it is selfish to keep an animal alive. I sat with him on my lap for two hours rocking, petting and talking to him. Finally my husband came home and we drove to the vet's office. I held him my arms, put my face down by his ear as he had become so deaf and I told him goodbye. He left this world quickly and peacefully. I cried as we left the vet office and I cried all the way home. One thing that I hate is the relatively short lives our pets have compared to that of humans. I have said goodbye to far too many pets and it never fails to hurt deeply. RIP Scottie. You were loved. You are missed.

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New Breed Discovered!

Yes, we have a whole new canine breed at our house! You can see him pictured above with the extremely looking intelligent look on his face.

This breed came about as a result of my husband wanting a Newfoundland. Well, that was fine as I love big dogs but they are prohibitively expensive. Therefore, I began perusing the want ads every Sunday to see what we could find at the shelters. One Sunday I struck pay dirt! South of the cities, about an hour and a half from our home, there was a no-kill shelter that advertised a four month old Newfoundland mix pup.

We called the shelter and let them know we were interested, packed all four boys (this was BG – Before Geordie) in the van and took off to get our new family dog. Everything went smoothly and, before very long, we were on our way with this black bundle of fur.

It became clear quite quickly that this was NOT a dog that enjoyed riding in a car. Perhaps he was tossed from one or had some other horrific experience but, for whatever reason, he hates riding in them to this day.

His name was Kodiak, which was a nice enough name, but naturally we wanted to give him a name that we had chose ourselves. Eventually, after strong debate among the family members (this occurs each time we name a pet), we decided on Chewbacca. Remember the big furry dude from Star Wars? Well, it stood to reason that a big old Newfoundland with lots of fluffy fur should be called the same.

As the months passed we were delighted to find out that he had a natural inclination to fetch a ball. Over and over we would toss tennis balls far out into the yard and he never seemed to tire of it. It is amazing to this day to watch him hunt as he sets up a grid and moves back and forth until he sniffs out the ball. If you put one of his balls up on something or it rolls under the furniture he will go totally nuts and bark until we “rescue” it. The other day I heard him going on and on and started to worry. We have bears in the woods behind our home now and again and he has been known to protect his family by barking at the woods to scare them off. However, it was a false alarm! He had merely sniffed out the small supply of balls that my husband had picked up and put in the storage area on the garden tractor. Sometimes we wonder just how long he would stand there and bark if we let him but we can’t quite manage to stand the noise long enough to satisfy our curiosity.

He also exhibited another characteristic that was not quite as endearing at the fetching: he bit. Never a family member. No, we were his and we were to be protected by every bone and wisp of fur in his body. Unfortunately, the people he chose to bite were usually under four feet tall. Perhaps he didn’t feel able to defend us against adults but, for whatever reason went through his little canine mind, he bit children. Luckily for us, we had extremely kind and understanding friends and neighbors. Each time it happened I was so scared it was the time that the bite would be reported and we would lose him. Dogs that bite are only give so many chances and he had actually long since used his up. All told, I believe he bit about four children and we seriously had some talks behind the doors of our bedroom about the possible necessity of having him put to sleep. But the children loved him so and, except for that, he was so very sweet. We compromised on keeping a close eye on him. When a child came over to visit Chewbacca was locked up in another room. When an adult came over we would be on guard for any possible aggression on the part of the dog.

We have had many dogs before of assorted sizes and so we are familiar with the growing pattern of pups throughout a year’s time. Therefore we were surprised to see that Chewbacca wasn’t growing bigger faster. When we visited the vet for his puppy shots and checkup we inquired about it. We were disappointed but not terribly surprised when the doctor said this was definitely NOT a dog who had Newfoundland blood in his background. Well, we still loved him and he was a good family dog overall.

To make ourselves feel better we have decided he is just a new breed: a toy Newfoundland. He is now going on fourteen years old. He no longer has the urge to bite anyone and he tires more easily than he used to but he can still find a ball anywhere you through it. He still doesn’t like to ride in the car and we eventually quit trying. It wasn’t worth the fear he had to deal with to take him anywhere other than to the vet for his shots. I even groom him myself to save him that extra trip a few times a year.

It seemed appropriate to shorten his name to Chewie so that has been his name for the majority of his life. Chewbacca seemed like more than he could handle and certainly Kodiak was a bit beyond him. Although, seeing him standing out there barking at the woods to scare away bears I have to say he has the heart of a dog named Kodiak!

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