Playdate...

Some friends and I decided to get our pups together for a play date. There were five people and:

Sport (14 lb. doxie mix, 1 y.o.)
Cloey (~30 lb. aussie mix, 8 m.o.)
Leo (~30 lb. pit, 5-6 m.o.)
Rhino (~45 lb. pit, 6-7 m.o.)
Toad (~25 lb terrier mix, 6-7 m.o.)
Zoey (~35 lb. golden mix, 2 y.o.)
Olive (~40 lb. husky mix, 2 y.o.)


Sport was a little overwhelmed by everyone, being as how he was the smallest dog there. I felt really bad because he would want to play, but then he would get so freaked out by everyone rushing over that he would get scared. Then everyone would scramble to pull their dogs off him. Everyone kept correcting their dogs (calling them away, putting them in sit/stays or down/stays) and I didn't know if I should call Sport away or not. All he was doing was getting scared though, so I couldn't really correct that. And he was sticking pretty close to my legs, so I couldn't really call him off.

The unfortunate aspect of the group dynamics is the fact that all of the dogs are very young. Most are in their teens so none of them were ever correcting each other and play started escalating to the point where someone would get pissed off.

I will post pictures later. My friend took them so I haven't seen them yet. Sport did have a little fun when he wasn't being such a baby. I think for the future, I will only do one or two dogs until he gets used to playing with others.

Little Leo is coming to stay with us so hopefully he will get used to playing with him!

Adventures in Sport's Land.

Today we deviated from the trail and decided to trek through the grass today. It was fun. The sky was so blue and the weather was just gorgeous. I really don't want it to snow just yet. We are having too much fun!

We practiced some recalls.


He practiced his flight.


But then he spotted something.


What is it, boy?


Llamas!! Why does it look so mad?


Cuz Sport wants to eat them.

After our walk, I had to go to work. My boss, Ali, let me do a bunch of vaccines and blood draws for heartworm tests. It was only my fourth time drawing blood, but I think I did really well. I did blow one vein, but I did six different dogs and I managed to get them done quickly and effectively. All were negative for heartworms.

The last dog that we had to do a blood draw on is a crazy shepherd mix pup. She was going insane, so I told Ali that she should do it instead. I restrained Zoey, the pup, while Ali tried to draw the blood. Unfortunately, Zoey chose a really bad moment to flip out and I lost my grip on her, Ali lost her grip on the syringe and I felt a stabbing pain in my thigh. We looked down and see the syringe sticking out of my leg! OUCH. I have a bruise around the site. I am just glad it was an empty syringe (she hadn't even drawn the blood yet) and not a vaccine or sedative or something bad like that. Man, who knew practicing medicine could be so dangerous?

R.I.P. Little Icky

Today, we put my little foster dog to sleep. He was in kidney failure. I will miss him so much. Sport is still looking for him..

I'm glad that I got to hold him while it happened. I am glad I had a chance to know him. Even only knowing him for a couple weeks, I admit that I cried the entire car ride home (and am still crying now). He was a sweet dog, full of personality, even when he was so sick.

It makes me mad though that his story ended this way. He should have died in the arms of his owner, the one he loved. Though I love him, he deserved better. He had better than most though. How many dogs die terrified at the end of a rabies pole? Millions. How many die in a gas chamber scared out of their minds? It is unfair and cruel. I hope that more people would think about that when they surrender a dog to a shelter (an older dog at that). Not only will they be stressed but it is likely that they will die surrounded by strangers (however kind they might be). Would you want your dog to be terrified in their last minutes? Most don't care, I suppose.

Icky deserved better. I honestly believe that he would have lived longer if not for being submitted to the shelter system and all the stress involved. Even loved as he was, I know that he was stressed.

Sorry for the rant, sorry if it isn't coherent. I am too drained today.

Icarus Udpate

Little Icky is in the hospital. After talking to the vet and having her look over him, she told me that it seems like kidney failure. We decided to still run the blood work to confirm, but it doesn't look good.

I don't think Icky is coming home.

How weird that I could be so attached to him after only a couple weeks. I started crying as we discussed it. The sad fact of the matter is that he is not my dog and I cannot afford to pay for expensive treatments for a foster. Nor can my shelter, really. There are so many more things we could do than try to extend the life of an old min pin.

I also found out his whole story today. Apparently his owner died and the person who inherited him surrendered him to the humane society because he was biting (no teeth!!!!). The humane society transferred him to us because of his attitude and age.

How sad that this boy had to live the end of his life amongst strangers. Strangers who love him, certainly, but not the people he has known and loved for his entire life.

He is such a sweet little dog and he deserved better than this. I am just glad I got to meet him. I am glad he got to spend these past weeks in a home and not a shelter.

The first day here...


Hanging in the yard with Sport

Smarty Pants and Icky-poo

I have never practiced "Leave it" outside of my house. I usually only use it for cheap parlor tricks (put a piece of food on Sport's foot and tell him to leave it until I release, "Okay!") or when I drop something I don't want him to eat (like chocolate) and then I reward with a treat.

Today on our walk, my little boy surprised me! I had him off leash and he was bounding through the field. I called him back and he came running and stopped right before he got to the trail. He looked down and sniffed. I walked over to him and saw a BLOODY RODENT SKULL just as his little jaws were opening to gobble it up.

"Leave it!"
He looks up at me.
"Good boy!"
He looks down and opens his mouth again.
"Leave it!"
He looks at me.
"Let's go!"
He runs towards me and we go down the trail.
"GOOD BOY!"

I honestly was expecting to have to pry it out of his mouth. I made the mistake of rewarding him before I called him away. He is used to me saying "leave it" and then releasing him to eat it with "okay" so he thought I was releasing him to eat the skull. But he still listened to me!

Even more amazingly, he still left it alone when I went back to take a picture of it (because I am a zoology major/nerd and I wanted to see if I could identify what kind of rodent it is). It had to be tempting since it was very fresh. Probably just killed a couple of hours ago.

I'll spare you the pic, it even grosses me out. But I was really proud of him.

I am worried about Icky, though. He hasn't been eating again and he has lost quite a bit of weight. He ate some turkey tonight, but hasn't has a meal since Monday. I am taking him to the vet tomorrow to run some blood work. I am so disheartened about him sometimes. Who is going to adopt this goon? But honestly, if I find out that he is sicker than we thought, I will be willing to keep him. It's not like he is any trouble. I bet my parents will even take him on...

Icky-poo!

Hiking

Today I got to sleep in with Sport. It was beautiful. We woke up lazily at 9:00 and made breakfast with my roommate, Amber. Well, I made breakfast with her, Sport just got in the way and picked up fallen scraps from the floor. After we sunbathed in the yard for a bit:

Sport, Amber and I went for a hike. Icky decided to stay home because he is old and sick.

We had a blast. It was probably the last really nice day of the year and we took advantage of it. Sport was decidedly against having his picture taken, though.

I don't see you.

Though, this would have been cute if not for my shadow...

The trail was only about three miles and we were feeling good so after the hike we decided to head down to the reservoir and see the beach. Don't tell anyone, but we let Sport off lead! He got a serious case of the zoomies:

Don't worry, he really did come back. We played a bit in the water (he still won't go in further than his chest, though) and just ran around in the sand for a while. Then Amber decided to climb some rocks and disappeared over the hill. Sport got a little concerned:

Where is she?


Is she over there?

But eventually she came back and all was well. He slept like a baby on the car ride back. It was a good day.

(Excuse the quality of the pictures and video. Again, it was all taken with the camera phone.... boo.)

The good and bad news

Bad news:

My camera is broken. That means no pictures for a bit. I still have my camera phone but the quality is lousy, as you have probably noticed.

Unfortunately I had a bunch of cute pictures. I was going to write a post about a mystery yesterday! Someone (either Sport or Tiramisu) stole a bag of Zukes treats and ate them all. I want to point the finger at Tira since she has done something like this before and the rips in the bag look like they are from sharp little kitty teeth. However, Sport was mysteriously absent yesterday night and he is usually always by my side... Interestingly, neither one got sick so I guess we will never know.

I can't wait until Tira goes back to my parents. Sport has taken to chasing her and she is pretty stressed out. She is losing a lot of weight, even though she is eating. She is always on edge. I don't know why Sport chases her, but I think it has to do with Icky. Tira is pretty mean to Icky and Sport defends him a lot. Poor Icky has nasty kennel cough and isn't feeling so well.

The Good News:

I went to my first training class with Izzy, the lab mix from our shelter, yesterday night. It was a lot of fun. She is one of the smartest dogs I have ever had the pleasure to train with, so she picks stuff up really quickly. I was afraid that she was going to be bad since she can be a bit crazy sometimes. I took her out for a quick run before class and I really think that helped get some of the energy out. There are eight other dogs in the class. Some are very young and some are a bit older. Some were crazy and barking, some were growly...

Izzy was PERFECT! She barked twice in the whole hour. She only growled once when another dog tried to jump on her. She laid down when we weren't doing anything and focused like a champ. She made me feel like a better trainer than I actually am! My only issue was the marker word. I didn't bring my clicker so I tried using a marker word. Man, was that confusing. I use "Good!" with Sport when I am fading out the clicker, but with Izzy I used "Yes!" Unfortunately, I kept mixing it up and I could see that she was focusing on the treats more than me at some points. Next time I will bring my clicker though and all will be well.

Izzy. Isn't she gorgeous?!

His decision.

So lately I have been really frustrated with Sport. His recalls have been falling apart so our 90% off leash walks have turned into 20% off leash. We would get back home and he would still have tons of energy to burn. Today it was chilly and the middle of the afternoon so the trail was deserted... and I thought, heck, let's let him decide what to do.

Sport got to choose where we went the whole walk. Off leash. I didn't call him, I didn't give him a command (except once when we saw another dog and I had to leash him up). We went further off trail than I like. We went faster/slower than I like. He sniffed stuff I didn't want him to sniff... but I let it slide.

And you know what? It was the best walk ever. We had a lot of fun hopping through the brush, chasing caterpillars, running as fast as we could until we were coughing from the effort. We got down and dirty and I laughed harder than I have in a while.

Caterpillar!

Playing in the water

Some People!

I had a reallllllly bad day at work Saturday. It all started before we even opened for business. I was just finishing cleaning up and waiting for eleven to open the doors when I heard the bell go off. The door had been unlocked to admit grooming clients, but our groomer forgot to lock it back up. I went up front and was confronted by a woman. She had put an application in on a Lhasa Apso that we have. She didn't put down a deposit though. When that happens, we check references and then call the adopter once their application is approved to set up a pick up time.

"I'm here to pick up Daisy. I'm ********." she says. I look at her app. She had listed three veterinarians as her personal and vet references. We had called them on Thursday and left messages for all of them. Vets are notoriously hard to get a hold of and none of them had called us back. I told her as much. She then made me call two of them again. One didn't answer and one was in an appointment.

Now she is getting mad. She claims that my boss told her to pick Daisy up today and that she drove forty miles to get here. I tell her that I am sorry, I don't know why she was told that but that I can't send the dog home without any references. She yells at me for a little. I apologize again and tell her that we can call her when we have her application approved so that we don't have this mix up again.

She leans forward and hisses, "I am not the right person to piss off."

I stare her straight in the eye and say, "That's unfortunate, but I still can't send this dog home with you at the moment."

"Keep her then. Idiots."

My boss was in back and I was shaking when I went to go tell her what happened. My boss had never told her to come in today, and told me that this woman is a dog training columnist for our local paper.

"She has some good advice," she tells me. Then looking at me, smiles and says, "but she is pretty old school." It is common knowledge that I am in the R+ camp and pretty passionate about it.

It made me think, when you regularly use force to get what you want out of dogs, does that begin to boil over into your interactions with people?

This is an excerpt from her website, "I don’t teach clicker training in my dog training classes. Not because I don’t think it works, it does, if you’re a professional trainer. Clicker training takes a certain skill that most people don’t have. It’s a timing thing. The average dog owner just doesn’t have it."

*Snort* I'm glad she isn't adopting a dog from us.

Daisy dog. She deserves better.

Overwhelmed...

I'll admit it. I am constantly in a bad mood lately. It's silly because I don't feel like I am in a bad mood, and I don't act like I'm in a bad mood... but things that used to make me happy don't so much anymore.

I really dislike my classes this semester. I struggle to stay awake in each one, to understand the concepts, and to get the grades. And when I do badly, I don't even care that much.

Blase. Apathetic. These are the things that I feel.

At work, I am annoyed. By both people and dogs. The dynamic between the dogs currently residing there is... strained. There is a lot of fence fighting and tiffs. I am frustrated and upset and this causes my concentration to be shot. That is why I got bit today. It wasn't a bad bite, no broken skin or anything, but I have a feeling that in the morning, I will have a nasty bruise on my thigh. It happened because a beautiful dog named Empress decided that she didn't like the looks of fluffy dog named Wylie (and his buds, Snowflake and Georgia). So she tried to eat them through the chain link as I was walking her past. I was pulling her along and like an IDIOT, I tried to body block her with my thigh.

Rule #1: Never use your body to block a dog that is snapping.

So I pushed my thigh into her face, and her teeth collided with me. OUCH. I yelled and scolded and she hit the deck. I felt like a complete jackass. It wasn't her fault. It wasn't as if she tried to bite me, I just got in the way of her gnashing teeth.

Then not ten minutes later, I am carrying a wiggly puppy to her crate, and she swings her head around and clocks me in the jaw. I swear my ears were ringing for at least an hour. I'll probably have a bruise there too.

Some would say these types of injuries are just part of the job, but in all reality they aren't. Honestly, if you are careful and respectful, you won't get bit. I have never been bitten by a dog. (my definition of a bite does not include a dogs face colliding with my thigh or any other body part) I have been snapped at, and I have come very close to being bitten, but contrary to popular belief, most dogs do not want to bite people.

But I know that these injuries are all my fault because I was not paying attention like I should. I swear my head is not screwed on right.

This unrest is seeping into my home life as well. More often than not I find myself shooing Sport away from me. I am currently living in a zoo, so I am a bit frazzled. My parent's cat is staying with us for the next few weeks. Plus I am fostering an old min pin with no teeth. He likes to bite a lot too, but he does no damage.

Icarus (Icky) is a little grump

Tiramisu hides in the sink. She hates the dogs.


Sport is confused by the new additions.

Life is exhausting and the only time I am content is Sport's massage time in the evenings. Then I can relax with my favorite boy.

Now we wait...

I just submitted my vet school application. ((Big sigh of relief)) It is amazing to think about all that I have done leading up to this one decision. Putting my fate in the hands of a bunch of nameless, faceless people... it is scary indeed. But what is done is done, and I can only hope that I have done enough to impress someone on that board. Now we wait until.... February.

Today, I also went and paid rent and another pet deposit since I kept Sport. I was paying it, and the woman asks, "Do you know about our restricted breed list?" I respond with, a very shocked NO.

"Oh it's the usual. You know, Pit Bulls, Rotts, Dobies, Akitas, and German Shepherds."

Oh man, I was pissed. When I rented this place, I specifically asked if there were any breed restrictions and I was told no. Now I am told there are? Right when I am going to get a Pitty Puppy?! The worst part is, I rented this house even though it was more expensive and further away from school than another house I was looking at, just because I didn't want to support a company that supports BSL.

My roommate thinks we should take the pup anyway. He's just a foster, and it isn't in our lease.