save the pit bull, save the world.

Luce has kennel cough. I feel lousy about it because it’s all my fault.

I vaccinated her.

Usually I don’t, even though my dogs go out in public regularly. They go to training classes, they go to dog events, they go to parades and other community events where there are plenty of dogs, they go to work with me where there are lots of dogs. But I don’t think the bordatella vaccine is particularly effective or particularly necessary, so I don’t give it. Except in order to register for training classes at this new club, I am sending my paperwork with somebody I know. And I can’t tell from the paperwork or from the website whether or not she needs to have a kennel cough vaccine (I just have to send “proof of vaccination”), so to make things simple and avoid any complications, I just gave it.

And promptly, a week later, she’s got a stuffy nose, is coughing and gagging and snorting and reverse sneezing. She’s eating and she’s acting normally, so I’m just letting it run its course, but I feel bad. It’s got to be distressing to be reverse sneezing and honking and gagging like she was Monday night. It’s better today, but it’s still there, triggered by activity and change of temperature. My poor monkey.

I’m all for vaccinations. To be frank, the major move by some people to not vaccinate at all scares me. I know how important herd immunity is, and I feel pretty strongly that the reason that we don’t see a whole lot of things like distemper (and even parvo, though it certainly has its outbreaks) is because the majority of dogs are vaccinated. It works the same in people. Smallpox, anyone? The more people stop vaccinating out of fear, the more dogs we’re going to see cropping up with these diseases in populations we don’t currently tend to see them in.

On the other side, I don’t think it’s a good thing to pound our dogs’ immune systems with unnecessary vaccines. I subscribe to the every three year protocol for the moment, at least for dogs. I’m fortunate to live in a state where rabies vaccines are only required every three years, and I give my dogs DHLPP vaccines every three years as well (on alternate years from the rabies, so they only get one at a time). Yes, I do give Lepto, as we see it around here. I don’t (usually) give kennel cough. I don’t give Lyme even though I live in an endemic area and we see a lot of it at work. My dogs are primarily town dogs (though I did find a tick walking across my bathroom floor in the middle of the freaking winter), and I don’t regularly see ticks on them. Lyme doesn’t scare me that much- treated with doxycycline, most dogs do just fine and don’t have complications. I’ll cross that bridge if I come to it.

I’m really kicking myself about the kennel cough, though. It’s really a mild case, and it was a killed vaccine so she’s not contagious, but I feel bad that she’s under the weather. She’ll be completely back to normal in a few days, and will have no lasting effects, but it still annoys me. Poor Luce.

I get a lot of people who, upon meeting my very friendly pit bulls, tell me knowingly that it’s “all in how you raise them”. I’m clearly not a thug. They don’t wear spiked collars or aggress at small children and grandmothers. They smile and wag and wear their ridiculous costumes proudly.

But here’s the thing- I didn’t raise any of them. All of these dogs have come to me as adults. Harv I now know came from a situation bad enough to warrant removal by an animal control officer. I don’t know for sure, but I’m guessing he wasn’t raised “well”. Luce and Mushroom were both picked up running at large. Neither was claimed. Again, I don’t know for sure, but all signs point to “not raised well”. But still, they’re wonderful dogs.

The dogs from the Michael Vick dog fighting raid were without a doubt treated horribly. How is it, then, that so many of them are stable enough to have remained people-friendly, even to the point of being able to work as a therapy dog?

Because it’s not all in how you raise them. Certainly “nurture” has a role in the behavior of all dogs, but genes cannot be ignored. An inherently stable dog is going to remain so, even in the face of less than ideal living situations. They can be miracles in little dog bodies without even realizing it- they are just being the dogs they were born to be.

And the reverse is true as well. It’s fairly well recognized that fearfulness/shyness especially has a genetic root. The folks of the Canine Behavioral Genetics study are looking at a number of different aspects of genetics and behavior. (See the website for ways to get involved, whether you have a normal dog or a dog with behavior concerns.) I have been excited about their study since I first learned of it several years ago, and I will be very interested to see what they’ve learned.

Anyway, this whole post was written in response to this wonderful post about a pit bull named Mabel who, despite her blinded eye and her broken jaw, still trusts and still loves. I want to send out a huge thanks to the author Stephanie Ernst both for her post and for her very intelligent, sensible responses in the comments. Mabel is a very lucky dog to have ended up where she did.

Life is so much less complicated with only two dogs. They’re well programmed. They know where to go when. They listen. They have solid commands like “wait” and “come”, which Harv could never quite figure out. They only have to spend half a day crated each now, Luce in the morning, Mushroom in the afternoon. There’s a lot more room in my bed. There’s a lot less poop in my yard.

So why can’t I stay off Petfinder? Why am I looking for another old dog?

Clearly, I’ve lost my mind.

I’ve been coveting a well-bred border collie puppy for months. I’ve not worked up the courage to contact any breeders, for fear that I won’t measure up. Or perhaps for fear that I will, because I’ve never had a puppy before and I’m a little bit scared of being eaten alive. Or of failing to mold him into a Good Dog.

I think right now is not the right time for a puppy. I want to do Serious Things with the puppy, and I think at this point in our lives, that wouldn’t be fair to Luce. She needs to be my Serious Things dog right now, and even though she’s got her limitations, I think I need to honor that and put her training needs first and foremost. I don’t need a puppy here to eclipse her. There will be plenty of time for puppies in the future.

My heart is still drawn to those old dogs in a way that I can’t explain. There’s just something about them that makes me want to bring another one home, even though I know that it will end in heart-break. Harv was such a great dog and I miss him so much. He was so special and I know there will never be another Harv, but that doesn’t mean there’s not another old dog out there who is just as special in his own way and will bring me just as much old dog joy as Harv did.

Earlier in the week, I sent a letter to the York Shelter where I got Harv, letting them know of his passing and of my gratitude to them for having sheltered him. I know that an old black pit bull is one of the least adoptable dogs on the planet, but they saw in him what I saw, what so many other people saw, and they continued to hope for him. I had to say thank you one more time, and I wanted to let them know that even though he is gone, he was so very loved.

I didn’t expect any kind of response. I hoped that maybe his picture would show up in their newsletter the way it did last time I sent them a picture and an update. Instead, I got this:

Dear Katie,

On behalf of the shelter staff, I would like to let you know that we are so sorry to hear about Harvey’s passing. Our hearts go out to you as we understand the loss you are feeling.

I was actually the one who originally removed Harvey from his deplorable living conditions over four years ago. At the time, his name was Beast. Obviously, his name did not suit because he was nothing but a kind soul. Having worked for the shelter for over fifteen years at the time, I knew the reality of the adoptability of older pit bulls. Nonetheless, there was something about him that made me believe he could have another chance. When he was adopted the first time, I was thrilled. Unfortunately when he was returned I was doubtful that another adopter would have an interest in him. Luckily, you saw his potential and decided to give him a home. I am so glad he lived the remainder of his life with you.

Please watch for Harvey’s picture in our upcoming newsletter. I plan to do a story about him and his recent passing.

Thank you for letting us know about what has happened and thank you for loving Harvey.

Sincerely,
Melissa Smith
Executive Director

By the end of it, I was bawling once again. I had no idea of my sweet boy’s past. I knew he’d been at the shelter for a year before being adopted the first time, and that he’d been returned because of a divorce. I had no idea that he’d been removed from his first home, though with all the scars he had covering his whole body, it didn’t really surprise me to learn.

And “Beast”? They called that poor boy “Beast”? I imagine his soft, gentle spirit was quite a disappointment.

I know that dogs are so much better at living in the present than I will ever be. He didn’t care about his past in the time that he was here. He cared about his soft bed and his smelly bones to chew. He cared about dinner and grazing in the back yard. He cared about playing with Luce and snoozing on the couch. He cared about digging under the deck and staring longingly at my french fries. It makes me both more sad and more happy that he spent his last year here, where he was spoiled about as much as a dog can be. It makes me even more glad that he died loved and cherished, and that his memory will live on for a very long time.

He was a special guy. So many more people than I ever realized could see it in him.

I am incredibly touched that his story will be in their newsletter. I hope that it will encourage more people to consider adopting an old dog and experiencing the joy and love that they bring with them.

I miss him so much.

One of the things that made me the most happy at our Rally trial on Sunday was the wide variety of dog breeds that were there. Yes, it was an AKC trial, which means all the dogs were (ostensibly) purebred dogs of AKC registered breeds (that line between American Pit Bull Terrier and American Staffordshire Terrier is a damned fuzzy one), but they ranged from Chihuahua to Newfoundland, Beagle and Basset Hounds to Papillon and Border Collie, Miniature Schnauzer and Miniature Poodle to Labrador and Golden Retriever, Rottweiler to Dalmatian. The dog that won the Advanced A class was another “Amstaff” with a very pit bull look to him. The dog that won Novice B was a nice little Golden Retriever bitch. The dog that won our class was a Cairn Terrier. The variety was tremendous and I was glad to see “non-traditional” breeds right up there with the “traditional” obedience breeds.

I’ve run into a fair bit of breedism in the very limited experiences I’ve had in the dog sport world, and I don’t tolerate it well. I have done a number of Rally matches and run-throughs at the club that held this trial, and it was there that I felt most of it. It made me a little hesitant to go to this trial, and I have not done obedience classes there because I’m afraid of being given a hard time about my dog.

I know it’s stupid. I shouldn’t care what anybody thinks about my dog or my chances at succeeding with her. I know she’s a good dog. She’s proven that she’s a good dog. No, she’s not a push-button robot dog, and yes, she’s got a whole slew of issues that limit what I can do with her, but she’s the dog I’ve got right now, and she has taught me so much. There is so much more value in my learning with her than there would be in training a dog who was “easy”. I am a much more flexible, creative trainer than I ever would have been otherwise. She has taught me the value of being able to think outside the box, and that’s something that has a tremendous amount of worth.

I’ve met a number of professional trainers who have never had “difficult” dogs who showed up with pre-acquired issues, so while they’ve done the book work, and while they’ve worked with other peoples’ dogs, they don’t understand it from a first person kind of view. They don’t understand the frustration and the heart-ache that can go along with working through behavior issues more complicated than jumping up in greeting or counter surfing.

At any rate, I was encouraged to sign up at the club for their Rally 2 class, and while I didn’t speak to the trainer who teaches the class that I would be able to make, she was there, and I saw her doing a lot of cheeringleading and encouraging her students who were entered. I liked that a lot. I have plenty of my own issues, mostly in the self-confidence department, so I need a trainer who will build me up, not one who will cut me down. I’m a little nervous about going into a class mostly blind, but I am really hoping that it will work out, that we will be accepted there, and can learn and grow as a team. It’s been a long time since I’ve had the opportunity to really learn new skills, and I’m hoping that a new trainer will help me clean up and polish off some of the sloppiness I know I have, and get us moving again.

If Rally 2 class goes well, there is also a Novice class, and I’m also interested in Agility Foundations class. Luce can’t do a lot of agility stuff because of her knees and because I don’t trust her off-leash around other dogs, but the Foundations class is primarily groundwork, and primarily on-lead, so it might be a real possibility. We’ll see what happens.

Also, I’d like to thank everybody who commented this past week for your support and your kindness over my loss of Harv. I miss him tremendously. I feel his loss in all kinds of little ways, in places I would never have thought to look. I wrote a letter and a check to the York shelter the other night, thanking them once again for having trusted me with such a wonderful, sweet dog. I hope that someday I’ll find another dog like him, a gentle old man who needs someone to dote on him, and who gives back so generously in all the ways that a dog can.

Today Luce and I competed in our very first Rally Obedience trial. Yes, I have a little piece of paper that passes her off as an Amstaff. Imagine that.

We’ve been working toward this for years. Many years. Far more years than it should have taken, but she’s a special dog. She’s had all the behaviors, the fronts, the finishes, the turns, even the three steps backwards in heel position that is only used in the upper level courses, for years. What she hasn’t had (and still only occasionally manages) is the attention to make it all happen in public. She is capable of beautiful heelwork when there’s not something more interesting distracting her. Unfortunately, everything is more interesting on your average day. Grass growing. Paint drying. Oooh shiny!

She’s just that kind of a dog. It’s frustrating, but we’ve been working on it. And working on it. And working and working and finally I got up the guts to give it a shot. A $28 entry fee can buy you glory or it can buy you public humiliation. Roll the dice. See what comes up.

We were the second to last dog in the ring of the entire day. Only five dogs showed up for the Novice A class. I didn’t see much of what went on- I was too busy trying to warm up my dog and keep her focused on me and not on every dog that walked past. The course was very nice. It flowed well, was not confusing, and didn’t include the Call Front, 1, 2, 3 steps backward sign that has forever been our nemesis. The judge was very nice and very low-key. I like low-key.

Our run went very much typically for Luce. She was a mess at the beginning. Little attention, lots of points lost for tight leash. Somewhere around the middle, though, her brain kicked on and she got in the groove, and then she was beautiful. She was right with me. Her left turns were fantastic. Her eyes were on me and me alone, her tail was wagging, her mouth was grinning, and she pranced. I love when she prances. We finished and I pounded her sides enthusiastically and told her how brilliant she was and she tried to take off with Mad Zoomies.

We managed an 89 out of a total of 100 points. Good for second place to a Cairn Terrier who scored 90. I was floored. I figured we had a pretty good chance of qualifying- scoring at least 70 points- for our first leg out of the three needed for a title. I thought as long as she didn’t do anything ridiculous, I didn’t have to worry too much (there is always the chance of the ridiculous with this dog). But second place? Unbelievable. Shocking! And absolutely thrilling.

So, we’ll definitely be back. There’s another trial in August that I’m going to try to get her into. We’ll see if we can manage to get our act together a little earlier on in the course next time. But at least I know now for sure that we can do this. And that it was even kind of fun!

This post is going to deal directly, frankly, and possibly graphically with euthanasia. If you find the subject uncomfortable or upsetting, please please do not read it.

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I have dealt with death day in and day out for years now. I cannot remember how many cats and dogs I have felt the life pass from under my hands. I have euthanized animals. I have assisted in the euthanasia of animals. Day after day. And it does become routine. It is not exactly that I have become hardened to it, but more that it becomes less shocking, less horrible. These are humane deaths, either in the arms of loving owners, or in the hands of vets and techs who do care that each animal dies a good death and knows kindness in their last moments. There are far worse things.

I have read horror stories of euthanasias gone terribly wrong, with screaming and suffering and much trauma. I have never witnessed one myself. Yes, there are times when the tiny veins in a shriveled, dehydrated, dying cat are hard to find. There are times when dogs vocalize as an effect of the drugs (it doesn’t happen often, but it does happen). There are times when it seems to take forever for the injection to travel through a failing circulatory system. But they are not bad deaths.

And Harv’s was not a bad death. And for that I am grateful. He went quietly in my arms. I was able to bite back the wail of “no, I’ve changed my mind” that tried to creep up my throat.

But it gutted me, just a little bit, to think of him wrapped in a black plastic garbage bag, tucked into a freezer, awaiting the crematorium. I went out to the freezer yesterday, laid my hands on the lid, and told him how much I miss him. I don’t think he heard me. The man in the white truck picked him up yesterday, and his ashes will be back in a few days. I will place them in their carved wooden box carefully inside a larger wooden box with his collar and tags, some pictures, maybe his rubber ducky bellyband. All my memories of him carefully contained. Kept safe. I’ll place him on a shelf. I’ll always keep him near.

My heart is still breaking as I discover the little vacancies he’s left all over my life. The spot on the floor at the foot of my bed where he isn’t. The absence of him running back and forth through the downstairs overwhelmed by the joy of impending dinner. I wake up numerous times at night, a habit, listening for the sound of his pacing, his signal that he needs to go out and pee.

Life is far simpler without his needs. I was late getting home from work last night and I didn’t have to worry about his medication being late. I don’t have to worry about being home to take him out every couple of hours, lest he soak his belly band and end up wearing wet pants and risking urine scald. I can go on vacation this summer and not have to worry about him seizing and somebody else having to deal with it. I don’t have to lug his 55 pounds up and down the stairs numerous times a day.

I would give anything to have him back, complications, bad breath, accidents on the carpet and all.

I shot this video a couple weeks ago and completely forgot about it until I found it on my camera tonight. The first bouncing black dog is Mushroom. Harv shows up halfway through, always needing to be in on the action. (And no, despite the horrible sounds coming out of them, they’re not fighting. They just have no manners.)

So much heartbreak. So many sweet, sweet memories.

Who is kicking asses and taking names at the Rainbow Bridge.

He started seizing tonight and I couldn’t get it to stop. I ended up taking him into work after hours and my bosses put him to sleep for me. I’ve known for months that this was coming, that this thing in his head that has been making him have seizures would get too big or too ugly for us to cover up the signs anymore, but I wasn’t ready. I’m not ready. I’m not ready for my old dog to be gone.

RIP Harv. I love you so much. You should be here snoring at my feet right now.

“The Housedog’s Grave”
By Robinson Jeffers

I’ve changed my ways a little, I cannot now
Run with you in the evenings along the shore,
Except in a kind of dream; and you, if you dream a moment
You see me there.

So leave awhile the paw-marks on the front door
Where I used to scratch to go out or in,
And you’d soon open; leave on the kitchen floor
The marks of my drinking-pan.

I cannot lie by your fire as I used to do
On the warm stone,
Nor at the foot of your bed; no, all the nights through
I lie alone.

But your kind thought has laid me less than six feet
Outside your window where firelight so often plays,
And where you sit to read — and I fear often grieving for me –
Every night your lamplight lies on my place.

You, man and woman, live so long, it is hard
To think of you ever dying.
A little dog would get tired, living so long.
I hope that you when you are lying

Under the ground like me your lives will appear
As good and joyful as mine.
No, dears, that’s too much hope: you are not so well cared for
As I have been.

And never have known the passionate undivided
Fidelities that I knew.
Your minds are perhaps too active, too many-sided . . . .
But to me you were true.

You were never masters, but friends. I was your friend.
I loved you well, and was loved. Deep love endures
To the end and far past the end. If this is my end,
I am not lonely. I am not afraid. I am still yours.

(Oh, and the bunny died yesterday morning sometime, too. Hell of a lousy week, and it’s only Tuesday.)

Shortly after I posted yesterday, I hooked up the Shroomdog up and off we went. And, you know, because we’ve had at least two or three uneventful walks, we were charged by an off-leash Jack Russell Terrier with no owners in sight. It came up behind us, and it was only at the last second that Mushroom whipped around, and therefore, I spun around, and the dog was right there, so I stuck a foot out, more to deflect than to actually forcefully “kick” the dog, but my foot and its head connected. Not that this stopped the dog of course. It just kept coming, but I got all in its face yelling and telling it No, and to Git and Go Home. I kept Mushroom moving and I walked backwards so I could see what this dog was doing, since it wasn’t giving up.

And of course, there were two people standing outside their house watching the events all unfold. They didn’t belong to the dog, but they called it over and coddled it and lamented over how I kicked it. My other options were A) pepper spray it and B) let it get into a fight with a 55 pound pit bull who, at this point, is not open to the option that an incoming dog may be friendly. Really, I think I went with the best option available to me, but it still probably looked pretty bad, and I feel bad about it. I’d have felt worse if my dog had gotten involved, though.

I am so frustrated I could just scream. Dear people: IT IS NOT OK TO LET YOUR DOGS RUN AT LARGE!

The upside of our walk was the ten minutes I spent talking with two kids and their mom about my dog. I carry a lot of equipment with me when I walk- poop bags, treat bag, clicker, pepper spray- and the kids wanted to know what all of it was and why I had it. I let them tell Mushroom to sit so they could click/treat him, which they thought was great. The older kid was a boy who was especially interested in the pepper spray and why I carry that. I told him because Mushroom got attacked once by another dog and it made him really afraid. The kid then told me all about how people don’t treat their dogs right sometimes and that makes the dogs mean and it makes them want to run away, so then they turn into stray dogs and they can be really vicious sometimes.

I had to hide my grin. He was so earnest about it!

It always makes me feel good when I can give kids a good experience with my dogs, and especially this type of experience that included lots of discussion about, well, everything. And I love how much my dogs adore kids, and Mushroom especially is so calm and well behaved with them. He sat and he shook hands and he didn’t punch anybody in the crotch. Good dog!

In other news, my jerk cat caught a bunny in the backyard today. He doesn’t appear to be seriously injured, but thus far he’s not eaten anything as far as I can tell. He is currently living in my garage in a cage with approximately 10 food options, but he’s not interested. I hope that the stress wears off soon, and that he starts eating, because I don’t want him to die, and I also don’t want to have to take him to the vet right now. I don’t want a bunny, but his owners haven’t materialized, and I don’t feel comfortable releasing him back into the “wild”. I need a sick bunny like I need a giant gaping hole in my head, but he’s here, so what are you gonna do?