Dog Tales

[Tremayne]

I have only a small fenced area for my 3 dogs so I walk them regularly around the neighborhood. Near one corner there resides an arch-typical pit bull. He looks perfect for gargoyle duty on a cathedral, ears clipped down to pointy horns. A bolt in the ground secures the heavy chain he's on that attaches to a 3 inch wide nylon collar. Even this is not considered adequate. He is behind a 3 ft fence and the chain keeps him away from the edge of it. All of which announces that this is a dangerous dog that must be heavily restrained. He further feeds this assumption by lunging wildly and barking ferociously whenever any stimulus arises. So it was amusing the other day when he was stumped by "threats" coming from two different directions. He'd been sunning and noticed both me coming around the corner with my dog AND a truck coming from the opposite. In his indecision over which intruder to address, he simply laid there speechless looking back and forth until the truck had passed. He seemed embarrassed by this lapse in his habit of vigorous defense and only gave a half-hearted woof at us after the truck was gone.

Despite his over-reaction to anything interesting, I actually like this dog. He's neutered so I don't think he would prove dangerous if he got loose. After he has stopped his display of viciousness, he usually looks after us in curiosity. I've taken to stopping and talking to him on occasion. I even got so daring today as to take Jessie up near the fence. He seemed tense but was not barking (until we turned around, at which point he had to show us he was really tough after all). I'm hoping some day he'll end up like most of the other dogs in the neighborhood for whom me and my dogs passing is not worth raising their heads over.

[Dominic_Deegan]

I used to have a cocker-terrier pup named Missy. She was just shy of being 15 when I had to put her down because she had some bad kidney problems. She wasn't my very first pet, but she was my first companion.

One day, my mom and I were making chocolate chip cookies. When we were done, I grabbed a few and put them on a low coffee table in front of the tv with the intent of vegging out to a favorite show at the time. My mom called me back into the kitchen to help her really quick and I left the cookies out. It took me no more than a minute or two to help her and when I turned back around, I saw Missy slowly walking away with her head down and her tail between her legs. I pointed her odd behavior out to mom and she called Missy's name. Missy looked up at us and she had one of the cookies in her mouth! I gave chase and she ran behind the couch, ate the cookie as fast as she could, and then came out with a look that said "Okay, I ate it. Now you can punish me."

[Carl Heinz]

Chocolate and woofies don't mix.  It can be poisonous for them.  We're frequently having to make sure that candy is beyond the reach of our guys.

[Dominic_Deegan]

Chocolate and woofies don't mix.  It can be poisonous for them.  We're frequently having to make sure that candy is beyond the reach of our guys.

Yeah, I know that it is not good for them by any means. That incident was my fault for not moving them where she couldn't get them. It was still very cute and funny though. 

[Tremayne]

Dominic, your story reminds me of other "mouth" incidents. Many people teach their dog a command to drop things from their mouth. In my case, I use the command "leave it." My elkhound, Wicca, would have been a complete garbage hound if she'd had the chance. When she was younger she would dutifully drop whatever experimental object she'd just picked up to chew. But later she got rebellious and instead of offering up the object that she knew would permanently disappear, she would swallow it. So if I suspected what she had in her mouth would be dangerous for her to swallow, I would refrain from using "Leave it" and instead would nonchalantly walk up to her and pry her mouth open to extract the latest gourmet garbage.

Sometimes, however, she would honor the command. One day we were in a high meadow in the Big Horn mtns of WY. Voles had tunnels just under the surface of the ground. Wicca kept cocking her head at the tunnels and pouncing on them. Once she poked her nose down and seemed to come up with something in her mouth. I said her name and she turned to me with this look of complete innocence but with two pink vole feet peddling out of her mouth. She must have judged it too big to swallow because she dropped it when I asked her to and it immediately disappeared into the earth. I let her do this a couple more times before moving into an area where there were fewer tunnels. She was not a great hunter so they must have been very lethargic voles. (Had to wonder why the coyotes weren't keeping the population in better check.)

[DonaCatalina]

Then there is my granddog Bailey. He in a solid red brown all over and only weighs 30 some odd pounds.
He loves our backyard because of all the birds and squirrels. He runs out as soon as he sees one but he doesn't bark.
The squirrrels wil run up the tree but when he stands there not making noise, they come back down to check him out. The male squirrels will occasionally come down from the tree and challenge him. I guess they think he's some sort of mutant sqquirrel.
It is potentially dangerous for Bailey,
But it looks hilarious to see the squirrel stand his ground and chiiter away.

[lady serena]

My story is from when I was very little around 4 years of age as my Mom told me anyway. We took in abused German Shepard's and raised them as our own. We had one German Shepard her name was Mitzy and she thought that she was my mother, when I would try and go out towards the road, as we lived in the country, she would grab my pants or shirt or whatever piece of clothing she get a hold of and pull me back up towards the house and my parents where supprised that she did not grab on any skin at all. Mitzy wouldn't even let anyone near me that she did not know, she would get between me and the person and start growling and if the growling didn't work it would progress to barking and bearing of the teeth, she was very protective of the whole family that way but me especially. When she would lay down Mitzy would let me lay my head on her and we would fall asleep together, my Mom has a picture of me and Mitzy in the kitchen curled up sleeping. Mitzy and all of our shepards were all wonderful dogs that we had including Tish, and Skip, and they all came from abused homes.

[RenRobin]

I have  a Boston Terrier/Chiuaua (sp?) mix, she looks like a petite Boston.  Bella ablsolutely goes bonkers when birds fly over her yard.  They could be 30 feet in the air, just passing thru and she will bark at them, and it they light on a tree branch or the roof of the patio, she will bark her voice away.
A cat could and often does walk thru the back yard as well as Moose, our resident squirell, and she could care less. 

She also loves to tug...anything.  She has trimmed all of the small shrubs in the back yard as well as the honeysuckle vines.  She grabs on and tugs and pulls until the vine or limb snaps and them moves onto the next one.  If she can not reach one, she howls and cries until we either bring her inside or we bend a limb down and she can start tugging again.

[Hoowil]

All these dog carrying things stories reminds me of a summer, years ago. I was visiting with an uncle who lives a few miles outside of Redding, in a small canyon that leads into the river. There was at the time an old wolf who had moved into the canyon years before that. I don't remember her not being there. She was solitary, and had kind of adopted the two families living in the canyon as her pack. It was really cool but and little wierd, and a little sad to have this beautiful animal attatch herself to people. She lived loose in the canyon, but if you were outside, she'd come and hang out, even following you inside, and letting you pet her. But she was actually wild, just one of the residents of the canyon.
My uncle had a couple cats. No horrified gasps please. One of his cats had had a litter of kittnes that were about 3 weeks old. My uncle and I came back from a walk to find the wolf, soaking wet, standing over the den of kittens. Not really paying attention to the fact that she was wet, we ran over to try to protect the kittens, expecting the worse. As we ran up, she moved in closer, and proceeded to spit something out, and turned away. We ran up, to find another kitten, not one of the litter, probably about a week old, laying in there with the rest of the kittens.
Nearest we could figure, with the river being less than a mile away, the wolf being wet, and the strange kitten, was that she had found it in the tiver (probably dumped), and brought it to the nearest place it would be safe. The kitten spent the rest of its life known as the wolf kitty.

[Molden]

I got "man-handled" by an 8.5 lb Italian Greyhound puppy at a dog show in Greenville, SC last weekend!

I was helpin' my Beautious Lady and one of her friends to show some Italian Greyhounds on my virgin voyage to the show ring...(that stuff ain't easy folks!). On Sunday, Lady M's good friend Mary had me show one of her puppies. We practiced our down and back routine before going into the ring, almost flawlessly. We got in the ring, I put th' little one on the table for the judge and did just fyne.

Then the judge asked us to walk "down and back" so she could see the little feller in motion. We took about 2 steps and errrrrrt! The pupper locked 'is legs an' said "No Way Jose! We ain't goin' NO WHERE!" I tried to tug 'im a little to see if'n 'ed go...but no...his front paws only skidded a little. I knew I wasn't going to drag him, that would be a nokie-dokie, so I smiled and tried sweet talkin' him, everything...but no dice. FINALLY I got him about three-quarters of the way. When we turned back, he pranced along like he should.

Though I was mortified beyond belief...apparently seeing this big dude in a suit being totally man-handled by a puppy got a LOT of sympathy points from the judge and the rest of the participants.

Let's just say I have a NEW appreciation for what all goes into those fancy-prancy dog shows! (I think I'll stick to professional wrestling, 'tis a LOT easier!) 

[Lady Mikayla of Phoenicia]

So my Dog Tale from Molden & I's Valentine's Adventure Weekend was...

we were staying at a La Quinta in Huntsville, Alabama for a couple of nights.  So our second night, this past Tuesday we decide to go out to dinner.  It's really cold and we've had the pupper dogs out with us all day so we tuck them in their lil crates for a nap while we go for food!  1 1/2 hours later we come back and there's this young girl walking an Italian Greyhound.  I get so excited and ask her, "is that an Italian Greyhound" and she says, "yes it is" I say, "oh my gosh, I'm traveling with a couple myself" she says, "yes I know, this is your dog we had a complaint that they had been locked up all day and needed to potty."  In disbelief I reply, "no, no they were with us all day, we just went to get supper."  The next day Molden using his expert sleuthing skills determined it was the trucker complaining to deflect ALL the attention he had been getting from running his truck, setting off car alarms & etc. 

[Molden]

me own black 'eart jumps up in me throat it does, everytyme I remember seeing Bozzie out in th' parkin' lot with a stranger, it does! Thankfully both boys were crated, and she was a contientious dog lover....like you and Lady D, when I think of it, I don't know exactly how to take that... *whew!*

[Lady Mikayla of Phoenicia]

Me too Hun and I don't thynk there are too many things that get Mary as wide-eyed as when I told her THAT story!  I very clearly see lil Bozman's face looking up at me in the car as he recognized my voiice, "Mommie is that you?"  oy vay thank goodness she was a dog lover and being very careful with my prancy prancy show dog... (Roman just tooted whew...) 

[Molden]

(Roman just tooted whew...) 

LOL! That's a dog tale of it's OWN!