Mom has started her Halloween decorating. She is debating whether she needs to buy more skeleton dogs because there are 3 of us. What do you think?
We think she has enough scary stuff already. Do you know the name of the plant that Sofie is chewing on? It’s called ‘BLOOD GRASS.’ Ha Ha Ha Ha. It is invasive and will soon take over everything if we let it. Sort of like us. We animals at the DogDaz Zoo sure take over everything. And that’s the way we like it.
Hello Blog Friends – We found some very interesting things on our walk today that I want to tell you about.
We found a red balloon, which we learned means that there are clowns in the storm drains. We think that is just silly. The kids told us the clown’s name is “Pennywise.” We think Pennywise may just be clownfoolish. I think we will stay away from the storm drains for a while anyway. Mom says they are dangerous for dog paws and best to be avoided if something is going to grab you and pull you in.
Then we found an Eastern Box Turtle walking across the road. We wanted to play with it but Mommy said ‘No.’ She always says ‘No.’ These are common turtles in our area and best left alone unless they are in danger. Around here you have to be careful because the car in front of you may stop for what appears to be no reason and you will find it is to let the turtle cross the road. That makes me think of a joke: “Why did the turtle cross the road…. to get to the other side. ” Bark Out Loud, I am funny!!!
What kind of mischief did you get into today? – Louise (aka Lulu Belle the comedian)
It all started 2 weeks ago Wednesday night with Louise throwing up, twice. Then the smelly gas started. It was so bad all night that I had to move her to another room. Louise rarely throws up. Her tummy was grumbling and making weird noises, which it does sometimes with her colitis. But this was different. She was refusing to eat, which she just doesn’t do. She was mopey and blue. I made her favorite chicken and rice. No luck. The other dogs were sniffing her behind a lot, which they do when her Perianal Fistula Disease is acting up.
When she refused her breakfast Saturday morning, I called my usual vet. But it was Saturday morning and he was packed, so he said to go to the emergency vet. Before doing that, I called the cats vet (it’s a long story why I have 2 different vets) and luckily they were able to fit her in.
After waiting almost 2 hours (Louise was a doll, as usual), they did blood work and gave her fluids and some other stuff. They put her on Metronidazole (Flagyl), which is really hard on the system. She was not herself.
On Tuesday the vet called (while I was in the middle of grocery shopping, so you know I only heard half of what she said). She is a new vet to the practice, I had not met her before, and she is really nice and spent a lot of time explaining her diagnosis to me (while my ice cream was melting). She ran this special blood test (SPEC cPL) that showed significant pancreatic inflammation (high normal is 200 ug/L and Louise is 1,369). All the other blood work was normal. The Vet added Clavamox (Oh My Dog that is expensive) and some Spleen Support Formula on top of the Metronidazole.
In the last 2 weeks, I have researched the heck out of Pancreatitis in dogs. High-fat diets are one of the main things that they blame pancreatitis on. Since Louise has been on Z/D ultra (19% protein/14% fat) exclusively for years and never gets table scraps or garbage, it is hard for me to believe this is diet based. Certain conditions may predispose dogs to pancreatitis and I am thinking that it is just a mix of genetics and her other health issues.
Getting 5 pills into Louise at every meal has been a challenge. When she first got sick I ground them with some white meat chicken and wet food in the blender. I usually use Peanut Butter to give the dogs pills, but that is off limits because of the fat issue. After a few meals Louise started to refuse the mash. So now I wrap each pill in some cooked chicken breast and gooble gooble gooble. She is happy to eat again. Louise loves chicken.
We go back to the vet today to redo the test, so hopefully this bout has passed.
Charles loves Louise. If she sniffs something, he sniffs it. If she pees on it, he has to pee on it. He follows her so closely sometimes that it bothers me, because he fits perfectly under her torso which freaks her out, and because he doesn’t move when she is peeing, which grosses me out.
Something very interesting must have come down the center of the road last night and since the dogs’ smellers are 25X more powerful than mine, they know what it is, but I sure don’t. Sofie is usually my street sniffer and mostly it is right in the center. Sometimes I have to pull her to the side so she doesn’t get run over by a car. The only thing I can think of is that it must be the foxes who walk down the center ridge (I don’t know why) and maybe they pee as they go.
With 3 dogs, it is very easy to run out of hands or feel like you are on a medieval rack when everyone wants to move along (in different directions usually) and you need to stop and pick something up (after getting a bag out of the pouch, unfolding it, and bending down… you get the picture) My answer is a CHAIN GANG (but a happy one not a bunch of prisoners). Since Mr. Charles wants to keep going and nothing stops him, I loop him onto Sofie’s lead. Then Sofie holds him back (since he is a little afraid of her) and I loop her onto Louise, who in most cases will stay when I tell her to. Louise is the heaviest and strongest of the 3 so I can keep control down the line.
Sniff and pee – Pee and sniff – What kind of mischief did you get into today?
DogDaz remembers and salutes the victims and survivors of the September 11th Terror Attack
I visited Ground Zero at the World Trade Center 9/11 Memorial while it was under construction. I am standing by the giant man-made waterfall with the names of the victims around the outside. It is very humbling and very eerie. Let the world practice peace and make war no more. – Lorian
I discovered this place where I can get nice dog and cat toys at a good discount. I actually went in to get some new drinking glasses, because too many have broken and I needed new ones (but I digress).
Knowing my charges as I do, Louise got a stuffing-less Squeaky Skunk, Sofie got a flat bat looking thing that crinkles, and Mr. Charles got a rope and ball. They were so excited and each played with their respective gifts for about 10 minutes. Then, we went outside for a while.
When we returned to the living room, Charles started doing what he does best – toy hoarding. First, he stole Sofie’s crinkle thing – she was distracted so she didn’t put up a fuss. Then he moved onto Louise’s skunk (which appears to be his new favorite). Louise was a bit unhappy, so she went over to her pillow and moped until I rescued skunk and gave it back to her.
The other dogs’ toys are always more fun. Charles ends up sitting on a pile of everyone’s toys so only he has them.
I don’t really need a weather app on my phone to tell me a thunderstorm is coming. Here at DogDaz Storm Center, we have 2 main thunder warning systems – Louise and Sofie.
In the middle of the night last Monday, some how, Louise managed to unlock her kennel, by herself, and come upstairs and start breathing on my while I slept. Then Sofie, who rarely comes on my bed, pushed me away from my pillows and hunkered down in my spot. It sounded like a freight train coming through the house and the flash and clap were immediate. Amazingly, 15 minutes later an EF2 tornado touched down on the other shore of the Chesapeake Bay on Kent Island (I’m the Western Shore and that is called the Eastern Shore). It started as a waterspout and took full tornado strength (125 mph winds) quickly. Thankfully, though there was a lot of property damage, only 1 person was slightly hurt.
Who needs all those meteorologists when you have 2 dogs that can tell you at least 2 hours before something major happens that something is going to happen? Do you really need to know more than that? Get to cover!!!!
Lucky for me, Charlies seems fine through the storms and the cats don’t show me much anxiety. These 2 big babies take enough attention for the whole Zoo.
Foot note: They are both huddled under my desk as I type this because yet another storm is passing through. This is summer on the Chesapeake Bay. Oh, my!
Cats sometimes pick the oddest things to sleep on. Here is Noel, in the newpaper box on the table (her recent favorite hangout), sleeping against a watermelon. It sure does not look comfortable to me. She is a funny girl, that Noel. You just have to love her.
At DogDaz Zoo, I try to control the amount of food that any animal eats in a day based on their size and energy level. I parse out all kibble in the morning into containers and then give a portion at each feeding, making sure that there is some left over for evening in-house play. The dogs have several toys to chose from (1) a large feeding cube (mostly used by Sofie), (2) a medium feed ball (which was too big for Charles, too little for Lulu, and Sofie doesn’t like it). So I got, (3) a little feed ball (for Charles, who can’t figure it out), (4) a big rope jug (that Louise LOVES), and (5) a spinner (currently only Sofie’s survived because Louise ate hers – bottom is rubber).
Everyone waits, impatiently, in the evening for play time. I used to wait until 8 PM or so to do this, but now they have started demanding play time earlier and earlier. Sometimes, I give in and they have playtime only 30 minutes after dinner. What’s the difference, it’s all their food anyway.
Charles gets a special treat in a puzzle bowl with some kibble, because he is either too lazy for the feed ball, or just doesn’t want to lower himself to work for it. He loves a teeny tiny Busy Bone (r) and will gobble it up as soon as he finds one under the kibble.
We have lots of food fun at the Zoo. What kind of mischief did you get into today?
Mom has started her Halloween decorating. She is debating whether she needs to buy more skeleton dogs because there are 3 of us. What do you think?
DogDaz Zoo 