Good Dogs, Unleashed!

We’ve been approved to host obedience lessons in Paper Mill Park on Tuesdays from 7-8, starting May 8th!  All breeds and ages are welcome, but all dogs must be vaccinated. We’ll be covering sit, down, stay, come, drop it, leave it, good leash walking, polite greetings and common behavior problem solutions. Clicker training will be offered but is not required. Contact us to register!

At the end of August, we finally moved out of the ghetto. While the house we lived in wasn’t terrible, it was definitely a stupid, impulse decision to move there and it was a poor choice. The landlords were nightmares. Constantly talking down to us, treating us like we were second-class citizens because we rent and just generally being difficult to deal with. On top of that, the landlord’s father would show up at the property unannounced on a regular basis to do yard work. Not only does this go against the landlord tenant code, and our lease, but is also disruptive to my schedule, freaks out Chomper and is creepy as hell. The week before we moved out, I found him in my kitchen window at 8 in the morning. Yes, he might have been pulling weeds or some crap, but I was in my pajamas and hadn’t even had my coffee yet. Rude and creepy.

So we finally were set to move out on the 31st, but spent our last night at the new place. We showed up the next morning to find our back deck painted, and all our back deck stuff gone. This included the $80 metal baby gate we use to keep the dogs on the deck. I freaked out and called the landlord who was rude and dismissive. The landlord’s dad showed up and told us he thought we moved out so he threw away all our stuff.. And not just threw away in our trash, but dumped illegally in the people across the street’s trash. The gate was obviously gone since people pick through trash there all the time and who wouldn’t want a free baby gate? The landlord’s showed up to do a walkthrough of the house and offered me their old, beat up baby gate that was missing pieces. No deal there bucko. They still refuse to buy a new gate, but I have an appointment with my lawyer on Wednesday and I think he’ll be able to handle it.

The other thing about us moving out, was that during the walkthrough, the landlord complained that the house smelled “like dog.” Now, we had permission to have Chomper, and Petey is a service dog who is allowed to be in any housing he damn well pleases. The house smelled mostly like rug cleaner since we were extra nice and got the carpets cleaned. Other than that, it smelled overwhelmingly like wet basement. Which is understandable considering this was what the basement looked like the morning after Hurricane Irene:

Dirty standing water smells bad?

But obviously it wasn’t the water that smelled bad, it was “dog piss.” Nice try landlord, but my dogs don’t go in the basement. Ever. It didn’t smell until we had a HURRICANE. Basements all over the east coast smell like this right now. Don’t be a jerk, jerk.

-By the way, the hurricane was incredibly anticlimactic where we live. I told everyone that it would be. We’re not near any bodies of water that would flood, so I wasn’t worried. Chomper, who is terrified of the average thunderstorm (see Petey Takes Drugs), spent the night sleeping and didn’t need any sedatives at all. Boyfriend and I had an epic, 4 hour game of Trivial Pursuit (I won, obviously) and Petey spent the night like this:

Hurricane? What hurricane?

Anyway, other than the basement, the landlords seemed genuinely surprised that the house was in the exact same condition that they left it to us in. Uh, yeah, we’re not jerks like you people, of course we took care of your stupid, falling apart, poorly painted house. Do we seem like irresponsible people? No, obviously. The best part was at the end when the ass told us we should think about buying a house. I think he works for a mortgage company or some crap. Yeah, like we’d ever talk to you again after any of this. Don’t think so.

On to the AWESOME part of moving. The house we want won’t be ready until the end of the month, so we moved in with boyfriend’s parents. They have a huge fenced yard, and pool, a hot tub, and the best part is that their property backs up to a creek surrounded by tons of woods. The dogs are having a blast running around off leash back there, and Petey has even taken to playing in the water.

What? I've always liked water. Duh.

This is of course, awesome. Since I still can’t do anything to strenuous, and sometimes walking 2 dogs is just too strenuous, having the ability to take them for a walk off leash is perfect. Petey does superbly well with staying close to me and Chomper checks in every few minutes before running off into the woods again. Petey also lets me take glamour shots of him:

Dead eyes.

Today, Petey used a downed tree to balance beam himself right across the creek. I’ve been doing this every day, but this was the first time he followed me. It was awesome. He has amazing balance and can jump ridiculous heights and lengths. Agility trials here we come. But not really because I don’t have the self-discipline for that stuff. I will make him jump through stuff and walk across narrow things though, so that kind of counts.

The only problem, as usual, is the Chomp Star’s typical fear aggression issues. The house already had 2 large pugs and 1 large chihuahua/pug. All females. Chomper does not approve of this situation at all. The big pug is about 30lbs, deaf and mostly blind. Chomper ignores her completely, and Pudge ignores Chomper right back. The medium pup is about 25lbs, and apathetic toward Chomper, so she ignores her back too. The little pup weighs in at around 20lbs and is a yippy little bugger. She is terrified of both Chomper, and Petey. She hides from them, and as soon as they start to leave the room, she’s breaks into a fit of barking, “Yeah, that’s right, you keep walking!” Chomper does not like other female dogs. She does not like dogs that bark or act up in any way. This makes for a problem. Luckily, Chomper mostly just wants to herd all three dogs into a corner or under the table and then she’s satisfied. For now. We only had one little skirmish at the door when the pizza guy came. Mostly just a lot of noise and snarling, but I yanked Chomper up quickly and put her in the bedroom to cool off for a while.

Besides the dogs, Chomper has nipped at boyfriend’s brother while he tried to put bug spray on, and barked menacingly at brother’s girlfriend as she came up the basement stairs. Chomper’s original owner taught her that biting feet was a fun game, so the foot nip, while bad, is not surprising. Chomper’s veterinarian and I also believe that she may have progressive retinal atrophy. This manifests itself in crappy eyesight from a young age, especially in the dark. She’s always had issues with growling at the top of dark stairwells. Usually, once you get close enough for her to see who you are, she wags her tail and gives a little doggy apology. This of course, does not make it any less disconcerting when she’s growling at you. So mostly, Chomper has stayed close to me, in the backyard, or in the bedroom. So far, so good, considering. Then again, it hasn’t even been a week.

The day after Petey got neutered, he was quiet and sleepy most of the morning. This was highly unusual, but I wasn’t worried, I figured he was sore and hungover from pain meds. When he got up around 11 though, I started to get concerned. He was walking funny, and not the “I just lost my testicles” spread legged walk that I’ve seen before, but a woozy, legs coming out from under him kinda funny. I tried to walk him across the room and he was uninterested. I coaxed him with some treats and he started walking sideways. At this point, my overactive imagination slash worst case scenario pessimism kicked in. Clearly he’s neurologic. They must have done something wrong in the surgery. Maybe he’s having a bad reaction to the anesthesia (yes, 20 some odd hours after he got it, shut up). I switched my brain to tech mode and started a full exam. Heart rate slowish, but normal, reactions normal, conscious proprioception normal (flip over each paw and see how long his reaction is to flipping it back to normal). Clearly he is just in pain and groggy and I’m overreacting.

So of course, I text someone. This someone happens to be one of our foster pups new moms, and we talk on a regular basis. She’s hilarious and awesome and if we lived closer to each other, we would be best friends. Sadly, she doesn’t. But she does have a male dog who just recently got neutered and ended up with a terrible infection. He had some antibiotics and is fine now, but I thought I’d ask her if she’d noticed any of the same symptoms. Even in the back of my head, I knew he wasn’t acting normally, but I didn’t want to completely freak out. He still wanted food, so I took that as a good sign.

I decided to watch him for a while to see how things progressed. As I waited, I thought I’d do some laundry. Standing in our bedroom folding clothes, I noticed Petey licking the floor. Great, another button from the comforter. Nope. Crushed pink pill. Specifically, the half a sedative I had on my bedside table for Chomper and the loud thunderstorms we’d been having. In my half consciousness in the middle of the night before, I had taken out 1 1/2 pills for her. 1 I shoved immediately down her throat so she would stop clawing at my face in a thunder panic. The other I apparently sat on the table, so of course, Petey ate it.

This explained everything. Now that I knew what happened, I recognized all the same signs as when I drug Chomper. Woozy walk, slowed movements, droopy eyes, drunk crooked stare. I contemplated calling poison control or the vet, but only for about 2 seconds. First, poison control costs $75 a pop and they’d just tell me to go to the vet anyway. 2nd, I knew he had gotten into it hours ago, so there wasn’t going to be much they could do. They could induce vomiting, but the pill was probably already absorbed, and they could give charcoal, but I didn’t think he needed it. I decided to just watch and wait. It was a small dose and he weighed almost as much as Chomper. He was fine, but drunk as a skunk. By all reports, he was extra maniacal the next day while staying with my sister. Which was fine with me.

Tooth!

Every morning, after their walk, the dogs wrestle and run around together. Today, Petey came up bloody. We saw he was missing a toofer, but we didn’t think we’d find it. Normally, dogs swallow their puppy teeth, or they get lost in the carpet or grass or whatever. Lucky for us, we found it! Here’s a picture of the hole it left:

Tooth hole!

Today was Petey’s first outing into a public place to test his temperament for therapy work. This is separate from the psychiatric support he provides me at home. This is simply to see how he will do if we decide to also train him for therapy work with hospital patients (I’d really like to, he’s such a huge help to me, I think it would be great to share him with others). Here he is riding in the front seat (also a first). He did super well at the pharmacy, we only had to wait in line for a moment. I, on the other hand, didn’t do so well as I left my drivers license on the counter. ‘Tis the nature of the beast.

Now that summer is hear, our furry friends are being exposed to a slew of parasites in an around our homes. Fleas can be one of the hardest parasites to get rid of once they’ve infested your home and they also can transmit intestinal parasites. Ticks aren’t a problem in all areas of the country, but they can be dangerous for those of us who live with them. Ticks can transmit things like Lyme disease, ehrlichia, Rocky Mountain Spotted fever, anaplasmosis an so on (we’ll talk about each of these tick-borne diseases in an upcoming post).

A flea and tick prevention plan is a dog’s best bet toward staying safe from these parasites, so here’s a list of common products and their uses. Remember, you should never start using any product without consulting with your veterinarian.

The dog park is a great place for our pets to get exercise and learn to socialize with other dogs and people. Dog parks are also a great place to meet other dog lovers and share stories and advice. Here are some simple rules to follow to keep the peace and make the dog park fun for everyone.

1. Don’t bring food! Although it might seem harmless, food can spark a variety of problems. Food can often cause skirmishes among dogs. Although your dog may have no issues with food aggression, you can’t be sure about the other dogs who are at the park. Don’t expect to be able to keep those treats a secret either. A dog’s nose can sniff out even the smallest piece of kibble. Yes, even if it’s in a sealed container or a zip lock bag. Remember, there are dogs trained to sniff out drugs, explosives, even cancer cells! Nothing you do to hide those treats is going to fool those nostrils!
2. Leave your expensive toys at home. Anything that you bring to the dog park is going to be fair game for chewing and tug of war. We promise your dog will enjoy fetching a cheap tennis ball or a stick. If there’s a toy you can’t bear to see get destroyed or lost, keep it for playing in the house or the backyard at home.
3. Bring clean H2O. Many dog parks have water fountains for people and pups, but it’s always better to bring some just in case.
4. Don’t pick up your small dogs. Although you just want to protect your dog, you’re actually putting yourself and your dog in a bad position. You don’t want to put your face at mouth level for one, and for two, you only make the dogs on the ground want to jump up on you to reach your precious pooch! You’d have better luck if you use your body to protect your dog by positioning yourself between her and the group. Better yet, try taking your dog to a park that has a separate area for small dogs!
5. Small children don’t belong at the park! Although we’re big believers in having children and dogs be comfortable with each other, the dog park is not an appropriate place for that to happen. Dogs of all sizes are often running free at the dog park, and even the friendliest dog can accidently knock over small kids.