This is Belle, aka Bellatrix LeStrangedog. She's an australian cattledog (used to be known as a blue heeler until they got ritzy). She doesn't heel the horses, thankfully, but she does enjoy "wristing" her humans. I'm thinking it's her way of telling us "keep a hand on the dog at all times". She gently mouths our wrists until we pay attention to her.
What she does chase is rodents. GOOD DOG BELLE! I may have to scoop the rodent corpses out of the barn, but keeping their populations under control is of paramount importance during rattlesnake season. Fewer rodents in the barn means fewer snakes in there to prey on them. GOOD DOG BELLE!
She's also a wonderful watch dog and alerts me whenever anything or anyone is in the yard that shouldn't be. She's extremely friendly so visitors are completely safe. Some of the adult horses intimidate her, the babies consider her another foal. She naps side by side with the babies.
My two year old colt, Desi, loves to play chase back and forth with his buddy Belle and Belle adores her pal Desi. When they're tired of their games they'll share a drink out of the same water pail before Belle wanders off to snooze with her foals.
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Some people are like slinkies. They don't have a purpose But they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs
I've got two pampered pets. The picture of Molly was taken right after she broke her leg falling down the stairs. She was 5 months old at the time. She's 4 now. Peanut, my Chihuahua, has had a variety of health problems. When she was about 6 months old, she got vasculitis in her ear veins which resulted in necrosis along the rims. No vet could figure out what to do. Her ears were literally rotting off. I ended up taking her to the veterinary school of medicine at NC State University. The vets there think the cause was the rabies vaccine. At the vaccine sight, she had a knot for months and the muscle there eventually died, but it doesn't cause her problems. They prescribed an ointment for her ears that decreases the auto-immune response, similar to medication they give transplant patients. I had to put it on using gloves because it can cause cancer. Her ears healed up nicely although they look a little moth-eaten. She also has epilepsy, so she's on phenobarbital twice a day for the rest of her little life. Peanut is a great dog though. I took her to work until she was 6 months old so she is well socialized. Peanut is 3 yrs old now. . I've also got two parrots...Noah who talks, dances, sings and cusses. I got him in 1997. He was a year old then and should live to be about 40. He is a red-sided eclectus. Then there's Rocky Rodan, a red-lored amazon, who only talks parrot talk and occasionally barks like a dog. He was supposedly 6 months old when I got him lm 1985 so I've had him most of my life. He should live another 15-20 yrs.[spoiler]
My dog, Annie, who is perhaps the least refined dog in the history of dogs. She snorts and snuffles. She scrubs her butt on the carpet. She eats what one might delicately call "nuggets" out of the litter box. She'll try to eat dirt, rubber bands, jalapenos, Gummi Bears, and even strawberry Newtons. Compared to her, Jean's dog Elmo is practically Sir Laurence Olivier.
I often go to the grocery store on the way home from work because it's more efficient; I'm already in town and it saves a trip. So one day I bought a package of strawberry Newtons, ate exactly one, and put the package on my nightstand and entertained lovely notions of having a cup of coffee and some strawberry Newtons later on while reading my latest book.
Much too late I noticed that my dog, AKA The Amazing Stomach, was licking her chops. She's eaten the whole package. All of them. She once ate my Whopper when I turned my back on it (and her) for about thirty seconds. Another time she ate all the meat, cheese and vegetable matter (including a lot of jalapenos) out of my submarine sandwich. She once Hoovered all the topping off a slice of pizza, including the sauce, leaving me with a limp piece of crust about the color of a manila folder. How appetizing.
But she means well. She's the happiest little dog all the time anyway, and when you give her a little bite of your smoked sausage, why, she's suddenly having the best day ever.
I LOVE Molly and Peanut! There should be more little dogs in the world. One more person tries to tell me how "adorable!" their pitt bull is and I may become homicidal.
Belle is a great dog. She's friendly, mid sized, and works for a livin'. My heart, however, is with little cuddly dogs. William mentioned "Elmo" (aka Hellmo). He sleeps late, sacks out spread eagle on his back in the middle of our bed. Flops on his back with his head on my shoulder while I watch bull riding. Follows me everywhere in the house. Goes outside for no more than about 5 minutes at a time, 4 times daily, and thinks rain is too icky for Elmos.
Last night we found that William can add another item to the list of things his "Dawg", Annie, eats. I went into our room and found her looking mighty guilty on the bed. She'd managed to sneak some Skittles out of a bag William had left on the bed (no doubt thinking "no dog would eat these"). He forgot to mention that Anniedawg loves pickles and tomatoes too.
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Some people are like slinkies. They don't have a purpose But they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs
Your dogs sound like great companions even if one eats everything in sight. I have always had dogs since the day I was born, and I will always have them. The hardest thing is letting them go and knowing when it's time for them to pass on. It is one of the hardest things I've ever done. Yeah, both my dogs are small. Molly is 7 lbs and Peanut is 4.5 lbs. When I got Peanut at 8 weeks old, she weighed 13 ozs. I was startled by the size of her and had expected her to be bigger. The picture of her you see was taken shortly after that. She gets cold so easily so when she was that small I had to buy little girl socks and cut them up to make sweaters for her. She has graduated to women's socks now.
Your dogs sound like great companions even if one eats everything in sight. I have always had dogs since the day I was born, and I will always have them. The hardest thing is letting them go and knowing when it's time for them to pass on. It is one of the hardest things I've ever done. Yeah, both my dogs are small. Molly is 7 lbs and Peanut is 4.5 lbs. When I got Peanut at 8 weeks old, she weighed 13 ozs. I was startled by the size of her and had expected her to be bigger. The picture of her you see was taken shortly after that. She gets cold so easily so when she was that small I had to buy little girl socks and cut them up to make sweaters for her. She has graduated to women's socks now.
What kind of dog is Molly? The whole reason we got Elmo was because we visited a mall Pet Shop one day and I held a tiny teacup yorkie puppy that barely filled the palm of my hand. Elmo is a big boy. Right now he weighs 12 lbs, which is the heaviest he's ever been and he's not fat. As much as I adore the teacup sized dogs, I'd be terrified I'd roll over it in my wheelchair, or one of us would roll over on it in bed, or that William would crush it by planting a foot on it. Elmo and Annie are so underfoot when he comes home, anything smaller wouldn't stand a chance.
Elmish gave us a terrible scare a few months ago. He came down with a terrible local disease called Valley Fever. It's a fungal infection that animals and people can get around here when the wind blows the dust around. The spores are in the dirt and carried on the wind. Elmo went to bed well and woke up so sick he literally could not do anything other than cough. He coughed so hard he was foaming at the mouth and broke little blood vessels in his eyeballs making them a bright red color.
He's been on Fluconozole for 3 months. He's doing better. He can eat on his own now but he's not as active as he used to be. His lowered activity level has finally allowed him to put on weight. Before he got sick, he ate more than Anniedawg but was skinnier than Don Knotts.
He's still not well and is on the medication for at the very least another 3 months. If the disease spreads to his spine or his brain there won't be much chance of recovery. Right now he just has a limp, has some trouble getting up and down from the bed (I see doggie stairs in our future), and has a bit of difficulty eating out of a low dish on the floor.
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Some people are like slinkies. They don't have a purpose But they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs
Gosh, I hate to hear that about Elmish!!! I've never heard of Valley Fever but seeing as how it is not a disease around here, I'm not surprised I didn't know about it. I hope he gets completely well soon. Sounds like he's had a bad time of it though but is getting better.
I bought Molly from a breeder in Hickory, NC. She is CKC registered as a Pomeranian. The dog I had prior to her was a Pomeranian, and he was only about 5.5 lbs. But they can be bigger though.
When I first saw her I noticed immediately she had awfully big ears for a Pom, but she stole my heart and I bought her anyway. Turns out she has luxating patellas (floating kneecaps) that is a genetic disorder usually inherited although it can show up in any dog. Fortunately she's not lame, but I fear she will get arthritis as she gets older. The surgery to fix it in Raleigh at the NC State Univ. Veterinarty School of Medicine, which would be the cheapest place to have it done, is around $4,000. You can feel them slip out of place, but so far it doesn't seem to bother her and her vet said since she's already 4 yrs old, she probably won't go lame.
But I digress. I think Molly is a cross between a Pomeranian and a Chihuahua. Look at the picture below and you'll see why. I was giving her a bath, and you can see how big her ears are. She's a great dog though. Love Poms. They're very affectionate, loyal and are easily trained. They can bark a lot, but Molly seems to only bark if someone knocks on the door or she is excited about going outside.
I worried about Peanut being so small too and rolling over her in bed or stepping on her. Until she was a year old, I had her sleep in her crate on a chair by the bed. Now they both sleep with me, and she is always right beside me under the covers. They seem to have an innate sense of getting out of the way when you're walking or rolling around, but it's not unheard of for them to be crushed. Actually Peanut can never go outside again. It's sad but since she had that reaction to the rabies vaccine, she can never get any vaccines again, including distemper or parvo, because it could kill her. She's paper-trained and does very well with that. It's probably just as well that she stay indoors because we have a family of red-shouldered hawks in the trees behind the house, and Peanut woud make a good meal for them. I've seen them take squirrels with no problem.
Keep us posted on Elmish. I'm included two photos. One of Molly wet and another of Molly and Peanut together.
Here's something I found cute, written by Kody Lostroh:
"This week I want to tell you about my new pup I just picked up. She's a breed of dog called a Catahoula. They are used to work cows, and some people use them to hunt wild hogs as well. I use mine to work cows, mostly because we don't have any wild hogs in Colorado! Anyways, these dogs have a natural instinct to work. Which is great, because if they didn't they wouldn't be very good cow dogs. But that natural instinct to work can be a very frustrating thing for the owner when the pup doesn't know what his or her job is. Well, that's exactly where I'm at with my new pup. She has the instinct to work and round up cows. But at this point in her life, she doesn't know the difference between a cow, a horse, a cat, a goat or anything else. All she knows is that something inside of her is telling her to chase and round up something. This strong force was put inside of her before she was ever born. To fill the desire inside her, she has to chase something--anything! The thing is, if she doesn't know what she's supposed to be chasing, she will chase every little thing that walks by and create total chaos."
How cute! I can imagine the worker dogs are just chock full of energy when they are puppies. I don't know if I'd have the patience.
I'm not much of a dog person. I feel about them the way some people feel about kids--other peoples' dogs are great! I can play with them for a bit, then give them back. However, since my husband is a dog person, we adopted two mutts about 11 years ago (shepard/huskie mixes). They're old now and don't do much besides lay around.
Here's something I found cute, written by Kody Lostroh:
"This week I want to tell you about my new pup I just picked up. She's a breed of dog called a Catahoula. They are used to work cows, and some people use them to hunt wild hogs as well. I use mine to work cows, mostly because we don't have any wild hogs in Colorado! Anyways, these dogs have a natural instinct to work. Which is great, because if they didn't they wouldn't be very good cow dogs. But that natural instinct to work can be a very frustrating thing for the owner when the pup doesn't know what his or her job is. Well, that's exactly where I'm at with my new pup. She has the instinct to work and round up cows. But at this point in her life, she doesn't know the difference between a cow, a horse, a cat, a goat or anything else. All she knows is that something inside of her is telling her to chase and round up something. This strong force was put inside of her before she was ever born. To fill the desire inside her, she has to chase something--anything! The thing is, if she doesn't know what she's supposed to be chasing, she will chase every little thing that walks by and create total chaos."
How cute! I can imagine the worker dogs are just chock full of energy when they are puppies. I don't know if I'd have the patience.
I'm not much of a dog person. I feel about them the way some people feel about kids--other peoples' dogs are great! I can play with them for a bit, then give them back. However, since my husband is a dog person, we adopted two mutts about 11 years ago (shepard/huskie mixes). They're old now and don't do much besides lay around.
That is a cute quote! He's a fair writer. I'm impressed. Or at least I'll be impressed AFTER Marchi wins the championship. Right now I refuse to get warm fuzzies over Kody lol.
Right now Belle is a bored "workin'" dog. The squirrels have all but gone for the winter, with a bit of help from Belle, Real Kill, as well as the cooler weather. She stays with the horses all day, but thankfully, doesn't herd them. She's learned they don't "herd" well. The adults will "herd" her butt right out of their paddocks. The babies just stand there looking at her. So, mostly she's become the "barn police". If the horses are arguing amongst themselves she barks at them to "BREAK IT UP!" When the vet or farrier come out, she's got her nose right in there with them, making sure they aren't killing her charges. If anything, like brushes, spray bottles, halters, the hose, or horse toys, are laying around untidily, she chews them up to teach us a lesson.
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Some people are like slinkies. They don't have a purpose But they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs
