Doggone rough week
Good news: Nala is doing much better. In fact, as of today I'd say she's just about normal again. Somewhat arthritic, but not to any sort of crippling degree. We had her at the dog park today, and she even trotted at times, tail perked up, cheerfully sniffing everything. Phew!
Jade, on the other hand, had a rough day. So, as stated above, MiniPlu and I took the dogs to the dog park this afternoon. Immediately upon our arrival, three or four dogs took to sniffing Jade all at once, and pouncing on her, which kind of overwhelmed her. And then one of the dogs decided to attack. Not play-attack, but proper-growling-snarling attack. With all the other dogs so close to her, Jade couldn't get away, and the other dog was clearly hurting her, because we could hear her going yipe yipe yipe yipe yip yip! One of the other adults was trying to help get them apart, but ended up tripping over one of the other dogs, ended up doing essentially a dive roll. Jade did eventually get away, but didn't want to put weight on her front right leg (ironically, the same one that bothered Nala so much on Thurs) and she was still crying. Not whining, but that crying yip, just broke my heart.
The owner of the attacking dog - a shepherd mix of some unspecific variety - quickly leashed his dog, as well as his well-behaved pit-bull mix (yes, the pittie was the sweet one). I was focused mostly on trying to soothe Jade, along with a couple of other owners who came to see if she was ok, but I did hear the owner say his shepherd-y dog had been getting crankier recently, and another owner saying he needed to socialize his dog more BEFORE bringing her to the park. (I got the impression the dog hadn't seemed particularly attack-prone today until Jade showed up. No idea why.) The owner didn't apologize, exactly, but he did ask repeatedly if Jade was ok, and the way he instantly corralled his dog and left right afterwards, showed at least he was trying to be responsible.
Thankfully, after letting Jade rest for a bit, and petting her, she got up, limped a little bit, and then seemed to shake it off. Sort of like if you turn your ankle a little, or crack your wrist, the way the pain fades after a few minutes. So, phew, didn't seem to suffer any major physical damage. I was really not keen on another trip to the emergency vet, given that we were there six hours the last time (the day after Jade came home).
However, she was clearly spooked by the event. She'd run around with the other dogs, and sometimes show she wanted to play on the outskirts of whatever wrestling other dogs were doing - rather like she did when she was younger - but the minute another dog tried to engage her directly, she hid under the bench we were sitting on. After a little while, we decided to cut short our visit and go home to get her away from the stress.
Then, to add insult to injury, we gave Jade a bath when we got home from the dog park. Between sloshing in muddy rainwater earlier in the week, and rolling around (or being rolled around in) the dirt at the dog park, she definitely needed cleaning. Poor dog.
Also, this was actually Jade's second attack this week. On Monday, we were walking past a neighbor's house down the street; they are, as another person put it, kind of white trash. The mother is alcoholic, the father is bipolar and doesn't take his meds, the teen daughter is probably the most responsible of all of them, and there's a 12-year-old girl who is kind of a socially deficient thorn in the side of other neighborhood kids. They have pit bulls who aren't ... bad, really, but totally untrained. And they can jump over 6'/2m fences. And don't have collars. So, anyway, we were walking the dogs by their house, one of the pits jumped the fence, and came to sniff Jade. A few seconds later he decided to get snarly with her, so I scooped her up into my arms (all 35lbs/15.8kg of her) and walked back to the home's front door, trusting the pit bull to follow us (he did). Whereupon the 12-year-old came out to claim him. Without apologizing. No real harm done there, to Jade, but still unnerving. We've decided to walk on the opposite side of the street in future - it would be hard to avoid that section of neighborhood entirely as their house sits at a crux where a LOT of walking routes go past.
So, yeah, rough week for our dogs. *pets*
In other news: we bought a Christmas tree last night and decorated it tonight. Looks lovely! Also, R&K were kind enough to take a detour on their way to driving to Florida, swinging by our house for a late dinner (Chinese) and birthday cake (whipped up at the last min) so the twins could have some sort of celebration together. Their actual bday is Mon; it's rare for them to be separated for the occasion, so it was important to both of them to do something together.
Jade, on the other hand, had a rough day. So, as stated above, MiniPlu and I took the dogs to the dog park this afternoon. Immediately upon our arrival, three or four dogs took to sniffing Jade all at once, and pouncing on her, which kind of overwhelmed her. And then one of the dogs decided to attack. Not play-attack, but proper-growling-snarling attack. With all the other dogs so close to her, Jade couldn't get away, and the other dog was clearly hurting her, because we could hear her going yipe yipe yipe yipe yip yip! One of the other adults was trying to help get them apart, but ended up tripping over one of the other dogs, ended up doing essentially a dive roll. Jade did eventually get away, but didn't want to put weight on her front right leg (ironically, the same one that bothered Nala so much on Thurs) and she was still crying. Not whining, but that crying yip, just broke my heart.
The owner of the attacking dog - a shepherd mix of some unspecific variety - quickly leashed his dog, as well as his well-behaved pit-bull mix (yes, the pittie was the sweet one). I was focused mostly on trying to soothe Jade, along with a couple of other owners who came to see if she was ok, but I did hear the owner say his shepherd-y dog had been getting crankier recently, and another owner saying he needed to socialize his dog more BEFORE bringing her to the park. (I got the impression the dog hadn't seemed particularly attack-prone today until Jade showed up. No idea why.) The owner didn't apologize, exactly, but he did ask repeatedly if Jade was ok, and the way he instantly corralled his dog and left right afterwards, showed at least he was trying to be responsible.
Thankfully, after letting Jade rest for a bit, and petting her, she got up, limped a little bit, and then seemed to shake it off. Sort of like if you turn your ankle a little, or crack your wrist, the way the pain fades after a few minutes. So, phew, didn't seem to suffer any major physical damage. I was really not keen on another trip to the emergency vet, given that we were there six hours the last time (the day after Jade came home).
However, she was clearly spooked by the event. She'd run around with the other dogs, and sometimes show she wanted to play on the outskirts of whatever wrestling other dogs were doing - rather like she did when she was younger - but the minute another dog tried to engage her directly, she hid under the bench we were sitting on. After a little while, we decided to cut short our visit and go home to get her away from the stress.
Then, to add insult to injury, we gave Jade a bath when we got home from the dog park. Between sloshing in muddy rainwater earlier in the week, and rolling around (or being rolled around in) the dirt at the dog park, she definitely needed cleaning. Poor dog.
Also, this was actually Jade's second attack this week. On Monday, we were walking past a neighbor's house down the street; they are, as another person put it, kind of white trash. The mother is alcoholic, the father is bipolar and doesn't take his meds, the teen daughter is probably the most responsible of all of them, and there's a 12-year-old girl who is kind of a socially deficient thorn in the side of other neighborhood kids. They have pit bulls who aren't ... bad, really, but totally untrained. And they can jump over 6'/2m fences. And don't have collars. So, anyway, we were walking the dogs by their house, one of the pits jumped the fence, and came to sniff Jade. A few seconds later he decided to get snarly with her, so I scooped her up into my arms (all 35lbs/15.8kg of her) and walked back to the home's front door, trusting the pit bull to follow us (he did). Whereupon the 12-year-old came out to claim him. Without apologizing. No real harm done there, to Jade, but still unnerving. We've decided to walk on the opposite side of the street in future - it would be hard to avoid that section of neighborhood entirely as their house sits at a crux where a LOT of walking routes go past.
So, yeah, rough week for our dogs. *pets*
In other news: we bought a Christmas tree last night and decorated it tonight. Looks lovely! Also, R&K were kind enough to take a detour on their way to driving to Florida, swinging by our house for a late dinner (Chinese) and birthday cake (whipped up at the last min) so the twins could have some sort of celebration together. Their actual bday is Mon; it's rare for them to be separated for the occasion, so it was important to both of them to do something together.