critter central...
So, a few days ago, I alluded to yet more critter adventures, but never followed up on it. Heh. That's because they're FRAKKING ONGOING! *headdesk*
Anyway…
Last Thursday, while I was out back gardening and rescuing injured stray dogs, we got a phone call about a pair of ducks in our driveway. O_o While we do have a small river as the back boundary of our property, it's pretty overgrown and I've never seen ducks there. Don't they more prefer lakes and ponds? But these ducks seemed to dig our concrete driveway. Of course, I didn't know about this until later, because…
I was out back, rescuing a stray dog. Originally, I was weeding our garden, but then I heard a ruckus a couple of houses down from us and, realizing that it was a gang of neighborhood kids (ranging in age from 6 to about 10) yelling at a small dog. They were trying to get her to stop jumping on them, but all the yelling and bouncing was just getting the dog more excited. (Duh!)
As the only adult around (!!!), I went over to check it out. At about the same time the little beagle-sized dog jumped up on me, the oldest of the kids informed me that the dog was bleeding, which I quickly discovered on my own because of the blood smear on my leg. Poor thing.
I grabbed her collar, which of course has NO tags or ID of any kind, and made her hold still for a minute while I determined that the blood was coming from her mouth. Kind of unsettling, but she wasn't foaming at the mouth or anything, so I dragged her away from the kids (not a big deal as she was quite willing to come with me) and put her into our fenced back yard while I ran for Dr. T.
Turns out the dog had been seen off and on in the neighborhood for at least two weeks and no one knew anything about where she came from, nor had anyone apparently been looking for her. Tammy said she looked very healthy, all things considered, and that the cut was in her mouth and would just do its thing - no way to bandage it or put pressure on it, but it should stop bleeding on its own, as it didn't appear to be too deep. From the color of and wear on her teeth, she's around a year old, maybe a little less. She's also been spayed. But she'd clearly been living out in the woods for days and the poor baby was absolutely covered in ticks. (EW!)
We managed to get some of the ticks off of her using rubbing alcohol, but they were hurting her and so she wouldn't stand for many more. We figured I'd get some Frontline or something on the way home from work the next day to get rid of the rest and give her a flea/tick bath and all that once the majority of the little bastards had dropped off of her. I fed her and gave her some water and she and Tasha kind of sniffed at each other through the fence (no way I was letting them into the same area with all those ticks on the little girl).
Don was off the next day and planned on working on the brick patio that he's creating in the back yard, so she'd have some company and supervision while I was at work. Unfortunately, he's used to having dogs that stick around and wasn't was watchful as he should have been when he was bringing supplies through the gate - the little girl ran off after she got scared by some loud noises. So I got a call at work that I should not stop for Frontline but rather come straight home so we could go look for her. Which I did, but no joy - she was nowhere to be found. And we didn't have a name for her, so we couldn't even call her. :(
Flash forward to this weekend. I'm standing out back, talking to a neighbor and three people go walking through our backyard by the woods. The neighbor called out to ask if they were looking for something. Turns out they were looking for a dog that had just gotten away from them about 10 minutes earlier and headed into the woods. The description was of our missing stray. Thinking they were the dog's actual people, I asked what her name was, but they didn't know. Guess what? She was a stray they'd been taking care of for a couple of days.
To make a long story a little shorter, they'd had the same dog for the same amount of time we'd had her and done the same things (tick removal, vet visit, Frontline - only they'd actually had her long enough to apply the Frontline). But they had no intention of keeping her, because her dog had just died two weeks ago and she wasn't ready for another dog yet. Because we'd been planning on keeping her if no one came forward to claim her (after checking with the local vets' offices and the local police and pound), they told us they'd bring her to us if they found her.
Which they did, about half an hour later. While I'm in the shower. Hee. But that's okay, since I was almost done.
So, at least for now, we have added a new dog to the menagerie. A sweet little girl we are calling Spot:
Spot
Spot and Tasha
Spot, lying on my foot
Spot stretching
Tasha, just because
I really didn't expect us to be keeping her, not until Don got so upset at losing her. He's such a softie.
Anyway…
Last Thursday, while I was out back gardening and rescuing injured stray dogs, we got a phone call about a pair of ducks in our driveway. O_o While we do have a small river as the back boundary of our property, it's pretty overgrown and I've never seen ducks there. Don't they more prefer lakes and ponds? But these ducks seemed to dig our concrete driveway. Of course, I didn't know about this until later, because…
I was out back, rescuing a stray dog. Originally, I was weeding our garden, but then I heard a ruckus a couple of houses down from us and, realizing that it was a gang of neighborhood kids (ranging in age from 6 to about 10) yelling at a small dog. They were trying to get her to stop jumping on them, but all the yelling and bouncing was just getting the dog more excited. (Duh!)
As the only adult around (!!!), I went over to check it out. At about the same time the little beagle-sized dog jumped up on me, the oldest of the kids informed me that the dog was bleeding, which I quickly discovered on my own because of the blood smear on my leg. Poor thing.
I grabbed her collar, which of course has NO tags or ID of any kind, and made her hold still for a minute while I determined that the blood was coming from her mouth. Kind of unsettling, but she wasn't foaming at the mouth or anything, so I dragged her away from the kids (not a big deal as she was quite willing to come with me) and put her into our fenced back yard while I ran for Dr. T.
Turns out the dog had been seen off and on in the neighborhood for at least two weeks and no one knew anything about where she came from, nor had anyone apparently been looking for her. Tammy said she looked very healthy, all things considered, and that the cut was in her mouth and would just do its thing - no way to bandage it or put pressure on it, but it should stop bleeding on its own, as it didn't appear to be too deep. From the color of and wear on her teeth, she's around a year old, maybe a little less. She's also been spayed. But she'd clearly been living out in the woods for days and the poor baby was absolutely covered in ticks. (EW!)
We managed to get some of the ticks off of her using rubbing alcohol, but they were hurting her and so she wouldn't stand for many more. We figured I'd get some Frontline or something on the way home from work the next day to get rid of the rest and give her a flea/tick bath and all that once the majority of the little bastards had dropped off of her. I fed her and gave her some water and she and Tasha kind of sniffed at each other through the fence (no way I was letting them into the same area with all those ticks on the little girl).
Don was off the next day and planned on working on the brick patio that he's creating in the back yard, so she'd have some company and supervision while I was at work. Unfortunately, he's used to having dogs that stick around and wasn't was watchful as he should have been when he was bringing supplies through the gate - the little girl ran off after she got scared by some loud noises. So I got a call at work that I should not stop for Frontline but rather come straight home so we could go look for her. Which I did, but no joy - she was nowhere to be found. And we didn't have a name for her, so we couldn't even call her. :(
Flash forward to this weekend. I'm standing out back, talking to a neighbor and three people go walking through our backyard by the woods. The neighbor called out to ask if they were looking for something. Turns out they were looking for a dog that had just gotten away from them about 10 minutes earlier and headed into the woods. The description was of our missing stray. Thinking they were the dog's actual people, I asked what her name was, but they didn't know. Guess what? She was a stray they'd been taking care of for a couple of days.
To make a long story a little shorter, they'd had the same dog for the same amount of time we'd had her and done the same things (tick removal, vet visit, Frontline - only they'd actually had her long enough to apply the Frontline). But they had no intention of keeping her, because her dog had just died two weeks ago and she wasn't ready for another dog yet. Because we'd been planning on keeping her if no one came forward to claim her (after checking with the local vets' offices and the local police and pound), they told us they'd bring her to us if they found her.
Which they did, about half an hour later. While I'm in the shower. Hee. But that's okay, since I was almost done.
So, at least for now, we have added a new dog to the menagerie. A sweet little girl we are calling Spot:
Spot
Spot and Tasha
Spot, lying on my foot
Spot stretching
Tasha, just because
I really didn't expect us to be keeping her, not until Don got so upset at losing her. He's such a softie.