A perfect gentleman

 

A perfect gentleman

Gilbert, wet from a swim, modelling his tracker. He and Roxy wear trackers every time they go for a walk.

In our house there is a lobby between the sitting room and the kitchen. It has four doorways, but only three doors. One door leads from the sitting room. One doorway leads into the kitchen. One door leads to the integral garage, which houses everything but a car, and where things disappear never to be seen again. One door conceals the downstairs loo.

It is a reasonably-sized area, and houses one of the cat litter trays, and a gallon bucket of water. All the animals, including visitors, avail themselves of it, and small children are discouraged from plunging their hands and heads into it.

One wise dog, long gone, our gentle Dalmatian, Dominie, always used to have a good drink before she went out for a walk. None of the others has ever done that, but they go immediately to drink on returning home.

Gilbert is very sensitive, ever willing to please, and mortified if he thinks he has done something inappropriate. He also keeps an eye on Roxy when they are out, and if she hangs back, or remains too long in one spot, he draws attention to the fact.

At home, he frequently curls up by my feet, as he did when he was a puppy, while Roxy spreads herself out in everyone’s way. That way she cannot be ignored.

Today, after their walk, Gilbert was having a long drink. I was in the kitchen, needing to go past him into the sitting room. Without a word or gesture from me, he shifted his body so that I had room to pass.

He is a perfect gentleman.

 

Agility Course

 

Agility Course

Watching dogs speed around an agility course is pure delight, particularly if they make the course their own, and run under obstacles instead of over them, or miss them out completely. Some dogs are natural comedians and respond to laughter, and they are the ones who steal the hearts of an audience.

We had a liver and white Dalmatian called Buddy, who was actually rather good at agility. He had brains and beauty, and wanted always to please his young owner, our youngest daughter, Bethan. She had spent a great deal of time building agility courses in our not very large garden, for Cariadd, our first Dalmatian. Bethan was three years old when we brought the small, warm puppy home, so Cariadd was around six when she started training her in agility. Cariadd was very obliging, but it wasn’t really her favourite occupation. She preferred cross country running.

 Buddy was a different prospect. He would do anything for Bethan and did well in his classes. However, he was just too big to compete with the dainty little dogs that normally excel at agility and eventually the lessons ceased, and he reverted to being a proper Dalmatian, running miles every day with Barry, Cariadd and Dominie.

We have an agility course in our house. The objective is not to discover how fast we can complete the course, but to see if we can complete it without breaking our necks.

The first obstacles are the slow-moving, indolent cats, who weave their way slightly ahead of us, miaouing if we dare to suggest they could move a little faster, please. Every move towards the kitchen indicates to them that meals might soon be served. They have been heavily influenced by the dogs, whose major loves in life are us, followed swiftly by food. The rule is, ‘If the humans move, we move, too.’

Having negotiated a track past the cats, the major obstacle presents itself. This is Roxy, who prostrates herself before us like a living sacrifice. It is imperative that she is never more than twelve inches away from one of us. I fear that she suffers from the reverse ostrich syndrome; that is, if we cannot see her, we might deny her existence.

Preparing meals, filling the kettle, emptying the dishwasher/washing machine/tumble dryer, packing the groceries away in fridge, freezer or cupboard, Roxy is always there, at our feet. I don’t know how we don’t trip over her.

Gilbert is also part of the course, but his function is to help. He moves around us, bringing us toys if he thinks we need some encouragement in our pursuits.

When we have completed whatever footling task we embarked on, we retreat from the kitchen, but now the agility course has been altered. The recumbent Roxy has miraculously and silently blocked our way out of the kitchen. It would not be advisable to step over her, because she has been known to rise up, mid-step-over, and that is quite hazardous. Slowly, we navigate our path back, accompanied by our four-footed friends.

Nothing can be accomplished at speed in our house unless we shut the animals away. Hence, we have baby gates at strategic doorways, behind which dogs can be contained. They don’t work for the cats – they slither under or leap over. The gates mean that the dogs can still be in contact, but not as closely as they might desire.

It's not so vastly different to having toddlers and at least the animals don’t have tantrums.

Ten years

 

Ten years

It is ten years since our last Dalmatian died. Frodo the Faller was fourteen years old, quite a good age, considering all the ailments he suffered. He was preceded by Buddy Liver Spots, Dominie, and Cariadd, all of whom lived long active lives.

Barry had run with them for years through fine weather and foul, but his knees were increasingly painful. Once his new chrome alloy knee joints were in place, he didn’t want to wear them out, so running, a life-long pursuit, was replaced by other activities, and another Dalmatian was out of the question. Thirty years of Dalmatians had been great fun, but we recognised our new limitations and anyway, Labradors are so much easier.

The only Dalmatians we now have are ornaments, and some Disney-type iterations. I think they were toppers from large tubes of Smarties. I always loved Smarties, and they’re so useful for number work and simple music theory with young children.

Whimzees

 

Whimzees

A few weeks ago, I mentioned the ‘toothbrushes’ we had bought for Roxy and Gilbert and how the chews came in different shapes and sizes. 

I bought some alligator and hedgehog chews, which they enjoy just as much as the toothbrushes, but I was disappointed to see how much smaller they are.

The dogs aren't bothered, of course. So far as I know, dogs don't discern discrepancies in size. If one has a large carrot, and the other a small, they just accept them. A beach ball is as much fun as a tennis ball, though not so easy to retrieve . . .  

Baby Roxy with a beach ball

. . . and a large stick is as magnetic as a small twig.

               Cariadd, foreground, and Dominie. 'I'll hold it - you chew.'

I decided to treat my ‘granddogs’ to a selection of chews. I hope they enjoy them as much as our dogs do.

Sixteen years

 

Sixteen years

Sixteen years have passed since these photographs were taken. Our Dalmatian years lasted for 30 years, the last one, my velcro dog, Frodo the Faller, leaving us 9 years ago.

                                        Frodo the Faller, my velcro dog

I’ve heard all sorts of stories about Dalmatians. Some people asked us if black-spotted Dalmatians turned brown in old age, or did the liver-spotted turn black with age? One person told me that liver-spotted Dalmatians were not regarded as proper Dalmatians. They are ‘proper’ Dalmatians and some breeders try to specialise in the liver-spotted variety. Many people were surprised to learn that the puppies are white when they’re born, developing their spots from the age of about two weeks until 18 months or so.

                                    Dominie of the thunderous paws

It is a fact that puppies born with coloured patches used to be destroyed at birth. Whether this was because it was thought the patches might become cancerous or because it demeaned the breed or the breeder in some way is unclear. Patched puppies are no longer destroyed and haven’t been for more than forty years. They make fine pets, though they will not be destined for a show career.

                                        Buddy Liver Spots

Like most white or piebald animals, Dalmatians have a tendency to deafness, but this is being addressed with careful breeding and BAER testing (Brainstem Auditory Evoked Response) of registered breeding stock. There are some unregistered breeders so deaf pups are still born. With careful, patient training they can be wonderful dogs, but they require a lot of work.

                        Buddy Liver Spots and Frodo the Faller

We greatly enjoyed our Dalmatians. They were fantastic running companions for Barry and would also walk for hours with me. Now we lead lives more suited to rambling, Labrador Retrievers have become our companions once again. We have come full circle. We started with a Labrador, then had the Jack Russell years, which overlapped the Labrador. The Dalmatians ran concurrently with the JRs for a while, and then led back to Labradors.

                Jenna. the little Labrador with the enormous paws, with her tracker and cow bell, never happier than when retrieving

A Life Full of Animals - part one

 

A Life Full of Animals - part one

I have never known a time in my life without animals, apart from the three years I was at college.

My earliest memory is of Bob the Collie, for whom my father laid a place at the table. There followed Sombre the Smooth-coated Collie, Ginger the cat, Punch the Springer and Judy the kitten.

The first dog Barry and I had was a yellow Labrador called Whisky. She was three years old and she was my birthday present from Barry when I was in my final year. I couldn’t keep her at college so Barry kept her in the officers’ mess at RMCS Shrivenham, where she led a very convivial life. She was a patient and very friendly dog, and eventually a great companion to and protector of our young children. 

Whisky with Gareth

We thought her not to be a natural guard dog, barking only at buses and ladders, until one night in Northern Ireland when Barry came home very late, she barked menacingly at him before she realised who he was and was then abjectly apologetic. She was not averse to helping herself to choice morsels from other people’s shopping baskets, when the opportunity presented itself, and enjoyed ‘picking’ blackberries, too.

Biddy with Gillian

As she aged and our children grew, we decided to get another dog, to ease the pain of Whisky’s passing, when the time came. Thus we acquired Biddy, a 7-month-old smooth-coated Jack Russell terrier, (JR) the long-legged variety now known as Parson Jack Russell. She had already been cubbing and never lost her penchant for searching underground, once disappearing for several hours and emerging mostly brown, rather than her usual tan and white. She was enormous fun, always seeking to ingratiate herself by sliding round on one shoulder in front of one of us and submitting. She was very much Barry’s dog, loving to huddle inside his jacket. When he wasn’t around, Biddy’s preferred companion was Gareth, particularly in the forest. She was expert at climbing trees.

Biddy and Gareth

After Whisky died, Biddy was lonely, missing her old companion and so we got Leo, a rough-coated, short-legged Jack Russell. He had been a stud dog and in our innocence we thought we would have no problem keeping him and Biddy apart when she came into season. How wrong we were! Biddy had five adorable puppies, and we kept Daisy and Sam. Daisy was a very pretty broken-coated girl and liked sleeping in the cat beds we suspended from the radiators, for by now, we had a cat, a beautiful brown Burmese.

Leo

Susannah, Gillian and Gareth with Biddy and her five puppies

Daisy

Daisy, Sam and Biddy at the seaside

This came about because Susannah had wanted a rabbit. We had experienced heart-ache with Gillian’s previous rabbits and so persuaded Susannah that a cat would be preferable. We called her Alicat and we were encouraged to breed from her. JRs are reputed to be cat killers but when we brought Alicat home, Daisy jumped on my lap, watched by the other three, and we never had a problem. Of course, each of our then three children had a different favourite kitten and soon our menagerie grew, until by the time Bethan, our fourth child, arrived, we had four JRs and nine Burmese. We also had guinea pigs and pet mice and gerbils, all of which reproduced at will.

Sam with Susannah and Bethan

Bethan with Barry, Sam and Daisy

Sam was also broken-coated and immensely strong for his size. He loved collecting logs, the bigger the better. He really was a big dog in a little dog’s body. He and Leo did not get on once he grew up, so Leo went to live with my parents. Sam’s life was short and sweet. Out running with Barry one day, he ran off and was knocked down by a car. He died unexpectedly after surviving a few days with the vet. He was six years old. Biddy had spent much time licking his ears and little Daisy was somewhat overlooked. Clearly, Sam was his mother’s favourite and she pined for him.  We commenced our search for our next dog. 

I had long wanted a Dalmatian and soon Cariadd joined our family from Wales. She was smaller than the JRs when she first arrived, but soon outstripped them and proved to be a good problem-solver.

Biddy and Cariadd

Cariadd. Bethan, Biddy and Daisy

Barry holding one of Cariadd's longer 'sticks', watched by Bethan

She specialised in carrying long branches, more like young trees, through small gaps and was the perfect running mate for Barry. She also had a terrific smile, which worried people who were not familiar with dog smiles. We were sometimes told, ‘Your dog’s snarling at me.’

Many breeds of dog smile, or snark, some with closed lips, others with varying degrees of tooth display and nose wrinkling. I must admit it can look quite alarming!

I believe that once you have two or more dogs you can never go back to just one. Dogs need dogs and the one that’s left alone becomes depressed. A ‘new’ dog, whether baby puppy or older dog, rejuvenates the survivor and rekindles his or her energy and enthusiasm.

When our last JR, Daisy, died, we had to find a companion for Cariadd, and this came in the form of Dalmatian Dominie, from Devon, four months old and a really big puppy. She was as soft as butter, a little dog in a big dog’s disguise. Cariadd, not noted for her maternal instinct, allowed the youngster to chew her neck and never grumbled at her. Dominie was not well coordinated as a puppy and fell in our pond every day for a week as she thundered over the bridge, but she grew into an athletic dog who could turn on a sixpence, giving any chasing dog a great work out.

Dominie with our eldest grandson, Callum (now 25 and an expectant father)

We were very taken with our Dalmatians, delighting in their elegance and intelligence, and it was good to have not one, but two big dogs to which we could reach down a hand to be nuzzled. As Cariadd aged, and, sadly, dogs age too quickly, we decided to look for a third Dalmatian. Bethan had enjoyed building obstacle courses for Cariadd and was keen to try showing a dog. Dominie, beautiful though she was, was simply too big and Cariadd had never been keen on the show ring.

We thought it would be fun to have a liver Dalmatian, so green-eyed Buddy left his home in Cornwall to live with us. His eyes didn’t remain green. He was a handsome boy, devoted to Bethan. When we brought him home, Dominie’s expression was one of pure joy. We could almost hear her saying, ‘My puppy, oh, my puppy.’

Dominie with baby Buddy

Labradors are renowned for being greedy, but Dalmatians can match, if not outpace them. Ours all learnt very quickly that food was freely available on work tops and we had to find places they could not reach. Naturally, they didn’t attempt to thieve while we watched. We were careful about not allowing them ‘dangerous’ foods, like grapes or macadamia nuts, but even so Buddy demolished a chocolate cake and lived to tell the tale. Our grandchildren still laugh about that.

Buddy does the leg work while Dominie waits

In the meantime, the cats were ruling the roost, and attempting to find a way into the fish tank for a tasty fresh snack. When they had a spat, as cats do, they would find a dog to curl up with. The cats never attacked the dogs, just each other. Sometimes, a dog would stand between two arguing cats, to calm them down.

Cariadd and 6 Burmese

After Buddy came seven-month–old Frodo, from Lincolnshire, a dog bred primarily for looks rather than temperament. He was always gentle and loving with everyone in our household, particularly Buddy, but reactive with unfamiliar dogs, not a good trait in a show dog. He became my Velcro dog and remained so until his death seven years ago.

 

Frodo the Faller

The 24th blog of Augustus Lazarus Cooke (Gus)

The 24^th blog of Augustus Lazarus Cooke, (Gus) aged 9.

Hello everybody? Anybody? Is there anyone out there?

I wouldn’t be surprised if everyone had abandoned this blog, just like Mrs H seems to have done! She thinks she’s the only one who’s got lots to do. It’s not even as if Frankie takes up a lot of time now because he’s at school. Humans! They should try being dogs. We have to be alert all the time, guarding the house and barking at the television. We like Kitty Croquettes so we clear up after the cats, too, but the Humans don’t like us doing that and pull faces and tell us to go away. That’s not a nice thing to do to loyal Labradors, or any other faithful dog, for that matter. I suppose they have their reasons.

Talking of devoted dogs (and we all are) Mrs H saw a photograph of Buddy Liver Spots on her Facelook feed the other day. What? Facelook! What’s wrong with that? Oh, Jenna’s just told me it’s FaceBOOK. Well, I didn’t know . . . Anyway, it was a lovely photo. I remember Buddy, and Dominie, but the Dalmatian I remember best is Frodo the Faller. 

(If you want to know why he was called Frodo the Faller you’ll have to read about him here and here and here and here . . . and so on.)

I loved Frodo. I really admired him and wanted to grow up to be as big and strong as him.  I didn’t grow as tall but I’m sure I’m just as strong as he was and quite broad, too.  We all missed Frodo when he travelled on but we had each other and then Roxy came to live with us and she’s a lot of fun. Well, the other day, in the Dreaded Woods, we met a Dalmatian and Bertie and Roxy and I really enjoyed playing with her. I felt as though I was a puppy again. Jenna was very friendly to the Dalmatian, too, but she’s thirteen and doesn’t charge around any more. She prefers to stay close to the Humans because they’re carrying the biscuits and she loves biscuits.

I had to go to the Vet before Christmas because I had a lump on my leg. My Humans thought it was a cyst but it was a tumour and it was benign. Well, the Vets carried out more tests and discovered that it is malignant but very slow-growing. It doesn’t matter to me. It doesn’t hurt. I don’t feel as bad about going to the Vet now as I’ve been quite a lot recently. I met some nice children there the last time I went.

I had to keep going to the Vet because my bandage kept falling down. First I had a lovely, Christmassy red one, then a blue one, then a green one. I was very pleased when I didn’t have to wear a bandage any more because then I could go out for walks again. I can tell you, it’s not much fun being stuck in the house when the others go out.

It was lovely to go out again and it's always fun when Frankie comes with us.

On Christmas Day a heron visited us. The Humans think it was trying to find a way to reach the fish in the pond. It stayed for quite a while.

What else has happened? Oh, yes, there has been a new baby. He’s called Jack and he arrived on Marnie’s birthday. She’s twenty-five and he’s nought! So, Mrs Human went to stay with Bethan for a few days to help with Jack’s big brother, Charlie.

Jack, a few hours old

Brothers!

Gillian and Paul and Callum and Kat came to see us after Christmas. They didn’t bring their dogs, though, so we were a bit disappointed about that.  Roxy was ever so pleased ‘cos she really likes Callum.

I don’t think there’s anything else to report. 

Be good.

Hwyl fawr am nawr! (That’s Welsh for ‘Goodbye for now!’)

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday!

Watching and waiting

Jenna is eight years old today. We should have called her Slippers because she sounds as though she’s shuffling in the house. 

Dominie with Jenna

She was the first Labrador we had had since Whisky, many decades before. 

Whisky - that was her name when she came to us at 3 years old - we were going to change it but didn't.

Dalmatians are as greedy as Labradors and will do anything for food . . . particularly steal it . . .

  Dominie encourages her nephew, Buddy

Jenna was eight weeks old when we brought her home and was not in the least fazed to find herself in the company of three large, unfamiliar spotted dogs. In the following years she has seen the Dalmatians reduced through natural causes to one (Frodo) and welcomed the introduction of her half-brother Gus and another Labrador, Bertie, from the same kennels, as well as five Ocicats, the first two dying far too young, at three and six years of age.

Jenna with Monty

She left her breeders and her litter-mates without a backward glance and has remained an exceptionally friendly dog. She actively enjoys visiting the vets and is always rewarded by the receptionists and the vets with treats which she consumes quickly, unlike her Labrador companions who won’t eat anything while there. She approaches all people and dogs with a wagging tail and a smiling face, completely trusting everyone she meets and, strange as it may sound, that is quite worrying for not everyone is moved by the kindest motives and there have been cases of dog-napping in the forest. In her younger days Jenna was apt to disappear for lengthy periods, following interesting trails, and so we acquired a tracker for her in order to trace where she was. It transpired that she was never far from us and since she has had Labrador pals she has been less inclined to wander. Nonetheless we maintain a vigilant eye on all our dogs and keep them close to us.  

A pocketful of biscuits is invaluable in holding their attention.

Lift-off!

Jenna loves to work and a good walk involves lots of water, thick cover and much retrieving, the best sort being that which engages her Labrador friends and relatives and their brains, noses and tails - the wagging accelerates as the quarry (usually a tennis ball and occasionally a biscuit!) is located.

Searching - the tails aren't wagging yet . . .

Jenna is a delightful little dog - she never did grow into her big feet – and an affectionate and willing member of the pack we are privileged to lead.

 The expression says it all - engaged, willing, happy.

Happy Birthday, Jenna!