Dog_Horse_Girl

She was...I used to call her my 'model'! I miss her every day...and I visit her grave most days...talk to her...remember her silliness.

Gorgeous! I'd have to buy more than one though...how do you decide on only one when they're so beautiful?

Just two of the many pictures I have of Lilly...I'm gathering stones to build a cairn over her grave.

This is my first post in a while. I'm really sad to post that my beloved greyhound, Lilly was PTS and passed peacefully on the morning of Friday 8 March 2013. She is buried in the small paddock at the back of my house. It was the most difficult decision but she was no longer enjoying life even though she was not in any pain...she just lost her zing and I knew it was time. Lilly, you were a goofy, silly, crazy, often brainless hound. You had a ridiculous sense of fun and humour. Doing zoomies was your favourite thing. So was finding the most comfy place to rest - usually my bed. And snuggling. You really didn't like water, puddles were almost torture...and yet you'd spend hours digging in soft dirt just for fun. You changed a lot over the years. When you came home, I remember you wouldn't come near my bedroom, preferring to sleep at the other end of the house, stretched out on the lounge. Slowly but surely you got closer to the bedroom until you slept right outside the door. And eventually, you not only moved into the room, but you took over the bed too! So what did I do? Of course I got a bigger bed and you spread out even more. I'll always remember my one and only greyhound. I can never have another...as much as I love the breed, there will never be another Lilly. It was the best $15 I ever spent in rescuing her... I love you Lilly, run free, and go get that bunny!

I currently have four, and Zoe is only a very recent addition. They're aged 13, 12, 10 and 4. Lilly and Ruby (the two elder dogs) won't be here much longer. I've already decided that Lilly needs to have her wings this month as she's just not enjoying life much. Her appetite is down, she's losing weight, her incontinence is no longer treatable, she has trouble standing up and keeps getting eye infections. I'm dreading the day because in her good moments, she's the goofy greyhound I adopted all those years ago. But those good moments are fewer and further between now.

My dogs are no longer "routinely" vaccinated. They're 13, almost 13, 10 and 4 yrs of age. They only ever got KC when they were boarded and that was after having the two strains of vaccine. The youngest dog was the sickest but even so was better within 10 days and all she needed was a bit of cough mixture and extra attention. I won't take them somewhere if a pre-requisite is having them vaccinated. I no longer need to use boarding kennels as I have family around the corner who can mind them. My belief is that kennels may request vaccinations just to cover their own arses rather than for any concern over my particular dogs' health and welfare. That's JMO...I could be wrong. :)

Here's my fairy...everyone who has seen it loves it...even strangers comment on how pretty she is!

These days it's just me...with the ex it was always crowded but not any more. :D And Molly takes up almost no space, it's Ruby that stretches out ACROSS the bed so she uses up as much space as possible...and I often awake to find her rear end in my face...literally.

Yay for a happy and positive update...good on you Nek for helping...you are a true dog-star!

I've now got 4 dogs... Ruby (stafford cross) sleeps on my bed because she's old and arthritic and she's always slept on my bed. Lilly (greyhound) sleeps in her bed/s in the kitchen. The main reason is that she gets up during the night and wanders around every hour or so. That activity wakes me up so the kitchen is just far enough away that I don't hear her every time. She has more than one bed so can swap beds as often as she wants. Molly (chi cross) started off in a crate beside my bed but she didn't like it and was restless and whiny so she very quickly got promoted to my bed; she sleeps under the covers most of the night. Zoe (chi cross) is in a wire crate beside my bed for the night, then in the morning she comes up on the bed for a cuddle. All the dogs were adopted as adults so had experience in other homes before mine. :)

Survey completed.

Oh what a happy story that could have been so different for BeeBee...I also love her little flag! She must bring a lot of happiness to the home, its staff and residents.

Received a lovely sympathy card from our vet yesterday. It features a white horse with wings...and the horse resembles Flossie...brought me to tears for the first time.

Yes, I think even being cared for by someone else for the time the OP is at work is going to put enormous stress on this poor dog. I certainly wouldn't be considering it as an option because I'd be far too worried about the dog's well-being and behaviour in my absence. It's setting the dog up for potentially even more "failure" IMO. I completely agree. Sometimes, no matter what we do, an anxiety problem is too severe for the dog to overcome sufficiently to have a reasonable quality of life. It's never going to be an easy decision for us. I've got two elderly dogs nearing the end of their lives and I know the decision I need to make will be so very difficult BUT when the time comes, I'll make it for THEM. I have to be unselfish for them no matter how much it will hurt me. I've had a dog with mid-level SA and it's horrible for them. DAP helped her enough that I eventually weaned her from it but it took about 3 yrs to get to that point. I doubt I could have coped with the levels of anxiety you're describing. Whatever decisions you make, I wish you strength and wisdom. And I'll be here for you if you PTS...you'll need support and understanding.

Thanks all. Zoe has settled in so quickly and easily, it's like she's always been here. She and Molly were crated today (I have a giant breed soft crate) in my bathroom as it was the coolest part of the house and they clearly got along well. I left them with just a bed and a water bowl (+ a puppy pad, just in case) and they were so good together. I'll see how they are at sharing toys when I'm here to supervise and if that goes well, they can have some toys while I'm out too. The two big dogs aren't fazed by her at all. Lilly plays with Zoe as she does everyone; Ruby can't really be bothered with a younger dog any more but they're polite enough to each other. Zoe is a great little watch dog too. She's copying Molly to an extent but is also sending out alert barks when she thinks it's appropriate. She also quiets down when told. :D Am definitely keeping her...just have to break the news to my bank balance! :p Seriously though - she came with enough food for a month and she'll be desexed at the previous owner's expense. I'll have a wellness check done at the same time just to make sure there are no serious issues and check her microchip. :)

It's odd but when I went to meet her at her place, she was so timid and wouldn't come near me for ages...my friend eventually picked her up and brought her over to me for a cuddle. Apart from the occasional growl at one of the others, she's fit in straight away. I went to town for a couple of hours today and she whined as I was leaving - and was super excited to see me when I got home! :D Molly has her noise *slightly* out of joint even though I'm paying her more attention than Zoe. They're very similar in size and temperament but Molly is the only dog to sleep on my bed. Zoe is crated right next to my bed and the other two are gated into the kitchen. She's come from a unit with a small (tiny really) courtyard to my place - my front yard is 1/3 of an acre! So she's pretty much in paradise right now. :)

I was told she's four and she seems about that age. I reckon there's either Min Pin or Manchester Toy Terrier or similar in her. Pics to come shortly...she doesn't sit still long enough for me to take anything that's half-decent... :p

I had a call from a friend on the weekend, asking if I knew of anyone looking for a very small female dog (not desexed). I went through the options: pounds, rescues, friends and family etc however he had already tried all those avenues. As Zoe is a crossbred, breed specific rescues weren't appropriate and at this time of year most pounds and rescues are full to brimming. He didn't want to leave her at a pound facility and not be assured of a good home. After talking for a while about Zoe, I said that I might be able to take her but it would be conditional upon the dog being desexed and of her getting along with my three. So we agreed to a trial period and if all goes well, Zoe will be mine at the end. So I picked her up today and she's the sweetest little girl. She's tri-colour (mostly black, some tan and some white) and looks as if she has a bit of everything in her - particularly mini daxy, chi and mini foxy...she was a little timid while at her place but once in the ute, she became a new dog: sniffing the air, looking around and whining in excitement. When she got home she ran around like a mad dog for a while before I introduced her to the existing pack members one at a time (in size order from smallest to largest). She's spent most of the evening lying next to me on the couch, with Molly on the other side of me. I'll post up some pictures soon...she isn't easy to photograph as she doesn't sit still for very long! She seems to be house-trained...and that's about all the training she's had so I have a little work ahead of me. Regardless, I'm going to enjoy having her around and she'll be a great play-mate for Molly too. :) ETA - she will be desexed at her previous owner's expense as soon as we agree that I'm keeping her. ;)

No, I was the lucky one TM...she gave me so much more than I gave her. I miss her so much. I keep looking for her and find myself listening for her hoof-beats during the quiet times. I want to take on another oldie when I can. And I may get a little pony or miniature for the back yard paddock as I really enjoyed Flossie's company.

Flossie, I didn't know you for long but you touched my heart and soul. When I saw you standing alone in the sales yard, head down, eyes nearly closed, I knew you hadn't given up yet. You were thin, far too thin to be standing and yet you refused to lie down. We brought you home and I fed you. You ate with such gusto I knew you enjoyed every bite. You had almost no front teeth but the back ones made up for that. Every time I approached your paddock in my back yard, you nickered...and eventually you came to trot to me. You'd place your head in my arms for a cuddle. You gained weight, and were doing so well we were getting ready to move you to the big paddock with the other horses. But I came home from a ride yesterday evening and you were down. It was clear you'd been down and rolling for a while...your breathing was a bit laboured and you were groaning from time to time. Our vet came out and gave you a shot to calm the gut down and asked me to call in the morning. I hardly slept...you hardly slept...you spent the night down, rolling on the cool damp ground to try to get some relief. When I got up to you this morning, I knew our vet would have to come out again. We moved you to the big paddock and the other horses kept you moving. We left for a short time as we waited for the vet to call back, and when we went back you were down again. Your face said it all. "It's time, I'm tired, please let me go." And our vet was on his way. But you got up and moved to the back of the paddock...to a patch of ground with lots of soft grass, and you stood there letting me pat you quietly. Your circulation was very slow, your heart-rate elevated, breathing laboured, your kidneys had failed and your other organs were following. It took three syringes of green dream but you went down after the second...lying on your near-side, you looked at me with such kindness in your eye and slowly took your last breath. Flossie, I gave you the dignity you deserved at the end of your life. And that's its own reward...seeing you blossom as you did, seeing you soak up the love and care you desperately needed, that was all I wanted when you came home. Enjoy the Big Paddock. Join up with the herd. Know you are loved. Know I'll miss you.

Is that what you think I said? Of course the racing industry is to blame but while-ever doggers buy unwanted race horses, the industry itself doesn't HAVE TO ACT to slow the over-breeding it creates. It's NO different to the greyhound industry except unwanted hounds used to be either starved, shot or abandoned by their trainers. It's a little harder to do that with an animal the size of a horse and besides, a horse is always worth some money because the doggers will always buy them for their meat. Not quite the case with greyhounds though. So you're calling my friends fools or foolish? Perhaps if you see how aggressive these doggers are at the sales and how fast the auctioneers move, you'd have a greater appreciation for the situation. Throw in the fairly significant fact that the doggers are on first-name terms with everyone who works in the sales industry, and you have a huge amount of familiarity between the parties that the mere horse-loving public don't always have. Rapport is crucial...and the doggers have it in spades. Their business relies on this as much as they rely on people who consume any of their products. That's on topic as far as I'm concerned.

The racing industry doesn't HAVE to be responsible for its oversupply of horses BECAUSE of the dogger's willingness to take on so many of its cast-offs. In each sale I go to there are at least four separate doggers and each buys from 20 to 40 horses at a time, more if there is stock available (and on big sales days there is always more stock available). Some they immediately on-sell to bidders that weren't successful at the sales for various reasons (friends of mine were too timid to keep bidding on horses they really wanted on the understanding that they could approach the doggers afterwards, accept the hugely inflated price and take the horse home). That's fairly common knowledge among private buyers at the sales. I'm not saying that NO horses should be dogged - that's kind of difficult to justify, almost like saying that no pound dog should be PTS. But when there are countless sound and sane YOUNG animals being slaughtered just because we allow it to happen and we allow people to profit from it, then IMO that's wrong. I think that's a bit different to the "noble" end in bygone generations...and haven't we learnt anything since those days anyway? Perhaps not.

The very few horses he on-sells, he inflates the prices to a ridiculous extent - ALL doggers do this because they're in it for the money. They buy up really cheaply ($200 on average) but won't sell for less than $550 or more each...and some of them are turned within half an hour of purchase at the sales. How many sales have you been to? On average this man buys 20 or more horses every sale, his trucks are always full at the end of the day...Camden is twice a month and there are many regional sales held monthly or more often. He uses a LOT of horses to make pet food. He makes a heck of a lot of money out of the misery of "unwanted" horses from all over this country AND many doggers also export LIVE to markets that use horses for HUMAN consumption. Not all the horses they buy are for Australia's dogs...many end up on dinner plates overseas. And that alone ought to be enough for every consumer in this country to boycott ALL doggers, not just Burns.