Spanish Street Dogs; the other Waifs and Strays.

From BBC News website 8th March.

A dog has been found alive in a rubbish bin on the A14 near Stowmarket.

Jason Bloomfield said he got the "shock of his life" when he found the dog while working for Mid Suffolk District Council's street cleansing team.

The 40-year-old is taking care of the dog, nicknamed Dusty, and said he would be delighted to keep him if the council could not find his owner.

"He's took to me and won't leave my side," Mr Bloomfield said. "He's totally bonded with me."

He said he believed Dusty would not have been discovered on Wednesday if there had not been bad weather.

He had been collecting litter on the verge of the A14 but had to stop when spray from lorries made conditions too dangerous to work.
'Death sentence'

"On our last bin near Stowmarket I got my key and unlocked the bin as normal," he said.

"I got the shock of my life. Something jumped up in the bin - I didn't know if it was a rat or what it was."

Mr Bloomfield said he was shaking as he slammed the door shut to prevent the animal from bolting towards the road.

"We looked in the top of the bin and there were these big brown eyes looking up at me," he said.

"He looked well fed and looked after but there were a lot of scratch marks inside the bin where he had been trying to get out."

Dusty did not have a collar and had not been tagged with a microchip.

A vet is due to check him to try to determine his age.

Mr Bloomfield said there was "no way" Dusty could have entered the bin on his own as it was locked and resembled a "big letterbox".

"I can't believe anyone human would do that - he was basically sentenced to death," he said.

"The bins aren't usually emptied on a Wednesday, they're weekly bins emptied on Friday. He could have been dehydrated and perhaps dead by then."

Well done, Jason. Good Luck and may you and Dusty be good friends for a long time.

It has been suggested that walking the dog is a therapeutic, pleasurable pastime that keeps you fit, active and mentally alert… what a crock of sh*t… what a load of old b*llocks.

It’s highly overrated, it’s time consuming, infuriating, and at times downright dangerous. On a cold, wet and very windy day like today I can think of a thousand things I’d rather be doing, like maybe going into hibernation until the warmer weather finally arrives and stays for more than a couple of days.

Needs must however because of the definite shortage of space in the house and no garden or patio space. The dogs need to relieve themselves. To this end they, all nine of them, get three or four walks a day. Not too bad when Summer is home to help out but at the moment she is on one of her flying visits to the UK.So it’s just down to me…

Walking the dogs then takes on a whole new meaning; they are all to some extent ex-street dogs. The alpha female, Izzy, and her mate Leo are the undisputed queen and king of the pack (Cesar Millan would have you believe that the human is supposed to be the pack leader… another load of old tosh!)

If I want them to do something, they will consider all the options before committing to a decision; if they want to do whatever I suggest then fair enough but if after due consideration they decide that its not such a great idea, then there is no power on earth that will make them change their mind. Going out in the cold is not a good idea… going out in the wind is not a good idea, going out in the rain is definitely not a good idea. Going out in a combination of all three? Forget it!

In any event the logistics of actually walking the dogs on my own three or four times a day, would take up every minute of the day, so when faced with the situation for the first time a year ago I hit upon the idea of taking them out in groups.

Group One is Izzy, a mature greyhound bitch, Leo a mature Saluki male, Sox a mature Podenca bitch, Suzy another Podenca bitch though not so mature in years, and Fred an immature Pod / galgo cross. All are extremely strong dogs, (Sox really should be nicknamed Scania, Suzy could be Iveco and Fred probably should be called Volvo), Izzy and Leo are normally pretty docile on the lead, just pootling along like a couple of Nissan Micra’s until a cat appears on the scene then its instant Porsche time…)

Group Two is Spike and Scruffy... these are the two reprobates that put Summer in hospital last April with a busted hip necessitating an emergency operation to fit an artificial one, daily shots of  Heparin, a lot of post op discomfort, six months of recuperation and an embarrassing scene whenever she goes through a metal detector screen at the airport. Spike and Scruffy are constantly on the go when on the lead, everything needs investigation, sniffing and sampling (anything goes no matter how disgusting).

Group Three is Pippa and Sophie… most of the time you wouldn’t even know Pippa is there; her lead is normally slack and she is right there at heel. Sophie however is a lot like Spike and Scruffy checking out everything, usually at the full extent of her lead.

From that you can see that although the dogs get three or four walks a day, I actually get nine or twelve… I hadn’t actually thought about it much until a couple of weeks ago when on a cold wet night similar to today in fact it occurred to me that since the first of January this year the dogs have each had over three hundred walks and I have over nine hundred. It’s no wonder the soles of my trainers are like racing slicks! Each group on each walk gets around thirty minutes of exercise. Izzy and Leo, like the 40mph couch potatoes that they are, get some free-running exercises in a nearby abandoned enclosed basketball / five a side football / tennis court. I’d love to be able to let them run free together outside of the confines of the court, but there is too much risk from traffic on a road that cuts through the area and far too much risk of a chance encounter with a flock of sheep or goats (the two hounds don’t have a good track record where four legged wildlife is concerned…).

So there it is… rant over! There is a picture below that I found on Google Maps for where we live… this is actually me, walking the dogs, back in the day when we had just three…

Aah... The good old days...!

But it wasn't me... honest....!

OK... who remembers this...

Stayed at this hotel many times during liaison visits to RNAS Yeovilton, back in the days when the Navy had real aircraft...

Been a while since I added anything so here goes with a couple of pics...

Not all abandonados have four legs....

Update.. Separation Anxiety...

Summer has had a series of visits to a local dentist lately which requires us to be out of the house for maybe an hour. These appointments are always in the evening so we try to make sure the dogs are fed before we go out.

It's always a tough time for them; after all when Summer heads back to the UK every so often they see us leave together and only I return, so separation anxiety sets in almost immediately; normally it's Sox that sets things off, she isn't normally a very demonstrative animal, she is secure in her place in the pecking order of the pack, but if either Summer or I leave the house she is always the first to kick off and the rest join in straightaway. This separation anxiety invariably leads to pee puddles and worse, the chair and settee covers have holes in them from being chewed. At one stage the settee got peed on so we started covering the cushions with pee pads (made by Tena and originally designed as mattress protectors). The settee and or chair covers then go over the top of the pads.

Dogs soon found a new game... the pads are filled with recycled paper waste, pulped and dried,... they make a hell of a mess when shredded... and our lot are past masters at the art of shredding. Can't leave a toilet roll on the holder in the bathroom and  can't leave kitchen rolls laying around; this is difficult because said kitchen rolls are our first line of defence for mopping up so there tends to be one in every room...

There are times when its very hard to find a single redeeming factor in favour of any of them; individually they are all gems of course and they all lok to Summer and me for comfort and protection but there are times when collectively they are somewhat more than a pain in the ass.

Elsewhere in this blog I posed a question about whether or not abandonados or street dogs actually want to be rescued; Cesar Milan claims that 'dogs live in the moment' and this was never truer than with Siouxsie. Until she came into our house last August she had never been inside a house, had weathered a cold winter living outside, been through rain, hail, snow and biting winds at one end of the scale and a blistering hot summer at the other, largely fending for herself other than somewhat irregular meals from me. She was to a large extent a wild dog, intensely wary of all humans particularly males. Now an essential part of the house pack she is extremely possessive and protective of me, Summer and the rest of the pack. I can't ask her whether she prefers the outdoor life of course, but she is always near the front of the queue when I get the leads out of the cupboard and she is usually the first back into the house when we return.. Making the best of both worlds perhaps.

She among all of the 7 adoptees that live with Summer, me and the upstairs royalty Izzy and Leo, is the one who has made the most of her stay and the biggest impression on me. She has the looks (and at times the temperament) of a scaled down Doberman. She is feisty, argumentative and 100% lovable. At the opposite end of the size scale Sophie is Summer's favourite adoptee.

We have one of those Lazee-boy type reclining armchairs with a kick out extension at the front, and regardless of the season, in this house siesta time applies between around 1.30pm and 5pm, so whilst Summer busies herself on the computer I normally settle down with a good book after a belated brunch. Immediately, Siouxsie takes her place on my left, laid out alongside me with her head up on my shoulder. Fred, the neutered male takes up a similar position on my right, Spike and Scruffy normally then get engaged in a scuffle to see who is actually going to sit in my lap, and finally little Sophie, the chihuahua lookalike joins the pile wherever she can. Needless to say there isnt a lot of reading to be done fot the next three hours; invariably we are all asleep within minutes.

Wakeup time coincides with Summer prepping their one meal of the day, so come rain or shine at 5pm I will be found out on the street firstly with Izzy, Leo, Sox Fred and Siouxsie taking a walk, then it's the turn of Spike and Scruffy, and finally Pippa and Sophie. Taking 5 big, leashed, dogs out for a walk is a bit of a misnomer really; its more like 5 dogs taking me for a walk; if they are co-operating its a pleasure, if not then it's a real chore and I come back knackered!

Anyway... gotta go... its Walkies time... last one of the day then off to bed..

fb

Agnonising...?

Found this on another blog with a request to repost...

Tissues ready, folks.

fb

Sophie had her spay op on Tuesday and came through it very well. She is the smallest dog in the housepack and Summer and I were a bit concerned about her but as it turns out our worries were groundless. Now, two days later, she is back to her normal stroppy self.

She had been to the vets a few times before for routine vaccinations and microchipping and normally enters the surgery like an old hand; Tuesday however was different; we had a good car trip down to Santa Fe where our vet has his surgery she was standing on her back legs most of the way, gazing out of the windows and remonstrating with anything or anyone she happened to see and was as happy as a lark until I parked up. What a change... she started shaking and trembling, all bravado gone. She flatly refused to get out of the car and I had to lift her out. She immediately tried to bury herself in my jacket and i realised then just how scared she really was. I got back into the car and sat her on my lap but she buried herself in my jacket again. We sat outside the surgery for a full quarter of an hour before she finally stopped trembling and poked her head out from the inside of my jacket. Quite what she expected to see I don't know... but having frightened herself so much she was in desperate need of a pee and clearly now wanted out of the car.

I put her lead on and led her off away from the surgery to a spot a few yards away which most visiting dogs tend to christed before or after visiting the vet. Sophie then took a long pee and when she had finished I took her for a walk around the block so as to approach the surgery from a different angle. This time she was ok and danced into the surgery like Muhammed Ali ready to take on all-comers. The vet was waiting for us, he had seen me sitting in the car with her, so I explained what had happened. Needless to say he had seen it all before.

He took Sophie from me and checked her over then said that she seemed calm enough so the op could go ahead. He suggested I collect her at around 5pm by which time she would be mostly out of the clutches of the anaesthetic. I watched as he carried her off to the little op theatre and then I left.

It was a long day... I arrived back at the vets just before 5pm. Sophie it seemed had been puking on and off for a couple of hours and was curled up on a towel in one of the recovery crates. She didnt want to come out and was obviously feeling quite poorly. She puked again as I went to retrieve her from the crate so I cleaned her mouth, then slipped her lead on and took her outside into the fresh air. That seemed to be what she wanted; well, that and a pee, so once again we went over to the little area where she did what was needed. I took her around the block again and she seemed happy enough, so I put her into the car and went back inside to settle up.

The trip home was uneventful, so I took Sophie for another little walk just to get rid of any remaining after anaesthetic symptoms. When I finally took her back into the house, we were met as always by the rest of the pack; she immediately went on the defensive and barked and bullied her way inside then, having found her normal place on the chair she curled up and went to sleep. Later that evening at bedtime I gave her half a painkiller tablet (doggy ' brufen). She installed herself next to me and again went to sleep. She didn't budge from her spot until morning. Since then she has been getting back to normal; she has decided that my lap is her choice of chilling out place. I'm happy to report that she is more or less back to normal, she is staying away from the antics of the rest of the pack; its as if she knows that the line of neat stitches down her tummy needs protection. These stitches come out on the 1st December.

So thats it...all the girls are now spayed and Fred's been snipped. Starting next month we will get Suzy and Pippa and Fred started on their routine vaccinations and microchips, steps towards getting their passports issued. Once that's out of the way it will be time for the rst of the gang to get their shots renewed. All this on top of the normal food bills... it ain't cheap... thanks again to the Little Pod Foundation for footing the vets bill for Suzy and Pippa's ops.

On Monday night my internet connection died; well it didnt so much die as was brutally murdered... Sophie during one of her evening chasing sessions with the rest of the pack, jumped up onto the desk where my computer station is situated and pushed over a freshly brewed mug of coffee all over the router. The router didnt react well... neither did the keyboard of Summer's computer work station, it too was flooded.

I phoned Telefonica to request a new router they told me that I would be off line 'til Wednesday when a techie would come to the house to instal a new router. OK; I can live with that, no great problem. Summers keyboard was also completely trashed soo I had to buy a new one.

In a normal household having a tradesman visit isn't too much of a problem; when the house has been converted to a two bedroomed kennel however its a different matter! The Telefonica guy that looks after our area is scared of dogs... bit of a problem then in that we have 9 of the buggers and nowhere to put them when anyone calls.

Sure enough yesterday at around 5pm Telefonica man arrives amidst 'mucho ruido' from the pack... barking loudly they are enough to ward off any unwelcome visitors. I poked my head out of the living room window and asked him to hang on whilst I sorted out the dogs. The two blackies Spike and Scruffy I confined to their crate, Sophie and Pippa (Sophies Mum) into another crate, Sox, Suzy and Fred bundled into the bathroom and Izzy and Leo shut up in the royal Quarters (our bedroom). Out of sight they might be but definitely not out of earshot... Spike and Scruffy barking and shouting, likewise Pippa and Sophie, wolf like-howls from Izzy and Leo upstairs and somewhat noise suppressed protests from the bathroom gang!

Telefonica man comments on the number of dogs and the noise level and I let him know that they all are rescues or former abandonados at which point he becomes a bit more understanding. Anyway he checked out our old router and its power supply and confirmed that both were U/S so he fitted a new one did the config thing and then went off, happy I think to be clear of the kennel!

guess that'a about all for now will leave you with a pic that I found 'out there'  not one of our dogs and a bit cutesy but ...

bye for now...

Been a while since the last post so here goes...

There's Always Room for One More

I see by his coat
he must be a stray,
the untidy look
gives him away.
He's lost his will
and is so thin
hasn't eaten, since
God knows when.
I know as I coax him
through the door,
There's always room for one more.

The other night
in the freezing rain,
That little female came again.
Matted and soaked
crying in need,
lost and alone
with babies to feed.
Her pleading eyes
I couldn't ignore,
There's always room for one more.

There's a new face
on the docks today,
hungry but clean.
to our dismay,
I stroked her head
Her body ripples
when she got up
I saw she was crippled
she started to go, but
fell on the floor.
There's always room for one more.

There's the poor doggy
standing in the rain,
I've tried to entice him
Time and again.
One ears lopsided
the other's been torn,
Blind in one eye
lost and forlorn.
He's coming now, so
I'll open the door.
There's always room for one more.

These stories are true,
As I've said before,
There's always room for one more.

11,  November.

Our village has but one shop, a liitle place that sells most of the stuff one is likely to need in the way of food and general domestic needs. Everyday we have a range of travelling shops roll through the village, the bread man (two of them!), the egg man, the fish man and two or three different fruit and veg people. Yesterday while I was out exercising the pack seniors, Izzy, Leo, Sox Suzy and Fred, the veg man called out to me; In his right hand he had a very small black and tan female puppy. She looked to be perhaps six or seven weeks old. He yammered away at machine-gun speed Andaluce which was completely lost on me but it was clear that he wanted me to take the puppy from him. Well with five dogs in tow and another four waiting in the house for their turn, I couldn't do anything there and then and in any case I had just returned from the Vets after arranging to have Sophie spayed. (She is pregnant by the way; I said that I would have problems monitoring her 24/7 for the two full weeks of her season).

More expense... 100€ to be split, by special arrangement into two instalments, to coincide with incoming pension payments.

I explained to the veg man in my best Spanglish, that I couldn't take on any more responsibilities... "No tengo espacio, no tengo dinero, no tengo asistencia, no tengo ayuda..."  At this point we were interrupted by a prospective customer so I turned away and continued with the walk. When we returned, the van had gone but sitting on a low wall was the puppy, looking very sorry for herself. Still unable to do anything about her, I cursed the veg man for abandoning a near helpless puppy, but it occurred to me that perhaps he hadn't abandoned her in the first place, but had maybe just been calling my attention to her presence at the roadside knowing that among the villagers we are known as the mad English couple that rescue abandonados.

Either way, I still had the rest of the pack to see to plus a whole raft of other time consuming tasks to attend to. The pup was still there sitting on the wall when I took the others out for their walks, but by the time I was able to return to check out this latest abandonado, she had disappeared. I would like to think that someone has taken her in, but I really don't know...

Some time ago when I was trying to win over the hearts and minds of Suzy and her siblings and her Mum, two of the regular interruptors were a pair of black Spaniels, obviously brothers. They used to turn up at the cave at feeding time and join in the fray. One of the Spaniels disappeared at about the same time as Suzy's mum and siblings, but the other one is still around some eight months later. He is in a sorry state... he's obviously getting enough to eat either by foraging or begging or via the actions of one or more villagers. He is very reclusive though, and like Suzy was at first, he won't come near when the rest of the house pack are around, prefering instead to follow some distance behind. Like all black Spaniels he is long coated, but his coat is matted and hanging in clumps, his back end is a total mess of matted fur and his ears too need some serious attention. The clumps and matting wont be brushed or teased out, they need cutting out. He could do with a visit to a vet and a grooming studio, but thats not going to happen unless and until he accepts human handling; he is a true street dog. Lovely dog though...

I get the impression that he would like to be friends with the pack but there is a degree of colour prejudice within the house pack... Izzy and Leo just hate black dogs; it's nothing new, they have always been that way, even back in England  the presence of a black dog would immediately put them on a war footing. Strange too that Leo is that way inclined because his coat is black over silver... Given that the house pack has two yappy snappy, very active black dogs among its number makes for some confrontational meetings. Izzy and Leo's way of coping has been to set up their own Royal quarters in our bedroom; the rest of the pack are  welcome to visit, but definitely not Spike and Scruffy. S & S just want to be friends but Izzy and Leo are having none of it; if the two blackies do stray upstairs they are instantly warned off.

Anyway... I guess that's it for the moment. Sophie goes to the vet on Tuesday morning for a termination and spay. More later....