BooIzzy.comSpecializing in feral chihuahuas and blind pit bulls

Brian and I picked up a new foster dog this past week. She is a stumpy little pit bull, basset hound mix, and she’s a total love bug. Somehow she’s been at the county shelter for the last three months. She was one of the Salt Lake Pit Crew dogs. Unfortunately, space at the shelter is tight right now, and she had a deadline of Friday to find an adoptive home or be taken by another rescue group. I saw her pic on Facebook and just couldn’t say no.

She’s adapted amazingly well to life post-shelter. She gets along well with all the other dogs, although Izzy hasn’t been all that nice to her. While she lacks a bit in manners, she’s remarkably chill and relaxed in spite of all the new things she’s encountered in the last 48 hours. She even seems to be house trained.

The only thing she isn’t so good about is staying in her crate. She busted out of it the first time we used it, but we’ve been trying to entice her with treats and chew toys. By the end of this weekend, I’m sure she’ll love it.

Unlike my other two fosters, I fully expect this one to get adopted. Right now she’s under quarantine, but next weekend she’ll be at PetSmart ready to meet her forever people!

This past week Stevie turned one, and we move on from the period of house training, chew toys, and puppy food. Stevie was my first puppy, and I had real qualms about being able to do a good job of getting him to the one year mark. If you’ve read anything by Ian Dunbar, you’ll know that puppyhood is a time when one wrong experience or misstep can wreck your dog for life.

Fortunately, Stevie has made it through with flying colors. Sure, we still have a lot of things to work on. He has a bizarre obsession with chewing up plants. His downs and stays are atrocious. But generally, he’s a great dog. And now that he’s one, we’re in the terrain that I know. We can officially apply to come a therapy dog team, although we’re not there yet. I guess the point is that I’m breathing a sigh of relief that we made it this far and that we’ve done just fine.

Of course, one milestone makes me think of another. Next week it will have been four months since Boo passed away. A lot of things make me think of Boo. This past weekend we happened to be staying in the exact same cabin in Escalante that we stayed in with Boo last October. Last night I found his Snuggy in the back of a drawer.

It’s hard to know the best way to memorialize a dog. There are always people who will think you’re nuts for doing it all, but you can’t deny experiencing grief and wanting a way to express it.

A couple of months ago I came across a woman who makes pet stepping stones. I ordered one, and I’ve put it in a sunny corner of my yard where Boo used to sit and nap for hours on end.

I think it turned out quite well. I still haven’t figured out what to do with his ashes, but I smile every time I see his little stepping stone in the yard.

The best part about this picture is that when I took it my camera gave me a closed eye warning. Thank you, camera!

Stevie’s story is featured on Pawesome.net this week.

In other news, Izzy is also being cute. This one is for you, Julie.

Since Brian started working again last month, Stevie is back in doggie day care at Diggity Dog. Since he loves other dogs and people, he absolutely loves it when Brian drops him off there. So it was much to our surprise when Brian received an incident report upon picking Stevie up one night. Apparently, our little pittie Stevie was attacked by a particularly fierce Borzoi. You can read the description below. I’ve scrubbed the names to protect the instigator’s identity.

Stevie was uninjured, and the nipper was given a time out  in a kennel. Having once written a section of a training course on handling biting incidences in toddlers for a childcare facility, I’m glad to know that the same processes are followed for my dog.

Over the past few months, I’ve been going through old pictures and videos looking for good ones of Boo, and I’ve come across some good videos that never made it onto this site.

This first one is from Izzy’s agility days. Lacking a yard, we made use of the playground across the street. Boo makes an appearance and proves himself not so agile.

This one is from earlier this summer when we discovered Stevie’s odd ability to howl in tune with his squeaky toys. At least he only does it with the toys.

We put Boo to sleep last Wednesday. Over the last few years, he had developed some sort of spinal cord issue which was causing him to lose control of his back legs. Initially, it made him walk slowly and lose control of his back legs. But in the past few months, he’d begun falling regularly and was getting sores on his stomach and back legs from the falls and being in one position so long. He had a hard time maneuvering around the house, and there was no hope of a cure.

It was still a hard decision for us to make and even harder to carry out. We brought Boo into the vet on one of his favorite beds covered in blankets, and we were able to feed him turkey dogs as the initial sedative kicked in. As he grew more and more tired, he laid down in his bed and made his happy grunting noise. He seemed content and at peace, which isn’t how he usually is at the vet. After about 15 minutes, the vet came back and gave him a sedative to stop his heart. We stayed with him for a while after.

My hardest moment was leaving him behind. I couldn’t bring myself to move him from his bed and blanket. As we walked out, I asked the assistant at the front desk if we could pick them up later, but she immediately went to go get them for us. I wanted to stop her and tell her that he needed them. He might get cold. It was just so hard to imagine him laying on the cold floor or the metal exam table without something soft and familiar around him. I tear up even as I think about it now.

Boo was always so full of life. Ready to go anywhere. Ready for an adventure. Wanting to be with us. He was with me through so much that it’s hard to believe he isn’t here anymore. I got him when I was only 18. He traveled with me to Washington as I finished college and got my first full time job. Then he went with us across the country to Boston where I went to grad school. He saw both oceans and flew on a plane.

As far as dogs go, I like to think that he had it pretty good. Still it almost feels selfish that I’m not cleaning up after him anymore. Or helping him onto the sofa. I had to hide his food dish in the far back of the cabinet because I can’t help but automatically go to feed him first. I’ve been doing it for so long.

I come home to five dogs. Five really great dogs. But Boo will always be my first. My companion through some pretty volatile years. And it’s going to be a while before I can think of him without shedding a tear and wishing that he was still romping around like he used to.

Our newest dog Stevie is blind. He and his two sisters were dumped at the county shelter at five weeks old because they were all blind. Probably the result of inbreeding. His gray color is somewhat rare and coveted among pit bull owners, and someone was probably breeding dogs they shouldn’t have been to make a buck off that gray color.

In spite of his disability, he’s an amazingly confident and well adjusted dog. He walks on leash. He plays at the dog park. He loves a good chew toy. He can find a warm spot on the couch all by himself. Occasionally he bumps into stuff, but all in all, it’s a pretty normal canine existence.

That said there have still been a few challenges. Initially he would chew anything that was in front of him. It could be a toy, but it could just as easily be the coffee table or a shoe. That problem was pretty easy to solve with a firm “No,” followed by handing him an appropriate chew toy, and rewarding him for taking it.

A more difficult challenge was walking on the leash. When we tried to walk him outside the house, he was very reluctant to follow and held back on leash. As a 20 pound puppy, it sometimes just seemed like it would be easier to carry him. But 20 pounds quickly became 30 pounds, and 30 pounds became 40.

To encourage him to follow, I filled a plastic container with kibble and shook it. After getting his attention, I would give him a piece of kibble. Once he got to know the sound of the kibble, he was pretty eager to follow the noise. I just hooked him up to the leash and headed out. Over time, he just started to follow.

Now he’s so confident on leash that he likes to get to the end of the leash and navigate around me in a big circle. Probably a signal that we need to start working on heal.

The other issue was stairs. He got the grasp of our doggy door quickly, but the back steps at our house proved a big barrier to house training. That too just took a lot of coaxing with kibble and physically helping him to see that the drop off wasn’t the massive chasm that it appeared. He’s still not always sure about stairs he doesn’t know, but he’s getting there.

He does have the come command down. Here’s a video of us at the park today:

If you want to find out more about blind dogs, there’s an informative site over at blinddogs.com.