The Poodle (and Dog) Blog

Dude, there’s a dog on your roof!

Dubi rules over a quiet neighborhood in West Greeley, Colorado. Or maybe it’s a quiet neighborhood because Dubi is the Neighborhood Watch from his owner’s roof top.

Owner J.D. Picket got Dubi from the Humane Society as a puppy. He is part black Lab, part Boxer and part mountain goat.

When Dubi was a puppy he jumped up on the patio roof one winter when the snow was deep and Picket had to keep helping him down.

As Dubi grew, he continued to climb up on the patio roof and learned to jump the four feet up to the roof of the house. Worried that Dubi would fall off the roof, Pickett tried several ways to discourage him, including installing chicken wire on the back of the roof.

But as most of us have learned, when a dog like Dubi is determined to follow his destiny, there is little humans can do to stop him. Finally Dubi won, determined to mount his aerie to watch over the neighborhood.

At first neighbors would ask if they knew there was a dog on the roof. Now people stop by to take pictures. Source

How to get your tasteless TV messages to the public without actually paying for air time

PETA has done it again. By their own recently released records which they are required by law to release, they killed 2200 pets in 2010. That is 94% of the pets entrusted to them.

Since 1998, their body count is 25,840. (That isn’t counting the ones they discarded in the Piggly Wiggly dumpsters.)

Spending part of their $33 million yearly operating budget on veterinary care and marketing to find homes for pets is not their idea of “ethical treatment.” They prefer to spend their money on media campaigns telling the rest of us that eating meat and drinking milk, wearing fur and leather, hunting, fishing, killing mice and flies are all “unethical” while they remain the enemy to our pets.

Part of their strategy is to spend a lot of money on ads that manage to insult the sensibilities of civilized people everywhere. Then they approach the networks to buy time to air them. They know that the ads will be banned from the networks.

Naturally they want to buy at times when happy families are enjoying themselves. Impressionable children are a major target.

While it might seem that they have lost when networks refuse to run their ads, they have really won. This is what they want. Airing their commercials would cost a lot of money, but now they can crank out press releases about how their ads have been censored.

Columnists and editorial writers give them a lot of free lineage, more publicity than they would get it the ads actually ran.

They could easily tone down the ads to get them aired, but that’s not what they are about. Their ads are about telling the public how to live their lives.

Examples ads include:

• A risqué ad they wanted to run during Super Bowl 2009 of horny, scantily clad women fondling vegetables to show that…uh... I’m not sure what the point was.
• An ad they wanted to run during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade of a girl describing how turkeys are supposedly tortured while she is saying grace
• An ad showing a dead man in the morgue clutching a Big Mac, “I was lovin’ it,” with a McDonald’s logo prominently attached to his toe
• An ad showing people with dog size body bags attached to leashes showing that supposedly if we buy a dog, we kill a shelter dog.

A lot of controversy, a lot of exploiting of women, a lot of show business types looking for free publicity, a lot of media exposure for very little money. For such groups there is no such thing as bad publicity. 

Whenever I do a PETA post I invariably get comments and emails from what sound like the sweet, young and naïve trying to re-educate me. So please, Tiffani, Brandi and Madison, et al do some serious research first. Such as this post on the founder of PETA.

When do ski lifts stop running?

 1. When there is not enough snow for skiing.

2. When the snow level reaches the height
of the ski lift.

Skiing stopped when the snow level reached the height of the ski lift at Alpine Meadows.

More than 50 feet of snow global warming climate change has hit some California ski resorts this winter.

 

 

Saint Bernards 

bail. 

Can a sheep give birth to a puppy?

Liu Naiying, a farmer in China (yes, that China), believes he has found a different kind of sheepdog on his farm, a hybrid of sheep and dog. According to the Daily Mail, he found the strange baby shortly after it was born. 

I was herding the sheep, and saw a sheep licking her newborn lamb on the grassland. The lamb was still wet. When I went up close to check on the lamb I was shocked because it looked so weird, like a cross between a sheep and a dog. I was a bit frightened, as I've been raising sheep for 20 years and had never seen such a creature.

The baby has wool like a lamb, but the paws, tail, mouth, eyes, and nose look like a  puppy. Thousands of people have been flocking to the farm to see the supposed puppy-lamb.

However, Yue Guozhang, a scientist at an animal husbandry technology center, said that is not possible for a dog to impregnate a sheep since they are different species. He believes it is just an abnormal lamb.

Maybe it's just me, but I don't see much resemblance to the mother. It looks like a cute mixed breed puppy to me rather than a mutant lamb, but who am I to argue with China which (have I mentioned lately?) censors my blog?

Emily and Einstein—A Book Review

  Written by Linda Francis Lee; published by St Martin’s Press

Happily, Emily and Einstein, A Novel of Second Chances was not what I expected it to be. I expected a sentimental little tale of a woman who experiences a loss and finds solace in a faithful and loving little dog who helps her reconnect to the world.

It turned out to be a little darker, more complex, and more entertaining.

Emily is a list maker, a planner who seems to have her life under control with a job as a respected senior editor, a handsome husband from an old money family, and a great apartment in the world’s most famous apartment building, the Dakota.

Then her life comes apart. Her husband, Sandy, is killed suddenly; she finds out that he was a world class jerk who was planning to divorce her; and she is in danger of losing her beloved apartment. While struggling with all this, things unravel at work when a rival takes credit for Emily’s ideas and the publishing house is taken over by a company intent on making money.

She does find solace in the little scruffy dog, Einstein, but Einstein is not what he seems. In a bit of fantasy Sandy has entered the body of Einstein and the arrogant, self-centered man becomes a funny, self-centered little dog.

As Emily’s life spins out of control, Einstein is torn between helping her or giving in to jealousy because she is still human while he has to suffer the indignities of being a little dog.

Sandy/Einstein must learn to save Emily as the only way to redeem himself.

The book alternates chapters with Sandy/Einstein chapters in san serif type and Emily in serif, as they experience the same incidents, but from differing perspectives.

Other characters include Emily’s totally irresponsible younger sister; their deceased mother, a pioneer in the women’s movement who continues to exert an influence; a strange old man who offers Sandy/Einstein choices he doesn’t understand; the inevitable bitchy women at work; a ruggedly handsome former Navy Seal who becomes Emily’s love interest; Sandy’s mother who tries to throw Emily out of the Dakota, but who has an embarrassing secret; and an old family friend who gives Emily a way out.

And somehow the Dakota itself seems to be almost a character to advance the plot, not just a setting.

Emily and Einstein is a well crafted book about second chances and redemption. It is an entertaining read, not just for dog lovers.

Patrick poops and why so many people are excited by it

Patrick was found in a plastic bag dumped in the garbage and thrown down a chute at a New Jersey housing complex. The employee who found him called the Associated Humane Societies.

What they found was a skeleton of a one-year-old dog barely alive weighing less than half of the 50 pounds he should have weighed.

He was rushed to Garden State Veterinary Specialist trauma unit. Through a lot of loving attention by the highly trained doctors and technicians, a blood transfusion and several medical treatments, Patrick has shown his determination to survive.

Just knowing that there is no intestinal blockage and that Patrick’s food canal is functional is great news for his caretakers. He is now able to stand and take in food several times a day.

Although he has a long way to go, there is every indication that one-year-old Patrick will someday be a happy, healthy dog. According to one worker, “He loves people.”

So many donated to Patrick’s care that GSVS has stopped accepting donations for him. Instead they are asking that people donate to their local organizations in Patrick’s name.

Kisha Curtis, 28, was charged with two counts of abandonment and two counts of failure to provide proper sustenance to the animal. She faces two criminal counts and two civil counts, which could result in up to six months in jail or a $1,000 fine and community service if convicted. Fox News

Or maybe the judge could just rap her on the knuckles with a ruler.

Toy Poodle helps Secretary of State Clinton deal with stress

With the constant turmoil in the Middle East, few people are under more stress than Secretary of State Hilary Clinton. How does she and the former President deal with it?

Enter Tally the Toy Poodle and Seamus the arthritic Labrador.

The Clintons got Seamus after Buddy the Chocolate Lab was hit by a car after they had left the White House and moved to their new home in Chappaqua, N.Y. The Clintons were out of town and Buddy was being watched by members of the Secret Service at the time. Seamus is from the same line of Chocolate Labs as Buddy.

When Mrs. Clinton fell in love with a neighbor’s Toy Poodle, she knew she wanted a small dog. Tally was adopted into their lives to keep Seamus company.

Although Buddy was subject to many photo ops, few people know about Seamus and Tally. Mrs. Clinton takes it as a sign of increasing privacy for her and her family that even the regular State Department reporters didn’t know about these dogs.

Mrs. Clinton is thankful that the press has backed off somewhat on covering every aspect of their family life. In an interview for People magazine she said:

"I'd love that it even be less so. These jobs are really hard, and if you don't have time to just really be a private person, you can't refuel yourself to be able to deal with all of the pressures that come at you during the average day. So for us, it's great having just the opportunity to go for a walk with our dogs."

"When I'm home, we go on these walks and we have this old Labrador who has arthritis, and we always try to convince him to come out for a walk. And then we have this toy poodle that we got to keep the Labrador company and to try to get the Labrador to be more energetic. And she's, like, bouncing all the time. And so we go on these walks and it's great because the – our Lab, Seamus, sort of starts off kind of like an old man, just kind of very ambling and slow. And Tally, our poodle, is like, jumping up and down and then Seamus gets some energy and off he goes."

Like many other dog owners, the Clintons rely on Seamus and Tally as comforts of home to deal with the stresses of their lives.

There really ARE things as important as winning

Veteran musher John Baker, an Alaskan Inupiaq, won the 39th annual Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race with the help of his lead dogs, Velvet and Snickers, and was honored in his hometown of Kotzebue with a parade and celebration.

But there are other awards given to mushers following the race. Aliy Zirkle (Boondocks’ human) won the award for best dog care, an award she considers as important as winning.

“In my world there's no higher prize,” said Zirkle, who finished 11th. “I'd love to win, but more than that I love to have a happy, healthy dog team at the finish…When I go out there and race, my priority is to keep the dogs together.”

She won the Leonhard Seppala Humanitarian Award selected by veterinarians for the top 20 musher who best demonstrates outstanding dog care while remaining competitive.

Zirkle’s husband and kennel partner, Allen Moore, won the Sportsman Award for coming to the aid of a fellow musher whose team had stalled less than 100 miles from the finish.

Karin Hendrickson was disoriented and on the verge of hypothermia when Moore’s team reached her. He got her to walk and drink fluids and then hitched her team to his sled and towed them into White Mountain about 20 miles away.

Hendrickson eventually scratched from the race and Moore had other mushers pass him on the trail, probably losing three places in finishing. Moore finished in 6th place.

"The race didn't matter, because if she falls asleep out there in that wind you could die easily," said Moore, who earned $4,800. "It wouldn't have mattered if I finished 20 places lower."

Rick Swenson, 60, the only five time winner in history, was chosen by fellow racers as the most inspirational musher after breaking his collarbone early in the race and still finishing in 20th place. He accepted his award with his arm in a sling.

Ellen Halvorson, 50, a psychiatrist from Wasilla, ran the race because she believed it was “a grand way to celebrate half a century on this earth."

As a rookie in 2007, she won the Red Lantern award and this year became the only musher who ever won it twice. The Red Lantern is awarded to the musher who finishes last in a race that many mushers never finish.

No dogs died during the running of this year’s—or last year’s—Iditarod to the disappointment of certain animal rights groups and that silly woman in Miami whose sole purpose in life seems to be to stop the running of the race.

A furry different kind of a teacher for little kids and big kids

Wrangler the Poodle is a therapy dog, but he doesn’t just visit the classrooms. Wrangler is a staff member. He has become everyone’s favorite counselor since he came to the Round Elementary School in Michigan.

Thirteen-month-old Wrangler listens to students read without judging or correcting, helps them relieve stress, and listens to their secrets. Wrangler is "great" at getting students to open up, something adults are not always successful in doing, according to one teacher.

He spends some of his day in special education classes, but several staff members are trained to handle him so he is available to all students at the kindergarten through fourth grade school.

Fourth-grader Lily Green acknowledged that Wrangler seems content listening to her read, no matter her pace.

"Nobody is scared to read to him; he isn't mean," Green said.

Wrangler was donated to the school by Beth and Gary Spanski, of For Better Independence Assistance Dogs in Leslie, a small town near Lansing, Michigan. Source

And in a somewhat related note from the New York Times:

Yale Law School has announced a pilot program in which students can check out a dog along with books from the library.

A dog named Monty will be available at the circulation desk for stressed-out students to check out for 30 minutes at a time beginning next week. A memo was sent to law students from the law librarian to introduce the pilot program:

“It is well documented that visits from therapy dogs have resulted in increased happiness, calmness and overall emotional well-being.”

Details are sketchy.

Ambivalence and the Dogs of China

I’ve had many Chinese students, but one group was most memorable. They would join several of us to unwind over a few brews in the campus pub on Friday Happy Hour.

We covered many topics, some serious and as the beer flowed, some frivolous. One Friday the subject turned to American food. They all loved American food and confessed that they had put on a few pounds while they were here.

Then one student stopped all conversation when he said, “I miss dog meat.”

We advised him that this was not a subject he should be introducing in his current environment, but he was adamant. “You kill many dogs in your shelters. What is the difference?”

Of course you can’t explain cultural differences in logical terms. What is unthinkable in some cultures is natural in another. For centuries people in his province have raised dogs for food and also had pet dogs. How was that different from producing dogs to be killed in shelters?

Companion dogs have a very long tradition in China. Some of our most popular dog breeds originated in ancient China as pampered darlings of the imperial courts: the Pekinese, Pug, Shih Tsu, Chinese Crested. The Shar-Pei and Chow Chow are ancient Chinese working dog breeds.

In the 1960’s Chairman Mao banned pets as symbols of “bourgeois decadence.” Under his rule dogs were killed, hidden, smuggled out of the country or used for cuisine. The dog population was virtually wiped out during this time.

In the last few years companion dogs have become the rage among the newly affluent class in China. Tibetan Mastiffs are major status symbols with outrageous price tags.

You have probably heard about the newest “most expensive dog in the world,” a 180-pound red Tibetan Mastiff named Hong Dong (Big Splash). A coal baron in Northern China has reportedly purchased him for over $l.5 million USD.

If you listen carefully you can hear Chairman Mao turning over in his grave at the “decadence” of his countrymen today.

People who know about these things say that 11-month-old Hong Dong will be able to command stud fees of $15,000.

A couple of years ago a Chinese woman identified only as Mrs. Wang was reported to have spent $582,000 for Yangtze River Number Two, a black Tibetan Mastiff, making him at that time the world’s most expensive dog.

We know two things about Hong Dong and Yangtze River Number Two: they will probably never be neutered… or dinner.

DOG BREEDS