Monday, August 24, 2015
Thursday, August 20, 2015
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!
We started out this morning in eager anticipation of the UPS man. At 1:49, he arrived!
What could it be? Pip couldn't guess!
Even after we opened it, she wasn't sure.
They looked small in Pip's Photoshop picture.
But not in real life!
Laura put Pip's paw in the middle. Pip knows how to "stay" so she never even tried to put her paw or nose on the eye pieces.
Then Laura and Pip went out to see some birds! Laura would not look through them at any bird until some chickadees finally came in.
And now Laura has the best binoculars AND the best dog AND the world's most generous and thoughtful friend!
First birds through them are (in order of being seen)
- Black-capped Chickadee
- Downy Woodpecker
- Red-eyed Vireo
- Nashville Warbler
- Ruby-throated Hummingbird
- Purple Finch
- Rock Pigeon
- Red-breasted Nuthatch
- White-throated Sparrow
- Chipping Sparrow
- Mourning Warbler
Plus, one of those chickadees was LAURA'S chickadee—the one with the missing toes, who had the deformed bill.
Pip truly has the best Uncle Tom!!
Thursday, August 13, 2015
Why didn't I get a rescue dog?
In these polarizing times, people feel increasingly
comfortable breaking everything into simple dichotomies and attacking people,
even absolute strangers, online or in person, for being on the “wrong side.”
I’ve only had a few people tell me to my face that I should have gotten a
rescue dog rather than my purebred Pip, but yesterday I spent time with the
happy owner of a golden retriever puppy and she’s having to deal with a lot of
people trying to make her feel guilty.
Rescuing dogs in trouble and giving them a loving and
permanent home is a noble, rewarding, and important thing to do. My daughter and son-in-law
rescued a pit bull from a shelter in New York, and put in time, hard work,
and commitment to ensure that Muxy is happy and secure, and that other dogs
are safe around her. That last part of the equation has been the hardest—she’s
both fearful and aggressive toward other dogs—but they understand their
responsibilities and have worked hard, with professional trainers and on their
own, to make Muxy’s life a good one without harming anyone else.
Michael, Katie, and Muxy |
The time and commitment it takes to work with a rescue dog
must be taken seriously, and should never be a requirement for pet ownership. Guilting
people into adopting a rescue dog can lead to horror stories. Many kind-hearted
people who do adopt a dog with health or behavioral issues end up with far more
than they can handle, physically, financially, and emotionally. A great many of these dogs
end up being “rehomed” again and again. And many people end up with a dog they
truly love but cannot manage—people with the gentle, non-dominating personality
most susceptible to being guilted into getting a rescue dog in the first place are often exactly
the ones who end up with a dog who needs a much more domineering owner in order
to be well-adjusted and happy in a world where they’ll be encountering lots of
people and dogs.
Some of us simply cannot put the necessary time, effort, and
commitment into dealing with the health or behavioral issues that land puppies
and dogs in rescue facilities. It's best for every person who wants a dog to be realistic from the start about our needs and capabilities. There is nothing wrong with wanting a puppy that
had an ideal start, of a breed whose temperament matches our lifestyle and
temperament—indeed, people who have done the research and put in the time and
commitment to choosing the right breed and breeder are to be congratulated, not
condemned.
We all should be supporting ideal breeders: those who work hard to
ensure the safest genetic combinations, provide the best conditions for their
breeding dogs and puppies, keep the puppies for a minimum of 10 weeks to ensure
they have enough time with siblings to work them through their mouthing/biting
stage and enough time with their mother to get them started on housebreaking,
feed their adult dogs and puppies high-nutrition food, provide socializing and enrichment
experiences for the puppies, make sure they have a gentle start on necessary
vaccinations, get them microchipped, and make sure they don’t have any
recognizable genetic defects that are going to give them a shortened or painful
lifespan. These are also the people who make sure that the people adopting their puppies are going to be good, responsible dog owners.
Breeders who don’t guarantee their puppies’ health and who
don’t guarantee that they will take the puppies back for any reason at any time
are not likely to be ideal breeders. But some breeders who do take puppies back
without questions simply
send them off to a breed rescue group to be "rehomed." This is of course not bad in and of itself, but these rescue groups may cause more harm than good if they don’t keep
track of the breeders shuttling dogs off to them and work to put irresponsible
ones out of business.
It’s ironic that many of the people who feel morally
superior by rescuing dogs are actually supporting the very system that makes
puppy mills and irresponsible breeding increasingly lucrative. Most rescue
organizations charge hundreds of dollars for adoptions, and more and more
humane societies and other dog rescue groups have been working WITH the worst
breeders to take their unwanted dogs rather than exposing them and putting them
out of business. And the people adopting these dogs get saddled with a decade
or more of vet bills and the heartbreak of seeing a beloved pet suffer from
painful, crippling, and life-shortening conditions.
Looking at long-term, sustainable solutions to pet
overpopulation, the very first step is to end puppy mills entirely. As long as
the AKC collects registration fees for every pedigreed puppy regardless of
whether it comes from a responsible breeder or a puppy mill, the AKC is a
serious part of the problem—and one that profits directly from puppy mills.
I was thrilled to find the Havana Silk Dog Association of
America, which broke away entirely from the AKC to ensure that their breeders all
take responsibility for the health of these lovely little dogs. The Havanese is
an old breed, originally from Cuba and popular in Europe since the 1800s
(Charles Dickens had one for his children). It wasn’t recognized by the
American Kennel Club until 1996, but because of its small size,
“hypo-allergenic” coat, and sweet and easy-going temperament, it quickly rose
in popularity until now it’s #25 of all breeds.
That rise in popularity provided a lucrative market for
puppy mills and irresponsible breeders. Several serious and life-shortening
health issues are associated with some easily identifiable conditions, so the
Havanese Club of America developed a system to encourage widespread
participation of seven recommended tests for eye disease (CERF), congenital
deafness (BAER), patella luxation, cardiac diseases, hip dysplasia, hip joint
disorder (Legg-Calve-Perthes), and elbow dysplasia, and encouraged breeders to
submit all their dogs’ test results to the Canine Health Information Center
(CHIC) program. Testing required for a Havanese to receive a CHIC certificate
includes OFA BAER, OFA Hips, OFA Patellas, and annual CERF exams.
A group of breeders and the Havanese Club of America tried
to make passing those tests a requirement for a dog to be registered with the
AKC, but the AKC simply doesn’t allow that—their only concern is pedigree. So the Havana Silk Dog Association
of America broke away. My Pip passed all those tests before she left the
breeder, and has provisional
registration with the HSDAA, but she won’t be fully registered until she’s a
year old and has passed the tests again. The AKC should be following this or a
similar procedure with all breeds, but they get far, far more paid
registrations, and thus profits, from they way they do it now.
As long as the AKC gets a fee for each registered purebred
without consideration of health or the conditions of kennels, they’re directly
profiting from the most egregious puppy mills, where the majority of pedigreed
dogs come from. The burden is on those of us who buy purebred puppies to make
sure the breeder we decide on follows best practices.
But as long as rescue groups sell puppies directly or indirectly from those very
puppy mills and irresponsible breeders, they’re contributing to this
unconscionable practice. They justify the high price of adoption as essential
for continuing their operations, but without working to put out of business
those puppy mills and irresponsible breeders, this will be a never-ending
cycle. People who unquestioningly get dogs from them have no justifiable claim
of superiority over those who buy puppies from good breeders.
In a perfect world, every puppy would be bred by a
knowledgeable and responsible breeder to be healthy and sound, get at least ten weeks of proper and enriching care inside the breeder's home with its mother and siblings, and every person
would choose his or her puppy based on a firm understanding of that breed’s
unique needs and temperament. In that perfect world, the only time puppies would
ever need to be rescued would be when an owner had to give one up due to death,
serious illness, or other unforeseeable event and something had happened to make it impossible for the breeder to take it back.
That perfect world is far from what we have today, but we must keep our eyes on the long-term goal even as we deal with short-term solutions. Everyone who adopts a puppy or dog has a responsibility to investigate where it came from. “Rescue” organizations that work with puppy mills are perpetuating the problem. Meanwhile, responsible breeding today is the only way we will be able to ensure healthy, sound dogs with predictable temperaments and abilities for the future.
That perfect world is far from what we have today, but we must keep our eyes on the long-term goal even as we deal with short-term solutions. Everyone who adopts a puppy or dog has a responsibility to investigate where it came from. “Rescue” organizations that work with puppy mills are perpetuating the problem. Meanwhile, responsible breeding today is the only way we will be able to ensure healthy, sound dogs with predictable temperaments and abilities for the future.
Monday, August 10, 2015
Birding on Big Pete Road in Port Wing
Big Pete Road has treasures at every level, from the spongy soil to the spires of the tallest white pines. |
Big Pete Road is a quiet dirt road, with two houses on it. Most of the time when I walk there I don't run into anyone at all. I put Pip on a retractable leash—I can pull it in if we see any people, dogs, bears, etc., but otherwise we can each walk at our own pace. She is wonderfully easy going, running ahead (never tugging at the leash) until she spots or sniffs something she wants to investigate. She's more comfortable than any other dog I've had with letting me pass her while she's sniffing something, but doesn't lag too far behind--she's too companionable for that. Once in a while she goes off the dirt road for a foot or two, but seems to prefer staying on the road.
Big Pete Road is nice and sandy. |
Friday, August 7, 2015
At what point...?
Pip chewing a bully stick |
Sunday, August 2, 2015
Saturday, August 1, 2015
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