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The online diary
started life as a blog of my strange 'other life' with the dog. I
wanted to record some of the experiences that I had as a first-time dog
owner. To access the archive, click on the appropriate month.
The most recent articles are listed
separately.
You are most
welcome to send comments about any of the articles. Record your
comments via the Contact Me page.
MISSING – THE ACTUAL STORY!
Sun 24 October 2010
At last, I
have found the time to relate this story. As I remember the incident took
place a couple of days before the end of the summer term. I took
Beattie out for a walk that has
become a regular, a circuit starting and finishing at the village of Lound.
Most of this walk can be done off-lead and Beattie had been rather too used
to taking little detours off into the fields at the side of the path. Only
occasionally was it a problem and that was when she disappeared into
standing crops and could not be seen.
This was
exactly what happened on this day. We had not long started our walk when I
was suddenly aware she was not with me anymore. I retraced my steps to a
gap in the hedge and I knew she was after the game when she put up a
pheasant! She reappeared, briefly, as she leapt up above the barley, and
that was the last I saw of her. I waited there for about half an hour,
calling at regular intervals, but she had disappeared.
As school was
now finished for the day, I telephoned
A and told her the story. She
drove over to help look for Beattie. When she arrived, Beattie had been
missing for about an hour. A
walked back into the village, whilst I crossed two fields to the point where
the walk ends. I met a couple of people and told them the story, but they
had nothing to report.
We decided
that the best course of action would be for us to do the walk in opposite
directions, in case Beattie was looking for me! By now, she had been lost
for nearly two hours and we were both really worried about her; the trouble
being that Beattie would go with anybody!
The last part
of the walk is through a wood and as I walked uphill through the trees, I
called out her name without much hope of a response. Imagine my surprise
and pleasure as I topped a rise and saw a familiar figure trotting towards
me, apparently quite unconcerned! Yes, it was Beattie! She must have
walked the whole circuit on her own. I had her lead on as quick as
lightning and then telephoned A
with the good news.
I wondered
what she had been thinking as she made her way round the walk. Was she
worried that she could not find me? Did she think she had been abandoned?
It’s at times like this that I wish my pet could talk.
But then,
again, perhaps I would not want to know … Back
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BLUE FOOT
Sun 24 October 2010
A couple of
weeks ago, we had a weekend in The Lake District. It was the occasion of
the annual Wainwright Memorial Lecture, held at Rheged, near Penrith. As
usual, a Society walk preceded that main event and on this occasion it was a
walk from Glenridding up to the summit of Birkhouse Moor, a new fell for
Beattie.
A did not accompany us as she
has been feeling under the weather lately and decided to spend the day in
Penrith (spend, being the operative word!). Beattie and I completed the
walk, and it was only on returning to the car park that
A noticed there was a large red
lump on Beattie’s foot between two of her claws. I had not noticed anything
unusual on the walk and Beattie showed no signs of lameness.
On our return
home, I took her to the vet, who prescribed antibiotics and told me that he
suspected a foreign body in her foot that had made it swell up like that;
perhaps a grass seed. I was to bring her back if the swelling did not
subside.
After a week,
there was no noticeable difference, so last Monday I returned to the vet,
who said her would open up the cyst under anaesthetic. On Friday, Beattie
went under the knife and I collected her in the afternoon. The vet had
telephoned to say that he could find nothing in her foot, but he had flushed
out the wound and he hoped it would now heal. Her foot had been bound in a
blue dressing making her leg look rather like a blue chicken drumstick!
Since she has
been home, we have kept her quiet with short excursions out into the
garden. At first, she ran around on three legs, but today has been able to
put weight on her blue foot. We have to keep the dressing dry so she has
been going outside with cling film wrapping over her dressing, and that does
seem to be doing the trick!
Tomorrow, she
has an appointment with the nurse to remove the dressing and another visit
to the vet on Wednesday. I hope that it is the end of her troubles, for
now! Back
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Photographs taken with a Fuji MX-2900
Zoom or a Canon EOS 20D
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