Poor Hayduke

Hayduke's been swimming so much that his ears have been bothering him.  We ordered some stuff online that was recommended as a sort of dog swimmer's ear remedy.  It reviewed well, and we figured it would help.

Last week, we noticed some little bumps on top of his head.  No big deal, we thought - they're probably some kind of bug bites, or scratches from sticker bushes incurred while crashing through the underbrush in the woods somewhere.

But this week, on Monday, the little bumps were all over his poor head, and they were bothering him.  All around his ears, and all down his neck, were little bleedy bumps.  On Tuesday they were worse, and by Tuesday night they had spread to his muzzle.  His eyes and mouth were all swollen.  He was really feeling bad, and it was scary for him and for us.

First thing Wednesday morning, he and I were at the vet's office.  The awful hives and the swelling were an allergic reaction to the ear stuff, they said.  He got a terrible haircut and some benedryl and steroid shots, and I stayed home all morning with him until the antihistamines kicked in and the swelling started to subside.  He's got different ear medicine now, and some oral antibiotics, but it's going to take awhile for these awful itchy bleedy hives to go away.

And the worst part?  He's not allowed to swim for ten days. So stay away from "Vet's Best Ear Relief" or else your $12 in over-the-counter product will turn into a $150 vet bill!

Little Maumelle River

We borrowed boats from our friends over at Arkansas Outside to try out a stretch of the Little Maumelle River.  There are so many things I love about central Arkansas.  Imagine being able to paddle a kayak for eight plus miles down a river, within the city limits of the largest city in your state.  We began at Pinnacle Mountain State Park and floated through a forest of cypress trees, ending our trip just past Two Rivers park, at the boat launch at the bottom of River Mountain Road.

Ivydog was nearly perfect.  Hayduke was terrible.  He and I ended up in a single kayak, hanging back out of sight of the rest of the group.  When he can't see anyone else, he's a lot calmer about being in the boat.

I wish I'd had a camera, because he was extremely excited today about lily pads.  We floated through big stretches of water that's so still and shallow that lilies grow in big 'fields.'  Hayduke thought it was great fun to hang his big head out of the boat and try to snatch the flat leaves in his mouth.  Once he grabbed a lily bud and pulled it up, four foot stalk and all.  He looked at me as if to say "well, I caught it, but now I don't know what to do with it."  We left a trail of leaves with bites taken out of them.

Hayduke is a nightmare on the water but he has so much fun it'd be sad to leave him at home.

Adventures in Dog Boating

In preparation of a future Buffalo River trip, we decided to spend the morning on Lake Ouachita.  We could try different kinds of kayaks and canoes, we figured, and we could check out how well the dogs would do on the water.

Ivy likes water but not too much, and she's a little afraid of riding in cars, and she generally likes to sit up straight and be admired.  I predicted that Ivy would sit still in the middle of a boat and allow herself to be paddled around the lake like the princess that she is.  I was right.

Dog House Project

Hayduke has a pretty good life.  That little stray puppy huddled in the tree roots, hungry and scared, has made a fine life for himself in the house across the street.  He gets good dog food and an endless supply of toys and treats and belly scratches and long hikes in the woods.  It's his first winter here, and even though he sleeps inside at night, he needs a doghouse for the cold mornings and evenings he stays outside during the winter, or during the rainy parts of the year.

But will any old doghouse do?  No, it will not.  No doghouses we can buy locally are insulated.  No doghouses we can order online review well.  Most dogs in Arkansas do just fine with a non-insulated doghouse.  Most dogs don't read online reviews.  

We're BUILDING a doghouse.  We ordered plans online from doghouseplans.com and gathered ideas from reviewing hundreds of doghouse photos.  We've gone to Home Depot a half dozen times.  We've spent good money and large parts of four days building this doghouse. 

Obedience Class for Dogs

Hayduke went through a puppy kindergarten this past spring (Blue Sky Dogs) with flying colors, though with perhaps a little bit too much enthusiasm.  We took the class from Colleen who runs a pet shop on Cantrell Road, and it was worth every penny and every minute we spent.

For his beginning obedience class, we switched to the Little Rock Dog Training Club.  They have a much more extensive lineup of courses for people who want to show their dogs, but we thought that many of the skills involved would translate well to just having a good, obedient, reliable family hiking dog.

Boy, were we wrong.  What a waste of time and money!  We spent nearly eight weeks relearning all the things we already knew from puppy kindergarten, except that we spent time to learn them in a snooty, dog-show way.

Hayduke had already learned that when I say "sit", he should put his butt on the ground.  He's very good at it.  Sit.  Butt. Ground.  Good sit.  NOT a good sit, according to the snooty dog show people.  He should sit THIS way, doing THIS, and not do THAT.  Hayduke wasn't interested, and I wasn't either.  He'd sit sideways, or stick his leg out, or lean on me.  He and I were both so grumpy about the 'new rules' that I really believe he started sitting wrong on purpose.  In fact, when he'd occasionally get it exactly right, he'd realize it and get up and sit again, pointing backward.

When we practiced 'recall', I'd call him from across the room.  "Hayduke, COME!" I'd say in a happy, excited voice, and he'd run as fast as he could straight to me.  But was this correct?  No, it was NOT.  I was supposed to say it sternly, in a voice of authority.  "Hayduke, COME", in a frowny loud tone.  I pointed out that the students who said it this way had dogs who walked slowly to them, or ignored them completely, or wandered off to someone else.  Mine was the only dog in the class who actually appeared to want to mind his human. 

Most of the class was completely impractical pickiness and time spent fiddling with skills already learned.  We were both disinterested and frustrated.  I had to invent games for Hayduke to play or he'd get bored waiting on other dogs to do things perfectly.

Ugh.  We finished our class, and we got our certificate (that's it, up top), and phooey on them.  We're not going back.

Backpacking with Hayduke and Isabel

Our friend Isabel just turned five, but she's been outside a lot.  Her parents are both active, outdoor people - they both cave, and Amy runs and backpacks, and Spike hunts a lot - so Isi's quite accustomed to sleeping in a tent, to eating noodles while sitting on rocks, to peeing in the woods.  No problem.  Isabel is comfortable in the big wide world. 



So it was no surprise that Isi's first backpacking trip was a resounding success.  We'd been planning it for months.  We met up at Fairview campground on Friday night and did a quick car-shuttle before dropping into the Ozark Highlands Trail near Ben Hur.



Isabel carried her own snacks and jacket.  She borrowed one of Mandy's hiking poles.  And Woofie came along to, clipped to Isi's backpack.  We poked along the trail looking at stuff, and the creek crossing wouldn't have bothered her at all, except that it's still early in the spring and the water's still really, really cold.  So she hitched a ride.



Since we'd planned low hiking mileages and lots of playing-around time, we thought this would be a good first backpacking trip for Hayduke too.  He doesn't like water a lot, but he was a good sport about the crossings.  Once in the water, I think he figures he might as well just swim to the other side.



Later we realized that this was very likely the first time he'd ever been in water so deep.  How many of us have a photograph of the very first time we went swimming?



We had lots of time in camp for naps and talking.  There were ticks everywhere, but the weather was pleasant and the company was good.  Isabel has a great memory for places, and the next morning when we left camp, she's the one who found the double-blazed trail intersection she'd seen the day before, and led us back toward our car, counting blazes as she went.



On Sunday, we finished our hike in plenty of time to visit some waterfalls in the neighborhood.  First we went to Falling Water Falls and splashed around for awhile.  When the creek is up, this is a popular spot for kayak people to practice (going over the falls), but in lower water conditions, it's fun to walk along the rocks above the little falls, or sit at the edge of the pool below.  This trip, we found a really neat spot where the bottom of a tree trunk has made something like a little playhouse, all open to the sky.  It even has windows.



We also visited Six Finger Falls, though due to road construction we had to walk along the road for a mile or so to get there.  Hiking and playing are hard work for a puppy, and Hayduke had to take lots of naps in the sunshine.  All in all, it was a great weekend.  We loved spending time with Amy and getting to know Isabel.  Both our 'preschoolers' did a great job on their very first backpacking trips. 

Adoption Announcement

We've decided to keep the puppy.  He's been trying to be a good boy, and has already learned some commands like 'sit' and 'wait' and 'come.'  He'll grow up to be big and strong enough to stay outside during the day, and he'll like coming with us on backpacking and hiking trips.  We're getting him at the perfect age to teach him to behave and cooperate.  And he really needs a home, so even if we aren't perfect puppy parents, his life with us will be a lot better than just being out on the street, or stuck in a shelter, or chained in some guy's backyard.

We've enjoyed having Hayduke underfoot the last couple of weeks. We're looking forward to seeing what kind of dog he turns out to be.

Making himself at home

We've had a "FOUND PUPPY" sign up out by the busy road for two weeks now.  I've only received one phone call, from a woman who lost her little black pomeranian.  "I'm not sure what this dog is, ma'am, but I can tell you for sure he's not a pomeranian."

I brought him inside on the first night and slept on the couch with him, since it was chilly and there were thunderstorms. I just didn't feel right about letting the little guy stay outside by himself. Now he stays outside during the day, while we're gone, but spends his evenings in the kitchen and sleeps inside, too.

He's decided that since the rocking chair in the kitchen is where the people sits, he should sit there too.  He can't get up there himself, though, without a really gnarly climbing move in which he sticks his head through the arm of the chair and then sort of muscles his way up through the bars.

We're trying hard to house train him, figuring that it's something he needs to learn no matter where he ends up living.  He understands that going potty in the front yard is a good thing.  He hasn't quite figured out that he should NOT go in the kitchen.  We're working on that part.

He's a sweet puppy and I have to admit that Bryan and I are both getting a little attached to him.  (Mandy says she'll only like him if he learns to behave.)  I don't think he belongs anywhere.  I hope we can find him a good home. We'd be awfully sad to have to take the little guy to the shelter.

Kind People Live Here

Dogs show up in our neighborhood and around our yard on a pretty regular basis.  They're usually unfamiliar dogs, and they're usually in good shape, clearly just stopping for a little smell around on their way someplace else.  We're not above patting a head here and there, or making a phone call if there's a number on a collar tag.  We provide a bowl of water if a drink seems to be in order.  But for the most part we don't get very involved in the business of itinerant dogs.



You may remember that, about a year ago, two beagles showed up at our house and took a long nap in the shade.  They didn't seem inclined to leave, once we'd scratched their ears and given them some water.  They were tired and seemed like they needed some help.  We put out signs and put ads in the paper and took care of them for about a month.  Finally, we helped them find their home.



We kidded each other at the time that there was some visible-to-dogs-only sign above our house that said "stop here for a rest."  Hobos had their own system of pictographs; a little line drawing of a cat meant "a kind woman lives here."  Do we have one on our house?  I don't see it. 

But the sign is clearly there.  Today I got a text from Bryan:  "Mandy found a puppy."  The two of them had been doing afternoon errands and had passed by the mowed lot across the street several times.  They'd noticed a dark thing under one of the trees, but they'd thought it was a neighborhood cat, or maybe a discarded black t-shirt..  In the late afternoon, when the black thing had been there for hours, they finally went over to investigate.  They found a puppy huddled at the base of the tree.



He's in good shape - clear eyes, healthy skin, little pointy white baby teeth.  His tummy is round and fat.  He loves to be with people.  The vet near our house guesses that he's just barely six weeks old, only just weaned, and confirmed our hunch that the puppy has no microchip.  He eats in a sort of panicked way, but it may just be the hunger of a young creature who missed his lunch.

He has a collar, so hopefully this story will have a happy ending.  He's in our backyard now, and I'll make a "Found Puppy" sign tomorrow.