That’s blind Babe on her favorite spot in winter, atop the snowbank that forms from the snow sliding off the Widget’s House roof.  We turn the dogs out for exercise in small groups in several different yards adjacent to Widget’s House; in Babe’s yard you see blind Allie the black Lab, Shiloh in the center…

Trooper, the adorable Lab/Hound mix who arrived from Louisiana back in December, is finally ready for surgery.  Judging from the number of emails I’ve received from people asking how he’s doing, I realize I have been remiss in not posting any updates on him since he came.  But he is doing just great, and that…

On the way back from taking Trooper and Popeye to the vet in Helena today (see post above), I decided to take some photos of the road home — during the last 10 or so miles, from just north of Helmville on Montana Highway 141 all the way to the ranch.  So here’s a quick…

It was a happy ending that wasn’t.  In fact, it ended tragically. That’s Luke in the photo, a blind hound in a rural Virginia animal control shelter.  The day he started his journey to a new life here in Montana turned out to be his last day.  It really doesn’t get worse than this. A…

Just a quick post to report that our vet in Helena, Dr. Brenda Culver, called yesterday evening with good news on Pepper.  The growth on her side turned out to be a deep abscess, not a tumor of some sort.  And she is responding well to her IV antibiotic therapy, with her temperature almost normal. …

Jodie called me from Widget’s House shortly after 8 a.m. this morning to say something was wrong with blind Pepper.  Pepper hadn’t eaten breakfast, she wouldn’t get up, and she wouldn’t come out of her crate.  I grabbed a thermometer and headed over.  By the time I got there, Jodie had managed to coax Pepper…

In a post last week, I reported that Bo our blind Appaloosa was experiencing episodes of nystagmus, or rapid eye movement, and sometimes showed some mild incoordination when this happened.  I had taken him to see our equine vet, Dr. Erin Taylor at Blue Mountain Veterinary Hospital, last Monday for an exam.  After getting him…

Alayne took this series of photos this morning of little Daisy climbing into a chair in the living room.  Daisy is one of our Dachshunds with neurological problems … she walks with an odd gait, kind of rocking back and forth on her hindquarters, and she makes a clump-clump-clump sound with her tiny feet as…

On Friday evening, as I was driving back from Missoula after saying goodbye to dear old Dillon, Alayne called me in the truck to say I had just received an email about a blind Beagle named Briggs.  He was on death row in a rural Georgia animal control shelter.  The email, which came from someone…

We lost our oldest boy, Dillon, yesterday afternoon. He hadn’t been able to walk in months, yet his eyes still lit up and he could still catch a tossed dog cookie in the air, even lying down.  He spent his days on a bed in our living room, right outside my office.  That’s where I…