Rolling Dog Farm Blog

This is Patch, now known as Skipper, the little Schipperke with a rare auto-immune skin disease who came to us several weeks ago from a shelter in California.  We renamed him Skipper in honor of his Schipperke heritage, because this breed was used as watchdogs on boats and barges in the Netherlands and Belgium.  ("Schipperke" is actually a diminutive form of the Dutch word for "skipper," so there you have it.)  As you can see, Skipper has now become an official rolling dog himself.

I took this photo of him right after that roll, and you can see he was one very happy boy.  It’s too soon to know what kind of "roller" he will be.  We have three categories of rolling dogs here.  There are the "fair-weather rollers," who generally roll only on grass when it’s warm out.  Then we have the "all-season rollers," who roll year-round regardless of the weather.  Finally, we have the "snowy rollers," who usually prefer to roll only on snow.

It’s kind of hard to tell from these photos, but Skipper’s hair is definitely growing back and his skin is in much better shape.  He still has some crusty areas, particularly on his ears and around his neck, and his face does seem to be permanently scarred.  But we’ve only had a couple of days where he’s been scratching at himself, so we are cautiously optimistic we have his skin disease under control.

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I was heading from the kitchen back to my office the other evening when I looked over and saw this Dachshund line-up in the living room.  That’s new arrival Belvie by the wall, then little Daisy on the cot in the middle, and Bailey in the foreground.  Bailey is sleeping on his friend and occasional arch-rival, Mr. Caterpillar.

What’s missing from this photo is the white fluffy stuffing that the Doxies and their friends are always ripping out of the soft squeaky toys.  Usually our living room floor is covered with white tufts, so Alayne must have swept it not long before I took the photo.

What’s interesting is that although all the stuffed toys get their innards pulled out eventually (usually within 8 hours of us handing them out), Mr. Caterpillar has managed to survive fully intact and fluffy for months now.  I mean, if there was ever a tempting target, it’s Mr. Caterpillar.  It’s not his size that makes him immune, because Bailey personally had a major role in de-fluffing Mr. Bear, who was very big, too.  So Mr. Caterpillar has a certain je-ne-sais-quoi about him.

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Here’s another "outtake" from the newsletter photo shoot with Soba and Noodle.  I should have used this shot yesterday instead of the two sisters wrestling (see post below), because this happened before the girls got off their cots to roughhouse with each other.  Nevada the blind puppy seems to always keep popping up in our photos.  She maintained a discreet distance during the photo shoot, but as soon as it was over — I’m not sure how she really knew we were finished — she made a beeline for the cots and her two friends.

I think Nevada had every intention of settling in for a snooze with the wobblies, but Soba soon had other plans.  The gentle, snuggly scene in this photo lasted all of, well, about 45 seconds.  Notice Soba’s mischievious, ready-to-pounce posture.  I think the thought going through her little head at this point was, "Hmm, sis is lying down … she’s not even looking.  She might even be starting to fall asleep.  This could be my moment." 

And then pounce she did, sending both of them off their cots and into their wrestling match.  This left a somewhat surprised Nevada behind, alone on the cot.  That’s when Nevada climbed down and wandered off to sit in the tall grass, as you saw in the photo from yesterday’s post.

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We were taking photos a couple of days ago for our summer newsletter of Noodle and Soba, who are going to be our "cover models" on this next issue.  After getting these two very wobbly, high-energy girls to lie quietly on their cots for the photo shoot (no small task, mind you), they decided they’d had enough of the sitting-still business.  So they tumbled off the cots and began roughhousing with each other in the grass.  That’s when I happened to get these shots.

Now, I know this photo above looks like they’re fighting ferociously, bared teeth flashing and all that, but this was nothing more than these two sisters having a great time.  What I liked about this shot is the contrast between the sheer chaos of the two girls going at each other in the foreground … while there in the background are the calm, Buddha-like Brody and the Sphinx-like Nevada.  Both Brody and Nevada were apparently oblivious to — or merely uninterested in — the World Wrestling Federation bout a few feet away.

And just four photo frames later, here’s what this scene ended up looking like.  Well, that didn’t last long, eh?  In one of the other photos I took, Brody was actually yawning, and you can see here that he remained completely detached from the event, as did Nevada!

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I took this photo of our newest arrival, Kasha, and Alayne this afternoon.  Kasha arrived late Thursday night.  Alison James, our new development director, was planning to head to Spokane last week on personal business, and kindly offered to pick up Kasha and bring her out to the ranch for us.  (Alison starts her new job with us tomorrow, on Monday, and will help Alayne and me on the office side of running the sanctuary.)

Kasha is much smaller than we expected, weighing in at about 30 pounds.  This photo — like the original photo the shelter took of her — makes her look bigger than she is.  She actually is barely up to our knees.  Kasha is very skinny — I might even call her emaciated because all her ribs stick out — and clearly her life before getting to the shelter was not a nice one. 

For example, she began digging under the wooden fence in our isolation yard so she can get out to be with the other dogs, and when I went up to the fence and said "No!" in a loud, firm voice, Kasha slinked away and disappeared into her cottage.  I found her cowering in her crate, too afraid to come out.  Once I coaxed her out — she urinated submissively on the floor on the way to me, however — and made all over her, the dark cloud lifted and she became a playful, bouncy puppy again.

I guess, having had a foot chopped off, it’s amazing she isn’t more afraid.  But most of the time she is a very happy girl.  She’s been going on walks around the ranch, and she loves these opportunities to explore.  Kasha’s a bit of a tugboat, in fact, and it’s hard to believe she had a limb amputated a few days ago.  She just wants to get up and go!  She is such a sweet, loving little thing.

On Wednesday, when Kasha was discharged from the hospital in Spokane, a kind lady named Christie fostered her overnight for us until Alison could pick up Kasha on Thursday afternoon.  I wanted to share part of an email Christie sent me Thursday:

"I just want to thank you and your group for the work you do.  I have worked in a vet clinic for 10 years.  And have been a foster home and rescue transporter for 8 years.  NEVER have I seen a rescued animal have the ability to receive the best services in town.  Most rescues are fixed by local veterinarians who donate much of the costs just so treatments can be done.  Treatments are always the bare minimum.  Kasha is very lucky to have such a group as yours caring for her."

When I thanked Christie for her note, I told her we were able to provide this kind of medical care for our disabled animals only because we are blessed with incredibly generous supporters from across the U.S. and Canada.  Yes, Kasha is lucky in many respects — lucky to be alive! — but we are lucky to have such kind and compassionate people supporting our work with these wonderful animals.  It’s what makes possible everything we do here.

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Here’s blind Brody enjoying a roll in the green grass yesterday.  He’s a natural-born "roller" — he’ll roll over for a belly rub as soon as he hears you approaching — but he really loves rolling in the green grass on these nice June days.  And if you just happen to walk by while he’s rolling, why, it’s a good time to stop for a belly rub anyway!  He knew at this point I had walked over to him, which is why he’s pulled his front paws up to make more "abdominal real estate" available for rubbing.

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I got this shot of wobbly Noodle and three-legged Cody sharing a cot yesterday afternoon.  What’s interesting about this is that Cody is really not big on sharing space, let alone with a wobbly pup like Noodle who might at any moment flop over on him like a wave crashing on shore.  But here he was, quite content to lie on the cot with her.

Cody is our resident "hall monitor," as we call him.  He’s always bossing around the younger, more rambunctious dogs, and he’s at his bossiest when the youngsters are crowding him.  So to find him like this was rather surprising.

As you can tell from yesterday’s post and today’s, there’s a lot of sharing going on at the Rolling Dog Ranch!

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Alayne got this photo yesterday of blind Willie the Beagle and blind Nevada the puppy sharing a new dog house we recently put out in the yard.  Yes, I know that sticker says "Bonus! Dog House Door Included!" and it would appear that … ahem … someone forgot to install the door.  But if we put a door on it, how could they sit in there and look outside, right?  (And who can remember where we put the plastic door flaps anyway?)

I know it’s a bit hard to see Nevada inside the dog house, but she’s got her characteristic cock of the head … she knew Alayne was out there somewhere, and this is how she "looks" at things.  She tilts her head up and then slightly to one side, with her ears all askew, listening intently.

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Dr. Joe Harari of Veterinary Surgical Specialists in Spokane called me this morning after examining Kasha, the Shepherd mix puppy from the county shelter.  Dr. Harari found that Kasha’s leg had been severed just below the hock — he called it "a clean cut of the bones" — and said that it looked as if a machete had sliced through it.  There is less than an inch of the metatarsal bones remaining below the hock. 

I asked him if it were possible she had been caught in a leg-hold trap of some sort.  He said he doubted it, because trap wounds are "messier," as he put it, with the wound and bone remnants usually more jagged.  Kasha’s bones were sheared off cleanly. 

It’s at a time like this when you really, really wish the animal could tell you what happened … and who was responsible, you know?

Leaving her leg in this condition wasn’t an option, of course.  We did discuss an experimental prosthetic device, but given the fact that she is still young and growing, the nature and location of her injury, and that fact that she is an energetic puppy who would be inclined to chew off anything attached to her, we concluded that a prosthetic device would not work well for her.  Dr. Harari thought that an older, "quiet" dog might be a suitable candidate to try a prosthetic, but Kasha wasn’t the right case for it.

So Dr. Harari took Kasha into surgery this afternoon and amputated the rest of her leg.  He called after the operation and said she did fine.  Kasha will remain in the hospital until mid-week, when we’ll head over to Spokane to get her.

Although she looks big in this photo, Dr. Harari said she only weighs about 30 pounds.  He called her a "beautiful puppy" and said she was very sweet.

We told our other three-legged resident at the ranch, Cody, that he will soon have another tripod to play with!

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Last week our friends at Spokane County Regional Animal Protection Services in Washington contacted us about a young Shepherd mix puppy at the shelter who was missing her left rear foot.  This is her in the photo … and yikes, look at that leg.  Her name is Kasha, and they think she’s about 4 or 5 months old.

One of the shelter’s employees emailed me to say, "It’s painful to watch her stand with weight on the little end of the stump. Not sure if it hurts or not, but it hurts to look at!  Happy dog.  If she had that foot she would have been snatched up, I think."  But without that foot, one of the shelter volunteers told us, "her chances for adoption here are slim."  Hence the request to us.

We asked the shelter to see whether she got along with other dogs, male and female.  After they reported back on Thursday afternoon that she did just fine, we agreed to take her.  Next up was getting that leg evaluated and finding out what our options are for treatment.  We have two board-certified veterinary surgeons in Spokane at Veterinary Surgical Specialists — these guys, Dr. Joseph Harari and Dr. Howard Lawrence, are truly world-class surgeons … we just wish they weren’t four hours away! — so on Friday morning I contacted the clinic and arranged for Kasha to see Dr. Harari on Monday, June 11.  The shelter will drive her over for the appointment and drop her off.  We will be paying for her exam and any follow-on surgery if required.

Michelle D., who runs an all-volunteer animal transport group called Paws Across the Northwest, has kindly arranged for a foster home for Kasha until we can get to Spokane later in the week.

At this point we’re just waiting to hear from Dr. Harari after his evaluation, and we’ll post the update on the blog.  Meanwhile, it looks like another black-and-tan is coming to the ranch!  (Or maybe I should say, having viewed the photo again, another black-and-tan-and-pink is coming to the ranch.)