OMG Is this Rusty?

As my faithful readers know, I have a soft spot for Miniature Pinschers--my own dog, Taco, was a MinPin, and I have fostered several MinPins from the Shelter, including a very sweet oversize stag red guy we called "Rusty."  We had Rusty as foster dog all summer so he could undergo heartworm treatment, and we loved him a lot.  Last September, during a Labor Day PetsMart event I adopted Rusty to a family in our area--and still have the work phone number of the wife.  Even now, we still think about Rusty--he was a sweet, friendly, laid-back dog who liked everybody, even if he wasn't the sharpest saw in the toolshed.

I went to the Shelter today to see two Miniature Pinschers.  One was a female chocolate and tan girl with upright natural ears, a docked tail and a dainty demeanor.  The other was a stag red boy.  I can't take on a foster right now as I have another set of travel dates, and have already got two dogs in foster care (both Tucker and Teencie are doing great, according to their temporary foster Mom), but we all want another MinPin to replace Taco, who went over the Rainbow Bridge at the end of April.  I had to check out the boy dog.

So...here's this stag red MinPin.  He was turned in as a stray, but the people said they found him, and no one responded to their signs.  I don't know where he was picked up yet--I plan to find out tomorrow--and while he didn't do a "Lassie Come Home" jump-for-joy at the sight of me, he was very happy to get out of the Kennel.  I compared microchip numbers when I got home--they are different, but this dog has a fresh set of microchip scan slips and a tag in his paperwork folder, so he could have two chips. He's a stocky, rather pudgy dog (Rusty was leaner) so his original microchip could have slipped.   He has the same calm, happy demenor, and he's clearly been someone's pet.  His size and basic color, stance, build, and ear/tail treatments are the same.  Could this be Rusty? 

The MinPin at the Shelter is the dog on the left in all the photos.  Rusty is the dog on the right.  It was very cloudy and dark today (thanks to Hurricane Alex, south of Houston), so this MinPin's coat appears lighter.  Plus, I tend to push the saturation on my photos, so my shots of Rusty have all been tinkered with.

My husband thinks he's a different dog.  What do you think?  Leave me a comment!

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

 Time for more "Shelter Snapshots".


The Good

I went to the Shelter today to straighten out paperwork for my teeny-tiny Chihuahua foster and things were crazy.  This GSD, a small, but very typey female, came in as a stray.  The woman who brought her in thinks she may have jumped out of a truck.  She was in good shape, just frightened.  No microchip.  We'll be lucky if anyone claims her.  If not, though, she'll be put into rescue or adopted quickly.


The Bad

No, this isn't "bad" because she is a pit bull.  It's bad because she came in as a stray, super skinny, obviously bred-to-bits, and bearing scars on her ribcage and ears.  This is our typical pit bull mama dog--a marshmallow personality condemned in a fighting body.  This girl probably has heartworms, along with at least one badly infected dug.  Her fate is uncertain.


The Ugly--WARNING:  THE FOLLOWING IMAGES ARE GRAPHIC

This train wreck of a dog was scooped up from the roadside by a good Samaritan.  He is a tiny boy Chihuahua who--more than likely--has spent his entire life being a stud dog.  He is not blind, but close to it, has no teeth, no lower jaw, and was covered with fleas and nearly bald, with exceedingly long, jagged toenails.

We thought at first that this would be an immediate euthanization case--he lay listless in an old towel.  But once he was on the floor, the little booger lapped up some food (we made it soupy) his tongue darting like a hummingbird's, then we we put him in a crate with an another dog (a Yorkie about twice the Chi's size), the little old man puffed up like a Rottie and dominated that poor Yorkie, standing with his studly equipment on full alert, and growling (although it sounded like snufffling).  The Yorkie cowered in the corner, terrified of this little banshee.

This guy's fate after the end of his stray-hold period is most likely euthanization--he has visible tumors, an abnormally swollen prostrate, a bellyful of worms and most likely is heartworm positive.  How someone can permit an animal to decline into such a horrible state is hard to fathom.  This dog's problems were almost all preventable with decent care, but clearly, his owner didn't consider them to be issues worth treating.

We've had a run lately with stray old dogs arriving in horrible shape--a blind, incontinent Pomeranian, an old Yorkie with half his coat gone due to mange, and a blind Cocker Spaniel with a coat matted to a dense carpet of flea-dandered fur.  We end up giving these weary seniors the pink injection, but the volunteers and Shelter staff would sure like to give a swift boot in the rear to the owners who abandoned these elders in their last days.

Making the Call

Today, I delivered an old, ill, befuddled male chihuahua into the arms of the Shelter Vet Tech for euthanization.  I made the decision on an animal that people had been fretting about for two days.

One volunteer thought the dog was just "despondent."  Another admitted that the animal was near its end, but felt that someone should take the dog home and let it "pass away" on its own.  A staff person desperately wanted the dog to have time "outside the Shelter" before it died.

The dog in question was a stray-hold dog whose time was up today.  He was a tiny, old, cinnamon-colored male chihuahua, coated in flea dander, gummy-eyed, disoriented, shaking, and hacking with advanced heartworms.  The poor old man couldn't even stand--when I set him on the grass outside, his hindquarters quivered and he staggered once, then collapsed.  His ears were at half mast and his head was as jiggly as a bobble-head toy.

I have two foster dogs.  My own dog just died (and this little guy's staggers looked suspiciously similar to what I saw in my own dog during his last hours).  A staffer gave the old dog a Capstar with a bit of wet cat food.  Cat food works wonders with ailing dogs--he perked up and ate a few more bites.  I gave him a bath to wash off the bulk of the flea crap and rubbed him warm with a clean towl, then wrapped him in a piece of fleece.

I took him outside and set him down on the grass.  He staggered, then collapsed.  He didn't whine or complain.  He just worked himself into a down position and lay there, blinking blearily in the warm sun.  I watched him, tears filling my eyes.  I couldn't take him home.  No one else had volunteered.  We had no way to diagnose what was wrong with him.  After about twenty minutes, I bundled the old dog up and took him back into the Shelter.  I showed him to the Shelter Director, who is a Vet.  She watched him wobble and sag.  She told me to go to see the Vet Tech, neatly avoiding pronouncing the death sentence.

I admire our Vet Tech immensely.  Some of the volunteers think she is harsh and curt with people, but she is focused on doing what she can with exceedingly limited resources.  I unwrapped the little guy, set him on the floor.  He listed, then fell.  The Vet Tech looked at me and said, "There are two options for this dog.  Take him out of here, make him comfortable, and let him die.  Or put him down now."

"I can't take him home," I said, which was not an excuse.  "I want to put him down." The Vet Tech nodded. I carried the dog and we walked out of the receiving area, up the hall to a door marked "Private."  The Vet Tech unlocked the door, took the dog and his paperwork and turned.  Just before she closed the door, I said, "Wait. Let me say goodbye."  I kissed his little head and rubbed his flea-scarred ears.  "You were someone's good Chihuahua," I said, "You are a good boy.  It will be better now."  She turned away with the dog.  The door shut with a click.

I have a message on my phone from a volunteer praising me for "taking that poor dog home."  She won't be happy to know that I made the decision to have the dog put down.   He had as good an end as I could give him--he was cleaner, warm, fed and stroked.  He went to the Euthanization room wrapped in a clean fleece blanket.

Some people will consider me the villain.  But I hate the way we throw energy and resources at dogs that come to us in such horrible shape.   The person at fault is that dog's owner.  If that dog was abandoned or turned in as a stray, it was because his owner was too cowardly to make the difficult decision I made this afternoon.  That dog's suffering is over.  I sent him off with as much dignity as I could muster.

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I didn't have my camera with me today or I would have taken a dozen photos of that old Chihuahua.  This photo has been altered from an Internet image.