May, 2007
It’s true! There’s nothing like puppy breath. Our three little house guests have passed six weeks and are developing real personalities. White Boy is timid and would just as soon snuggle than play hard with his sisters. Big Girl is mellow but always willing to roll around with the others playing. Little Girl is a fireball, pouncing on the others and running her little legs off. She is also the most affectionate, but with puppies it’s hard to rate affection. All of their little tongues get going when a human face gets close enough. Check http://www.nwsams.com/katie.
After considerable research we elected to go with the new vaccination protocols as recently published by nearly all the vet schools in the country. That means we will wait until they are 8 weeks old for the first shots, and won’t let them go to their new homes until after the second shots at 11 weeks. If you aren’t familiar with the changed protocols, please read them no matter how old your dogs are. You’ll find the new schedule at WSU’s Vet School site: http://www.vetmed.wsu.edu/pets/. There is a growing body of evidence that over-vaccination is harming our dogs.
Katie had a few days where she didn’t feel well when the puppies were about four weeks old. That’s when we decided to seriously work on weaning them, and as a result their weights went up even faster. Katie’s check-up showed great vital signs, so the only help we gave her was with feeding, with some herbal support for her diarrhea. She is as close to perfect a mother as she could be, even to the point of still nursing three pups with mouths full of needle-sharp teeth. Still, at her age, we’re relieved that she will never have to go through this again. Her recovery from her c-section/spay was incredible, and from the time she jumped a baby gate one day post-op she acted like nothing ever happened (yes, we blocked her from doing that again). Whoever gets Katie is going to have as loving a dog as they ever met.
Because we can’t take any fosters until after the puppies’ first shots, we had to leave a Sammy girl at the Tacoma Humane Society for quite a long time. This year they announced they are trying to be a no-kill shelter and they have staff actively looking for rescue groups to take dogs. We’ve had a great relationship with them for years, and now it’s even better. They gave us updates several times a week as we kept our fingers crossed she would be adopted. Kathy (Buckner) Thomas did an evaluation that showed a dog that was possibly a mix but might be a poorly bred purebred Samoyed. Finally, after three weeks, we decided enough was enough. We wrote an appeal on the NW Samoyed Rescue list, and Jeff Bienstadt responded. Jeff adopted Sasha four and a half years ago, and has expressed interest in helping Rescue. He drove to Tacoma and pulled “Muffy” (the shelter named her) and took her home. Now her name is Holly, and she is doing well there and we have listed her on Petfinder.
May is the month we hear about more dogs than any other time of year. This week we were asked to take an eight year old female in North Bend. The woman who has her says Nikita was given to her a couple years ago, and she doesn’t do well in a situation with so many other dogs; she boards other dogs and has as many as a dozen at a time. We will list Nikita on Petfinder as soon as we have a signed release, and she will remain where she is while we take applications. We also heard from two other people recently who want help with their dogs, but we had to give our regrets because they were obviously not Samoyeds, probably not even mixes. That doesn’t mean we didn’t help; we have an extensive list of other rescue groups and individuals who can help with most breeds, and referrals are a big part of doing the business of rescue.
Oakley is still with us, waiting for the perfect home. He is still timid but getting much more confidence and asking for attention frequently — and he is a real face-washer when he gets it. The man who surrendered him claimed he had Oakley for five years and was told he was nine years old when he arrived. This is obviously not a 14 year old dog, and lately we have wondered if he was nine months old. That would make him about six now, and would be consistent with his behavior.
Our annual rescue picnic will be July 14 this year.