Pee or deal with it...

As most of us are in the grips of one cold and snowy winter, it was brought to my attention that many of us dog owners are having the same issues. How to get the dogs to do their business outside and not in the house. My solution came to me as a half ass gift many years ago. I was working with another rescue in early 2000's. One of the members had a hospital donate all there mattress covers to the rescue and they bought all new.  Now the member is sitting on a trailer load of these things and she decided she could unload them at an annual get together in the middle of the Smoky Mountains. As the camp ground hosted most of us she pulled that trail up and as we came in she started to unload. I had no idea what I would do with them but she kept heaping them into my van till I really had to protest that I was not there for fun I was on dog transport and I was dropping and picking up dogs and moving on. So as I moved on the transport I dropped off some of these mattress covers and ended up with a dozen or so after all was said and done. At that point in my rescue life I was not having an issue with this as long as I did not leave things on the floor like a throw rug or a pair of sock I had no problems. As time progress my problem did the same, dogs came and went and then I found belly bands was my new savior. I learned that traveling was a huge problem so we broke out the pee pads, as we now call them. One of my own dogs had a case of separation anxiety that I was not aware of. She never pee or pooed in the house or car as long as we were there. At home she had a doggy door and she went outside to look for us and left her trail of pee and poo. but let us leave the van and she hit every square inch of the van. She would wind herself up and let it go. We covered all the seats and pillows everything with the pads and it saved us from a head ace that almost cause me to kennel this dog for life. I may add that she is around 10 now and no long does this. She has around 10,000 miles of travel in her life with me and now it is no big deal and she is very happy to just sit and bark at the cars and people passing bye. 6 years ago I moved into this house and it had carpet and still does. I am not rich and therefore must keep the stuff till I hit the lotto. I realized early how important the pee pad were becoming to me. I yelled at the kids when I found them using them as paint drop cloths, almost had a heart attack. I have no idea how to get more. I bleached the hell out of them and washed them daily to keep up with the ever growing movement of dogs coming and going. Mine are now aging and so their house broke state is now broken. I started asking everyone I could about working or knowing someone who worked in a hospital. Trying to get that donation of use mattress protectors, as a few of the pads where starting to fall apart this was a huge stresser for me.

  Now as I am not one to just think outside the box on my own I usually need a board upside the head to get my brain unstuck. So one day at work I am whining about poor me what the hell was I going to do when the pads just disintegrated. My co-work said just Google it. Where do hospitals get their bed protectors? Duhhh.   Well I have not looked at all the sites as I am sure there must be many but in Alphabetical order Allegro Medical was the first thing I hit and I never left. Desperation has no price attached. They had just what I needed and I looked no further. Now what I have learned over the past few years is the size does count. I bought the little ones 24x36 and then started to sew them together to get the size I needed as they seemed so cheap I could buy a million and sew. Then my hall way became the pissing spot of choice and I just could not get the sides covered so I started to look at bigger sizes. I now buy two of the 44x52 sew two together and Ta Dah I have a hall runner that gets the job done.

Now I have found that the markers in the bunch like to piss on kennel doors so I put the small ones under the front of the kennels in the living room as these are the ones that they can get too. Back room is off limits so no worries as long as door is kept shut. Now as the dogs come and go I have to change the rooms that get blocked and change the pee pad locations to keep up with the Damn dogs.  So I found the next size down is the 34x52 are great to just through around in corners and other spots that they seem to think is a great substitution for the back yard when temps dip below O degrees and snow starts to pile up.

 Now I know that there are many folks that love their homes and just would not put up with this. So I am sure this blog is not for you. But for those of us that love our dogs just not there potty habits I hope this helps you save just a small piece of  your sanity. I will not tell you how many rug cleaners or vacuums I have went through in the last 6 years I don't want you to faint or have me committed. I am not supporting Allegro as there are many, you will find the one that has what you need.
They wash up great and you can bleach the hell out of them. Throw them in the dryer and it makes life just a little better so we can love our four legged pissers.
 

To all my friends on Valentine's

To all my friends on Valentine's

Team "Damn Dogs"

I get home after a long day at work and I am greeted by 13 hungry dogs. As I am schlupping food to the dogs in their kennels I realize there excitement seem a little more than, gee glad your home. Most of them are gulpers so dinner time is quick. I opened the back door and started down the line of kennels opening the doors and yell out. I usually am yell this a thousand times as one by one they run to the next empty kennel check to see if someone left a kibble or two that they might get. Tonight not the case I yell it one time and the room emptied. So I thought I was starting to get the hang of yelling out and picking up all the empty bowls when I noticed the noise out side had gone up a few decimal. I went into the kitchen to get some paper towel to clean up a poo I seen on my way in. I opened the back door and seen all the damn dogs at the back fence barking their heads off at a deer. When I realized the deer was not going to leave I ran back in to grab the camera. I was closer to the back room so I exited out that door and tried to take a picture and again realize the damn deer was not leaving and he was walking up to the fence. The Peruvian boys were out in front and the Crested dogs where there as back ups. When Jake one of the fosters ran to the fence and the deer butted the fence and he went ass over tea kettle. As Jake took a head butt for the team I decided that I may have to walk to the fence to break this up or someone was going over the fence if it did not stop. I had to tell the deer to leave. Then I see his girl friend who did not need a second invite to leave, and the boy friend running right behind. Who knew I would ever have to chase off the Damn Deer.

The real life of some animals

We know it is out there but it does not have a face so it is easy to look the other way and feel it is not our problem. I can now put a face on the problem along with mine, I will never be the same.

The face of poverty for humans and animals. I walked the street of this village and was brought to tears. The people are in constant struggle to survive and the animals they love and care so deeply for are what now haunts my dreams. Many are loved but can not be cared for. The ones that are loved have off springs that are now the street animals, making their own off springs in this hideous situation. This is a guaranteed life of misery and suffering till there untimely death of disease, starvation or plain human ignorance and cruelty.

 I can not speak for the human poverty I have no words on how a country has no help for them. I am overwhelm with the animals. The picture should be enough to explain the problem. But people everywhere love their animals no matter what. The animals that are not theirs are of no consequence as it is everywhere in the world we love what is ours, we live in our own little box no matter how horrific it is. It is all some know and with the love of their pets and family they exist. One of my bitter sweet moments was when the lady did agree to taking her very ill dog, in the right side of this picture sitting on a bag of sorts, to see the vet. The first picture is of this dog and it has a disease called TVT Canine transmissible venereal tumor it is very contagious to the other dog living in the animal population, when other dogs come in contact with body fluids of the infected dog. Often contracted through copulation and licking.    Metastasis is most commonly to regional lymph nodes, but can also be seen in the skin, brain, eyes, liver, spleen, testicles, and muscle. This is a form of cancer and can be treated with chemo and or radiation. Both are not accessible to the poor. So this disease goes unchecked and as the unaltered dogs keep reproducing they not only make more puppies they spread this cancer, the out come is a horrible death for the dogs. One unaltered dogs can have two litters a year with any where from 4 to 10 puppies in each litter and those off spring go on to do the same, as there is nothing to stop the population explosions. It does not take a calculator to do the math, more than half of these dogs have illnesses and live in horrific conditions, they will perish soon; but not with out a lot of suffering. The other half keep making more puppies that will suffer for who knows how long before they perish. The lucky puppies are born and dropped off at a spay and neuter campaign to be helped as most of the villagers do care. But in fact they will be euthanized as no one wants them.  The unlucky ones will suffer till they die.

 

As we arrived back from a little lunch the bags of puppies where left for us, 18 puppies in total. They were the wonderful little bundles of love that we all just gush over but the sadness is they will all be put down as no one want them. I can not look at puppies the same way again. My heart is broken  and feel more driven than before. As the ones that we did not get were in every nook and cranny. I never got more than a city block before I had to quit looking. The little cries of puppies coming from everywhere is calling to the part of me that loves them and want to hold them and cuddle them. Then the reality of what will happen to all of these little babies then caught me totally of guard and my stomach began to turn. I had to stop looking for them and holding them. I had to walk away. Now I live with this, to walk away from suffering. I pray you all never know this feeling.

 I came home with two dogs as that is all I can bring back. To know what I can do is a drop in the ocean. But everything in this world started with a drop in the ocean and then more drops and till there was a buck full. Soon the clouds open and the change will begin.  Not everyone can jump a plane and fly to a struggling county, frankly I don't think they want us to. But to get involved in a world wide problem is something we all can do. I did not know what I was doing, I just knew I had to do something no matter how small. I was very miss guided in the beginning.  I now have direction and focus. And will push on and I pray that I can reach others who will get involved. We all have something that touches us and makes us want to help, the causes in this would are infinite but for those of you that share my passion I hope you will get involved. I welcome any conversation on this problem and please feel free to contact me. crested@sbcglobal.net. To do nothing is the biggest part of the problem. 

Spay and neuter campaigns can put a dent in the cycle of over population. It is a start, there are vets there that are willing to help but the funds to keep these campaigns up and educating the people is a huge beginning to this problem. Here we pay upwards to 300.00 for a spay or neuter depending on where we live. There they can be performed for as little as 15.00 per pet. In one campaign one vet and two students perform 115 surgeries. This will put a big dent in the population of pets in this village. It is not enough but for those who love there pets it was more than a blessing.

As the village people wrapped up, boxed up there beloved pets and headed to there homes, I was left with a sense hope that a solution to this problem can be found and implemented.

Hands Helping Paws | Nonprofits - YouCaring.com

Hands Helping Paws | Nonprofits - YouCaring.com
you can click on this link to donate. Thank you

I am going to Peru to help with a spay and neuter campaign. This is where my heart leads me. It is something I believe in and hope you will help. I will bring back two more dogs to adopt and our goal is to spay and neuter 100 pets in the village. Thank you to all my readers.

Selfies....

It has become blatantly obvious that I am becoming a selfie junkie.  Now in this new technology craze I would have never thought I could be one of the folks that found themselves so interesting to take pictures of one self and show the world.  I think I am who I am and no one cares what I eat or wear. I have found many find interest in my life style, I have come to except I am strange. or at least different. I am told I am neurotic now I have studied what this means as my mind set is, I am not crazy. I done a lot of reading on this and it truly boils  down to "Neurotic means to suck at dealing with reality" and that sums it up for me. It's that I have this really shitty way of looking at things, I handle this with my sarcasm and humor. I try hard to not step on others as I go about my life. I never want to hurt anyone or anything. I do not claim to be good at anything I just go about my business and live my life the best I know how. I do not think of myself as special in any way as I know most can do the same things I do so no special ability or talents. But I never would have thought I could get caught up into the selfie craze. I don't know if I should be concerned about this new phase or just chalk it up to social change and compliance to that change. But it is what it is Selfie mania.