They Come And They Go

Except for Ziggy of course.  He came and refuses to leave, no matter what I do.  But the others come in and sometimes leave sooner than I expect.  I thought Oreo the American Bulldog would be a tough one to place due to his breed and the fact that he wasn't house-trained.  But as soon as I put him on the Internet, applications started coming in.  He received three applications in one week, and last week he went on a trial adoption with his new family.  I also thought that Amber the Pointer mix would be adopted before Sox the Border Collie/Basset mix.  I was wrong again - Sox was adopted to a wonderful family last week.  Amber is still waiting, although she does have an interested family who may adopt her soon!  Lindsay the Aussie mix has also been adopted and is doing great in her new home.  This just leaves me with Chloe the often-upside-down pit bull, Bogey the feral and semi-hairless Shar Pei mix, Charlie the shy dog, Jefferson the obnoxious Shepherd mix, Amber the hopefully-soon-to-be-adopted Pointer mix, and of course Ziggy the Adoptable Dog.

Chloe will be receiving her final heartworm treatment tomorrow, and then will need four more weeks of rest and relaxation before being allowed to resume attending adoption events and running marathons.  Okay maybe not the marathons.  But she will be allowed to go to adoption events in four weeks.

Bogey is still afraid of me.  He loves to play with the other dogs, and he loves to play with toys, and he loves to collect things.  He'll go around the house and pick up any dog toys or blankets or anything else he can and hoard them in his crate.  He will not willingly come anywhere near me, and will move away if he notices that I'm looking at him.  I tell myself that he's making progress, but I'm really not so sure.

Charlie the unknown mix dog (breed guesses, anyone?) has completed his treatment for demodex manage and was given a clean bill of health at the vet.  He is doing great here, but when we go out he is still afraid of strangers - mostly males.  He loves hot dogs so we're starting "hot dog therapy" where strangers toss him small pieces of hot dog so he learns that when a man approaches him, good things are going to happen!

Jefferson is being his usual happy and obnoxious self.  He's now decided that cats are Public Enemy #1, and he feels obligated to bark non-stop whenever he sees one.  If possible, he will also chase and possibly chew on the cat.  I say possibly, because so far I've kept him from actually obtaining a cat - but in a house with five cats, he gets plenty of opportunity to observe and bark at them!

Amber is such a good girl.  She does really well with all the other dogs, and she loves to play.  She and Jefferson are a really good match - they are roughly the same size and have the same amount of energy, so they wear each other out quite well.  I'm not sure what I'm going to do with Jefferson once Amber is adopted!

Ziggy is in BIG TROUBLE!  We had an incident where he decided to run across the room and down the hall in order to attack my cat Merlin, because he thought Merlin was going to go into his room.  Merlin ended up with a dislocated jaw, and Ziggy ended up with one more strike against him, since now he can no longer go to a home with cats.  In the past two years he's never attacked a cat, and typically ignores them altogether, so now that he's decided that cats are a threat who must be attacked to keep them from eating his food, it makes him even harder to adopt (and much harder to live with).  He already spends too many hours in a crate because he can't be out with other dogs - now I'll also have to rotate and make sure when he's out there are no cats around either.  Did I mention he's in Big Trouble?

Ziggy did not want me to tell you about this Most Dreadful Incident because he was embarrassed that he panicked and thought Merlin was there to steal all his stuff.  He did not mean to hurt Merlin and claims is very sorry for his bad behavior.  I have not completely forgiven him yet, since Merlin is still in pain and has to stay in a crate for two weeks while he recovers.  Merlin should make a full recovery though and my guess is that he will never, ever, go down that hallway to Ziggy's room again.  As for Ziggy, plans are in the works to build him his own room in the walk-out basement and fence in an area on the side of the house with a dog door in the basement door so he can have much more freedom and the other dogs and cats will not be forced to "time-share" the house and backyard. At this point, it's still just a dream, but several wonderful people have volunteered their time and expertise to make it happen, so hopefully it will one day be a reality!

Also, for any of you familiar with the All Paws dogs, you may remember that I occasionally fostered Toby, the Shepherd/Pointer/Hound mix.  He has been in foster care for a Very Long Time, and has caused more than his share of destruction and trouble.  He has a lot in common with Jefferson, as they both have goofy and obnoxious attributes.  But it finally happened - a lady who loves big, goofy dogs saw Toby on the Internet and ended up adopting him.  She says he is doing really well and she's very happy with him.  So sometimes there are Happy Endings even for the very special fosters like Toby!

New Fosters!

But first, the remaining updates on current fosters that you've already met:

Charlie the Hairless Dog has been treated for demodex mange and is doing great.  He has two more weeks of medicine and then another recheck at the vet, and then he's hoping that he'll be done with the bad-tasting medicine and even worse medicated baths.  He is getting much braver, although he's still scared of men, but he now approaches strange women and children without much hesitation.  He still barks at the television if it's too loud, but he's getting much better with that as well.  He's been going to adoption events each weekend to work on meeting strangers, and he's hoping he'll soon meet that stranger that wants to adopt him.

Bogey the Other Hairless Dog is making progress as well, but much more slowly.  He had some skin biopsies done which found that the missing hair is due to scarring, most likely from mange as a puppy, and will not grow back.  So he is permanently hairless, but he doesn't seem to mind.  He is still very, very shy, and will not come near me or even look at me if I'm looking at him.  I would like to find a foster home for him with someone who could really work with him and help him to overcome his shyness.  If you're interested, let me know!


After Fanny was adopted, I had no one to take to the beginning agility class.  Charlie and Bogey were too shy, Ziggy had already passed the beginner class, and Chloe was still undergoing heartworm treatment.  So that left me with two options - take Jefferson, or get a new foster dog.  I considered Jefferson - after all, he's very energetic, but he's also got the memory of a goldfish and the coordination of a giraffe on roller skates.  So new foster dog it was!

I brought home Lindsay, a sweet four year old dog who had been waiting at the shelter for a long time.  She is another one of those rare brilliant, perfect dogs.  Already house-trained, good with other dogs, cats, and kids, and extremely affectionate.  She caught up with the rest of the dogs in the agility class very quickly, and she's been wonderful at home.  Since our trainer's name is Lynsey, I have nicknamed Lindsay "Zee" to make things less confusing.  Zee has been here a couple of weeks now, and she's done really well at adoption events and at obedience classes.  She's learned to sit, lie down, come when called, and we're now working on staying in place.  Zee is a wonderful dog and whomever adopts her will be very lucky to have her.

"Zee"

In addition to Zee, I also brought home another FIV+ cat.  This one looks nothing like Merlin either, but at least this time I was able to recognize that right away.

Midnight

Midnight was picked up by animal control and once he tested positive for FIV he was turned over to the vet to be euthanized.  The vet realized that Midnight was a great cat - very friendly and sweet - and instead asked for help saving him.  Since I already had one FIV+ cat, I figured one more would be no problem, so I took him home.  And yes, I'm the one who named him Midnight.  I know it's an odd choice for a black cat, but I like to be original.

Midnight is a great cat.  He has very thick plush fur, and he loves to be petted.  He gets along great with the other cats, although he's not such a big fan of dogs.  He's actually much cuter than his picture looks, but I'm not so good at photographing black cats.  Especially when they want nothing more than to rub against the camera and won't stay in place for a picture.  Cats are much harder to teach to "stay" than dogs.

So that's it for the new fosters, at least for now.  For latest news and previews of soon-to-be foster pets, visit me on Facebook.