My Dream of Excellence - Part 2

My heart pounded within as I walked briskly through our tiny airport.  It was a beautiful spring day and I was on a mission.  I reached for the first airport security guard striding across the concourse: “Excuse me sir, I’m here to pick up a puppy.  Where would that be?”  The hugeness of my new commitment seemed to solidify in my brain as I said it out loud.  Part of me got really, really nervous as I walked closer toward the cove to get my new little girl dog.  
Two small dog kennels sat next to each other.  A French bull dog puppy that looked curiously like a fawn-colored frog sitting on a lily pad sat quietly.  The tri-color cocker spaniel puppy next to the bull dog seemed so much smaller.  I reached down for her while simultaneously making myself brave from my gut to my heart as I said, “There’s my baby!” in a cheerful voice I did not know I had.  The puppy leapt upward to my chest and snuggled her head right up to my shoulder.  It felt like there should have been angels singing or something.

When I took her into my car and drove to the house, I pondered again with some nervousness that, despite all my reading, I did not really have any CLUE of how to take care of a puppy this small.  My earlier cocker spaniel had passed away months before at the age of about 17 years.  I had a medium-sized beautiful liver-colored lab mix that I had rescued from the pound waiting at home.  (I wrote extensively about adopting Timbyr in an earlier post.) 

Entering into my home with the new puppy did not begin ideally.  Timbyr began to drool profusely and pace all around the house very anxiously.  I think she may have feared she was getting evicted, which was certainly not the case.  But for this story, I want to focus on the new puppy and how that unfolded because everything about that first week was what I want to spare new puppy owners.

You will read in my posts of puppies for sale: “I don’t fly puppies.  I will not ship.”  I think that it is hard for puppies – I don’t care how “posh” the flight kennel is; I just won’t do it.  Earlier plane regulations put dogs in an area near the luggage that was not climate controlled.  Translation:  it could get too warm or too cold and there’s not a bleeping thing that can be done about that.  When you are a passenger in the plane, you know to swallow or drink to keep your ears from popping.  Dogs don’t know that.  You know that when the plane has turbulence, the captain is going to come on board and tell you to buckle your lap belts and that you’re just going through a rough patch.  Who is in the belly of the plane to re-assure the dogs?  You get my point.  I’m just not good with it.

The other thing is:  if you cannot go to the home that birthed the puppy and raised it for the first 8 weeks of life, you have no idea of what the environment is.  That matters.  A lot.  People who operate “puppy mills” – where they over-breed dogs strictly for the purpose of money making – don’t post signs on their websites that say:   “Yeah, we don’t have a large enough staff to care for our dogs so they howl a lot in kennels in the back.  And we can’t keep up with cleaning the pens either.” 

One young woman that visited my home to look at puppies remarked:  “I just got back from Pennsylvania.  I went to an Amish farm …. It was so sad.  The puppy didn’t look me in the eye when I picked it up.  It seemed uninterested.  There was another puppy (a littermate) that had some problem with its eye.  I told the farmer he needed veterinary attention and he just kind of shrugged it off.  I asked to see the mother dog and when he brought her out, she stood between his legs shuddering.”  It was a stark contrast to the two puppies that were bopping around her feet on my backyard, that’s for sure.  It brought tears to my eyes.  The Amish certainly have my respect for being hard working farmers and people of faith; however, it’d be a cold day in hell before I buy a dog from them for just this reason:  they are stereotyped for being notorious puppy mills.  Not unlike people who hoard animals they start off “rescuing,” I want to give the Amish dog breeders the benefit of the doubt that they don’t plan on over-taxing their dogs.  I think it starts off innocently, and then when they think they can make more puppies and more money faster, they over-breed the dogs and have issues.  Unfortunately, culturally, they tend to view dogs less as family members than we do … and that contributes to a lower standard of care for the dogs than I would agree with… at least that is how the mills work.

My puppy came from the south.  Her original name was “Darlin’ Pearl.”  That was a little too much syrup for me so I changed it to “Bethany Pearl.”  I took her to her first veterinary visit – a practice I no longer go to – and the examining vet shouted at me:  “WHERE did you get this dog from?!  She has 2 types of intestinal worms and yeast infections in her ears!”  I said:  “Online from out of state.”  And didn’t know if I was going to faint or throw up.  We left the clinic that afternoon with a hefty veterinary bill and doggie medications. 

I am a decent human being (mostly) so I made the phone call to the southern dog breeder gentle:  “I want to give you the benefit of the doubt that you did not intentionally send me a sick puppy.  She has giardia and coccidia and ear infections.  I will be sending you the vet bill to reimburse me.”  The dog breeder was mortified.  She said she had the whole litter into the vet’s only three days prior, and as a result of my report, she was taking the whole litter back for a recheck (and to yell at the doctor).  It’s curious how it starts with one vet yelling at a client and ends with another client yelling at a different vet?!

The initial start with this puppy was a challenge; however, after a couple of weeks, things smoothed out, her health returned, and I calmed down.  My commitment to doing something “right” or “well-done” sometimes comes out as me being edgy or emotional.  At this point I think that is just because I have prioritized this and it would just kill me if someone accused me of ever being a puppy mill. 

So with this sweet new dog with the perfect Type-B personality, two years later I began to search for an appropriate stud dog.  Another wild journey.  How do you write an ad for the newspaper that you are looking for a stud dog?  Even if you go online and reach out to other dog breeders, often times you get the following answers:

                “I only breed my dogs to each other.  I do not put him up for stud.”

                “No, the males here are all neutered.”

                “I think people should not breed; they should adopt.”

I stopped one lady who was handling cocker spaniels at a dog show and told her I had a beautiful young tri-color pup and wanted to breed her.  She responded, “Yes I have tri-color males.”  I said, “Well, I’m looking to diversify the colors in the litter.   Do you have others besides tri-colors?”  She snapped back:  “I don’t believe in that!” and walked away in a huff.  I’m still not sure what belief of hers I offended.  (???)

I met with one woman up in the north country who was so uncomfortable when I visited her that she sat with her back turned to me in her own kitchen, texting her husband who was somewhere in an airport waiting to catch a plane.  The dogs did NOTHING and my trip was wasted.  I returned to her a week later and the dogs STILL did nothing.  She subsequently offered to come to my home in a few days and I laid out corn muffins and tea for her while we waited on the dogs who …. Still did NOTHING.  Months later when I called to try again, she said her dog was living elsewhere and was neutered. 

I find that people in the breeding business are as varied as any other sector in life.  Some want to portray an aura that they are a higher life form than you because they have more dogs, or show them, or whatever.  Others are not interested in helping educate a new dog breeder.  Then there are some really great people who walk you through and put you at ease and really befriend you in the process.  I raise my proverbial glass here to the last two ladies who have helped me with the breeding process from start to finish.  I have learned so much from them. 

In the process of puppy care immediately after they are born, I am so blessed to have some great support people. One of them has been with me during the first three litters’ laboring and helped tremendously when I was up too late and too tired to think straight.  We’ve had the funniest experiences.  “Chris, did you put that black and white dog back in with Madeline?”  “No.  It’s here in the willow basket.”  “Are you sure?”  I peeled up the blanket to reveal an almost exact replica of the dog she was asking about.  Madeline had birthed a puppy without even letting us know it.  Five puppies later, I went upstairs to toast a frozen waffle for myself and stood at the kitchen island, very, very tired.  Madeline came up the cellar stairway, stood next to me, and without ceremony pushed a puppy right out onto the kitchen floor.  Madeline recognizes that I am her doggy midwife, and we are in this together.

Two teenagers have helped with the litters under the label of: “Puppy Socialization Specialists.”  That means they stop by after school and do the clean-up, mid-day feeding, and play with puppies.  Man, I wish I had a job like THAT growing up!!!  When people remark at how well socialized the pups from our litters are, I don’t hesitate to give credit to these wonderful young women whom help make our dogs great.        

To be continued ….