StinkyPup Kennel » Levi

Stinky Update

stinkypup — Sun, 17 Dec 2006 07:03:06 +0000

Levi: We decided it was time to euthanize Levi. This was a very difficult decision. I like to say that Greg and Flamme did an intervention for me. Levi was eating and walking around, well somewhat walking around, but his quality of life was shit. He had difficulty standing, was bumping into things, would often fall– and sometimes pee in the house and then fall in it, and the last couple of days he was around he was pooping in his bed and walking around in it. I think Levi got bummed out after he got severely beat up in the dog yard, and then again when he had a nasty sarcoma removed. He moved inside, and got used to living inside, but I think he felt that he was supposed to be a lead dog and was sad that he could no longer function as a sled dog. We;ll remember Levi as being a great lead dog (except when he turned the team around :)) and for being best buddies with Darla, and for being the original StinkyPup.

Magic: Magic got his ass severely kicked by Duke, Chester, Simba, Red, and a bunch of other dogs. He’s recovering nicely. I’d bring him inside, but he likes it better outside with his buddies and I think he’s a cat eater.

Sammie & Bruno: I took Sam and Bruno for a 4 mile run tonight and they did great! The line up was Duke and Storm in lead, Sam in Point/Swing, and Sugar and Bruno in wheel.

Last Mush of the Season

stinkypup — Sun, 23 Apr 2006 00:40:40 +0000

My last mush for 2006 was April 17th. Went out for two 4 mile runs. The dogs appreciated getting out and about. I hate it when they don’t get an adequate amount of exercise (like over the summer).

Vet update:

Levi had a huge sarcoma removed.

Chez has his mystery illness. Plus he got a hotspot, so both Chez and Levi are wearing helmets (e-collars). The Docs’ think the Chez has a c2-c3 lesion, which is affecting his respiratory drive and causing uneven pupils. This sucks. Chez is a really great dog– and started out as a great lead dog.

Chester had a 105.8 fever– very high. He has a urinary tract infection and is in the dumples.

Simba (or someone) has tapeworm. We bought a big tub of Panacur (which is good for lions, tigers, pumas, jaguars, cheetahs, panthers, leopards, grizzly bears, black bears, and my favorite pet– polar bears ) and will worm all of the stinkypups.

Shit Happens

stinkypup — Mon, 30 Jan 2006 07:35:24 +0000

And I’m not talking about poop (we’ll, not right now). Right now we have so many dogs in the house that I’ve lost count. The good news is that Jake (Radar/Chester), the mystery dog, was claimed by a friend of the owner. I liked Jake. He would have made a great pet.

Levi has moved inside. Hopefully this will be permanent. He seems to have taken residence up on our bed and on Dudley’s bed. Poor Dudley was wandering around last night because he didn’t have a bed to sleep on. We told Levi that he can’t sleep in Dudley’s bed.

Roo is healing nicely; she too is inside. Last Sunday Greg noticed a huge infection in her groin area…not really her groin, but I don’t know what the name for the area is. The infection was nasty, but superficial (hopefully). She’ll be inside until it heals. Due to the location of the wound, she didn’t get stitches. We’re treating it like an open wound; keeping it clean and applying ointment. Hopefully Roo will be well enough to run a 100 mile race in March.

Now for the bad news. Stub-a-dub has a lame hind leg. We’re not sure what happened, but she can’t use it at all. we spent a few hours at the vet today and the prognosis is inconclusive. Either she had trauma to the leg and has some muscle and nerve damage, or she’s had trauma (or something else) to her spinal cord and it’s affecting her leg. We’re keeping her inside and she’s on some meds. I guess we’ll know more tomorrow…if muscle atrophy has set in it’s bad news.

Besides all of our sick and injured and retired dogs, we haven’t been out that much this week due to -40 temps. It warmed up tonight (-20), so Greg took 11 dogs for a run and I took the retirees in the yard for a 4 mile run.

Greg has been having fun at -40. He’s been throwing boiling cups of H20 into the air to see what happens—the water evaporates, but it looks like it explodes. Oh, and for the longest time we thought that after around -25 it was too cold to snow. In all our years of winter camping at sub-arctic temperatures it has NEVER snowed, that is, until yesterday—it snowed at -40.