Bucky’s Demise

Greg has been trying to get rid of Buckwheat for months. For the last five months, Buckwheat was in a downhill spiral.  I brought Buck to the vet in January to see what we could do for his skin infection. He was on Cephalexin for quite sometime– which seemed to offer some relief. Then he was on steroids. But the time finally came and the events leading up to his death were kind of strange:

I was working from home on Tues. and decided to give Buckwheat a bath. He was so incredibly stinky– smelled like he was rotting from the inside (and he probably was).  I didn’t have dog shampoo, so created a mixture of Apple Cider vinegar, a teaspoon of lemon, some olive oil, and a huge bucket of water. I gave him a sponge bath on the porch.

Later in the day, I told Storm that she can move inside when Buckwheat was gone.

When Greg came home, we went for our evening walk with the inside dogs. I noticed Buckwheat just wasn’t doing well. I said to Greg, “I think it’s almost time for the Buck-a-r00.” Immediately after my comment,  Buckwheat collapsed. Greg carried him home.  Indeed the time had come.

We usually have our dogs euthanized at home because it’s more peaceful and less stressful for the dog and ourselves.  I was unable to get a hold of our house-call vet. I drove Buckwheat into town to the After Hours Clinic. After filling out the paperwork, Buckwheat and I sat on the floor of the emergency room. I was waiting for the usual doc to come in, and I was very pleasantly surprised to see that the doc on call was my old (not in age) vet, Dr. Pinto!!!! Pinto had moved away years ago and had happened to be in town for the week and thought she’d work a couple of shifts at the clinic.  She had euthanized several of my dogs before she moved away. I couldn’t have asked for anyone else (except for Dr. Rose) to be the vet doing the deed.

The euth went smoothly. I told Buckwheat to say hi to his brothers (Levi & Bandit) and sister (Darla). I feel a little guilty not getting Buckwheat back in a little box; I opted for a group cremation.

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As a side note, the pink stuff that they use to euth animals is Beuthanasia and the blue stuff is Fatal Plus. I was trying to think of the names because Pinto used the pink stuff and I was used to seeing the blue stuff.