We’ve been slowly integrating the new dogs with our lot. We’ve put the new dogs in the “downtown” yard on the wheel, while our gang is in the upper “uptown” yard. During parties, when we let all of the dogs run around, we keep the “new” dogs on their chain and let the stinkypup gang mingle with them. We then corral the stinkypups to the “uptown” and “midtown” yards, while the new dogs run around by themselves in the “downtown” yard.
This method was working for a while, until Rocket’s tail was bitten (either by Chez– who likes to bite tushies, or Chevy). I think it was Chez. I didn’t know Rocket’s tail had been bit until Heather came over and said, “Hey, that dog’s tail looks broken.” I looked at his tail and he was starting to get an infection lower down close to the tail tip– where he was bit. We cleaned it up and took him to the vet. He should be okay.
The next victim was Dutchess, who has multiple health problems. I broke up a fight between Dutchess and Spike. Dutchess ended up with many holes on her head, neck, ear, and paw. Actually, the puncture wounds aren’t really that bad. What’s bad is the breast cancer. Greg brought her to the vet today for a spay appointment. The vet just called to let me know that Dutchess has several mammary tumors. She took a chest exray and the results were inconclusive– they show two small nodules, but the vet isn’t sure if the cancer spread or if it’s scaring from something else. She said that she wouldn’t make life/death decisions based on the exrays. So, we are going to have the cancer removed and have her spayed. Poor girl.