The Latest from the Veterinarian

First, so no one panics, this is an old photo that was taken on Suki's first day with us. We just wanted you to have something to compare her latest photos to so you could see how far she's come. Six weeks of medicine, quality puppy food, diet supplements, and lots of love have definitely made a big difference.

Well - good news and bad news. The good news is that Suki's mange is doing much better. The bad news is that it is still not a mild enough case to have her spayed and so her adoptive family will have to wait another 4+ weeks to bring home their sweet new little girl.

Her case was quite extreme when she first arrived here from the shelter, in fact the vet wasn't sure he had seen such a bad case of generalized demodectic mange. Now, after 6 weeks on Ivermectin, she is doing much better. She's no longer a scabby mess and doesn't spend much time scratching, however she still has large patches of mite irritation on her neck, body and all of her legs. Yes, that's pretty much all of her, but her face and tail look pretty mite-free so we're going to call that a victory, especially since one side of her face and the top of her head used to look like one big sore.

I can't say that we're sad to hold onto this sweet dog for another month, but her adoptive family is so ready for her that I feel bad that they will have to wait.

Ratbone Rescues needs items for a charity auction

A wonderful Ratbone volunteer has offered to run auctions for us on ebay to raise money for Ratbone Rescues. The program is run through something called "MissionFish", and any items for sale need to sell for $5 or over. Soooo...... Do you think that you have anything to donate that might sell on ebay? 100% of the proceeds go to Ratbone AND you can write off the donation on your taxes because Ratbone is a registered "not for profit" organization. The items don't necessarily have to be dog related, just something that will sell for at least $5 (MissionFish rule).

We have "poster pups" that are featured on the different auctions so people can see and hear about a specific dog that the proceeds from the sale are helping. Here's an auction you can check out that features Moxie, a sweet dog that is currently in Washington. The poster pups will be dogs that have medical needs above and beyond the $150 adoption fee that is charged. Many of the dogs that come into foster care are severely neglected or even abused and the result can be a difficult and costly road to recovery.

Can you help us? If you are interested in donating something then drop me an email. Remember that I can give you a receipt for any donations and you can write that amount off of your taxes.

Above you see our personal poster pup - Suki - who is one of those dogs with medical expenses above and beyond the $150 adoption fee. She came to us with severe mange, an intestinal infection and bordetella from a shelter in Texas that was euthanizing her because she had demodectic mange and couldn't be spayed while she had it. A volunteer from Ratbone scooped her up and flew her to us here in Washington where she is being loved back to health.

When you take into account her vaccinations, flea treatment, mange medication, mange salve, antibiotics for the intestinal infection that she had, spaying and having 4 teeth pulled - things add up quickly. Through these fundraisers and donations, Ratbones is able to cover most of the dogs' medical costs, lightening the financial burden on foster parents and thus allowing more people to foster and save these sweet little dogs.

Running like the wind - well, kind of....

This last week I started running again and decided to take both dogs with me. My 14 year old son runs daily, and so we drove over to the BPA trail with Suki and Frodo and started off down the trail. Suki was ecstatic. She trotted along and in her harness reminded me of the photos of Santa's reindeer, prancing along. Frodo, on the other hand, was not at all amused. So I jogged along, one arm pulled forward as Suki tried to catch up to my son and one arm pulled behind me as Frodo pulled back trying to make his nightmare end. At one point he stopped so suddenly that he collar pulled right off of his skinny rattie head. My son ran with Suki for awhile but after a couple minutes she was back with me. We ran about a mile and a half and walked an additional 2 and a half miles and Suki pulled the entire time.

The goal is that Suki will start to understand how to walk/run on leash. She did learn a few things, but not how to gracefully accompany her person while on leash. Here are some of her lessons:

• 14 year old boys have no patience


• 14 year old boys do not approve of sniffing forays off of the trail


• Don't run in front of people or they will step on your paws (she didn't learn a lesson here, but at the time of being stepped on she made note of it)


• Her foster mom is not a very fast runner and needs to be pulled at all times


• Water bottles are very fun to drink out of


• 14 year old boys don't like dog slobber on their water bottles

I'm sure there were some other things she noted, but this gives you the basic idea.

No photos were taken during the run (my hands were full and my son was about a mile ahead of us) but I wanted to include another cute photo of the princess. Sometimes her and Frodo will sit on the steps like this - one end sitting and the other standing - and we think it is so funny.

Don't touch me!

In this little video Suki once again tries to initiate play, only to be shunned by Frodo as he scoots down the couch to get away from her.

Suki aka "Jaws"

As is somewhat typical of rat terriers, our teething beauty's baby canine teeth did not fall out when her adult teeth came in. I sat down to attempt to brush her teeth, and what do you know?! There were 4 canines poking out of the bottom of her jaw. If you look close in the photo you can see them. Her mouth looks a bit like a shark's. :) Now, when I brushed her teeth last night I noticed that the top canines are starting to come in and the baby ones aren't loose in the slightest.

When Frodo's baby canines didn't fall out he just had them pulled when he was in surgery being neutered. But Suki's still recovering from her demodex and so her spaying is on hold for the moment. Hopefully the double teeth won't permanently affect her bite. Wouldn't want her to have to see a doggy orthodontist! :)

She'll be going into the vet's for a skin check in another week and we'll just have to ask him to look at her mouth then. Until then, we'll let her continue to work on her nylabone, which BTW, I highly recommend as a puppy teether, and an alternative to a regular bone for adult dogs. Long lasting, very safe, and it helps scrape off tartar build-up. It's all good!

Smudge: The Latest

I emailed Smudge's new family yesterday to see how he was doing and just received a great report and some fun photos today. He has had his cast removed and is slowly but surely remembering that he can use that leg now. At first he walked on it, but lifted it up to run, but now he's discovered sprinting and that's sped up his willingness to use his cast-less leg.

It sounds like he tries to eat and drink anything (coffee, candy, even beer) but has to settle for apple chunks and cheese for a treat, which he loves. One of his favorite things is to ride around in his dad's shirt munching on sunflower seeds. He actually can shell them! His dad kept getting blamed for spitting his shells on the ground, when they figured out it was Smudge who was doing it!!

His big brother Maxwell (and by big, I mean BIG), a sweet old pitbull, isn't sure how to play with such a tiny thing, so he just stands there and barks at him. Smudge, a 3 pound little lion, stands his ground and barks right back and so they stand there, nose to nose, barking.

It is great news to hear how well he has settled into his forever home and that his leg healed well. As Ratbone Rescues likes to say, this is a "happy tail."

The photo above shows Smudge lounging around and having a little tug time with his brother, Milo. Doesn't Smudge look like a "mini-me" of Milo?

Suki sits and stays!

Just giving a happy update on Suki's training. We've been working on the "sit" command and she caught on very fast. Let's just say that she is VERY treat motivated - well, and she's pretty smart. She has "sit" down so well that I decided to move on to the "sit-stay" today. I do quick little 3-5 minute training sessions several times a day since she's still only five months with the attention span of a gnat. After just two short seconds we managed a 10 second "stay"!!!! Wow!

Frodo is loving all of this training because he gets to take part and earn treats right along with Suki. Seeing as he's been able to sit and stay for almost 2 years, he's thinking "man has this dog got it easy! Where's the "spin", the "roll over" the "high five"!"

I've recently discovered these great training treats that are made in the Seattle area called "Simon and Huey's Doggoned Tasty Treats." They are made specifically for little dogs and are about the size of a rabbit pellet (sorry for the gross description but the peanut butter and molasses treats could easily be mistaken as such). They are made with all natural ingredients, and remind me of the hippy health food cookies that my mom made me when I was a kid - peanut butter, molasses, oat flour, and unsweetened carob (yes, I tasted one.) They are super soft and I actually split the tiny things in half when we train. I just bought some of their "bacon bit" treats and the dogs are equally excited about them. And no, I'm not being paid for this ad. :) It's just when you find a great, healthy, tiny treat for little dogs you have to spread the word!