Normally, I talk about my children or homeschooling in some way or form. Today, I have something sitting a little closer to my heart. So, I hope you don't mind my sharing and discussing this instead today.
Last evening, I was on my way home from taking my daughter to town and came across a small beagle on the road above a bridge in the country. I noticed an older lady at the end of her drive a short distance away raking and I thought he may have been her little guy that had gotten away from her without her noticing. I stopped and asked her if he was her dog. It was not and she did not know who he belonged to either. She said that he had been living under the bridge at night for the past two or three days. About that time, a car pulled up with two men in it and they said that they had seen him for the past three evenings as well and was concerned about him. Well, I seem to be a magnet for critters in need and even have gotten to the point that I carry a leash in my car for such occasions. So, I started to try to catch the little guy.
This little fellow is rather small. He appears much younger than he is, but appears to be less than a year, otherwise, I am not able to discern. He, however, had an attitude of a junkyard dog right at that moment. He was growling, showing teeth, yipping, and down right vicious. He was also tail tucked and shaking horribly. He was just scared and trying to bluff. The two men and I were able to get the leash on him and he was instantly a pleasant little puppy.
I took him home planning to take him to a shelter that was a 'no kill' facility. They apparently, are not easy to find. Strays are only welcome at the local dog pounds. He is a darling. He really is. He wiggles and squirms and wags his little tail whenever he sees us. He has horribly infected ears that has been let go so long that his skin is like that of an elephant and he is in terrible discomfort to say the least. I started treating him with various items I keep on hand and he does not fight me or even seem to hold a grudge when it hurts him. I brought him in the house and he is doing very well with my three other dogs that I have taken in over the years. He has had a small amount of accidents, but is trying very hard to do the right thing.
According the the elderly lady that I spoke with and the two men that assisted me in catching him, he was flat refusing to leave the bridge. That is not uncommon with dogs that are left. They will wait and wait even starving themselves in the process or placing themselves in further harm waiting on their family to return for them. He is a handful being young and full spirited. I imagine he was a handful for someone that may not have expected the work involved in training young dogs. Then, when you add in the medical needs that he has with the recurrent ear problem that even an untrained person could not miss in it's severity, well, I have to wonder if he was just too much for his owners to take.
Too much work to train. Too much trouble when he did not automatically know how to please them. Too much money to take care of his medical needs. Too smelly when he had a flare up of the infection. Too much energy after a long day at the office. Just too much.
Please, please, consider these things when you decide to take an animal into your homes permanently. Please, realize that these little critters have their own baggage that they bring into your relationship and just as you expect them to bend to yours, you will need to bend a little, too. Please, be prepared to provide at least basic care for medical needs and I assure you, as the owner of way too many animals, they will have health problems. Sometimes, they can be many and severe. You need to be prepared for those as well. Know that they will expect to love and receive love in return. Know that they will mess up from time to time and that they will not hold your mistakes against you, so please, don't hold theirs against them.
When you take an animal into your home, you add a family member. You add a family member that knows to do nothing but to love, trust, and be the most loyal member of your family. They have no voices to tell you how they feel, so please, notice their love in their eyes. They adore you! You are their whole world! Don't break that trust simply because you did not plan on the extra work.
Research the breed you are considering. Many times breeds have tendencies that they simply can not get past. They will try. They will try to do ANYTHING to please you, but they have been bred over centuries and longer to increase those characteristics, so you are asking them to go against their very nature when you do and they will fail. So, please, know what traits your animal's breed may be likely to bring to your relationship and consider honestly whether you can live with those traits for their entire natural life.
This is not my first or even second rescued animal. This is an all too common situation. This lovely little fellow was willing to sit there on that road taking shelter under a bridge with cold running spring melt off adding to the normal water levels and no food or protection in the hopes that he would be reunited with his family. He KNEW they would return for him. That his human had simply made a mistake somehow (one he would forget in a minute) and would come back for him. That he LOVED them. That he TRUSTED them fully and completely to do the right thing for him as he would do for them.
That is the love and loyalty of a dog. That is the love and loyalty that you will receive when you give them a home and honor and respect that trust. (even when you don't, they will still give it to you) Where else can you receive such unconditional love and trust?
Please, please, people out there, be kind and fair to your critters and do not take them into your homes as pets if you are not willing and able to stick it out for the long haul of the animal's NATURAL life. All you have to do is to watch an animal in various situations to know that they have feelings. Go to the local shelters and pounds and look at what we as humans have done to these poor creatures. Each one there and living on the street is our doing in one form or another. Whether we did not provide adequate restrictions to the yard and they wandered off, whether we did not teach them proper behavior and they bit the neighbor boy that teased him, whether we did not get our pet spayed or neutered and then found ourselves with 10 more mouths to feed...the list is endless, but you can be assured that none of those animals asked to live there.
Please, just be kind. Sometimes the kindest thing a person can do for an animal is to say, you can not provide what they need and never bring them to your home. If that is the case, please, don't take in someone that will be left on a bridge somewhere to wait endlessly for your return.
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