Tasmanian Devils and Bad Breeders

/8 Comments/in , , /by

I love feeding my dogs a raw diet. I truly and honestly believe that it is the best, most biologically appropriate diet for dogs, and that many digestive and skin issues can be cleared up with a raw diet.

What I don’t believe, however, is that raw is a magic bullet. This puts me into direct conflict with certain segments of the raw feeding population, who will tell you that raw fed dogs won’t ever get rabies, can’t contract parvo and don’t get cancer.

I take issue with all of this (mainly because it flies in the face of logic), but I actually get fairly pissed about the cancer claim.

Read more →

Walking Dogs in My Backyard

/1 Comment/in /by

Away we go...

I spent the afternoon walking the dogs. Lucky for me, our house backs on to 4 kilometers of walking trails – well, walking trails now, but originally it was an old farm road, made redundant when the path of the new road changed.

The road winds uphill from our house, through a path of arched trees and between heavy woods. It crosses our stream, which runs downhill and becomes, for one moment, a small waterfall. At night, when it’s quiet, I can hear the water rushing over the rocks from our bedroom window. From our deck, or from the pool, it sounds like a real waterfall, not the trickle it actually is.

The dogs love this walk – they are never happier than when they are barreling up that hill in front of me, stopping to investigate interesting smells, intriguing puddles, stray patches of tall grass, bugs on rotten logs. They will only go as far as my sight line, even Delilah now, who in her not so very long ago youth would have been three counties away and not looking back once. Her mother, Sailor, was the queen of the runaways in her youth. She once led us on a chase that lasted three blocks, over roads and through yards and into heart stopping moments where I wasn’t sure if she was going to be killed, or if I was going to kill her. Now, Sailor doesn’t stray more than two feet away from me. Old age apparently has its advantages.

It’s entirely possible that walking dogs through what is, essentially, my backyard is a fairly boring way to spend a Saturday afternoon. There’s not much I’d trade it for, even so.

Photos after the cut.

Read more →

A Great Weekend in MI!

/in /by
French Bulldogs at Kalamazoo dog show - Bullmarket Absolut Darkly Dexter and Bullmarket NewHope at SpiritDragon

Dexter and Luke shooting "I het you" looks at each other

Congrats to Luke and Dexter on a great weekend in Kalamazoo!

Dex, his son Luke and his other son Manny each took a turn winning the dog points at the Kalamazoo, Michigan show. Unfortunately, the major broke, but it was still a great turn out! Sue managed to get some photos of Luke and Dexter together, but it wasn’t easy. There’s apparently no love lost between them, what with boys (and their hormones) being boys.

Sue’s other big news is that she won the bitch points with her little girl, Cindi. Way to go, Sue and Cindi!

Still waiting to hear back from Kristina and Amanda on how the other Dexter kids, Leah and Finnlee (Delilah’s daughter out of Dex) did over on the east coast. I hope it was another great weekend for them, as well!

This was Finnlee’s first weekend in the ring, so let’s hope she didn’t ‘pull a Delilah‘ on Amanda (that’s my nickname for anytime a dog makes a fool out of you – and especially if it seems intentional).

I am making plans to attend the Hamilton Kennel Club Dog Show, on Saturday June 26th.  I’ll be showing Delilah, because apparently I am a glutton for punishment.  I am fully expecting her to do something horrid to me in the ring – either she’ll fall asleep on the grooming table, or she’ll simply refuse to move on the down and back. Either of which would be a nice tribute to her grandmother, Tessa, who at one point or another in her show career did both of those things, with a spectacular flying leap off of the grooming table added in for good measure.

Details on the show can be found here – http://www.canineshowservices.com/hamilton/hamiltonpl2010.pdf

If you’d like to come out and meet with us to ‘talk Frenchies’, please drop me a line. Video cameras will be strictly banned from ringside – the last thing I need is video of Delilah winding the lead around my feet until I fall flat on my face going viral on YouTube.

Charges Against Michael Bryant Dropped

/1 Comment/in , /by

In a shocking (but barely surprising) decision, the Crown has decided to drop all charges against Ontario’s former Attorney General, Michael Bryant. Bryant came to fame in Ontario when he masterminded the mass destruction of Ontario’s Pit Bulls, Staffordshire Bull Terriers, and vaguely Pittie looking short coated dogs of indeterminate heritage.

From the Globe and Mail:

Mr. Bryant was charged last September with criminal negligence causing death and dangerous driving in the death of bike courier Darcy Allan Sheppard.

Police alleged Mr. Sheppard, 33, died after grabbing onto a car in downtown Toronto following an altercation with the driver.

Read more →

Phantom Puppy Scam Sinks to New Lows

/5 Comments/in /by

I was pretty sure that it couldn’t get much lower than the phantom puppy scam – that’s the one where some seemingly broken hearted owner can no longer keep his dog (which just happens to be a purebred French Bulldog/English Bulldog/Teacup Yorkie/Popular Breed puppy), and wants to give it away for ‘free’ to a good owner.  All you are required to pay is the shipping cost, which is usually quoted as something ridiculously, like $400.

Unfortunately, that low shipping price rapidly escalates to well into the thousands of dollars, what with import taxes and quarantine fees and other miscellaneous charges – and in the end, there is no puppy. What there is, is a scammer – usually in Nigeria, Cote D’Azure, Cameroon, or some other African country, sometimes working with a partner here in North America, sometimes acting solely from overseas.

While that’s pretty low all on it’s own, much to my surprise, it CAN get lower. Let’s call this new twist the ‘phantom babies’ scam.

http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local-beat/Woman-Offers-Up-Twins-for-12-94267374.html

The ad was first published on WiseCounty.com in the free classified ad section.  The ad lists a price tag of $12 and was first posted on May 15.  It reads:

“Please, I need someone with best intentions to adopt/give my babies a good family, home/lifestyle. The babies are in excellent health conditions with good weights, encouraging medical reports and are very playful. I’m healthy except of being physically disabled, a Christian by faith, not a smoker and hates alcohol. I gave birth to this twin at the appropriate time given at the hospital. Sincerely, I love the babies extremely much; the decision to give them up hasn’t been that easy but its necessary, my intentions are base on get the babies nothing order than a very lovely home and family that I trust to be very determination to welcome, raise them with much love/ great concerned for their welfare, future etc that will be best for the babies. Please, I will be extremely happy to blessed any good person or couples with my babies only if he/or she stand with good intentions of offering the babies with best. I’m hopefully looking forward to read from you.”

Just as with the phantom puppy scam (where the ads for a Bulldog might show photos of a Boston), the scammers don’t pay very much attention to details. The photos in the ad show two healthy baby boys, at least two years old, if not older.

The other similarities are the grammatical errors in the writing, which are very similar to those commonly found in the phantom puppy ads. Both types of ads read like they’ve been written by fairly good ESL students. The other similarity is the claim of being a Christian – the puppy scam generally claims that the puppy is with a missionary in Africa, and insists on finding them a ‘good Christian home’.

There have been rumors about this new twist happening on a few of the scam forums I read, but this is the first newspaper coverage of it I’ve read.

If you think there were a lot of people desperate for cheap puppies, imagine how many people are going to get sucked in by *this* version.