Winston Lucky Churchill the bouncy bearded collie, aka Buddy

Posted by marne on March 4, 2008 in other things | 9 comments

You all are really great at naming pets; I liked all the suggestions, thank you so much! Shortly after I finished that post I was looking at lists of pet names, and I found Winston, which was also mentioned in the comments a couple times. It fits him very well, being English and all, and he seems to like it. I loved Henry, but my grandfather’s name was Henry, so I couldn’t use that. Funnily enough, I had several beta fish while I was in college, and they were always named Fred. I thought Ned and Charlie were so cute too. Ned makes me think of Nancy Drew’s boyfriend, and is a great dog name (no offence to Nancy Drew). Buddy is a nickname I always call animals, so that will undoubtedly be used regularly. I think his middle name should definitely be Lucky, because according the pet rescue lady, he came from a shelter with a four-day limit before animals are put down. Lucky also, because although I’m sure these pet rescue people have the best of intentions, I’m not so sure they really know what they are doing.

Caution: mini-rant ahead.

We adopted our cats from the Helen Woodward Animal Center. I can’t recommend that place highly enough. They take excellent care of the animals, and will not adopt out any pets that aren’t in perfect health. Petey and Lucy both had ringworm when they arrived there, and underwent six months of treatment before they were eligible for adoption. When we wanted to handle various cats they made us wear gloves and wash our hands in between playing with the various cats. At the time we thought all these precautions were a little excessive, but we took home two healthy cats, so we didn’t complain. Paperwork and adoption fees were all very straight-forward, and while they asked a lot of questions to make sure we knew we were committing to a lifetime of care for these cats they weren’t overly intrusive.

The pet rescue people, on the other hand, set up a bunch of pens in front of the pet store and have two or three dogs in the pens together. People are constantly walking by, petting one dog and then another. A couple dogs, including Winston, had diarrhea. The lady cleaned it up right away in each case, but still, it wasn’t a good indicator of the health of the animals. It was so busy that it was hard to find out about the dogs, let alone be able to spend time with them. When I came back with Mr. Heylucy it took forever for the lady to give us a straight answer on the adoption fee and for her to give us the paperwork to fill out. She kept telling us the same story over and over, about how he was at a shelter in San Bernardino, she had to have him neutered, she had him groomed, but he got muddy, how handsome he was right after he was groomed, she needed to cover her costs for the trip to Los Angeles and the neutering and the grooming, blah, blah, blah. Finally, I went inside to buy him a food dish, and Mr. Heylucy told her to cut the drama and tell us what the fee was, let us fill out the paperwork and take the darn dog already. He has a soft heart when it comes to animals, but no patience when it comes to getting the run around. I was starting to feel like we really needed to get the dog out of there, to rescue him from the rescue operation.

Yesterday I took him to the vet to get all checked out. He’s healthy and perky, but of course he has kennel cough, is susceptible to getting a doggie cold, and has a pretty nasty parasite. All of the above are the result of too many dogs being too close together. Of course, now Bear and Reggie have been exposed to all these things, so we may be paying the vet another visit. It may not have been so wise to bring Winston home so quickly, but at least I know that we will take care of our animals, and make sure that they get healthy as quickly as possible if they start showing signs of any illnesses (just an aside, if you live in East San Diego County, the Singing Hills Animal Hospital is an excellent place, I highly recommend them!). I just don’t know if people should be in the business of rescuing pets unless they are committed to keeping them healthy and have the facilities to isolate those that are sick. I find the whole thing really frustrating. So, just be aware, and if you go to Petco while they have a pet adoption group out front, don’t bring your dog in the store with you (our vet said that just walking by a dog with kennel cough is enough to catch it, it’s that contagious), and don’t even look at those poor animals unless you are prepared to take them straight to the vet’s office and have them treated for one or more illnesses. I don’t want to knock someone for wanting to help animals; I just want them to do a better job. It seems that if you really love animals, you’ll do what you can to keep them happy and healthy. Okay, that is the end of my rant for today.

Isn’t Winston cute? I know this picture is fuzzy, but Winston is fuzzy, so it’s a good representation. He also got a bath yesterday, and he cleaned up so nice, even if he didn’t enjoy the bath all that much.