Squirrels And Charlie

Another beautiful day here today, 66° sounds of birds, a squirrel sighting and finally all of us get to see Charlie, a big white puppy a couple of houses down from here. He is 10 months old and his owner tells me he is not destructive inside when left alone but likes to pee on the shoes of his grown son when they visit. It was a restless and sad day today ... we went on hound walks, out for lunch but couldn't seem to just sit outside and relax ... Samson was put down today around noon local time.

Is Winter Really Over ??

Winters down here in "the tropics" are a little different than cities and towns in other parts of the state. We are actually further south than Louisville and much further south than St Louis. So the big storm predicted for Wednesday will blow by north of us and we will have high's in the 70's tomorrow and Thursday. The hounds love it and so does the dog. They spent most of their day outside on Monday. Henry and Watson had great walks with Samson Watson having quite the test to show me how good he is.

A Tetanus Shot & Antibiotics

A lot has happened I guess from my last post. Some of it information by those that have experienced "rage syndrome" and information from urgent care about my deep wound and other small dog bites. It's all good information though, so no worries there. So where do I start ??

Samson Attacked Me Saturday Night

 

That 1% I spoke of 10 days ago happened Saturday night. Unprovoked. It was halftime of the IU game and I had gotten up walking this direction, planning to make a right turn down the hallway to the bathroom. Just as I stepped on that wood I heard a loud  ATTACK bark growl and when I turned left to see what was going on, Samson lunged at me. The worse attack mode I have ever seen a dog in. You can see the kitchen table moved to the right. That must have happened as I struggled to get out of his grip ... and trying to get away from him. I was backing up through the kitchen fighting him off hoping to get to the garage and shut the door.

Hounds Started Early

 

You can tell by the tone of the photos it was early, like 7:30am and it was overcast with rain in the forecast. The made no difference to the hounds as they were outside early chasing each other, wrestling until the light rain showed up. I had to yell'' "milk bone" to get the three of them inside. Walter is included in that treat even though he was inside staying dry.

An Unbelievable Day - Seriously

Due to the "unbelievable one in a million chance" I am going to scramble your brain cells on this post. I am going to talk about what happened, even the sequence of events because some do not have photos. It will be before I talk and show you photos of Saturday afternoon and early this morning.

A Good Day For The Hounds And Dog

 

Google is up to its old tricks again reversing the order of my photos no matter how I load them. It takes too long to load them per content so I have always loaded them all at once, and type between them. So I will think in reverse order as I write. It's been a really good day for the new bloodhound and it's only 2:15pm local time. All four of them are in a deep sleep with Walter snoring loud from his spot in the computer room. Here you can get a better idea just how tall a bloodhound is.

Samson Arrives After All

 

Like always when I decide to do something I keep thinking about it, did I make the right decision? I kept thinking with his breeding, a littermate of Watson, he should be a good bloodhound. After 21 months maybe he could use a different environment. I was pretty sure my three would be okay with him. Their only experience of having another dog here was last spring when the bulldog Hank stopped by to visit.

So sometime after 10am and about the time I was going to text the owner to tell him that I had changed my mind and I would take him. The picture above showed up from the owner. How could you resist a face like that ??? LOL

I Deleted The Post About Samson

 

I deleted the post I wrote yesterday about adopting Samson because it's not going to happen. The later the night got, the more thoughts of common sense came into my head. Various reasons to adopt him a just as many not to. A few years ago when I was thinking of rescuing a basset hound or bloodhound, I can't remember which, a friend told me "Steve you cannot save all of them". That rang true last night.

The problem was with him, unlike Stella in 2015, Samson has a biting problem. Some things might be consistent in what causes him to turn aggressive but it was said he could at a "flip of a switch" for no reason. THAT would be hard for a non-profession trainer (me) to fix. It would take a lot of time and training to get him past that.

For all the time it would take would be less time I spend with Watson, Henry and Walter. Less attention for them to give attention to the new bloodhound. No matter what anyone says, you can only give 100% and it's hard to spread that out evenly.

Watson has really responded to his new training. I would hate to change his routine right now and have him compete with a new bloodhound that would be in a lot of training. Even if Samson got along with all my hounds and the dog, who's to say one of mine would not like him moving into their territory or want one of their bones. I am afraid it would turn into a hound/dog fight that I could not break up.

This morning I notified the owner and the lady that is trying to place him. I have not heard back from the owner but I have from her. She understood but it was hard to read "you were the best chance he had".

I may have been but those words ring in my head "Steve you cannot save all of them".