Anna the dog

[beerlaodrinker]

Your a hell of a good guy mendip

[hallelujah]

Your a hell of a good guy mendip

I'll second that.

[headhunter]

Your a hell of a good guy mendip

sadly they are FEW and far between,another is Michael j baines known in Chonburi as the dog father,THE MAN THAT RESCUESDOGS.
I salute you guys.hh.

[Neverna]

Your a hell of a good guy mendip

Yep, and strong candidate for POTY.

[tomcat]

...^agree: I'm still drying my eyes...

[Mendip]

I just like dogs, that's all. I also get a lot of spare time off work and find that living in Korat I need to keep busy.

Anyway, steady rain in Korat now, so yesterday I had to put a damp proof course in Anna's house and it's working a treat.

She's got her friends over today!

[Mendip]

We're getting some domestic trouble with our 'outside' dogs with all this rain. Suear (Tiger) and Vigo both want to be with Anna, but don't like to share. Vigo seems dominant, so Suear is left outside crying at night when it rains. I have to keep sorting them out by putting Anna in the middle. I guess they say 'three's a crowd', although I wouldn't mind a try meself if truth be told.

So today a new home.



I could have done with a QS - not enough cement blocks and one roof sheet short. But to be honest I've yet to be involved with a building project in Thailand that hasn't run over budget - both in time and cost. Will finish it tomorrow. Hope it doesn't rain tonight for Suear's sake!

[Mendip]

Well that was upsetting.

Anna's pregnant sister 'Sam', from a few posts above, disappeared a couple of days ago so I knew she'd gone off to have her puppies.

Went looking for her tonight on the dog feeding rounds. Found her dead under a tree. I'll spare the graphic details but she quite obviously died during childbirth (puppybirth).

Tried to distract my daughter but she spotted her. Strangely it's had much less effect on an eight year old than meself.

I think there will be a 'what am I drinking' post tonight.

[tomcat]

...none of the puppies survived?...

[Mendip]

Looked like the first one was half out. All very dead...

[headhunter]

i feel for you and your daughter,most upsetting,try not to beat yourself up,i know its easyer said than done.
HH.

[naptownmike]

Sorry to hear about that.

It's been nice to read about all the care you give to the local dogs.

I have seen some really great dogs around over the years that would have made great pets. And some tragic looking cases that could have used a bit of help like what you have done.

Nice of you to help them out.

[Mendip]

Life goes on!

Finished Seaur's new home yesterday...



He came to inspect it... (well, I plonked him down outside as he showed absolutely no interest)...



And he wandered straight back to his old home. All he wants to do is join Anna and Vigo...

[NamPikToot]

you should open a boarding kennels when you retire.

[Mendip]

^ Retirement... bit of a sore point these days mate!

[NamPikToot]

Ok, do what they do in the UK. You open a registered charity, receive donations and pay yourself half of all donations as a salary. I gave up charitable giving except to the RNLI over 25years ago because they are being run ss businesses now.

[Mendip]

Fed the dogs on the way home from the school pick-up and the dead mum 'Sam' is still lying under the tree after 4 or 5 days. I was really hoping one of the nearby residents would have sorted it out - the stench is unbearable. Not pleasant for me and my daughter, worse for the neighbours who live there, but they seem to put up with it.

What was most upsetting was that 'Dad Yogi', her boyfriend (post 46) was sitting nearby and whimpering. I've noticed before that dogs can show a lot of empathy, even these lowly soi dogs. So tomorrow morning I'll be going with the gardener and a couple of hoes to bury her. Once this stuff gets in my mind I can't leave it alone. I've done this a couple of times before and know what to expect - I won't be bothering with breakfast.

There's another pregnant dog on the patch (Sam's daughter) who I am hoping to sort out, but have just had a job come up and have to fly out Thursday night. Need an assistant really.

[Mendip]

^ Job done, not very nice.

In between finding homes for puppies we've also occasionally added to our own pack. Maybe about three years ago I was walking our original two dogs, Den and Dan (brother and sister), and a little white puppy ran out of some bushes at us and started yapping. This was on a quiet but fast road with no other houses anywhere near. I continued with the walk, and then on the way back the same thing happened - he was still there. This is the kind of thing I wish didn't happen, because I'm too soft. I picked him up, and he vomited up a kind of jungle curry on me - so worst fears confirmed, he used to have a home but someone had dumped him. Maybe they had given him one last completely unsuitable meal before leaving him on the road to get killed. He was probably 8 or 9 weeks old.

What can ya do... it was clear he wouldn't survive the day if left on the side of the road.



Prior to this we had only had the same two dogs for many years - so I had two problems. One, to get him accepted by the Kommandant back home, but as with any Thai she was easily bought off. The second problem was to get him accepted by our two resident dogs.

The trick here is to get the pack leader to accept a new comer, and then they will sort everything else out by themselves. Dan, the brown sister, was (and still is) our pack leader.

Thankfully, she took to Max almost straight away. This was one of the better dog names my daughter has come up with.



Max seemed to bring out the maternal instinct in Dan, who had never had a litter having been spayed at around six months of age. She wouldn't leave him alone.



Of course my daughter was made up at having her own puppy!



Den, the black brother, tolerated him. Can't say they ever got on well, but Dan would defend Max any time there was a squabble and things worked ok.



Soon they were all fishing together in the pond and Max was part of the gang...



A pic from a couple of years ago... Vigo, one of Anna's boyfriends was joining us on the walk that morning.

Den sadly passed away last year through cancer, yet he'd lived to the ripe old age of 12 and had a great life when considering his start, on the street. He now rests under one of our mango trees.

[Dillinger]

Great thread Mendip. I know à Guy down here who spends a fortune taking care of Soi dogs. I mentioned to him about why they have litters of nine like you mentioned and he said he does keep about 70% of packs alive, thus making a rod for his own back. Fair play to the pair of you though, fucked if I'd be arsed to enter that world of heartbreak.

[Mendip]

^ Once you start you can's stop mate. Maybe the trick is not to start. I've so many dogs relying on their evening meal that I have to get the gardener to take over the feeding when I go to work. He thinks I'm nuts.

The real trick of course is to get the girls spayed - I've got my eye on one just now who has moved onto my patch but she is already pregnant. If I can get her tame hopefully that will be her last litter...

[Dillinger]

It seems a mammoth sized task controlling these Soi dogs and something that the government should be getting petitioned with.
But as you see with the dead dog of 5 days, these fuckers don't give a hoot

Although I do wonder how many rats would be roaming the streets with no Soi dogs here.

[Mendip]

Yeah, its an endless task.

I've got my patch under control now but its been hard work. Must have found about 40 puppies homes and have got six bitches spayed to date. Many of these have hung around and the locals are happy with a few dogs knocking about and help to feed them occasionally. Once the bitches stop going into season the dominant males tend to wander off to look elsewhere.

I can't help but feed a starving dog, but of course that's great on an individual level and a nice thing to do. But when looking at the big picture each dog that survives will go on to reproduce and the overall problem gets worse. My 'patch' is only along the 2km dog walk we do every morning and that is hard enough to control. When you look at the big picture, the problem is huge.

[headhunter]

what joy you get every day,hearing the sound of yapping dogs in and around the MENDIPS,the hills are alive just like our little patch up here.
when the wife comes back with EMPTY bowls thats music to my ears.yes darling i will wash them.

[Dillinger]

Imagine how easy life would be and how well off the dogs would be if everyone contributed 5% of what Mendip does

[Mendip]

when the wife comes back with EMPTY bowls thats music to my ears.yes darling i will wash them.

You'll have to come for a visit mate, I'm sick of washing up.