Dog Needs A Home

[Vami]

A handsome Bangkaew mix/mutt with a lucky curly tail is looking for a new home. His name is Jazz, and he is both lively and smart. He is almost a year old, and more friendly than I know what to do with. My roommate and I purchased him with the understanding that she would train him and help look after him (I am a cat person, but she wanted a guard dog). She got sick and left a week later. I have been trying to care for him and provide a stable home for him ever since. However, I am going to Vietnam, and my boyfriend eats dogs (proudly too). While he would probably let me bring the dog with us and not eat him, he has called Jazz yummy a few time and is clearly uncomfortable around the affectionate dog. I realize this is selfish on my part, but I am choosing the boy over the dog. Is there someone who is less attracted to dog-eating-men and would give him a warm friendly home? Jazz is up to date with his current vaccinations and is very healthy. He is a bit of a wanderer and likes to travel about when given the chance, but he does not like to be left alone for long periods of time. He can stand his owner being away at work as long as he has been properly walked beforehand, but he will develop anxiety if left alone for longer stretches of time.When anxious, he eats furniture. He is very friendly towards other dogs, often approaching them backside first to start the sniff introduction. He barks at strangers, but does not bite. Even when we play, he never lets his teeth clamp down even when he puts his mouth on my arm. He gets jealous when others get his attention, and will try to sit in their lap or distance them from his owner. He is not fond of dog food, but will eat it. Usually the temple dogs come to eat his pedigree dog food, and he goes to eat their rice. He does not like Purina. Nor does he like riding on motorcycles. He understands the concept, but the moment the scooter stops, he is off it and gone unless you have him strapped in and he does not enjoy the ride at all. He is incredibly intelligent and often outsmarts me (one of the reasons he gets to wander so much). He needs a new home by April when I leave. Currently he is located in a small town in the Nakhorn Sri Thammarat province, but I am willing to cover his travel costs if someone farther away has a suitable home for him. Sorry for my selfishness and thanks in advance.

[Lunghans]

We are in desperate search for a good home for one of our dogs.

There is a story behind all this, two years ago when I was working in our garden I was confronted with a very dirty little dog staring at me.

The poor creature was half bold covered with sores and looked really terrible. My first reaction was "what are you doing here? Go home you ugly dog."

She did not want to leave and just kept staring at me with this look like "Please you have to help me"

The next day I found here sleeping under some wooden planks in our garden and told her again"Go to your own house ugly dog." But she was determined to stay and just stared at me with that same look. I then decided to buy her some food and wash her to see how badly she really looked under all that dirt. This was bad, she was half bold and had sores all over. She looked like a Shi Tzu this was later confirmed after a visit at the vet.

The next day my wife and I decided to take her to the vet and found out she was in a very bad condition, she was bold because of a serious demodex infection, had a fungi on her skin, parasitic worms in her liver, anemia, sores all over and was in heat also. She got a whole range of antibiotics, shots and pills, medication against the parasites, liver support pills and cream for her skin to kill the demodex. We had to visit the vet every other four days to monitor her condition. We also found out that getting rid of the Demodex could take 4 to 6 months providing she was getting healthy again.

In the next weeks she was getting fatter and fatter, was she pregnant or not? I asked the vet if this was the case. There was a big white Thai Ridgeback sitting in front of our gate and "Lucky", this is how we renamed her instead of "Ugly" that I called her before seemed to have a bond with this guy. According to the vet a small dog like her could not be impregnated by a big Thai ridgeback. After making an echo it was sure she was pregnant and the vet saw 3 embryos. He advised us as soon as the puppies were born to separate them from the mother and bring them up by the bottle preventing the puppies to get the Demodex as well. How to do this in a small house like we had then, we were also way to busy to bing up little puppies by hand. The vet eased on the medication she was getting because of her condition. I decided to take the risk and let the puppies stay with the mother as soon as they were born, the best way to get healthy puppies is to let them drink from the mother.

On Jan 26 2011 Lucky gave birth to 2 puppies, but the Vet said he saw 3, so when it took to long for the third one to come out we decided to see a vet, it was past midnight and the local vet in Khlong Luang was closed. We knew an animal clinic in Bangkok that was open all night. So the whole bunch in a basket and of we go. At the clinic the vet took a x-ray and concluded that there was not a third puppy inside. When the pups grew up they got the Demodex and fungi as well. We decided to go to the vet at Kasetsart University in Bangkok, visiting the local vet with Lucky costed us an arm and a leg and now with three dog it would take a big chunk out of our budget. After about 2 months of weekly visits to the University clinic they started to show improvement and a month later they were all healthy again. We named the pups Happy (male) and Money (female).

Happy is an overactive puppy and Money more docile but still strong headed, this did not work out for the two, Happy started to show his dominance over Money and Money did not accept this, the strange thing was that Lucky choose sides for Happy and started to reject Money, resulting in big fights. We had to find a new home for Money and we found one.

In October 2011 the floods hit our house in Khlong Nueng, Pathum Thani, our house had 65 cm of water inside and outside the house 1.5 m of water for two months. We had to bring the dogs to a balcony on the second floor, not an ideal situation for the dogs but we all survived this. After the floods Lucky and Happy lived in the walled garden, slept in their own cages.

We were extremely busy, recovering our company after the floods, (we produce materials and eBooks on how to make clay flowers and sell these on the internet all over the world).

As a result we were not able to spend the time to socialise Happy, but we did not see he had any problems at that time.

In December 2012 we moved to a new house we build in Nakon Rachasima with the help of my wife's family, we did not want to risk being flooded ever again, it almost bankrupted us.

This is when the problems started with Happy, we have to keep the dogs in-house because the house has no garden walls, they are working on this but after two months the walls are not finished yet.

We don't want the dogs roam freely around the house like all Thai dog owners do and walk with them on a leash, especially Happy who is not street wise at all and will surely be hit by a car or motorbike.

Happy in his efforts to protect the house is being over protective barking at everyone and everything that comes near to the house, no matter how hard we try to prevent this and teach him not to.

This is driving us and especially my wife to near despair, resulting in even quarrels between me and my wife.

I also found out that Happy is very scared, afraid of people, sounds, separation anxiety, etc., resulting in more barking and howling.

In my efforts to find a solution for his problem being so scared and hyperactive I searched the internet and came up with a possible answer.

Vets are now giving Prozac to dogs with similar behaviour and this seems to give results in most cases, so I decided to give it a try.

I managed to buy Oxetine (generic Prozac) and started to give him a small dose (10 mg.) daily, carefully monitoring him for unwanted side effects.

Now he is on a 20 mg. daily doses and it looks like he is making progress. Unfortunately my wives patience is finished she can not live with Happy anymore.

We have tried to bring him to family in Klong Luang, but this did not work out. Snapping at people out of fear who wanted to feed him or walk him out, so I had to drive another 500 km to pick him up again. He never snapped at me or the wife once and enjoys being touched and cuddled, so this surprised me.

Happy needs a patient new owner, gaining trust in time. He is a smart little Thai-Tzu who is eager to learn new tricks, is house broken and stopped demolishing things like shoes, has a funny punky look being a cross breed between a Shi Tzu and a Thai ridgeback.

Anyone who wants to give Happy a chance in life so he can live up to his name, please let me know.

Hans & Tarapat

Edited February 11, 2013 by Lunghans