Adventures of Nick & Ted
As Ted works away diligently in the background, the pup develops a fetish for footwear – expensive and worrying
Most of you will have heard the saying: “It never rains but it pours.” Well, as I sit here writing this it is chucking it down and Storm Ellen is imminent. This follows a period of intense heat, so it has not been an easy time to get out to train the dogs in readiness for the season. As it happens, the testing weather has proved to be the least of my worries. Other matters out of my control have overtaken any thoughts of training schedules.
Regular readers will remember that a few months back we had an out-of-hours rush to the vet’s when we realised that Percy had swallowed a sock. It transpired that he had to be given an injection to encourage him to eject said sock from his stomach. More recently, one of the grandchildren’s socks went missing and made an appearance a few days later from the other end of the little dog. Since then we have been hyper-careful to ensure that anything resembling a sock is kept well out of the way. Mrs R and I have become obsessive about doing everything we can to prevent another sock-eating episode. However, despite our best efforts, it all went wrong this week and we ended up having a most stressful couple of days.
Full-on
Percy is a pretty full-on type of cocker and he has certain traits that make me laugh as well as test me to the limit. For example, when
I go down the garden he leaps off the patio and does a circuit of the flower beds. Earlier in the day I had mentioned to Mrs R that he seemed a bit quiet and “not quite right” but it was very hot and I thought he may just be feeling the heat. However, as I walked back up the garden after feeding the chickens I noticed he had lain down on the grass, which is most unlike him. Over the next hour or so he became quieter and quieter and I was becoming concerned.
Another call to the vet’s and within half an hour he was on the operating table having yet another sock removed, this time from his small intestine. He was lucky; had I not been so aware of his normal behaviour and his change during the day he could have ended up very ill indeed and although it was a serious operation it could have been a lot worse. But the story doesn’t end there.
Percy came home the same evening with a surgical T-shirt on to prevent him from
chewing his stitches, although this in itself caused me quite high levels of stress, as I was sure that he could be partial to bit of T-shirt. The vet left in an intravenous (IV) insertion just in case they needed to rehydrate him the following day. I had him back at the surgery first thing and all was well, the wound looked good and dry and the stitches intact, so the IV was removed and a bandage put over the shaved area on his leg with the instructions for us to remove it in an hour or so.
Once he was home he ate some food, went to the toilet and then I popped him in his pen and put the kettle on. After lunch I remembered I had to take off the bandage so I let him out and I couldn’t believe my eyes – the luminous green bandage had gone. I searched his bed and pen but could find no sign of it. Then it dawned on me that the idiot had only gone and eaten it. I am sure you can
imagine my panic and embarrassment when I had to phone the vet’s to explain what had happened. Fortunately, I have known my vet for more than 30 years so the joshing was all taken in good humour when I returned to the surgery. Following yet another injection the offending bandage reappeared on the surgery floor. Percy looked very sorry for himself – and quite rightly so.
Deterrent
The following morning he was back to his normal bouncy, happy self and it was a great relief to see him looking so well, which was surprising considering what he had gone through. We worked out how he had got the sock: he must have performed a ‘smash and grab’ raid and run upstairs to steal it off the washing dryer when the kitchen door was ajar. He must have been quick, as we didn’t even notice he had gone and returned.
“I couldn’t believe my eyes; I searched but the luminous green bandage had gone”
Needless to say, further precautions have now been put in place with a gate installed at the bottom of the stairs.
The irony is that during his training he has never tried to bury a dummy or ball (which can be a cocker trait) and with most other little bits of ‘treasure’ he is pretty good at bringing them back to us. I can only assume he has some kind of sock fetish, which is not only annoying but it is becoming bloody expensive.
During all this drama, Ted has been quietly toiling away dogging in and the birds are looking really good. Our first day is scheduled for 12 September and I think his fitness is just about there, although, to be fair, he won’t be doing too much hunting in the beating line as most of it will be in maize, which, incidentally, has grown like something out of Jack and the Beanstalk.
I suspect we will be losing more than a few beaters during the first couple of shoots but we are very much looking forward to it. And rumour has it that there may be the opportunity to go picking up on the grouse towards the end of the month. Watch this space, all will be revealed. But, hopefully, please, not another sock.