Bernard (yes, Bernard)

On Saturday, the day after we returned from being away for three weeks, a Sheltie named Bernard (can you imagine?) was relinquished to us. Barbara had been talking with Bernard’s “people” for almost a month, asking them to hang onto him until we got back into town.

The woman who had Bernard had recently acquired a new puppy – a wolf hybrid! And Bernard didn’t really get on that well with the wolf hybrid (who, by now, was able to stand on its hind legs and look the woman in the face). The reason the woman wanted to relinquish eight year old Bernard (whom she’d had since he was a puppy, I think) was that he had started snapping whenever somebody tried to put him into his crate.

Well, he’d been here all of 30 minutes (in fact, the woman was still here doing paperwork) when I discovered that he had no aversion at all to being in a crate – except for the fact that his crate would have been too small for a chihuahua and he’s a normal (15″?) sized Sheltie. I also discovered that he hurts in several parts of his body, such as his hips and shoulders. It’s easy to guess what happened: the two dogs would get into a spat (probably because the woman was giving the wolf hybrid all of her attention, even though Bernard had been there much longer), somebody would try to stuff him into his crate, they would inadvertantly hurt his joints, and he’d tell them “Hey, ease up a bit” in the only way he knew how.

Well, Bernard is a real sweetheart, loves being in a crate, cuddles and kisses like anything, and already has a likely adopter! We’ll try to post a picture and we’ll let you know how the adoption goes.

On this day..

• Christmas Puppies? – 2007