TOTALLY OT: Pets

 I was peeking through the "animals" special interest forum and kept tripping over tumbleweeds and getting tangled in cobwebs, so I wanted to post here.  Sorry ahead of time, but I love animals.  Almost on topic - I feel like I have so much more fun with my animals now that I have lost weight!!

  I have 4 cats - all "fixed"
Leroy - orange tabby male, dumped at my house by a "friend" in '05
Diva -  solid black female, dumped at my work; she rules the house! whips Rio (see below)
Boots - tuxedo female - a friend rescued her as a kitten then talked me into taking her later
Lil - tuxedo female - same friend, same story ( I need to re-evaluate my friends!)

 I have 3 horses that I spend a lot of time and energy playing and working with:
Skye - 30yrs old; I've had her for 24 of those years; she is grey and sweet as can be (bullies the other horses though)
Buddy - 3yrs old - started out as me fostering him for animal control, I ended up adopting him. He thinks he is a 600lb dog - chases bikes, walks the wheelchair ramp, licks condensation off windows)
Titan - my major NSV! I bought him in January and love him so much; he is 8
(this is the day I bought him - he is sleek and shiny now with solid muscles... and I kind of warped the pic trying to resize it lol )



I now have 3 dogs. I find myself a lot more active as I play, wrestle and walk them.  Saturday I took Rio and Riley for about a 1.9mile walk / run / jog. Very cool

Rio - my heart - 4yrs old this month, runs about 108lbs. He is my comedian, counselor, confidante, roommate, protector and friend. That is Rio in my avatar kissing Buddy on the nose
Riley - about a 2yr old yellow lab, 92lbs. Lady found him and Frank, no owners after 3wks on Craigslist radio, fliers at the vets, shelter and streets. No collars / microchips/tattoos. He is a funny, sweet dog 
Frank -  Frank.  Frank. Frank is a very cute very snuggly very horrible little dog lol. He is a black and rust long haired dachshund, about 12lbs. He is a little Houdini and has taken out 3 of my window screens! The most recent one tonight - I left him in a crate in my living room and went home at lunch to find him in the front yard. The crate was still closed but the front window screen was ripped horribly.  My mom named him Frank as in "Frankfurter" .... I call him Frank as in "Frankenstein".

 I have 3 rabbits - Bon,  Cheeto, and Oops; and a crowd of chickens - about 20- (my favorite is a hen named Pat).


So, if you are interested, tell me some about your pets?

I'm jealous that you have room for all those animals.  I want chickens.  But not 20.  I want a goat, too.  For milk.  Why don't you have a goat?

I currently have three cats.

Cayenne is the oldest, about 12 and a half.  She has diabetes and an anxiety disorder (seriously, that's what the vet said.  she's the one that pees all over my house).  She had breast cancer a couple years ago.  She was adopted from an animal shelter.

Indigo is almost nine.  She was a stray.  The first time I came to visit my partner at his home, when we'd just started dating, we heard a cat crying and went outside and she was sitting in the back yard, all alone, just crying and crying.  So my partner decided to take her in.  I told him if he'd said to just leave her out there, I would have taken her and gotten in my car and driven home and never seen him again.  He made the right move.

Larry is probably about six or seven.  He was a stray.  Just sort of moved himself in one day.

I love cats.  I have always been a cat person.

I am planning on getting a dog at some point, hopefully not too far in the future.  I am planning to have the dog trained as a service dog to assist with my disabilities.  I think I am getting a golden retriever but I'm not positive.  The trainer I will be working with is checking with some rescue groups for me.

Apparently it is not practical for me to have goats and chickens in a mobile home park.  Huh.

  I didn't really intend to end up with 20. In fact originally I was going to get 6 ...2 each of 3 specific breeds. It's called chicken math lol - couldn't pass up the cute little peepers!
 Oooh I would LOVE love love to have a couple of dairy goats. My problem is land. My parents gave me 1 acre, but you have to have at least 2 to have livestock. So we left our property fenced together so I have a little over 3acres for animals.  However, my parents have the majority vote and they say no goats.  So sad.  :(

   I had a cat with an anxiety disorder - same thing, she'd pee in the house if she got freaked out.  She was also from the animal shelter.

 Sounds like your cats and your partner are very lucky to have you!

 Goldens are great service dogs, very calm and steady.

(Chickens only need about 10sqft each... 2 hens would have you in business  :)  -  says Lori, for a chicken in every backyard)

I think there is a city ordinance that would prevent me from having livestock.  But I'm not sure if they consider chickens livestock or not.  However, I suspect the owners of the mobile home park might object to chickens.

Can you just have two hens?  I know they are flock animals.  Would two be enough of a flock to make them happy hens?

I've been told that with goats, you really need two of them because they are herd animals and a single goat would be very unhappy.  And, in addition to being unhappy, would be apt to misbehavior, escape any pen, and get into the neighbors flowers and garbage, etc.

Goldens are supposed to be good service dogs, yeah.  I'm excited about it.  I want one from a rescue, though, I don't want to buy one from a breeder.

Some places don't consider them livestock, but pets. but yeah, owners of the park might not be thrilled!
   Two hens are fine together, as long as they aren't totally alone they get on great.
Goats are famous escape artists - that's one reason my parents don't want another one. I had 2 when I was growing up and the billy could climb fences, tear them down etc.  If you have goats you pretty much can bet on needing an electric fence. They are herd animals and in my opinion unfair to have one alone, but having more than one just means you have 2 times the trouble lol.

  Rescue dogs seem to know they have a new chance - I think that will make a great choice.  I wanted to get a rescue dog from a shelter in South Carolina to train him for Search and Rescue. I even had  a friend evaluate the dog for me.  Then Rio had to have very expensive knee surgery and I couldn't afford to bring a new dog into the picture at that time.

Apparently the issue with using rescue dogs for service dogs is that, first of all, most dogs simply don't have the right temperament to be service dogs, regardless of where you get them.  They can be great dogs and smart and easy to train and everything, but to be service dogs they have to be pretty much unflappable.  They can't be bothered by loud noises, weird people, strange things, etc.  They can't get distracted by food, even if people are trying to give them food - which apparently is not uncommon when you take a service dog into a public place like s restaurant.  I've been told that parents will allow their kids to run up to a strange dog (with the service dog vest on, but still...) and try to shove french fries in its mouth.  I cannot imagine why any parent would let a child do that but apparently it's not unusual.

Anyway, with a rescue dog, some of them have some issues from wherever they lived before they were rescued, of course.  But even without that, many dogs just don't have the right temperament to be service dogs.  Some breeders specifically breed dogs for that purpose and while that still doesn't guarantee the dog will be good at the job, it increases the odds.  But I just don't like the idea of breeding dogs when there are so many needing homes.

Plus, I don't have $1200 or more to buy a dog.  But even if I did, I'd rather get a dog from a rescue.  I have a professional trainer that has some experience with service dogs and she is going to help me choose a dog, so hopefully it will work out.

Training a dog for search and rescue would be really neat.  I hope you get the chance to do that in the future.

I love your post about all of your animals. I have a Black Bombay Cat. Got him at the shelter when he was 4 weeks old. He was a pet for my son but when my son left home, I got to keep him. We named him Cleo because we thought he was a girl. When Cleo went to get spayed both the VET and I were shocked. Cleo was not a girl. He ummm., never developed on the outside. His no no's were developing inside his body but he was so used to his name that we left it.
Cleo is my baby. He likes to sleep on my head at night giving me what my son calls love lacerations.. LOL. Cleo likes to ride in the car. He loves dogs and will go from window to window following the stray dogs around the house. It is so funny. He is my life. I talk to him when I have a bad day and even when I have a good day. He loves to play.
Thanks again for your post as I love to talk about my Cleo.

Bombay- those are the ones with the big eyes and round faces?  Cool!
   I had a cat that slept on my head at night. I got him as a 2wk old kitten when I worked at the hospital - someone dumped him on the curb of the ER with a tiny little nurser bottle. He was tabby and white , I named him Mooch. He met me at the door every morning (I worked overnight) and we shared a grilled cheese sandwich lol.

  I love talking about my pets!  People at work don't know me, but they know my Rio !! HA

I don't have near the animals you have but I love them. We are down to 2 cats and 2 dogs. We lost one of our dogs a couple of weeks ago. We still don't know what happened. We were in the back yard around 8 o'clock on a Thursday night. My husband was grilling. We have about 5 acres of land most of it wooded. Anyway the dogs in the neighborhood were barking and caring on like they do some times. Every dog for a country mile was barking. The dogs were on the deck with us and would go down a little ways into the yard and then back up with us. Well one time they were down in the yard and took off to the woods at the side of our house. My husband seen them go into the woods. That is not unusual they are always chasing rabbits and squirrels or any thing that moves. Then we heard a terrible yelp and 2 of our babies came running back. 1 did not. We called for her but no answer. My husband got a flash light and crossed the creek calling and looking for her but couldn't find her. The next day when my husband got home from work he looked for her while it was light. He got her oldest boy Bo-Bo to guide him asking him where momma was and Bo took him right to her. She was 1/2 an acre from where they went in. No marks on her except for a nickle size whole in her leg and most of her torso was skinned. I called a wildlife ranger to see what kind of animal would have done that to her and he said because she had not been ate on or had any marks on her it was probably human not animal. Who would come on our land while we were grilling and do that? We also have alot of coyotes her. I don't know we saw a coyote about a week later in our yard only feet away from where they went in. We are still very sad and nervous for our other animals.
The 2 cats stay in.
Silly Billy solid white. don't know how old really he just came up one day. green eyes. he lives up to his name.
Speedo he is a tuxedo. My husband saw the people stop and throw him out of the car. He is around 13. Very possessive of me. very stubborn.
Girly girl Is the female that died a couple of weeks ago. She was a drop off to. We live on a corner lot in the country. We started calling her Momma girl because the 2 we have left are from 2 different litters she had. She was pregnant when she was dropped off.
Bo-Bo is her son. He is 3 yrs old. He is a mutt. He is about 25 lbs. all muscle Short, short legs, and long body but his head kinda looks like a boxer. He is tan and has white marking.
Baby girl is from Momma girls second litter ( we fixed her after that, baby girl is fixed as well). She looks like a cross between a wienie dog and a Chihuahua. She has a mahogany color and probably weighs 8 lbs. She is 2.
Momma girl looked like she was mostly a jack Russel terrier but one never knows out in the country.
We also have 2 aquariums. 30 gallon and 75 gallon. They are fun too.

oh I am SO sorry about your losses!! Pets sure take up a lot of real estate in our hearts, huh?
   I would tend to think it was coyotes that got your dog simply because of the ruckus the other dogs were kicking up -  I'm sure people walk in the woods enough for them to be more accustomed to it?  At any rate, it is horrible and I'm heart broken for you.

 It sounds like your pets were very fortunate to end up with someone who would take care of them!  Your Bo-Bo sound like a dog Angus I recently saw pics of... he is Boxer and Bassett mixed - has a boxer head and basset body lol