Issue 9      December 2006

 Welcome to the Poplar Farm Kennels newsletter. If you wish to be removed from the mailing list please email us at poplarfarm.kennels@tiscali.co.uk and we will deal with it. For up to date information on available dogs and re-homing please do check the main web site at www.poplarfarmkennels.org.uk 

 We hope you enjoy reading this.

 Dave & Rachel

 Apologies and thanks

Sorry, once again, for the long gap between newsletters. We have been busy with dogs and life in general. Also I had surgery on my finger in September which put me out of action for kennel work for a couple of weeks. It also made typing almost impossible for quite a long time. Thankfully I am back to something like normal use and the recovery is progressing nicely. 

I would like to say a huge thank you to all the people that helped out tremendously whilst I was incapacitated. Maria and Trish did a sterling job of managing the kennels for the couple of weeks that I was totally grounded and Helen was a star getting me to and from the hospital.

Since I am unlikely to get time to get another newsletter out before Christmas I would just like to take this opportunity to thank everybody who has helped us over the past year. A huge thank you to all the people who help us out with the kennels and who get involved with all our fundraising events. Thank you too to all the people who have given one of our dogs a forever home. A special thank you to the people who turn up at the gates with donations of food, treats, paper and bedding, we would really struggle to keep going without you all.

So in lieu of a Christmas card……………..

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

to you all

 From Dave, Rachel and all the dogs at PFK

Fundraising items

The range of blank greetings cards created from original drawings by Mel Singlehurst has proved very popular at events throughout the summer. The range has now been extended to include Ace, a black Labrador and the picture of Eric the Greyhound has been completed and will be turned into cards shortly.  Pictures of all the competed cards are now available on the website on the new Farm Shop page http://www.poplarfarmkennels.org.uk/farm_shop.htm  The cards come with envelopes and are individually packaged. They cost £1.50 each or any 4 for £5.

This year Poplar Farm Kennels are also selling charity Christmas cards as a fund raiser. The cards feature a glorious winter snow scene and carry a message inside about us as well as a normal Christmas greeting. The cards come in packs of 10 (single design) complete with envelopes and are £3.50 + £1.50 postage and packing. Further details and a picture of the front of the card can be found on the website on the Farm Shop page.

Both of these lines are raising much needed funds for the kennels and every penny after production costs goes back to the dogs.

Website shop

Can I just remind everyone about the On-line shop that you can access through the link on the left hand side of every page of the website? There are a huge number of major retailers that can be accessed via that link and it all raises funds for us as we receive commission on all the orders placed via that link. Please check it out for all your on line Christmas shopping. That way you can stay warm and dry, avoid all the crowds and help the dogs here all in one go.

Improvements

The new fencing has been installed. The grant application to the British Racing Greyhound Board was successful and the cheque arrived in August. The work was finally completed in October or at least the parts being done by the contractor were. We are still working on the finishing touches ourselves and are still trying to tie in the new fence to the existing work around the kennels and the new workshop kennel block. Dave is also hard at work, surrounded and supervised closely by his trusty pack of dogs,  laying paving slabs along the new fence lines and we have just have the second of a number of loads of stone chips delivered to form a dry surface for the whole of the front section of paddock. Mandy and Ian have kindly arranged this and are delivering it themselves at the weekends. They are also helping unload and level it and we are extremely grateful for all their efforts.

These projects were started at Christmas two years ago and they are finally getting towards completion. Hopefully by next summer things will be almost done and its safe to say that anyone who hasn’t visited us for a while will find the place changed beyond all recognition if they venture out this way again. It is also worth mentioning that, apart from the grant money for the fence, the whole of the rest of this massive project has been completed without spending any of the kennels money, relying totally on materials that other people were throwing away and hard work by us and volunteers in very brief bursts between the many hours of normal routine work caring for the dogs here.

Aramis

Aramis continues to do very well. He has had a couple of seizures since the last newsletter but thankfully none of them were particularly serious and there were no clusters, just one off occurrences. One of the fundraising events that we attended this year was a Dog Show that was very local to us. Dave decided to take Aramis over there for a change of scenery and to spend a little bit of time on the stand. Aramis was a complete superstar and behaved impeccably with the people and other dogs around. Unfortunately later that evening he had his first seizure in many weeks so it appears that the excitement of these events is too much for him. Sadly this means that Aramis will not get to go to any more as we don’t want to risk his health.  There are more details on Aramis’s story on our forum http://s10.invisionfree.com/PFK/index.php?showtopic=63&st=0

Eric

Eric, the blue brindle male greyhound from Ireland who I mentioned in the last newsletter has now been with us a year. He has come on in leaps and bounds over the last few months. He is now trying very hard to convince us that he could be a house dog and join the pack here. His new routine at evening kennels is to come out into the yard for his toilet break and then instead of staying outside playing he now races Dave to the back door and spends his exercise period asleep on the kitchen floor. For a dog reported to be seriously dog aggressive, Eric is certainly very well behaved in the kitchen with maybe 6 or 7 other loose dogs around. He will either be standing with his head in someone’s lap or laying down somewhere. We are still working in a few aspects of his basic house manners. In true Greyhound fashion he is a great counter surfer and because he has never lived in a house he is still learning things like grill pans are hot and fridges do not contain Greyhound food.

Sarah

Sarah the greyhound who has been in our care for almost her entire two years of life has finally found her forever home. She came to us at 16 weeks of age from her breeder because she had a poorly leg. We were originally told that she just needed rest and it would mend on its own. Once in our care, we had the leg x-rayed again and our vet diagnosed a damaged hip. Their advice was to get Sarah as much exercise as possible to build up the muscles in leg so we put Sarah into a wonderful foster home. Sarah’s limp got worse and we went to a different vet for a second opinion. This vet recommended surgery as he felt that Sarah was in considerable pain. The operation went well and Sarah went back to her foster home where she made a great recovery.

Eventually Sarah’s foster carer made the decision that Sarah would be better looking for a forever home rather than staying there so we brought her back here, arranged her neutering and put her on the website for rehoming. Months passed and then we finally got an enquiry for Sarah from a lovely lady who had already adopted one Greyhound from us two years previously. Sarah and her new friend Stanley got on like a house on fire and Sarah is now happily settled in her forever home. The really uncanny thing is that when Sarah arrived at PFK two years ago, she came in with another older Greyhound from the same breeder/trainer. Stanley and Sarah came to us together and are now back together in a permanent home two years on. How’s that for a happy ending.

Rainbow Bridge

Sian

Sian our special snappy collie lost her fight against lymphoma on May 27^th 2006.

Poppy

Poppy was a very special lady. She came to us after we got a call from our vets saying that they had an elderly GSD bitch that was going to be put to sleep if they couldn’t fond somewhere for her to go. She had never lived in a house and wouldn’t go indoors and she didn’t like other dogs. Being completely mad we agreed to take her as soon as we could find a space.

We eventually got a suitable kennel free and Poppy arrived. At first she obviously missed her old family but she quickly bonded with Dave and from that point on there was no looking back. She and Dave formed a fantastic bond and gradually we started to introduce her to other dogs. She was absolutely fine with them and, in fact, eventually became so good and trustworthy with other dogs that we used her as a stooge dog with newcomers that were a bit tricky.

Her previous owners may have been wrong about her with other dogs but they were right about her not going indoors. For months and months we couldn’t get her past the doorstep. Poppy was at her happiest asleep in the yard somewhere or in her other favourite place, the back of someone’s car. You could never open a car door with Poppy around or she would be straight in, invited or not, as several unsuspecting visitors discovered. Eventually we managed to get her to come into the conservatory for food and we gradually progressed to the point where she would happily settle in there overnight. The only time she would venture any further into the house was during a thunderstorm, when she would overcome her reluctance and seek sanctuary in the kitchen with us and the rest of the pack.

Towards the end of the summer Poppy started spending more and more time inside the house and we really thought we had cracked it.  On August 22^nd Dave took Poppy to the vets because she was a little off colour. The vets diagnosed an enlarged spleen that was probably due to a tumour. Despite antibiotics, steroids and every ounce of love and care we could throw at her, Poppy’s condition deteriorated and she lost her fight on September 4^th 2006.

Max

Max came to us in April 2005 from Retford pound with his lifelong pal Tricks. Both dogs were in pretty poor shape when they arrived, particularly Max. He needed surgery for a cancerous retained testicle as well as a number of other minor problems but he made it through the surgery and revovered well. He was a very sweet, affectionate dog and would follow you round the kennel with his nose in your pocket looking for his favourite Gravy Bones.

Unfortunately we never found a home for him and Tricks so they stayed here but both of them were content and happy. In October, Max developed a limp, the locum vet we saw diagnosed arthritis in his back legs and prescribed pain killers. Unfortunately there was no improvement so after a couple of weeks we went back and saw a different vet. I had noticed over the previous day or two that Max was dragging a front leg and just wasn’t quite right in himself. After a very long examination, the vet said that she felt it was   neurological rather than physical so she prescribed steroids and meds to help the blood flow to the brain.

Sadly Max continued to deteriorate and on a number of occasions he would lose his balance and fall over. A return visit to the vet resulted in a double dose of steroids but even that didn’t help. On 11^th November Max was unable to stand properly so the decision was taken to let him go peacefully to Rainbow Bridge.

Tricks is coping well with the loss of his pal. He has company in his kennel and we are still hoping for a miracle. Maybe there is a home out there somewhere for Tricks.

We also lost 3 of our own oldies, Skye, Cassie and Emma all went to the Bridge. We lost Skye on 7^th July 2006,  Cassie went on 13^th October and Emma a week later on 20^th October 2006. All three old ladies had full and happy lives with us and all made it to a good age, Cassie and Skye were both 14 and Emma 12.  All of them are very sadly missed.

Rossi

Rossi, our dog mountain is a great big lovable lump of Rottweiler crossed with Pyrenean Mountain Dog and is 7 years old. He came to us 3 years ago with a reputation for being dog and people aggressive and had been through 6 homes in his first four years before coming here. Here, Rossi was the perfect dog but given his size and weight we were not prepared to take the risk of rehoming him with his background so he became a permanent fixture. His favourite trick was terrifying visitors to the front gate by hurdling the paddock gate, barking madly and flying at them. He always managed to look far more vicious than he really was. Rossi’s other party trick was to take visitors by the hand, literally, and take them wherever he wanted them to go. 50 kilos of dog taking your whole hand in its mouth can be a bit worrying the first time it happens to you.

In June this year Rossi developed a limp and we took him to the vets who diagnosed a cruciate ligament problem. He was booked for surgery but with rest the problem seemed to resolve by itself so we cancelled the operation. Everything was fine for a number of weeks but at the end of July Rossi started limping again. The vet came out at the beginning of August to do a number of vaccinations and check ups and we brought Rossi out for a check over. This time the vet said that although it was probably the cruciate again, she would like an x-ray doing as soon as possible because she could feel something a little odd. X-rays and cruciate ligament repair were booked with the orthopaedic vet who did Sarah and Houdi for us for the following week. August 11th I got up at stupid o'clock for the one hour drive over to Wisbech for 9am. I got there and went in for the consult and after I had explained the progress of the problem Johan started to explain that cruciate ligaments often do that.

However, once he had examined the leg he told me that he was 70% certain that Rossi had a bone tumour. He said he would get the x-rays taken whilst I waited and then have another chat with me.

The x-rays did indeed show a large tumour in the joint. The vet gave us a couple of options, pain relief until his condition deteriorates or don't wake him up. Amputation and chemo were not an option due to Rossi's size and also he said that as it is an aggressive tumour it would already have spread to the lungs and liver. Obviously we were not prepared to give up at that point so we said we would bring Rossi home to enjoy whatever time he had left. We were given a prognosis of 3 months.

Rossi has surpassed all expectations and is still with us. The tumour is absolutely huge but Rossi is still managing to get around OK, albeit on three legs. He is still bright eyed, waggy tailed and eating like a horse.

Update December 6^th:

Sadly Rossi deteriorated rapidly overnight and we took the sad decision to let him go at 3.30pm today. He was a dog in a million and will be very much missed by all who knew him.