Forum Activity for @anne-maguire

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Been a while!

My dog Biddie, who came to live with me in January 2020 is settling into a real sweetie. She has been a sweetie the whole time, but a pretty undisciplined one - now the is starting to learn some manners, and better behaviour! I don't know what the the first year or so of her life was like, but can guess it wasn't very nice. She was completely unsocialised, and terrified of everything, pretty much. She doesn't get the shakes when the grass is being cut any more, but she still hides under my desk. Her other great fear is water - she is terrified of getting wet. She will get her feet wet at the creek, but that's it! She is a Huntaway/GSP cross. Fortunately she has the Huntaway size, & some of the GSP spots but there rest of her is Huntaway, which is a working dog from New Zealand, an Australian Kelpie mix.

The little black cat (Bran) is doing very well. Lots of purrs, sleeping on knees, and all that lovely cat stuff. He did miss Pug, but he is an only cat now, and is enjoying all the attention. He and the dog are not friends as yet, but lbc is not afraid of Biddy, and has whopped her a couple of times!

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I like "The Rainbow Bridge"

There are going to be quite a few canine and feline companions to meet me there!

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Vale

Pug Maguire,
28 Feb 2009 - 15 Oct 2022

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Bran the black rescue cat from Christmas 2016 has turned into snuggly little cuddle-bug, especially since the dog arrived in February. He will now come and sit on my lap for cuddles and a sleep - voluntarily! I think it has a lot to do with senior cat Pug keeping away, avoiding the dog, and leaving the lap free. He even comes looking for nighttime snoozing under the doona!

When the dog is outside Pug will come for his usual "leg spot", and Bran will hop up for the "lap spot"! Now all I have to do is get all three in the right places at the same time!

There is still a little friction, because Biddy wants to play with the cats, but the cat don't want to play with her! Bran smacked her the other night, but without claws - just a little warning 'don't you dare do that'!

Patience, patience, patience!

updated by @anne-maguire: 07/26/20 07:45:53PM

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Your big blue looks like my late Humbug would have looked with a few more years under his fur!

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Well, rescue dog Biddy is well and truly settled, and has, I think, accepted this as her permanent home - at least I hope so! There was someone running past the house and over the bridge a couple of nights ago - she went off like a bomb!! Very big, deep barks and growls - took a while to settle her down. 

Senior cat and her still at loggerheads - problem is, Pug runs from dogs, as the last dog he had anything to do with tried to eat him! Junior cat gradually becoming more and more at ease. Not cuddle up together friends yet, but while Biddy was asleep last night he did come up to the lounge, stood up to investigate a dangling dog paw, then just walked away. I think they will end up friends.

So, all working out for the best, for now!

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Photos as requested, and promised! Biddy is such a mad, active dog outside, it's hard to get a photo without even a little blur, but I think I've managed it!

The settling in is going well, I think. The cats are still unsure, and there is a little bit of 'spit & hiss' going on, but in general the boys will move around the same room, keeping an eye out for danger. 

Biddy is lying at my feet at the moment, having had mad gallops around the yard, which will become, I think, her own personal racetrack - whizzes around and around - fortunately, it's a big yard with plenty of room!

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Photos will be coming soon!

Yesterday Biddy - her new name is actually Bidelia, which means 'Strong' - discovered that life with a nice big yard, windfall apples and a tennis ball was a lot of fun, and she was galloping around the yard again today. Should be nice and tired by bedtime, I hope. Didn't take to the gardener - I think somewhere in her past is a bloke with whom she did not agree. She was eventually friendly enough, but with reservations!

Have no idea about her past life other than she ended up in the pound and was then rescued in the nick of time. I think she was baled out of the pound when Tumut itself was evacuated under fire threat. Not everybody left, but the animal rescue people did get the pound evacuated - I dare say the "prisoners" ended up in rescue centres all over the place. Biddy also had to be evacuated from her rescue home, so she will have had a fair bit of upset in her short life.

She is booked in to my vet for Saturday morning for a 'meet and greet' and to have her nails trimmed - nothing traumatic! She will, whether she wants it or not, be having a bath tomorrow - running with the farm dogs has done nothing for her coat!!

updated by @anne-maguire: 02/04/20 02:46:55AM

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Today I welcomed into my home my new pup, a rescue from one of the fire affected areas. She wasn't one of the fire affected pets, but was being cared for at the Walwa Dunroamin Pet Rescue after being saved from the pound at Tumut. I suppose that, strictly speaking she isn't a pup, being about 18 months old, but ...! It will be four years on Thursday since I lost Jack the Ripper - when I told my nephew about the new dog, he says "it's about time'!

She is probably a German Shorthaired Pointer cross, with either a whippet and/or a kelpie, being mainly black with brindle eyebrows, brindle legs and ears and Pointer white with black spots on three feet and her chest. She loves other dogs, and also loves cats - my two don't quite know what to make of her, and are very curious. She won't make full Pointer size, which is fine with me!

So, tonight is her first night in her new home. Hope she likes sleeping in the lounge room on her specially designated chair or her own mat - as this happened quite suddenly, she doesn't have her own bed yet!

The vet who had her at her place only just had her house saved - the fire came to within about 2 metres of the house, and was stopped at the house yard fence. The vet subsequently had to shoot her little flock of fifty sheep because of their injuries. Her cows were saved.

She isn't going to get any more sheep.

But I have a lovely, friendly pup who just wants to be with her human, be friends with the household cats, and anything or anyone else who comes within smooging range!

Photos will follow as I get them off the camera

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Bran is doing very well, thank you! I will have to give him a manicure and rub some cream into his paws tomorrow - the trouble with putting anything on cats paws is that they will insist on licking it off - I use paw paw ointment, so at least it tastes nice!

He had another little breakthrough moment last week, when he voluntarily hopped up on to my lap and snuggled up for a cuddle, with purrs! Although he will hop into bed and cuddle up, this is the first time he has stayed on my lap for more than a
passing-through minute. It is all small steps for him, but he is getting better every day. Another little 'test' will happen tomorrow when the cleaning lady comes, as he really hates the noise - if he doesn't bolt for cover straight away we will count that as a win!

This Christmas will be his third with me, and he has more than repaid the investment of time and energy - he is such a sweetie! The senior cat, Pug, is also much better with him now, although the kitchen rough and tumble gets a bit willing! 

I have out a request to the universe for a dog - I really miss my Jack the Ripper! This time, however, I want an inside-outside dog, about miniature poodle size (don't want a poodle though - been there, done that!) who will be inside with me, or out and about with me, and who won't murder the cats! If the universe is feeling generous that's what will turn up on my doorstep. I'm not going looking, but will wait for the 'right' one to come along! 

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Update on my little black cat, Bran. I had both my boys to the vet in July - had deliberately left taking them both down to the vet, letting Bran be thoroughly settled before taking him anywhere. Both needed their vaccinations, and checkups, etc., and Pug needed some dental work done. As you know, Bran was a rescue cat from the pet rescue via the pound, and very stressed and unhappy when I got him. I mentioned previously that his front paws were a bit odd, and the pads deformed, so I had the vet check out his feet.

Here's where it gets a bit nasty. The vet said that at some time his front paws had come into contact with something caustic, and that his 'deformed' pads weren't deformed at all, but had been partly burned away by whatever the caustic substance was. She said it could quite possibly have been accidental, but could also have been deliberate - there is no way of knowing. There are some harder areas of scar tissue that occasionally give him discomfort, so I have to keep an eye on him and look out for his sore paws. I do so hope it was accidental, but going by the condition he was in, and his level of timidity and distrust I doubt it. I don't want to think that he was hurt on purpose, but we all know that there are some very brutal people out there who don't think twice about inflicting pain on an animal.

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Thank you, Strumelia! He is as sleek and slinky as you could wish, and very, very shiny! It is very hard to take a decent photo of a black cat - unless they have their eyes open, it's like photographing a black lump! These are a couple of my favourites!

The lady from the animal rescue organisation said that black cats are hard to find homes for, and that people are more likely to drown or otherwise dispose of black kittens. They were very happy to find a suitable home for him, as he had been at the pound and in foster care for quite some time. It's a pity, but I would never foster, as I could never give them up to their new homes - I would know they were safe with me!

My sneaky former boss has two black boys, both domesticated ferals like Bran, and now another friend has 'acquired' a little black boy and a long haired mackerel & white boy to go with her two gingers. All four give her dog a hard time - he is very young still, so can learn his place a little more easily than an older dog.

I think cats and dogs that choose you work out better - mine have always been or have turned into the soppiest things on four paws, and they repay you many times over, wherever they come from. I have only ever had one, back in the mid 1970s, who never settled, having come off a farm way to young, and lived a more-or-less independent life for a couple of years!

updated by @anne-maguire: 02/11/19 10:03:26PM

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Thank you, Richard! I had intended to pay for him myself, but my sneaky former boss beat me to it! Pug was missing Humbug something fierce, and as I had to leave him on his own for three weeks just three weeks after losing Humbug, he did suffer a bit. But, I just had to wait for the right cat! My cats and dogs have pretty much always been rescues, or 'saved', and they have repaid me with many, many years of companionship and purrs!

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I don't know who remembers June 2016 when I had to have my beautiful blue boy cat Humbug put to sleep, which left me with Pug, my cream boy cat. Waited 6 months for just the right little needy cat to bring home. Found a lovely little black cat (which are apparently very hard to find homes for), about 15 months old, in December 2016 -  a rescue cat who had had a very hard life, including being abandoned at the council pound, and spending some time in temporary foster care. He was underweight, and, because of an allergy to mosquito bites, a bit scabby and sore. I was allowed to take him early, being an experienced cat owner, so he came home on Dec 21st, as a (slightly) early Birthday and Christmas present. (my birthday is the 24th Dec) His bite sores were treated with PawPaw ointment containing Manuka honey, and he was fed up in little meals like a Christmas chicken! 

His name is Bran, which is Irish for raven, as he is as black as one! My former boss, who is also my 'bestie', gave him to me. The best ever Birthday and Christmas present I have ever had!

Well, what a difference two years has made to the boy, who is 3 and a half in March! He is a different cat entirely! Hasn't bulked up much - I think he is always going to be one of those slinky black numbers, but the change in temperament has been amazing, and most gratifying. He is a sook! He also has some deformed toes on both his front feet - I don't know if they are genetic or something really horrible had been done to him in the past. With a tendency to bite if handled, (he did bite me once quite severely!) he was extremely timid with people - probably thought that everyone who came to the house was going to take him somewhere else new! Now he can be picked up and cuddled, handled, and loves nothing more than to snuggle up in bed on cold winter mornings. He has learned to purr, and plays with Pug - something I think Pug would like him not to do on occasion! The kitchen floor wrestling bouts are epic! Sitting on my desk with me, or lying between me and the computer are two of his favourite pastimes, and he spends most winter days with me in my office, curled up in a basket behind my shoulders while I try and work - bliss!

In one photo you can see how his nose was bitten to pieces, and his nose leather was all pink - it's rare that it grows back black, but it has done just that! He now has a lovely black nose, and I don't feel that I have to colour it in with a black texta pen! The other photo is as he is now, snuggled up to 'his' puppy toy, on 'his' chair!

 

updated by @anne-maguire: 02/11/19 07:36:41PM