DEAR OLD DOGS                                                                                  MARCH 2009

You can donate to help to pay the bills for AAS's Dear Old Dogs 
 

All animals and their suffering profoundly moves AAS, but old dogs are especially dear to us.  For many years, we have rescued and looked after them. But we can't bear to "rescue" a dog only to put it down before it's had all the happiness we can give it.  Maybe it is those calm, accepting, old-dog-eyes; the eyes we can't resist. So it's time we told you a bit about some of them.

Gertie's expenses to March 3/09: $1277.10
Gertie:  Like so many dogs, Gertie was very sick and neglected when she came to AAS.  Her neighbour, who had seen her outside, sometimes chained, sometimes loose, for many years, watched in the last few year as Gertie got more and more stiff and shaky.  But still she was never allowed in the house. She shook her old head because of painful infected ears, but never was she taken to a vet.
But when the neighbour found out that Gertie was going to be put down, she finally acted.  She told Gertie's owner that she wanted to adopt Gertie and was gladly given her to save the $150 that a vet would charge for humane destruction. When the neighbour gave Gertie to AAS, her owner never even asked where she had gone.

As well as being thin almost to emaciation, vet exams and x-rays revealed a painfully fused spine and a mass on her spleen, as well as the infected ears. 

But there was that indefinable something about Gertie that said that she only needed the right palliative care to be happy. Maybe it was her eyes; those calm, accepting, old-dog-eyes; the eyes we can't resist.


Gertie waits expectantly for a treat

 Gertie is in a palliative care home where she will stay until her life is over.  She has been many times to the vet and now is on the right pain medication, at the right dosage, and the right food to tempt her appetite (home-made stewed chicken is one favourite).  Trips around the large fenced property, down to the creek and back, delight  even an old dog's nose. 

Gertie is getting such loving and experienced care that we are hopeful that there is still a lot of life in the old dear yet.