CAT ISLAND

In Japan there is this place called Tashirojima (田代島) which means "Cat Island" in English.  The reason it is called this is because (1) it is an island, and (2) there are a whole bunch of cats there.  In fact, there are only about 100 people living on Cat Island, but there are lots more cats than that.  I could not find anyplace that said exactly how many cats live on the island, so maybe nobody has ever counted them.  But somebody has counted the people and also asked how old they are, because it turns out that all of the people on Cat Island are pretty old, like over 60.  Well, except for one person who is 37 or so.

Tashirojima is located near Ishinomaki City, in Miyagi Prefecture.  Here are a couple of maps, in case your Japanese geography isn't so good.  The island is about 8 square miles in size, and you can get there by going on a ferry boat.  And in case you are worried about what happened to all the cats and people on the island during the earthquake, you can relax, because they are okay.  The only problem is that they need food and other supplies, just like lots of other people do who were near the earthquake.  At first, some people tried to get to Cat Island by boat to bring supplies, but there was too much debris and stuff in the water, so the boat couldn't get through.  Then the last news I saw was that an Army helicopter was going there to take food for the people, and maybe also cat food.

Anyway, now I will tell you how this island got to be an island full of cats.  A long time ago, people who lived on the island used to raise silkworms so they could make silk.  But mice would eat the silkworms, and the islanders kept cats to eat the mice.  

Also there were fishermen who came to the island, and they sometimes stayed overnight at the inns there.  The cats would come and beg for scraps, so the fishermen fed them, because everyone believed that feeding cats would bring good luck.  So the fishermen got very fond of the cats, and they thought that if they watched what the cats were doing, it would tell them what kind of weather was going to happen, and when the most fish would be around.  One time a cat got killed by accident while the fishermen were getting ready to go fishing, and they felt very bad about this.  So they buried the cat and built a shrine on the spot.

Anyway, now that all the people of Cat Island are getting older, they are trying to attract tourists to the island and also some younger people to live there.  A lot of people like to go there just to see all the cats and to get their pictures taken with them.  And they like to see the shrine and the houses that are shaped like cats.  

In the shops, you can buy a maneki neko, which is a cat with one paw raised, and this will bring you good luck.  Another thing you can buy is a good luck kitty bib to take home and put on your own cat.

So after everything gets all cleaned up and rebuilt from the earthquake, maybe you will want to go to Japan for a vacation.  And if you do, you can visit Cat Island.  I'd like to go myself, but for some reason, they do not allow dogs there!

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IRISH TERRIERS

Today is St. Patrick's Day, and I am going to celebrate by telling you about a dog breed from Ireland. There are actually a bunch of Irish dog breeds, but the one I chose for today is the Irish Terrier.

Nobody knows when or how the Irish terrier got its start, but everybody agrees that it is one of the earliest terrier breeds.  At first, Irish terriers could be any color, such as black-and-tan, gray, or brindle.  But later the only possible colors got to be bright red, golden red, red wheaten, and wheaten.

Terriers are all very good at killing vermin such as rats and mice, and at first people just liked having Irish terriers because they were good at their job.  So as long as they killed the vermin, it didn't matter what color the dogs were.  But by late in the 19th century, people started wanting to put Irish terriers into dog shows, and then the terriers had to look a certain way.  The first Irish terrier breed club began in Dublin in 1879, and this breed was the first one in the terrier group to be recognized by the English Kennel Club as a native Irish breed.

Irish terriers first went to the United states in the late 1800s, and they became sort of popular, at least for a while.  But this breed has never been as popular to own as some other breeds, like for example chihuahuas or golden retrievers or dalmatians.  The breed was recognized by the AKC in 1884, and the U.S. breed club started in 1896.

The average height of an Irish terrier is 18 inches, and the average weight is 25 to 27 pounds.  These dogs do not have many health problems, but sometimes they can get cataracts or hypothyroidism.  They usually live to be about 12-15 years old.

Irish terriers have a wiry overcoat and a softer undercoat.  They also have long whiskers and a beard.  If their ears are correct, according to the breed standard, they are V-shaped and a little darker in color than the rest of the dog's hair.  The ears should fold toward the outside corners of the eyes.  If a puppy's ears don't do this, they are glued to the top of its head so that they will have the right shape when the cartilage grows in.  When Irish terriers are born, their tails get docked by about 1/4 of their length.  In places where it is illegal to dock tails, they are left at the full length.

There are lots of things that Irish terriers can be used for, such as hunting, tracking, retrieving, ratting, guarding, police work, and military work.  Also they are good at agility and obedience.  They make nice family dogs, but they need plenty of exercise.  Sometimes they don't get along with other dogs in the house -- especially dogs of the same sex -- or with cats.  But usually they like to play with children.


Irish terriers are brave, energetic, and loyal.  Also they are curious about stuff, and they are always ready for adventure.  They like to dig, and they chase anything that moves, so they should not be off-leash in an unfenced area.  Of course, the same is true for basenjis and greyhounds.

So that's your St. Patrick's Day dog breed for today.  And now I will finish with an Irish blessing.

May your dish always be full of food,
Your yard be full of squirrels,
And your bed be soft and warm.
May your person pet you lots and lots,
And not make you go to vet very often!

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The Horrible Earthquake in Japan!

Last week there was a really, truly horrible earthquake in Japan, and it was like the 5th worst earthquake ever to happen since people started keeping track of such things.  The earthquake shook everything really hard, so lots of houses and buildings fell down.  And after that, the earthquake made a humongous wave, called a tsunami.  The tsunami went way up on the shore, and it washed whole villages away and drowned them, including all the people and cats and dogs and houses and cars and boats.


So right after all this happened, a bunch of rescue people rushed in and started trying to find people that were still alive.  They are still doing this, but mostly all they are finding now are dead people.  So far, they found over 3000 bodies, and they think there will be thousands more.  And a lot of the people that didn't die got their homes smashed by the earthquake or the tsunami, so they don't have anyplace to live right now, except in tents.  And meanwhile, there are some nuclear reactor things that might melt down and make everybody sick from radiation.  So what I'm trying to say is that the situation is very, very bad in Japan right now.

Anyway, besides all the people who ended up being homeless because of the earthquake, there are also homeless dogs and cats.  So while some groups try to help the people, other groups are trying to help the animals.  One group I found out about is called World Vets.  I had never heard of this group before, but they have their headquarters in Fargo, ND, and they send teams of veterinarians to different places in the world where they are needed.  A "first responder" group left North Dakota yesterday to fly to Japan and help take care of animals that were in the earthquake.  If you are want to know more about this group, you can go to their website.  And they also have a Facebook page where you can get updates on their work in Japan.

Besides that, there are some animal rescue groups in Japan who are getting ready to take in a bunch of dogs and cats that need help because of the earthquake.  You can read an article here about some of these groups and how you can help them.  Also there is a Facebook page with news and discussion about animal rescue in Japan.

One of the first groups to get involved in helping the Japanese people after the earthquake was the Search Dog Foundation.  They are a group here in the U.S. that trains dogs to do search-and-rescue work.  A lot of the dogs they use are dogs from shelters.  The way they decide if a dog would be a good search dog is they look for dogs that have a lot of energy and that really focus on stuff, like for instance finding a toy.  So if a dog is willing to dig down through a big snowbank because he really, really wants that toy, he could probably be trained for search-and-rescue work.

After the dogs and their handlers get trained, they have to be ready to go anyplace at a moment's notice to help find people who are lost or buried under debris or whatever.  So the Search Dog Foundation sent a team of dogs and handlers to Japan on the very same day that the earthquake happened.  And now I'm going to tell you a little bit about three of the dogs that got sent to Japan to help find people and rescue them.

Hunter is a border collie, and he is 8 years old.  He has a ton of energy, like most border collies, and he works with his handler at the Los Angeles County Fire Department.  Hunter started out living with the mom who adopted him, and he was a wild and crazy puppy who liked to chew up everything in the house.  His mom took him to the dog park a lot so he could get exercise, but then he started herding all the other dogs.  Later on, when something happened so that she couldn't keep him anymore, she donated him to the Search Dog Foundation, and he got trained as a disaster search dog.

On January 14, 2010, Hunter and his handler, Bill, went to Haiti after the earthquake there with 6 other canine search teams.  During the 16 days they were in Haiti, these search teams found and saved 12 people.  So now Hunter and Bill are in Japan, looking for people to save there.

Joe is a 4-year-old yellow lab who came from a shelter in Colorado.  He was chosen to train as a search dog because he loved to dive into bushes in the snow to retrieve his toy, no matter how cold it was or how much other stuff was going on around him.  Joe and his handler, Linda, live in Los Angeles.  They thought they might get sent to Haiti last year, but then they didn't.  But they did go to Santa Barbara after a big semi-truck full of gravel crashed into a house.  They had to search the house to see if anybody was in it, but nobody was.  Joe and Linda are also part of the 72-member L.A. Task Force that was sent to Japan by USAID to search for live victims of the earthquake.

Pearl is a black lab who is 5 years old.  She used to live with a human who wasn't home much, so she was always jumping the fence and going out to find something fun to do.  Then Animal Control would pick her up, and her person had to pay a fine.  So finally she got left at the shelter to find a new home.  After a while, some people figured out that Pearl might make a good search dog because even though she was really hyper, she was very smart, and she was totally crazy about toys.  So she got trained, and now she works with her handler Ron, at the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

Last January Pearl and Ron got sent to Haiti in the same group that Hunter and Bill were in.  And now they are in Japan, looking for people to rescue there.  I just hope they were able to find some people to save before it was too late.

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Another Update on My Exciting Life

I'm going to start today's update by talking about ME, because that's my favorite subject!  And what I'm going to tell you about me is that last week I had a thyroid test, and the results of that test were that everything is dandy with my thyroid.  But like I told you before, my hair is getting really thin, and even though I have been taking melatonin for almost 3 months, my hair is not getting any thicker.

So Dr. Patricia is trying to talk to Dr. Senter, the dermatologist, but he is a very busy man, so she is having trouble getting ahold of him.

On Friday, Nicky went to see Dr. Patricia, and he got a 3-year rabies shot and a 3-year city license.  Also he got a microchip and a bordatella vaccination.  And he had some blood taken out of him for a heartworm test and a titer to see if he needs to get a distemper shot, which probably he doesn't.

Dr. Patricia looked at Nicky all over, and she listened to his heart and lungs, and she looked in his mouth, and she said that he has something called CUPS.  You might think that CUPS are what you drink coffee out of, but in this case, you would be wrong, because the letters stand for Chronic Ulcerative Peradental Stomatitis.  So that's why most people call it CUPS, because it's hard to say (or even remember) all those big, long words.

Well, I didn't know what CUPS was, and neither did Mom, so we looked it up, and here's what we learned:  when a dog has this disease, he gets sore places inside his mouth, like wherever the insides of his mouth touch the plaque that forms on his teeth.  The plaque is caused by bacteria, so it's like the dog is allergic to the bacteria, and that's what makes him get sores in his mouth.  This is what you call an auto-immune disease, because you are allergic to something inside your own body.  It seems crazy to be allergic to your own self, but it happens sometimes.

Nobody knows for sure why dogs get CUPS, or why Maltese dogs seem to get it more often than a lot of other breeds.  Here's a picture of a dog's mouth who has CUPS.  The arrow points to a sore place that got started because it was touching the tooth.

Nicky's CUPS disease isn't too bad, so maybe he won't have to have all his teeth pulled, which is what happens in really bad cases.  The way you treat CUPS is that the dog takes antibiotics and also gets his teeth brushed every day.  Mom is trying to get us used to having our teeth brushed, but she hasn't got too far yet.  And a lot of days she forgets to even do it.  But I wish she would remember, because the toothpaste tastes really yummy!

Anyway, Nicky will have to go see a special veterinarian dentist, which will probably be expensive, like visits to specialists usually are.

Oh, and Nicky also has a growth under his tail.  It looks kind of like a little brown mole, and I don't mean the kind of mole that lives underground in your garden and eats the roots of your flowers.  This mole is not very big, and probably it isn't a scary sort of mole, but we don't know how long it's been there.  So Dr. Patricia wants to take it off, and she wants to do that now, while the mole is small, and there is still enough skin there to stitch up the wound after the mole is cut out.

So that's all I'm going to tell you about Nicky.  Barry and Mel are still busy having diarrhea in the yard most days, and Barry farts big, stinky farts a lot.  Nicky has diarrhea, too, sometimes.  But I have nice, firm poop.  Mom often compliments me on my poop, so that makes me feel quite proud of myself.  Dr. Patricia wants to do bloodwork on Barry and Mel to see what's going on with them.  Mom thinks that Nicky already had a bunch of bloodwork done, but she has had so much stuff done for so many dogs and cats lately that she can't remember who got what.

And speaking of cats, Charlie and Chloe seem to be okay right now.  Charlie had a cough last week, but it's gone now.  His weight is down to 18 pounds and 11 ounces (from 27 pounds at the start), but he still needs to lose a few more pounds.  He complains a lot about how Mom is starving him.  Chloe weighs about 9.5 pounds.  She lost a bunch of weight when she had pneumonia, so now Mom is trying to fatten her up a little.  Mom has started feeding the cats in separate dishes, and that means she has to watch them eat so that they don't eat each other's food.


Well, now for an update on Mom.  Mom has been busy lately because her friend LaDene is in the hospital.  Aunt LaDene fell down on Wednesday and cracked a bone in her knee, so she is not supposed to walk on that leg for a while.  She will not have to have surgery, but she can only go around in a wheelchair, which she can't use in her own house, so she will be in a rehab place for a few weeks.

Meanwhile, Mom has been going to Aunt LaDene's house every day to feed her cat, Trix, and to pick up the mail.  Also yesterday Mom had to water all of Aunt LaDene's plants, which took awhile because she has a bunch of them.  But not as many as Mom has.  Then Mom has to go to the hospital to visit Aunt LaDene and take her mail to her.  So doing all of that is making Mom a very busy person, but she is still trying to find time to stay home with us dogs because she loves us.

Okay, I guess you are totally up to date now.  We are all just a very busy little family, and if we are not busy running up vet bills, then we are busy napping.  It's a dog's life, and we have to make the most of it!

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MOM AND I DO A PARADE, by Nicky

Yesterday Mom and I had a most excellent adventure!  We walked in the Brookside St. Patrick's Day Warm-Up Parade.  It was actually a pretty warm day, so I asked Mom why it was called a "warm-up" parade, and Mom said she thought maybe it was a "warm-up" for the real St. Patrick's Day parade, which will be on St. Patrick's Day.

Anyway, Mom has been in this parade a whole bunch of times, but she always walked with the Humane Society before.  This year, though, she suggested to the REGAP president that it might be a good idea for REGAP to be in the parade, and that way people could see how beautiful greyhounds are, and maybe they would want to adopt one of their very own.  So that's how it all happened, and since Mom had the idea for REGAP to do it, she thought she had better walk with them.  Also she wanted to show off her new greyhound, which is ME!

So we went there, and we met a whole bunch of greyhounds, and I sniffed their butts, and I was very happy to meet them.  Most of us had to wear weird green stuff like bandanas, hats, chaps, and things like that because our moms and dads wanted us to.  But because we love our humans, we agreed to do it.

Then after we got all dressed for the parade, we had to wait for a long time for it to start.  And even after it started, we had to wait until it was our turn to go.  We were number 80 out of 105, so we were at the back of the parade, and a lot of people already finished the parade before we even started.

Besides us greyhounds, there were tons of other people and dogs in the parade, and even a few horses.  Right across the street from where we were lined up, there was a bunch of kids, and they were a drill team, so some of them beat drums while other ones did a routine.  Mom thought that I might be freaked out by the drums, but I wasn't really.

What I did get kind of freaked out by was this car sort of thing that looked like a giant hamburger, except that it didn't smell like a hamburger, and you couldn't eat it.  But it made this noise all the time that was like "Moo!  Moo!  Moo!" and I guess it was supposed to sound like a cow, but it was really obnoxious and a little scary, so I barked at it.  None of the other dogs barked at it, but I did, and then it went away, so I guess I did my duty.

Anyway, while we were waiting for the parade to start, we all lined up and got a group picture taken, and here it is.  Mom and I are way over on the right-hand side.  We think there are 18 greyhounds in the picture, but it's kind of hard to count them.

When the parade started, but before it was our turn to go, we saw some other groups and floats go by.  This one was the MacDonald family clan, but their leprechaun got caught in the tree, which seemed pretty funny to us.  Finally, they got him loose, though.  I thought leprechauns were supposed to be short, but I guess that shows what I know!

Here's the Humane Society.

And the Irish Setter Club.  They had some very pretty dogs, but they weren't as pretty as us greyhounds, and there weren't as many of them either.

Finally, it was our turn to start walking!

We walked along the whole parade route, and lots of people were there to look at us and see what lovely dogs were are.  The parade route wasn't all that long, but by the time we got finished, I was pretty hot and tired.  So when we came back to the spot where we started, I just plopped down on the ground and refused to go any farther.  Mom sat down beside me, and we rested for a while, and she admitted that she was a bad mom because she hadn't brought any water for me.  Then finally we went back to the car and drove home, and I slept all evening.  Well, except for eating supper!

But even though I got kind of hot and tired, I liked being in the parade, so I hope we will do it again next year!

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ENTLEBUCHER MOUNTAIN DOGS

This is the third breed that the AKC recognized this year for the first time.  I already told you about the other two breeds, which were the Mexican Hairless and the Norwegian Lundehund.  So anyway, now I will tell you about Entlebucher Mountain Dogs, which are also sometimes called Entlebucher Sennenhund or Entlebucher Cattle Dogs.

This breed comes from an area of Switzerland called Entlebuch, so that's how the dogs got that funny name.  And in case your Swiss geography isn't so good, I found you a nice map to look at.  There are people called Senn living in the area around Entlebuch, and they were traditionally herders, so they used these Sennenhund type dogs to guard and herd their sheep, goats and cattle.

There are four types of Mountain Dogs, and they are (1) Greater Swiss Mountain Dog, (2) Bernese Mountain Dog, (3) Appenzeller, and (4) Entlebucher Mountain Dog.  The Entlebuchers are the smallest of the four breeds.  They are square, sturdy dogs who are about 19-20 inches tall at the withers, and they weigh 45-65 pounds.  Their coat is close and harsh, and it is always tri-colored (black, tan, and white).  Sometimes the tail is docked, but this is now illegal to do in many countries.  Other times these dogs are born with a naturally bobbed tail.

All of the Sennenhund breeds probably came from the big molosser dogs that the Romans brought to Switzerland in the 1st Century B.C.  The Entlebucher dogs were described as a separate breed in 1889, but before people could really get started breeding them, World War I came along and everyone got distracted by that. Then after the war, it was really hard to find any Entlebucher dogs.  But finally in 1926 a breed club was formed, and 16 dogs were used to get the breed started again.

The smaller Mountain Dogs, the Entlebucher and the Appenzeller, were the dogs that had the job of herding dairy cows in from the mountain pastures.  The Greater Swiss and the Bernese Mountain Dogs guarded the flocks and also pulled carts to take milk and cheese to market.

Nowadays, Entlebucher Sennenhunds are mostly used as family dogs.  They are loyal dogs who are smart, good-natured, and who love their people.  They are territorial and a little bit suspicious of strangers, which makes them good watch dogs.  Usually they like children, but the dogs need to be socialized and trained starting at a young age.

Because they had such a small gene pool, Entlebuchers were inbred and have several inherited health problems such as hip dysplasia.  Other problems they sometimes have are hemolytic anemia and progressive retinal atropy.

The breed is already recognized by international groups like the Fédération Cynologique Internationale, the Kennel Club of the UK, the Canadian Kennel Club, and the United Kennel Club in the U.S.  And as of January, it is now also recognized by the American Kennel Club.

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Funny Things People Say

Mom has this little notebook, and she writes stuff in it that she thinks is funny, like weird or goofy names that some people have.  And also she writes down things people say that come out sounding funny.  Sometimes this happens when people are using an old saying, but they say it wrong or mix it up with another saying.  And other times people use one word when they really should have used a different word.

So anyway, today I am going to tell you a few of these funny things from Mom's notebook.  And I found some pictures to go with them, so that should make them more interesting.

Everyone is ignoring the herring in the room.

He had a hard road to hoe.

When they start giving me numbers and medical talk, my eyes gloss over.

Friends are blossoms in the flowers of life.

The oldest dog was pulling up the rear.

We need to stench the flow of oil.

I had tears rolling down my eyes.

The signs turned up missing.

They have Congress looking down their necks.

We're treading on serious ground.

We lost a cat in Heaven.  His name was Sam.

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