Strange Boy

A Young Finlay 

Last night I tried again, Finlay was mooching about at my feet looking for crumbs and I tried to stroke him. Sadly it was the same response and he turned and walked away. I thought I'd got used to it, but last night I could feel myself welling up as I wondered "what ever have I done to deserve this treatment from him?" Nico as observant as ever must have seen my tear filled eyes and came straight over for a cuddle and give me reassurance.

Jay At Crufts - You Move I Bark

Finlay is so hurtful towards me, it's like someone sticks a knife in my heart. Why, why me? I saved his bloody life, I gave him all this. Hell I know he doesn't owe me anything but never have I been treated like this by any dog I've ever owned before. My dogs usually adore me, as he did for the first few years, but over the last few years he has distanced himself from me so much and it's so damn hurtful. I can't think of any incident or any point at which this started, it just felt like he gradually seemed to start disliking me. I feed him, I walk him .. oh yeah he likes to come for walks with me, that's the only time when I actually do seem important to him, the rest of the time I'm someone to be ignored.

Simba

I know all dogs are different, but this special breed that I adore are usually so faithful and dedicated to their owner, and the boys are usually so affectionate. Including Finlay I have over the years owned 11 males; 5 of them coming to Blanik as older puppies or young adults, all with a "history" a story to tell of a very different life. I guess Jay wasn't as cuddly as some of the others, but he was ridiculously attached to me and he taught me how to do a brilliant recall! Simba had big issues, and I blame it all on his previous owners, with just a little socialising and training he quickly became a better man!

The Awesom Kaiser

Kai was full of confidence and had huge strength of character, to be fair in my opinion all his previous owners had done wrong was not had the time to give him and life in a kennel did not suit Kai. And then there's Nico, now he had had a hard time. When he arrived he was a crumbling wreck ... now he's confident, happy and a tad demanding of my time. One thing the 4 of them have in common with the males bred at Blanik, or brought in as youngsters is they have all been devoted to us, they always give all of themselves.

My Nico

Still life continues and Finlay plods along day by day. I feed him, I walk him, I clean up after him. I continue to love him from the distance he has put between us. There's nothing else I can do, I can't force him to be stroked, I can't insist that I be allowed to cuddle him, sadly though it breaks my heart I have to continue with this relationship on his terms only these days!
Crying again now!

The Boys Are Back In Town

Junior and Jamie

Aren't they sweet! 

Today's Sad Photos

This use to be such a tranquil magical place, sadly now ruined. Sammi admiring the view, sad she and future generations will never get to go down there like her ancestors did!

I was just devastated to see this!

 Posing in between the 2 lakes

Jake, Asha, Mikey, Louis, Finlay and Tali 

1997 - Nikki. Dexi, Blade, Seffe and Lia in front 

on the way down where all the destruction is going on now

Tali Swimming in the deep pool

Today Happy Photos

The Third Walk

 Just Love This Of Loki 

 The Empty Lake - The Older Generations Use To Swim In Here

 Posing

 Sammi Did Go Up too, 

But Came Down As I Walked Away To Take The Photo

Three Of The Eight Legs On The Floor

Three Walks Yesterday - One Set Of Photos!

With the camera in the bag I set off for my usual morning walks. It hadn't started well as Nico and Jezi had knocked Finlay over, they get so exuberant and basically you could knock him down with a feather these days. Anyway the old man was none the worse for wear and pretty good on the walk. It was such a lovely morning that I found my mind drifting from place to place. I thought of Dena, my friends bitch with her lovely litter and hoped they were doing well, after all they had come five days earlier than expected ... and then I thought of Kia, Nico's wife, she's due on Sunday. I wondered if Kevin knew there was a change of them coming early? So I text him, he immediately phoned me back and we nattered for the rest of the walk. Though only scanned for 4 pups by the vet Kia is apparently huge, she's hot and uncomfortable, but eating like like a pig. Well not many days to go, it will be interesting to see how many pups do come. After all Dena was also scanned for 4 by her vet, she had 7! So I was back at the van and hadn't taken any photos!
The second walk didn't get off to a good start either, our field was full of sheep for the 4th time in 2 days. As I walked I wondered why it was always our job to keep them out of our land? Could it not
occasionally be the farmers job to keep them in?  Ziva and I played ball, her smiling happy face warmed up my heart, Asha bounced around from ditch to ditch, and Tali? Where the feck is Tali? I called and called ... there was no sign of her, I was sure she couldn't be far as I do keep an eye on her. I decided to go back and look. Within 30 seconds I'd found her, even if her hearing isn't as good these days she was well withing hearing distance, she was in the reeds gorging herself on sheep shit. As I approached I swore at her, she looked up at me and without saying a word I'm sure she swore right back at me! I continued, this time keeping a closer eye on her, I was now above the Llyn Ffynhonnau and admiring the beautiful view. I could see Tali again in a patch of reeds, I called her, she ignored me, I called more aggressively and this time she looked up, poo sticking out of the sides of her mouth, she stared at me for a few seconds before deciding to carry on with what she was doing. I would have loved to have walked away, just left her there with the hope that she may have panicked when she realised we'd gone ... but with her poor eyesight I just couldn't take the chance. Again I went to get her and pushed her bottom in the right direction. She gave me "The look" and continued on her walk.
Tali is so frustrating, I get so annoyed but I have to sit back and admire her strength of character. Even now as old age creeps up on her she is confident in her own skin and does what she wants when she wants to do it! I couldn't be arsed to take any photos or her yesterday!
By the time I got home, Ken the vet had phoned and I felt a little better about the Mikey situation! I felt like the cloud had lifted somewhat and with Mikey and the youngsters I walked for miles and took loads of photos of our beautiful home ground!
Today they will be short walks, I'm off to Liverpool after lunch to be stuck in a tumble dryer for 30 mins!

Mikey Update

Ken the vet phoned this morning. He says he took several samples from the growth and there are no cancer cells found in those samples. In his opinion the blood is from the lump and not a contamination. He feels removing a chunk of the lump as the lab suggests will be too intrusive at this point and he would like us to monitor the growth again over the next 3 weeks. He still thinks it may be a haematoma as it's growing so fast and if it is hopefully it will now be reaching maximum growth. If it is a haematoma it may go down a little in future but we may have to live with it. Still all ifs and buts, but what he says does at least make sense!

Oh Mikey!

Ok so maybe the walk up mynydd Cilgwyn yesterday was a little too far, pooped today! 

Anyway trying to find a way of entertaining the troops without walking today.... but Mikey Spoiling everyone's fun by repetitively taking the hose pipe out of the pool!

Walking The Dog

 Up Cilgwyn Mountain - First Time Since Last August! 

 Ladies At The Lake

 The Sweethearts 

"Not Sure How I Got Down Here ... But I may Need Help To Get out!" 

No Answers Yet

Two photos of Mikey taken yesterday

the size of the growth can now be clearly seen in his backline in the photo above.

A vet from the practice treating Mikey phoned this morning and sadly the results for his biopsy are inconclusive! Apparently there was blood in the sample, they can not say whether this has contaminated the sample or whether there is blood in the growth. The lab suggested the growth be removed or a part of it be removed for further analysis. But as we already know the vet treating Mikey feels this growth could not be removed!
I know I'm repeating myself but I have never see anything like it, or seen anything grow at this speed. I know we continue to learn throughout or lives, but I wish this learning curve was not at the expense of Mikey! I guess we now have to think through everything we need to ask before Ken the vet treating Mikey rings us on Monday. If we did nothing now, waited a while, what would be the worse case scenario? If they take a chunk out of it and it is malignant will it explode and spread rapidly? So many questions that I thought by now we would be nearer to knowing the answers too!

Compare the overline to these 2 photos - 

top photo taken on the last day March

Bottom starting to show a slight rise taken 11/4/16

Click on the photos to enlarge!