Sorry I've been so rubbish with updates recently...here's a quick catch up of some of the things Inko's been doing.
Inko and the heat
Like many lappies, Inko has been struggling a little bit in the unusually hot weather recently. To try and keep her cool we have been spraying her with a water spray and have been leaving a wet blanket in her den for her to lie on while we are out at work. Despite being hot, Inko has still been running round like a hooligan most of the time...a bit of sun isn't going to slow this little lappy down!!
On one of the particularly hot days we had the fan out in the evening (we didn't want to leave it on in the day for her in case it over-heated and caught fire!). She got so close to it! Luckily no fur, or ears, found their way through the little holes in the front! That could have been messy!
Tarkka came to stay
On the night before the Windsor champ show, Inko's brother Tarkka came to stay, with Jo, George and Josh. Inko and Tarkka had great fun playing and were actually very quiet...I have warned the neighbours that there might be more woofing than normal but they were actually very good. Managed to get a few photos that weren't entirely blurred! To save uploading them individually I've added the link to them on my Flickr site.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22914982@N08/sets/72157621256269845/
The emergency vet...why to get insurance!!
Last Thursday evening I decided to take Inko for a road walk for a change instead of the usual romp in the meadow and waited till the evening was a bit cooler. After we'd been walking for about 15 minutes I noticed a spikey seed stuck the side of her face and bent down to pull it off. As I did, I had a quick check that there weren't any others and, as I touched her left ear she went mental! She squealed sooo loudly. I know that lappies are well known for their over reaction to anything that could potentially hurt (just to warn us that they might possibly die!) but this was much worse than what she does normally. She refused to walk on her lead after this because her collar was obviously rubbing slightly on her sore ear. I tried to see what was wrong but couldn't see anything, not helped by her huge amount of wiggling, so all I could do was pick her up to carry her home. She is not light!! Being about 10 minutes walk from home, my arms were practically dead by the time we got back home, and I'm sure passers-by must have thought I was trying to dog-nap her based on her squealing and wiggling!
When we got back home both Adam and I tried to see what the problem was but had no luck. She was clearly getting very distressed so we called the vets. This was about 10pm so got through to the emergency vet and arranged to take her over. It turns out that just to walk through the door of the emergency vet at that time of night costs £123! The vet tried to look at Inko's ear but she wouldn't stay still and was getting a bit snappy where she was scared. They tried a muzzle but Inko wiggled out of that in about a second! So there was no choice but to give her an anaesthetic...another £100! The vet pulled out a nasty large barbed grass seed that had gone right into Inko's ear. Luckily it hadn't burst or damaged her ear-drum. To remove it, the vet charged another £34 on top of the consultation and anaesthetic fee! I should have trained as a vet and run out of hours clinics, not been a psychologist!! Luckily we have Pet Plan insurance and we should be able to claim this back, minus the excess. Who'd have thought this might happen on a boring road walk!!
Inko's poor leg after being shaved for her anaesthetic!Meeting up with Tarmo
The other day we met up with another of Inko's brothers, Tarmo, who she hasn't seen since they were about 4 months old. We went for a walk in the woods at Hrsell Common, Woking, and they had a fantastic time. There is a large sand pit there and they had great fun running around and rolling in it...it didn't take long for them to change from black tri lappies into orange dogs!! There was also a pond. It didn't look the cleanest pond in the world but they were getting pretty hot from running around so they enjoyed having a good paddle. It was shallow enough for them to cross right through it. At one point Inko sat down in the water and then decided to lie down in it!!
Link to the photos on Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22914982@N08/sets/72157621256235671/
Visiting her fur family
In the last month I've had to work down in Plymouth for the day on a few occasions. As Adam was due to be working on an event two of the nights I was away there was going to be no-one at home for the Dink. So I took her down to Devon with me and dropped her off with Jennifer and Jay and she had a great time playing with her fur-mum Neka, fur-dad Keskiyo, fur-sister Maija, and the lovely Annie-Bear.
Show update
Inko is still very much enjoying going to shows. She loves meeting up with all the people and dogs. She also loves having a chance to sit on lots of chairs! She is obsessed with them, and doesn't care who they belong to!
- She came 2nd in puppy bitch at Bath, where she was up against her sister Kaija.
- She came 2nd in puppy at Guildford, to her brother Tarkka.
- She came 1st in puppy bitch at Southern Counties, but got beaten by Tarkka in the puppy challenge.
- Windsor wasn't quite so successful, where she came 5th in the junior bitch class...but she behaved very nicely...better than she often does...so I was pleased enough with that so didn't mind the 5th place!
- She got best puppy in breed at East of England...she was the only puppy but that's by-the-by! She once again behaved very nicely so that's very good.
Looking forward to National Working and Pastoral Breeds in Malvern next weekend, followed the next day by Evesham...camping with loads of the lappy gang will be good fun :)
