July 22 - Day One

July 22
I was contacted about a pregnant Mama dog earlier in the week. One of
the neighbors had been feeding the dog since her family moved out,
abandoning her. This dog was so loyal that she kept waiting in the
house for her family. Day in and day out, she patiently waited for her
family. She only ventured out in the morning for food and to use the
bathroom.

When I got to the dog, she was so pregnant that she could barely walk.
Even with a huge belly, you could tell that she was extremely thin.
All of her ribs were visable. I tried enticing her to the car with
treats, but this skinny dog was refusing to eat - a clear sign of
labor starting any time now. To get her into the car, the neighbor who
fed her, led her by the leash while I put a towel under her belly to
help keep it from dragging. I could feel her stomach contracting as we
loaded her into the car. Just getting her to the car was a slow and
arduous process that left all of us, human and canina alike, hot and
tired.

Fortunately, we had an uneventful drive home.

Once I got this Mama dog to the house, I tried to encourage her to
walk into the backyard. She just looked at me in disbelief. She was so
pregnant that she had no plans to walk anywhere until the puppies were
born. Eventually, my husband had to carry her out of the car to the
back yard so she could get her long overdue flea bath.

This Mama dog had a bad case of fleas. The fleas were just jumping off
of her. Her gums were barely pink, a sign that the fleas have been
eating well. Other than the horrible case of fleas, she looked okay
health wise. Her "waist" measurement was 41 inches! This means there
will be a lot of puppies in there! She let me look at her paws, open
her mouth, and give her a good once over. It didn't matter where I
touched her, she was very friendly.

Because she was so pregnant, there are very few options for addressing
her flea problem. Most flea treatments can cause issues for a pregnant
or nursing dog. The only option I could find, was giving her a
thorough flea bath. Because she is already showing signs of anemia,
killing the fleas immediately is important so that this Mama dog is
only feeding herself and her puppies. I don't want this Mama dog
passing her fleas onto her puppies, potentially making them sick from
flea bites. Also, I want to avoid getting fleas in the house. Because
we have other pets, I have a policy that all animals live in seclusion
or outside until they are flea free!

Besides the fleas dying en masse, this dog needed a bath so badly that
the water coming off of her was black. I have a feeling that this was
this poor girls first bath. She was startled and scared by getting
wet. She didn't care that we were trying to help her and kept trying
to run away from the water.

One of the things I look for when evaluating a new foster is how do
they react when scared. For this dog, even though we were scaring the
bejezus out of the her, probably giving her the first bath of her life
or that she was just taken out of her home, she was still a sweet dog.
As soon as we turned the hose off, she wanted to give me kisses!

Once the fleas were mostly dead, I tried getting the dog back in the
house, but Annabelle (the name we decided to give this sweet girl) was
not having any of it. So we opened the shed up, started running fans
in there, and set her up with blankets and food/water.