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Blaze of glory
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Before |
Poor ‘ole
Blaze. Regular visitors to Agilitynet may remember him as an overweight Papillon from the
Rescue Me page. He'd been rescued twice by Denise Welsh of Hailsham and then rehomed with
the Richard and Sheila Partridge when they were persuaded that they could manage another
'small' dog.
The second time Blaze was
returned to Denise, he was in a real state, vastly (dangerously) over-weight, unfit and
miserable. He was over ten kilos.
She started him
on a controlled diet and fed him lots of TLC and 'happy pills' and put him firmly on the
road back to being a proper dog again. Then we took him over.
Blaze joined
our menagerie along with our other Paps Rupert, Bandit and Smokey together with the
infamous Twerphound, the cat and a dozen goldfish.
He is
definitely an 'Essex' dog, - all white trainers and gold medallions! Where we live is
very, very rural; fields all round, narrow lane outside, no streetlights and nearest
supermarket eight miles away! This was a bit of a culture shock for our man. |
His first walk,
through the long wet grass and mud, met with a curled lip and an 'Oy, I don’t do dirt!'
look. His idea of a proper walk is a trip down a nice civilised pavement, quick poo and pee and
back home by the fire. We have discovered that he has what we call a flat battery. He needs his
lead on for the first quarter of a mile to jump-start him, and then he is off on his own.
Strangely, once he is firing on all cylinders he leaps and gambols with the others quite
merrily.
Once he had settled
in and lost a bit more weight -
he's
down to seven kilos but
still a bit tubby - and got a bit fitter we introduced him to the wonderful world of
Agility. He has taken to this like a duck to water. He is quite a bright lad, learns quickly
and seems keen to please. Not too surprisingly he is food orientated so is easy to
motivate/reward.
He is also pretty
brave. He runs up the seesaw and jumps up and down on the end, enjoying the ride down and the
bang when it lands! As an aside, Smokey our other 'new' dog, is very timid on contact
equipment, so we send Blaze over in front of him, and Smokey follows. Blaze is built like
a tow truck, so might as well use him.
| With
his black and white colouring and relatively small ears he looks a bit like a miniature
Collie in appearance, so we have dubbed him Big-Fat-Collie-Pap. However, he is settling
in well, is good natured, even though he still has the occasional bad tempered growl, we
just laugh at him. That usually shuts him up). He is even beginning to enjoy his country
walks, and now the weather is cooler and we light the log fire in the evenings, he has
discovered the joys of the hearth.
We expect by the Spring he will be
ready to compete, so when you notice a lumbering, tubby Pap waddling round please be kind
and don’t laugh too much. He is only doing his best. If you hear 'Fat Boy Slimmer,
' his Sunday name, called among the winners you will know that the lad has made it! |
After |
From Val
Clark...
I have just read the article about Blaze and would just like to wish Richard and
Sheila all the very best, not just on the agility circuit, but on their life with him as
well. I also rehomed a larger than life Papillon, Echo, from Denise - although an official
measure puts him in the small category - and he is a delight. They look very similar and, if
Blaze shows the same strength of character, courage and cheek as Echo, I'm sure they'll do well
when they start competing. We are still waiting for our first clear round, but my goodness has
Echo put the fun back into Agility.
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