[reba]

Hopefully I don't sound defensive and I certainly admit that I have alot to learn. These two are the 5th and 6th rotts we have shared our home with. Maybe I should introduce myself and our involvement with dogs in general and rotts specifically. I trained my first dog, an irish setter, at the age of 12 at the Capital Area Training Club in Springfield IL. Mandy and I took first place in the class and I was totally captivated by the experience. Later, after my husband and I got married we adopted a golden retriever pup. His name is Beau and he is now 14 years old and he just had his first professional picture taken with my daughter for her senior pictures. He was all gussied up for the occasion. You can imagine the connection there--we got him when she was 3, she is now 17 and he has been her buddy the whole time. We got our first Rott, Jackson in 1992 because we needed a more imposing figure than the golden. Beau is everyones friend and is not a barker. After watching a schutzund trial and talking to the rott owners/handlers we were convinced a rott was for us. We trained at the Dog House(Tom Rose) in St. Louis MO, we were working on his CDX, we were members of the St. Louis MO Rott Club, enjoying all the fun stuff they did, starting to get involved in rescue work when we ended up moving to Michigan for job reasons. We had purchased Tarra from Newahause Kennels about 6 months after we became involved in obedience competition to have as a show prospect, but as with any potential show prospect, things don't always turn out the way you plan, so she was now just your ordinary pet rott who could stand real pretty. Before we moved to Michigan I was on the phone calling rott people, trying to find clubs, training, connections etc. in the area we were moving to. One lady I spoke with showed her rotts and did rescue out of Detroit--about 3 hours from were we are at. Right after we moved she called me and asked me if I had any extra room for a couple of nights, it was desperate, you know the speech, there were two rotts at my local pound that needed to be picked up and housed until she could get them into a foster home. So I go to the pound and if you have ever been to the Jackson County pound you know how awful the place is, I picked up the two females. One had a reported broken leg. I took them right to the vet, found out the one didn't have a broken leg but had bone cancer, she was approx 10 years old, had just had a litter somewhere and the vet recommended euthanasia. The other girl we took home. She had also had a recent litter, but was otherwise healthy. A couple of days turned into a couple of weeks and before you know it she ended up staying for 5 years. Scarlette had to be put down because she developed bone cancer, a tumor on her hip/leg joint area. We think she was about 10 years old at that point. About a year after we moved Jackson dropped dead at 3 years old. Vet thought it was a heart problem but no autopsy was performed so we aren't sure. We were devastated. After Jack passed away, we looked at breeders in Michigan where we now live and we bought Kiva from Jane Justis, Windrock Kennels. Kiva was just our pet, we trained him ourselves because there just aren't any clubs or training facilities close by. Kiva passed away from ***Something*** about two months ago. We did everything we possibly could have done for him. We ended up taking him to Michigan State, they were supposed to autopsy him, when I called back to find out more information, they said "well we decided not to do that" and could not tell me exactly why. So we have no answers there other than his blood work did not show any bacterial or infectious cause. Vet thought it may be a poisoning but I'm not sure I am convinced. I have been in touch with Helen Linzy at Newahause over the years, so I called her to see if she had any upcoming litters to get excited over. We wanted a good competitive obedience prospect because we would like to get back into competing. We had absolutely no intention of leaving there with two pups! We had to go to walmart and buy crates to get them home in. There are also some things going on in her life that made it impossible for her to train these two right now and she didn't want to just let them go, her intention had been to show them but due to personal issues the timing is bad. She thought it was a good match--we can train and title them, she knows we will take great care of them and she will get to stay in touch with what they are doing. Also, through the years we have lived in MI and maybe because we have about 10 acres, people seem to want to give their dogs to us and I can't say no so the word is out. When I take a dog or cat into my home it is not a temporary situation. It is for better or worse for life, no exceptions. We currently have Beau--14 year old Golden, Tarra--9 yo rott, Scratch--8 yo brittney, trained for pheasants, that a friend begged my husband to take off his hands or he was going to put her down, Mollie Anne--3 yo shih tzu, another 'take her or else', Remington--3 yo Choc Lab rescue from pound. A friend in Oregon trains/breeds choc labs and heard about this guy who was considered unadoptable and was going to be put down, Ed called me, who else? and now Mr. Remi is the BEST dog ever. He is such a sweetie, the pound/humane society thought he was a lost cause and now he is my daughter's shadow. I took him back about 6 months after we got him so they could see his progress. They couldn't even get him to walk on a leash he would freak out. They told me they really thought I would be bringing him back. They couldn't believe the change in him. He just needed lots of lovin'. He was abused, that was apparent because if you picked up a rake/broom type object in his presence he would drop to the floor, peeing, shaking and cowering. Now he will avoid looking at the object but he has stopped the peeing/shaking/cowering, he doesn't like the fact that I am holding the object but he has alot more confidence. He also was HW+, not housebroke, all of which is resolved now. We've had him 2 years and he is just a great guy.
Add the two rott pups and that makes 7. They all get special attention and yes that is pretty much all we do. I spend an hour each morning playing with them in the yard, then feed and water them and off to work I go. When my girls get home from school about 2 pm, they let them outside (3 are indoors and 4 have outdoor kennels, pups are inside right now) When I get home from work about 6 pm I change into "dog clothes" and its playtime in the yard for about an hour and most nights my husband and I walk for exercise so 2 of them go with us for a 4-5 mile walk--they take turns, except for the old guy, he's got arthritis-- then usually we have playtime again about 11 pm before bed. Now that we have the pups, there will be training time for 15-20 minutes each night. So hopefully I have alleviated your concern that we are a couple of complete idiots, although I am the first to admit that TWO 5 month olds are quite the handful :D