Beach Bound Hounds

Photo BBH Photographer Bronnie Fisher

 Beach Bound Hounds is the greyhound event that our adoption group puts on at the end of September every year. We had 450 greyhounds in attendance with their owners this year. We take over the Sea Mist Resort and have vendors, dinners, beach walks, contests, seminars and fun for 4 days. I did a seminar for new owners and foster homes. Miles won the best trick contest there by doing 20 tricks in a minute.  Moose and I won the best owner dog costume contest by dressing up as a very small but notorious motorcycle gang.

Photo BBH Photographer Bronnie Fisher

Photo BBH Photographer Bronnie Fisher

 Miles learned how to curl up really small to sleep in an arm chair in the suite I share with several others. We don't have any arm chairs he can fit into at our house so this was a first for him. He also was filmed and photographed for Myrtle Beach Online

Photo Myrtle Beach Online

Big Moose got to meet little Moose the tiny star of the Birmingham Race Track commercials and her owner Mel that is the head of the adoption kennel at the race track. Here is another commercial. Mel did a seminar for us and talked about going from greyhound trainer into adoption and how she and her small group of volunteers move more than a 1000 greyhounds a year to adoption groups as far away as Canada.

The Moosekateers

 In addition to my own greyhounds, I took my foster LW's Fats to Beach Bound Hounds in hopes he would find a home. I wouldn't take many of my fosters on vacation with me but Fats is about as perfect as they come. He was well behaved in a hotel room and was not stressed in that type of crazy environment. He is so unique with his crooked nose and deformed face that I was sure that the greyhound people at BBH would appreciate him. I was not disappointed, by the end of the weekend a couple of people wanted him. He ended up going home to live with a BBH regular, Bettie, that lives in Florida. I am sure I will get to see him next year. I ended up not seeing much of Fats during the weekend. One of the speakers, Shelley Lake, a vet from Kansas that had flown in with no dogs, borrowed him for the weekend and helped show him off. Fat's new name is Max. Have a great life little boy!

11 Months and Piper has a home!

The pups are 11 months old today! Miles sister Piper has a home! Her new family lives on the beach and is coming to pick her up tomorrow. They have already adopted a greyhound from Greyhound Crossroads, our adoption group. They also have puppy experience with 2 whippet pups they raised. They got the horrible greyhound puppy speech anyway just to be safe but it didn't scare them off.

Piper is pretty good for a pup but has been a little more of a handful than the boys. Mainly because she was not raised here with our rules and also because of a few mistakes in her upbringing. We know she was left in her crate all day every day while her family was at work. No way a pup can hold it that long so it taught her NOT to hold it and to potty whenever she felt the urge. She is pretty good about covering it with blankets if she goes in her crate and really does do pretty good about not going in there most of the time. Fortunately she didn't lose the urge to be clean like so many dogs that stay in crates too long as puppies.

When Piper arrived she would go wherever she was when the urge hit though. She still has to be supervised but has gotten a lot better. It is obvious she had some supervision in the past, but just enough to train her to sneak out of the room to potty or even to watch to see if the human is watching her before going. Humans only get upset if they actually catch you in the act, after all. Pups learn that pretty fast if they are allowed too much freedom during potty training. Piper has finally learned to go in the grass/dirt outside instead of on the deck!! It took nearly a month of going out with her 5 times a day and making sure she went to the proper spot. I think she has a stubborn streak in her because she learns things very fast when she wants to.

Piper is an awfully sweet pup and obviously got a lot of affection from her previous owners. She snuggles as much as possible. She is very smart and quickly learned to "kennel up" on command and likes her kennel. She is usually quiet there unless we have company or are playing with the other dogs. She wants to be out to join in the fun then and may whine a bit to let you know. Piper learned how to sit, down and shake very fast and is very food motivated so would be easy to train to do just about any trick.

Piper hasn't been destructive except with stuffed animals. She takes them apart and removes all the stuffing. I made the mistake of putting a comforter in her crate for her to lay on instead of her usual blankets. She removed ALL the stuffing from the comforter in the couple of hours I was gone just like a big stuffed animal. My fault I should have thought about that with a puppy. My Italian Greyhound Pinky would do the same thing when he was a pup. I found out today that she chews rope toys apart strand by strand. It took me awhile to figure out what that big pile of what looked like string was when I found it in the back yard.

I weighed Piper today. I was pretty sure she had grown since I got her and she has. She weighed 40lbs. She doesn't look fatter so she must have gotten taller and longer like the boys. Piper can still walk under the boys and does frequently so hasn't gotten a lot taller. She was weighed at the vet a week or so before she arrived at my house and she was just 31lbs. The boys have put on less than 10 lbs in the last month I think. Ten pounds for Piper is a quarter of her body weight. The pups should really be about done growing by 11 months. The boys will probably still put on some muscle weight because of their hormones. Piper was spayed as a pup so her muscle will not increase.

Congratulations to the Lewis family for picking out such a sweet girl!

Typical Morning

Why do you always blame me for tearing up the toys? One of the other dogs MIGHT have done it.




A typical morning with the dogs:
I take my coffee out on the porch in my pajamas to supervise the morning potty. This morning I have pups Miles and Kohle (his littermate), Pinky the Italian Greyhound, Streak my adult male greyhound, and Vanna the foster greyhound.


Things we don't want:

Pups digging in flowerbeds
Pups pooping or peeing on tile porch
Pups peeing or pooping on rock deck around pool
Pups falling into partially drained pool.
Pups eating too much grass and then throwing it up in the house later
Pups dragging trash bags full of poo around - they are conveniently located beside the two grassy potty areas (and need to stay there).
Pups playing in mud or poo.
Pups walking under taller dogs when they are peeing or pooping.
Pups playing instead of going potty.


All we do want:
Pups and foster(s) to pee and poop in one of two grassy potty areas while I enjoy my coffee.
Doesn't seem like that should be so difficult.....


What actually happens:

Foster Vanna immediately squats to pee on tile porch right outside door while the other dogs walk through it tracking it the length of the porch.
Set coffee on outside table and get hose.
While turning on hose notice Kohle starting to squat on rock deck by pool to relieve himself.
Try to get Kohle over to grassy area but succeed only in making a trail of poo across rock deck all the way to the grassy area. He is completely finished by the time he hits the grass.
Go back to turn on hose.
Chase Vanna away from my coffee.
Hose off tile porch while making sure other dogs are going in the correct places.
Get clean up scoop and clean up trail of puppy poop from pool deck.
Chase Vanna away from coffee cup again.
Hose off rock deck.
Still watching and loudly praising other dogs for any potties in the proper spot (Maybe the foster and pups will hear it and it and learn).
Decide that leaving my post to wash hands with soap before returning to my coffee is probably not a good idea. Rationalize that I only touched the scoop handle, not any actual poop.
Rinse hands in cold hose water.
Take a swig of lukewarm coffee being sure to keep my possibly contaminated hand on handle of cup only just in case.
Notice Miles throw his ball into favorite flower bed to dig in - the one with the muddy hole.
Take coffee cup with me this time since Vanna has been eying it and head down to get the ball out before Miles takes the opportunity to get muddy.
Breath a sigh of relief that trouble was avoided.
Toss ball for Miles who does a soccer kick with his front leg that sends the ball flying into the pool.
Try to grab it without spilling coffee into the pool but it is just beyond my reach.
Hurry to pool house to get net while yelling "Leave it, Miles!" so pup doesn't jump in the pool after his toy.
Hurry back carrying long net and coffee, trying not to spill anything.
Realize I will have to set down coffee cup to use the net.
Check to see if it will be safe from Vanna.
She is on the other side of the yard not paying any attention. Its a go!
Set the cup on bricks around raised flowerbed and scoop the ball out of the pool and toss it a safe distance from the pool.
Turn to retrieve the coffee and there is Miles with his face all the way at the bottom of the cup happily getting his first taste of coffee (probably not the last).
Oh well it was cold anyway and how could I be mad at a face like this?