Remember the mug shot of this character?
I cannot delve into all the details, because they are more painful than I can bear to list at the moment...
The upshot of the entire unhappy drama is that I could no longer give Ben the safe home that he needed. Once he had been 'walkabout' enough times in the great wilderness of our place up here, it was all he could think about. Every open door or off leash incident, resulted in him being gone for various amounts of time, coming home with bloody feet and going far afield to the neighbors who have farm animals that he might disturb. Not to mention the mountain lion risk.
In the Rescue contract that I signed when I adopted Ben, it states if for any reason you find yourself unable to provide a good home for him, he was to be returned.
This my friends is what I did.
They found him a home very quickly, because he is SUCH a good dog in every other way. Beautiful, kind, healthy, gets along with cats and other dogs, sweet, the best howler in the world… I could go on and on.
BUT.
He could not overcome his crazed desire to bolt.
It's almost like he became a meth head.
Here he is on his last day with us:
Longing to chase one of the gray squirrels into the wild blue yonder.
I wish I could put him in rehab.
He went to a home with two other dogs, and a secure back yard.
It was a difficult day when the people came to get him. Though when the man of his new home said, after only knowing Ben for 15 minutes or so, declared that he had a nickname for Ben already.
He was going to call him, Mr. Franklin.
I knew then that things were going to be just fine for our Ben.
Me?
Not so much.
Not yet anyway.
I cannot delve into all the details, because they are more painful than I can bear to list at the moment...
The upshot of the entire unhappy drama is that I could no longer give Ben the safe home that he needed. Once he had been 'walkabout' enough times in the great wilderness of our place up here, it was all he could think about. Every open door or off leash incident, resulted in him being gone for various amounts of time, coming home with bloody feet and going far afield to the neighbors who have farm animals that he might disturb. Not to mention the mountain lion risk.
In the Rescue contract that I signed when I adopted Ben, it states if for any reason you find yourself unable to provide a good home for him, he was to be returned.
This my friends is what I did.
They found him a home very quickly, because he is SUCH a good dog in every other way. Beautiful, kind, healthy, gets along with cats and other dogs, sweet, the best howler in the world… I could go on and on.
BUT.
He could not overcome his crazed desire to bolt.
It's almost like he became a meth head.
Here he is on his last day with us:
Longing to chase one of the gray squirrels into the wild blue yonder.
I wish I could put him in rehab.
He went to a home with two other dogs, and a secure back yard.
It was a difficult day when the people came to get him. Though when the man of his new home said, after only knowing Ben for 15 minutes or so, declared that he had a nickname for Ben already.
He was going to call him, Mr. Franklin.
I knew then that things were going to be just fine for our Ben.
Me?
Not so much.
Not yet anyway.