Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Pond Boss Man's best friend

This thread was inspired by all my PB brethren that have shared the stories of saying goodbye to their best'est animal pals...their family pets.
Most recently, Cecil said goodbye to his pal Sandy. Blaine just bid farewell to Cycle. Sunil and many others have also had to face the reality that their buddies would be waiting for them at Rainbow Bridge . Many thanks to all of you for sharing the stories, the tears, and the memories.
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When I was in Wisconsin a few weeks ago, I worked with one of my sales rep's; a gal named Lynn. She shared with me her most recent passion (of some 7 years now). She is deeply involved in a Golden Retriever rescue organization. Lynn is all about Goldies...big time. When I read Blaine's recent post about Cycle , I knew that I needed to contact Lynn. I sent her a copy of Blaine's post/pic. Here is her response.

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Furthermore, I encourage the idea of letting this thread be a place to collect and share some pics and stories of these beloved pals that have moved on to Rainbow Bridge. They all deserve the Pond Boss treatment when we think back and smile.

What a great idea Bski!

We just pasted the one year mark of losing our cat "Conan." We buried him up at the ranch and visit his grave on each trip. Conan was a bengal cat and was 18% Asian Water Leopard. He loved water. One day while sitting in my office I notice a strange spashing sound. I lean back from my desk and peer around the file cabinets only to find Conan sitting in middle of a indoor fountain, facing the cascading water, and swatting the water up the side of the wall. He was soaking wet, the wall was soaking wet, the carpeting was soaking wet and he was having a great time. I couldn't keep him out of the fountain so I had to move it outside. Dang cat was weirder than me, well almost.

Beautiful cat Jeff. I love the appearance of bengals. I'm not much on cats, but Conan and my Buddy were manly cats. Buddy was 16# of muscle, and was also a very impressive specimen of tomcathood.

One morning I heard a commotion in the garage, so me and Buddy went to the back door to see what was going on. As soon as I opened the door, a friendly chocolate lab suddenly stuck his head inside the door within Buddy's reach. Faster than thought, Buddy did a rat tat tat on the lab's muzzle, making loud thumping sounds, and making the dog scramble in retreat. That cat hits hard I tell you. I would love to have a slow motion of that to see how many times he tattooed the poor lab.

Buddy came to us through that same door. One Saturday morning I opened the door, and there was a tiny, forlorn tabby kitten looking right into my eyes. I tried to avert my gaze, but it was impossible, as he kept his eyes locked on mine. The struggle was over within 30 seconds, and I didn't stand a chance. I brought him in and cleaned him up. He kept climbing up on me and cuddling against my neck... a habit he kept for the next 13 years. I really miss the big guy.

Thanks Brettski!

Wow those are gorgeous cats!

You know I used to shoot stray cats that caused my dog to run after them potentially onto the highway, peed on my deck, and went into heat and copulated on my deck at 2 A.M. driving my dog berserk. I'd live trap them and pop them in the head before they knew what was coming. But if they had a collar and were probably someone's pet I'd release them. But after the death of my dog it won't happen anymore. I will live and let live. I was thinking what a hypocrite I was to lament the loss of my dog when I was needlessly killing other animals that were just trying to survive. Maybe I'm wrong and will have a change of heart but that's where I am now. Maybe if I can get a discount I can capture them, have then neutered, and release them again.

I think the animal that needs a wake up call are the human beings that dump animals, are too cheap or lazy to have their pets neutered, or get one and decide they don't want the responsibility. And don't forget the ones that abuse or neglect their animals. I think we need to start neutering them.

Cecil, for the record I think feral cats are among the world's worst varmints. People that let their housecats roam are varmints too.

This is Jake my 2 year old golden retriever. He's a great dog. He loves fetch, never runs away, and he's great with my son Abram.

This picture is of myself and Jake enjoying the pond.



Unfortunately he is a little accident prone. We have been taking him to the vet off and on for the past 2 years. His skin breaks out in rashes and he itches like crazy. The local vet hasn't been able to fix the problem so we took him to a specialist. 300$ and 3 different antibiotics later he is getting the rash again Which means it's probably his food. We are getting another appointment with the specialist to talk about hypoalergenic food and possibly alergy shots.

Now for his second ailment. when he was a pup we were playing by the pond. I went to the other side and he ran to follow me. On his way he tripped over a rail road tie and bruised or stretched his ACL. We kept him calm for a few weeks (not an easy task with a golden pup) and he seemed to be doing better so we decided to just leave the situation as is. a few weeks later we took him to the kennel and during a play session at the kennel he stretched his ACL again. This time we said eneough is eneough and took him to the vet. 3-4 xrays, 1 bottle of anti inflamatorys, and 400$ later we get sent home with the expectation that if his ACL does not heal he will need a 1500-2000$ surgery. My wife and I braced ourselves financialy for the worst. Luckily after a few weeks of rest his knee healed up nicely and we haven't had any problems since.

All this to say be sure to buy pet insurence. In all seriousness Jake is a member of the family and we would have spent any amount of money to insure his health. I just hope the hypoalergenic food does the trick for his skin rashes.


I just noticed that Brettski said that this thread is to memorialize pets that have passed on. oops . Jake is still here and putting a smile on my family's face.

Jake is welcome on any thread at Pond Boss. I would say his continuing physical challenges easily qualifies him for living legend.

Great photos and story Bobad.

I cringe to hear what you have done to cats in the past Cecil but am relieved to hear that you have modified your actions. House cats that become feral cats can have an extreme impact on the environment. Conan was an indoor cat and we loved it that way. I don't want to turn this into a dog versus cat thread so please don't make it such. That being said I feel obligated to say that abandoned dogs can cause a huge problem as well. In a rural area near San Diego a pack of abandoned dogs began killing live stock (goats, sheep, chickens, etc).

Anyhoo, back to the thread's intention.

Tell us about your lost pal's and let them be memorialized here.

No problem with me. Brett started the thread anyway. As long as we talk dogs and cats I'm fine with that.

This is Sami, who was the best dog in the whole wide world, ever.

We got her when she was about a year old. She was 3/4 Yellow Lab and 1/4 Golden Retriever. She was just perfect to raise kids around - she let them climb all over her, tug on her, even try and ride her, all without ever having a mean streak in her.

She suffered from tumors on the right side of her abdomen. The first turned out to be benign and it was a few years before the second occurred. She was over 10 when that one, which was malignant, was removed, and she had a very difficult time recovering from the second surgery. We decided that it would not be right to put her through another surgery and when a third tumor made it impossible for her to have any "good" days at age 12, we had her put down.

She is buried on the South side of our front porch, where she loved to lay in the sun when she was older. She has been gone for about 5 years now, and to be honest it took 2 dogs (our Lab/Coon Hound cross and our Cardigan Welsh Corgi) to take her place - but don't tell them, because they're pretty special, too.

Here's my new addition to the family. A 1 year old Akita.




Not sure if she is a pure bred (actually hope she's not as I believe a mix has less physical problems). I think I made a good choice as she is really loving. Only downside is someone's fed her people food as she wanted what you're eating really bad. However I'm sure we can break her of that.

She's getting tutored (neutored) tomorrow first thing, but don't tell her that. I'll get her back the same day though.

I was reading a book this evening on the bed and she fell a sleep on her back with her back legs sticking straight up in the air. I wish I had had the camera next to me!

Corgies prefer kipping on their backs, too.

Wow Cecil! What a great addition to the Baird clan. Big smiles. We can only hope that Akita has the patience to properly train her new humans.

We're in trouble when she realizes what pushovers we are and uses it to her advantage! Slept right next to me on the bed all night!

Good job Cecil. Keep us updated on her adjustment to "Baird living".

A neighbor had a pure breed Akita and yours looks to me that has a little bit of hybrid genetics. Nice looking dog. Friendly is the kind of dog you need with a customer business on your property.

Does she have a name yet, Cecil? I propose "Khrushchev".

Congrats Cecil on your new friend.

Theo, do you still have that couch? Brutal.

Of course; it's a beautiful couch. AND a star of stage, screen, and radioactivity that has appeared in numerous movies and TV shows - most recently, Scrubs, IIRC.

Now you just have to teach her to run a seine

Cecil I'm jealous. My favorite dog was my Akita. They are great dogs. Very intelligent but my god, talk about stubborn. Mine played a game with me where he would dig a small but surprisingly deep hole and I would fill it back up. We did this pretty much daily for 2 years. I even dumped a large container of cayenne pepper in the top layer of dirt. Wouldn't you know it, I had gotten a dog that enjoyed spicy food (also ate 4 jalepeno pepper plants, peppers and all in one day). Mine loved to pull things. It took him about a week to learn how to pull a small cart. Made filling the wood box much more fun. I hope you have as much pleasure with yours as I had mine. She is gorgeous.

Beautiful dog Cecil, congratulations.

It's a shame that she is so stressed out with the relocation. You can just see by her posture and expression that she is just full of stress and anxiety

Absolutely. As usual I listened to my wise friend Bill!

The vet says he thinks she's pure, but either way it doesn't matter to me. I'd prefer mixed for health reasons but she's stuck with me now!

Here's a couple of pics of her in the shop snoozing. I have to keep the fish hanging high as she seems to like the smell of fish. Must be that Japanese ancestry. She's thinking, "Man I did I find the right place! Sushiiiiiiiii!"

Hey did you know some of our GI's smuggled some over from Japan after WWII and Hellen Keller even brought one over?

Thanks all for the kind words. Glad to hear you had one Jeff. Stubborn I can deal with. My last dog's middle name was stubborn.





BTW in case some of you don't know the tee-shirt is to keep her from licking her incision and a bacterial rash she picked up at the shelter which will give the antibiotics a chance to work.