He's 14yrs and 1 month old now. He's been living inside all winter long. Has been going downhill for about a month now fairly rapidly.
I have been putting off the inevitable. I think this evening is the right time to have him cross over the bridge and join a few of my other dogs who are now living the good life.
It's a tough thing to do deciding when is the right time. Who am I to decide his fate? But, unfortunately I suppose we are left with decisions that we don't want to have to make. I tell myself its quality over quantity for all things.
"Truman" grew up with the my kids and my neighbors kids. They taught him how to "dance" and he taught them the joy that dogs bring to us in life and also taught me the same, as the others I have had did.
As he got of age to start hunting 11 Sept kicked off and I was gone for basically 3 yrs of his life due to deployments. Not much hunting was done during those times. He had to learn a lot on his own which he did a pretty good job of.
Perhaps the only Vizsla that would not retrieve. He loved to muskrat hunt in the ponds behind the house and try to dig them out. He would swim with my lab "cash" ( his best buddie, who passed on a couple of years ago). He was "fixed" and so was she. They were kennel mates and very best of buddies. She came to live with us when Truman was about 3 perhaps and she was the same age.
I never will forget the look in his eyes when I had to have her put down. He was their when she closed her eyes for the last time and Truman was by her side. He was depressed for quite some time after. But, eventually got on with his life and me with mine.
When he was 12 going on 13 I took him on his last hunting trip. I knew this would be his last. He hunted the best he could, he still turned direction (something I taught him while hunting, or I should say we both mutually learned) when I whistled to him and was very intent on finding birds. Although only about a 2 hour hunt he had fun and so did I.
One last strange and maybe a bit humerous story about him (wasn't at the time). While I was deployed one time my wife had let him out while she fed the other dogs as we always do. He would run around the yard like always and come back for supper. This time however he did not come back. My wife was very upset and was scared to tell me she had lost Truman. In an email she told me about how he was missing. She had called drove around and could come up with nothing. As a last resort I told her to place an add in the paper. Sure enough the next day an old lady from SW Topeka called and said she may have our dog. Her location was 20 miles from me and accross a rather large river and through accoss the major part of Topeka. Not thinking that it would be him she went to take a look anyway. Well, it turned out it was him! She had found him in her backyard. He had a blue collar on (which i didn't own at the time). Apparantly (only thing I can think of) someone had stopped on the road and whistled him to their car and of course he jumped right in and they were gone. Being a Vizsla, he wanted to find his family so I am guessing he escaped from them and ended up in this old ladies backyard. She quickly took him in her house where he slept on her bed and she fed him of all things, steak! She said she didn't have anything else to feed him. So Truman came back to live with Cash and his family and has been here ever since. Caring for the place and keeping the peace between the dogs and telling stories of the old days to the new dogs in the kennel.
He's been a good one. A teacher of all who got to know and spend time with him. I think when a dog passes a little bit of us go along with them. Somewhere someone has a script at the bottom part of each post that reads something like this;
"The only problem with dogs is that they don't live long enough". No truer words have been typed.
That is all.
I have been putting off the inevitable. I think this evening is the right time to have him cross over the bridge and join a few of my other dogs who are now living the good life.
It's a tough thing to do deciding when is the right time. Who am I to decide his fate? But, unfortunately I suppose we are left with decisions that we don't want to have to make. I tell myself its quality over quantity for all things.
"Truman" grew up with the my kids and my neighbors kids. They taught him how to "dance" and he taught them the joy that dogs bring to us in life and also taught me the same, as the others I have had did.
As he got of age to start hunting 11 Sept kicked off and I was gone for basically 3 yrs of his life due to deployments. Not much hunting was done during those times. He had to learn a lot on his own which he did a pretty good job of.
Perhaps the only Vizsla that would not retrieve. He loved to muskrat hunt in the ponds behind the house and try to dig them out. He would swim with my lab "cash" ( his best buddie, who passed on a couple of years ago). He was "fixed" and so was she. They were kennel mates and very best of buddies. She came to live with us when Truman was about 3 perhaps and she was the same age.
I never will forget the look in his eyes when I had to have her put down. He was their when she closed her eyes for the last time and Truman was by her side. He was depressed for quite some time after. But, eventually got on with his life and me with mine.
When he was 12 going on 13 I took him on his last hunting trip. I knew this would be his last. He hunted the best he could, he still turned direction (something I taught him while hunting, or I should say we both mutually learned) when I whistled to him and was very intent on finding birds. Although only about a 2 hour hunt he had fun and so did I.
One last strange and maybe a bit humerous story about him (wasn't at the time). While I was deployed one time my wife had let him out while she fed the other dogs as we always do. He would run around the yard like always and come back for supper. This time however he did not come back. My wife was very upset and was scared to tell me she had lost Truman. In an email she told me about how he was missing. She had called drove around and could come up with nothing. As a last resort I told her to place an add in the paper. Sure enough the next day an old lady from SW Topeka called and said she may have our dog. Her location was 20 miles from me and accross a rather large river and through accoss the major part of Topeka. Not thinking that it would be him she went to take a look anyway. Well, it turned out it was him! She had found him in her backyard. He had a blue collar on (which i didn't own at the time). Apparantly (only thing I can think of) someone had stopped on the road and whistled him to their car and of course he jumped right in and they were gone. Being a Vizsla, he wanted to find his family so I am guessing he escaped from them and ended up in this old ladies backyard. She quickly took him in her house where he slept on her bed and she fed him of all things, steak! She said she didn't have anything else to feed him. So Truman came back to live with Cash and his family and has been here ever since. Caring for the place and keeping the peace between the dogs and telling stories of the old days to the new dogs in the kennel.
He's been a good one. A teacher of all who got to know and spend time with him. I think when a dog passes a little bit of us go along with them. Somewhere someone has a script at the bottom part of each post that reads something like this;
"The only problem with dogs is that they don't live long enough". No truer words have been typed.
That is all.
