Welcome Libi (aka: The Rat) First Two Weeks (weeks 8-10)

I’m not going to lie. This is just an excuse for a massively adorable photo dump.

For two years now, I have wanted a pointing dog. For the past two season, I tried working with Thelma, the re-homed, gun shy, bird blinking, bird eating Small Munsterlander (happy to tell you more of her story over a beer some day, and might make a post about it some day). When that became overly obvious it wasn’t going to work out, I decided to give a call to Skedaddle Setters, who I’d heard about a few times on various chukar podcasts, and a friend of mine, Tyler, also has a dog from. Since all I really want to do is hunt chukar, it was important to me to have a heat tolerant, strong padded, good nosed dog. From everything I’d heard, the Skedaddle dogs fit that bill, and Brit and Tina hunt chukar themselves with their dogs.

So I gave them a call near the end of the 2021 hunting season. I imagine they must hear from a lot of aspiring dog owners, because they told me I could go on the list and if/when a litter was available that I could have a puppy from, they would let me know. I continued to follow up for a few months, and in January of ‘22, Brit let me know that there was a litter due in a few weeks, and if there were enough females, I could have one from that litter. I only wanted a female and REEEEEAALY really wanted a black and white dog (tri color was fine too).

I learned that the bitch of this litter was Skedaddle’s Smoking Skipper (aka; Jane), and the sire was Skedaddle’s Kingpin (aka; Ray). Two fine looking specimens if you ask me.

Skedaddle’s Smoking Skipper - Jane, Libi’s dam

Skedaddle’s Kingpin - Ray, Libi’s sire

Jane had 5 puppies. I don’t even know what the full mix of boys/girls was, but I did know that there were 3 black and white females. I immediately asked which one was mine, and learned that the allocations wouldn’t happen until 6 weeks old. UGH! AGONY! And so started my plotting of how many people I’d have to kill to be sure I made it to at least 3rd pick on the females.

The weeks crawled by, and I reminded myself that all good things come in time, and I’d have my pup soon enough. I tried my hardest not to be annoying to the breeder, but I have to say, knowing you have an adorable ball of fur somewhere in the world that you can’t see is pretty painful.

The call came at 6 weeks old that I was 3rd pick on the females (good… then no one had to die), and there was one black and white female left. “I WANT HER! HOW DO I GET YOU THE MONEY?!” was the only thing out of my mouth. I made arrangements to drive up to Northern California to pick her up a few weeks later in the beginning of March.

We met in the parking lot of a gas station in town for the had off, and I started the long…. howling drive home. I had her in the crate behind my seat, and she seriously cried or howled the entire 6 hour drive home.

But alas, we made it, and no puppies were harmed during this transportation… but I am pretty sure I’ll some some irreparable hearing damage.

Now, I am a tax professional… so getting a puppy in the middle of tax season was a bit of sketchy decision. I was fully braced for the monstrosity that puppies can be, and knew I was signing up for sleepless nights, lots of playing and chewing all day, and generally terrorizing all aspects of life. But having this distraction in the middle of 10-12 hour work days was a bit of a concern for me.

I was rather pleasantly surprised to find out that she really liked to sleep. Like… a LOT. She’d wake up, want to play and terrorize things for about 15 minutes, and then would lay down and sleep for the next 2 hours. It was actually the perfect balance to tax season. She forced me up out of my desk ever few hours for some activity, and then slept perfectly soundly for the next 2 hours while I worked.

And so, the first 2 weeks were basically just non-stop sleeping and adorableness.

We weren’t doing anything really serious these first 2 weeks. Lots of walks, and just puppy play, and lots of sleeping. Of course, she slept in her crate at night, so crate training had started. Puppy walks included lots of time with the other dogs and seeing different footing and low covers. We played with water, and bugs, and she immediately decided she liked carrying her own rope around.

She learned the boundaries with the other dogs. Ellie, my spaniel, basically hated her. She was incredibly tolerant, but always looking at me as though seeking permission to kill the thing incessantly latched to her ears. Yet the puppy still managed to sweet talk Ellie into letting her cuddle with her when it was nap time.

Ellie, trying her best to keep an eye on me in the kitchen, but also hide from the ball of teeth. Spoiler alert: it didn’t work.

And so it went… play, sleep, eat, repeat.