A dog's life

Our Dad has had a really busy week and hasn’t had time to write his blog so we’ve been asked to help out. Our key board skills may not be up scratch but we’ll do our best to let you know what we have been up to since we arrived in France.

Our names are Tess and Rolo and we are Dad’s faithful dogs. Coming to live in France has been a great adventure for us although it seemed very unfair that we had to have lots of injections for Rabies before we could come whilst Mum and Dad didn’t need anything! It was a long journey to get here but we just settled down in the car and let the miles (or kilometres as we have to call them now) roll by.

Tess (left) and Rolo

What we have enjoyed most of all about France is the countryside which provides for miles and miles (sorry, kilometres and kilometres) of quiet paths for walks. It seems that every village has its own set of way marked paths which traverse through large forests, across open granite plateaus and meander along quiet country lanes where we hardly ever see a car. Exploring these paths has been great fun and along the way we have seen quietly grazing herds of the majestic Limousin cattle, complete with cows, calves and the odd bull.

Over the summer it was very hot at times and we didn’t go too far or stay out too long in the sun because sun stroke can be a very real danger for dogs. When the temperature reached nearly 40 degrees in August, Mum would have a wet towel ready to wrap around us when we came in from a short stroll.

As we write this there is frost on the ground and so we have to lay in front of the wood burning stove or face real risk of frostbite!

Removing a tick 

Tess was the first of one of us who found out about ticks. They are insects which live in the grass and attach themselves to passing animals to suck their blood! One day she had some little lumps on her head and our French neighbour Nadine explained what they were and how to remove them. She gave Dad a small, green, two pronged fork and showed him how to get the tick out properly. The problem is that if it is removed incorrectly it can leave the mouth parts of the tick still stuck in the skin and this can become infected. They pass on a nasty disease called Lyme’s disease which can make both dogs and humans very sick.

Tess was very good at allowing Dad to remove the ticks but Rolo didn’t like it at all and got very cross whenever the green fork appeared! Fortunately for us, Dad was able to buy something called Frontline which was applied by dropping it on our necks (hurray, no injections!) and it meant that any ticks that tried to suck our blood after that would be killed – dead.

Tess is 15 years old and is getting quite stiff because she has arthritis. In England she used to get some pills from the vet and so she was taken to meet the new lady vet in France. She declared herself to be horrified that Tess had been taking these pills for so long as they can apparently cause liver damage. The vet took a blood sample (ouch!) and the results showed that her liver was not working very well and so she suggested some new tablets for her arthritis which would also allow her liver to get better. These tablets are loads cheaper than the one’s Tess had in England and her arthritis is no worse – so Tess is happy and Dad is happy! (Actually we think Dad quite fancies the young French lady vet).

Rolo has made friends with some of the local dogs, especially a Gordon Setter called Titane. One day Dad was out walking with Rolo and they walked through the little hamlet where Titane lives. Rolo didn’t know this however so when a large dog came hurling out of a house barking for all its worth, Rolo panicked and ran back along the way they had just come. Expecting he would soon realise it was Titane, Dad just laughed and waited for him to come back whilst he had a chat with Titane’s owner, Jean-Louis. And waited……and waited. Eventually Dad retraced his steps and ended up back on a country road where he shouted and shouted. Meanwhile, Rolo had made his way into someone’s garden and they tried to catch him but Rolo remembered he should not talk to strangers! He ran back onto the road and was startled to see a moped come round the corner. Rolo is frightened of many things and mopeds and motorbikes are pretty high on his list of major dislikes – so he ran for all his worth.

Titane the Gordon Setter

 Fortunately he ran in the direction where Dad was waiting for him so over the brow of the hill came the sight of a startled Rolo being closely followed by (‘chased’ is Rolo’s view on the matter) an old man on an even older moped!

Rolo and Dad were reunited and decided it was best not tell Mum about their little adventure because she is always telling Dad not to let him off the lead. They walked back to see Jean-Louis and had a bit more of a chat when suddenly a very harassed Mum appeared. It turns out that even though they hadn’t caught Rolo, the people whose garden he had gone into had managed to get the ‘phone number from his dog tag – they had called Mum and said that they had nearly caught her dog but that he had run away again! Mum had therefore come out in the car in a panic and had spent 10 minutes hunting for Rolo only to find him and Dad having a jovial chat with some French friends!

That’s it from us, hopefully Dad will be back with more stories of life in the Perigord Vert next week.