Category: Sparky (Page 2 of 13)

With the snow coming down all day, we’ve been hunkering down.  Sparky didn’t even notice when I went down to the garage for an hour to put the snow tires on.  He was happy to lay by the fire, screw around with Mr. Moose, and help me watch Youtube.

When the wind let up, Sparky would surely be eager to bound through the snow, run off some energy and check on all the outside stuff he has to check on.  When we went out for our walk, Sparky put up a good front, but when I started for the bridge, he ran for the house. 

Sparky wants us to revisit the policy about never pooping in the house.  Even with a Carhartt jacket, going outside to poop in the snow doesn’t seem reasonable. 

To be fair, Sparky is cooperating with the policy, but he isn’t convinced.

Señor Piglet has to shed some weight.  When we talked about it, he kept patting my belly and smirking.  I can’t help thinking he was making some kind of point.

Today, Sparky weighs 29.8 lbs.  He was 25.1 lbs on January 18th, 2023, when he moved in.

Blue Buffalo Wilderness High Protein Natural Senior Dry Dog Food recommends 1 1/4 to 1 3/4 cups per day for a 16 to 25 lb dog.  Sparky gets 1 1/3 cups per day, with typically three treats.  He always seems hungry.  We have to try something different.

The first three ingredients in Sparky’s dog food are “deboned chicken”, “chicken meal” and “dried chicken”.  That’s good, but the next four are “oatmeal”, “barley”, “brown rice” and “potatoes”.  Dogs are opportunistic, but that isn’t natural food for dogs.  Sparky needs fewer carbs.

The Blue Buffalo dog food has a bunch of vitamins and minerals, so he needs to keep getting that, but not as much.  We are going to try 2/3 of cup of dog food, and a hard-boiled egg, with half in the morning, and half in the evening.

My eldest sister gave me two stainless steel bowls.  I made a bowl-holder for them.  Sparky’s little breakfast looks quite paltry in the large bowl, so I added two croquet balls.  The balls should slow down his eating and let him scrounge for his food.

The pair of bowls look like this:

Should I add a third croquet ball to further improve Sparky’s dining experience?

Sparky is getting too big for his britches.  Not in the “putting on airs” sense.  I encourage him to be a confident boss.  No, he is just getting too big.  Sparky doesn’t have any britches, but now that I’ve got a sewing machine, if I made him some britches, he mustn’t be splitting the seams.

Sparky gets Blue Buffalo dog food because he likes the wolf on the bag.  I went to the Blue Buffalo website to review the ingredients and nutritional profile.  They have alligator meat listed.  It’s not an ingredient in the flavor Sparky gets, but if I can figure out which recipe has alligator, we might switch to that.

Sparky just told me not to bother.  He isn’t nuts about eating alligator, but wouldn’t mind a pet turtle if I like reptiles so much.  Since I’m looking, he says that a switch to recipe with rabbit or raccoon would be good.

This photo was taken almost two years ago, the day after I brought Sparky home.  Man, he has really let himself go.  No wonder his nickname is Señor Piglet.  He needs to get on the carnivore diet.

At the orphanage, he didn’t have his own name.  They called him ‘Sammy’, but he hated that.  Like I’ve mentioned previously, he’s kind of racist, and it bugged him to be named after the indigenous people of Northern Europe.   He says the Sami people have small, round heads, large hands, and wide feet with splayed toes.  I have no idea what he was talking about.

When I first brought him home, we were trying to establish some common interests.  I told him that I taught physics.  He didn’t know anything about that, but liked chasing pigeons.  Being a congenial dog, he asked if I had any physics stories about pigeons.  I told him about Nikola Tesla and his fondness for pigeons.  He enjoyed that story and wondered if I had any stories about physics and dogs.  I read him Kurt Vonnegut’s short story, Tom Edison’s Shaggy Dog. 

Reading the story will give you some context.  He wanted to know if Tom Edison was a real guy.  I said that he was, and that he happened to be Tesla’s nemesis.  He was happy about that.  In the story, Edison is a jerk to the dog, but the dog is really smart, and makes Edison look foolish.  The dog in the story is named Sparky, and since the dog isn’t real, he wanted that name. 

Eventually, Sparky became self-conscious about not having a last name.  He didn’t want to take my last name because he felt it implied something about our relationship that he didn’t want to explore.  We put a pin in it.

Sparky and I like watching movies featuring dogs.  Months later, we watched Laurie Anderson’s movie, Heart of a Dog.  Sparky didn’t understand what was going on in the movie, but liked how Anderson talked about her dog, Lollabelle.  Also, since Lollabelle was allowed to play a keyboard, Laurie Anderson must be a nice person who understands that good dogs are smart and should be allowed to do whatever they want.

If I’m honest, I didn’t understand the movie either, but agreed that Laurie Anderson was a national treasure.  Sparky wanted Laurie Anderson to be his godmother.  He took her last name as an homage.

Señor Piglet became Sparky Anderson.  He prefers playing with Mr. Moose, but will chase balls until they roll under the furniture.  He doesn’t mind that there was a ballplayer named Sparky Anderson.

Sparky was all ears when I told him the troubling news.  Yesterday, while Sparky was patrolling the grounds, I saw a coyote between the chain link fence and the sound wall.  It wasn’t far from the grape vines where Sparky likes to snuffle.  They would be on opposite sides of the fence, so that’s not an issue.

My concern, and now Sparky’s, is how the coyote got passed the chain link fence.  The likely access is under the fence at the creek by the land bridge.  That is one of Sparky’s favorite spots because there is a culvert pipe to crawl in, rocks to stand on, high weeds for pooping and whatever wiggly things live in the creek mud.

I provide overwatch for Sparky when he is on a recon mission for the KISS army, but now we have to actually be cautious.  Sparky likes to kid around about being a friend of Wily, but after that possum encounter, he is starting to understand that this isn’t a petting zoo.

Sparky no longer wants to go past the top of the hill.  I’m starting to think he’s smelling something in the woods, rather than being intimidated by yellow jackets.  He will go on if he’s on a leash, but he isn’t nuts about it.

It might be a good idea to leave him with his phobia.  If he goes on a walkabout, and won’t go passed the top of the hill, he is a lot easier to recover.

That is all from one walk.  I like how Sparky looks back at me like I’m crazy.

Beagles 101

I tried doing my dog breed research before getting Sparky, but all the information was so vague.  This article from a beagle rescue in Oregon, gets the breed.  Dog writers really need an editor, but they make good points.

Beagles need guidance as they are extremely smart.

Everything Sparky does is deliberate.  He makes no mistakes.  Sparky won’t try to do a thing, I just turn my back, and he’s done it.

Trash, food, candy dishes..nothing is sacred to a beagle. They are NOT the type of dog you can be watching TV with while eating a pizza and expect to get up to answer the phone and returning to anything other than an empty pizza box..if that!

Sparky is a trash hound.  He pays no attention to the garbage can, unless he can get to it.  Then, when I’m not looking, he takes what he wants.  Three times, Sparky has stolen a loaf of bread because I put grocery bags on the floor.  He ignores it until I take some canned food downstairs.  Sparky also stole a bag of marshmallows. 

Some are bolters and dashers, others are wanderers. It’s not that they are running away from you or your home..it’s just that they are running “to” something that caught their noses.

Sparky has gotten out of the house five times.  He is so charming and polite that he lulls me into complacency.  He’s never bolts out of the door.  I watch a TV show, then notice that Sparky is gone because I left a door open somewhere.

Beagles simply cannot be trusted to be off-leash, or to consistently obey their owners when they are outside.

Sparky’s brush anchor makes him think he can’t run away.  He gets stuck often enough that he doesn’t try to wander off.  When given a command, Sparky doesn’t obey.  He either agrees or doesn’t.

It may seem at times that they forgot everything you taught them. Not true. They just make decisions on their own sometimes.

Beagles are not programmed to please their people…they are more like party animals who manipulate you into thinking they want to please you.

Sparky is bullshitting me all the time.

Beagles are house dogs; not “outside” dogs. They are very social and people-oriented. They are very pack oriented and consider YOU their pack so naturally, they are not happy in the yard by themselves.

This doesn’t seem like it’s true, because Sparky loves sniffing around in the yard and woods, but I think it is.  I put up a dog-run cable for Sparky.  He can roam a 100 feet, even into the woods a bit, and 10 feet on either side.  If I put him on the cable and go in the house, he sits in the yard looking at the patio door. 

Sparky is a cute puzzle.