Bear

I would be lying if I said that it was like this from the beginning. When we first brought him home, he discovered that there were cats in the barn and it became his mission to kill them. In his attempts to do so, whenever he was in the house and could see one of the cats through the window, he would jump up on the window and begin pounding his giant paws on the sill, creating huge, long gouges in the wood from his toenails. This wouldn’t have been such an issue if we hadn’t just spent $10,000 replacing every window in the house. After the second or third window was destroyed, my wife announced that Bear was going back to the pound”. However, upon hearing this, my son stated, “If you get rid of Bear, I’ll hate you for the rest of my life!” Consequently, that action was permanently removed from any consideration.

Shortly after his arrival, Bear managed to find a way out of our five-foot high fence and took off to explore our neighbors’ farms, in search of cats or livestock. There was about a half a foot of snow on the ground, so I put on my boots and took off after him. Unfortunately, having four feet, he was much faster than me and was able to put quite a distance between us. When I finally managed to catch up to him, he had found our neighbor’s herd of sheep. While I was very angry at the time, I just had to stand there, mesmerized, while I watched him, cutting back and forth, nipping at the stragglers and breakaways, and herding them all into the pen in less than a few minutes. It was one of the most fascinating things I’ve ever witnessed. The farmer’s wife was very understanding and once Bear had completed his task, he allowed me to grab his collar and take him home.

A few weeks after this event, Bear began having diarrhea and vomiting of clear fluid. We took him to our vet, who was unable to find anything wrong with him, and prescribed chicken and rice for a week, which cleared things up. However, once he was back on his regular dry dog food, the symptoms returned. After a second visit to the vet, they suspected a disease brought on by drinking standing water and prescribed medication and the same chicken and rice diet. Once again, this cleared up the problem, but afterwards, the symptoms returned. Finally, (without our vet’s help) we deduced that it was his food, which after doing some research, we found out had been made using gluten that the Chinese had made with toxic plastics. We are very fortunate that we did not lose Bear during this period.

Although we have tried to teach Bear that our barn cats are part of the scenery here, he has taught us that it is simply his nature to try to hunt them and that he cannot be changed. He educated us to this fact by breaking out of, (once even jumping completely over), the fence three more times. On the last occasion, after all of us had been out searching for him until 11:00 PM, we were unable to find him and assumed the worst. Finally, just before midnight, with tears in my eyes, I saw him slowly walking up our long muddy driveway, exhausted. Unable to think of any alternative, we bit the bullet the next day and bought an invisible fence to go around the physical fence. Fortunately, we have not had another incident. In order to help relieve Bear of some of his predatory needs, our son Elliott devised a “squirrel game” using a stuffed animal on a cable in the back yard. Bear loves this game and will jump up to grab the stuffed squirrel as it goes scooting along the forty-foot cable at about five feet off the ground.

Even with all of these outlets for his energy, every day, when I come home from work, my running partner lets me know that he has been waiting all day and that it is time for the two of us to get some exercise. Unless it is raining, or there is more than a dusting of snow on the ground, we take off for a three-mile run. If the weather prevents us from going, he will growl at my son or me until one of us agrees to chase him around the family room, or wrestle with him in a mock dog fight. Although his fangs are at least an inch long, he is very careful and has never broken any skin when playing with any of us.

Having owned six dogs during my life, I have never experienced one so determined to maintain order in the pack. If anyone in our family is arguing or raises their voice, he immediately rushes in and begins barking in a threatening manner, as if to say, “You’d better stop it, right now!” Unfortunately, he can’t tell the difference between real arguments and when the kids are just playing, and exerts his authority in all situations. He also does not like it when my wife and I hug each other and will deliberately wedge himself between us so that he can get all of the attention. He is also very, very protective of our children and even if we are just playing a game of football or baseball in the back yard, he will grab my arm or the seat of my pants if he thinks I am playing too rough with them. He also greets each member of the family as they come downstairs in the morning and again when they arrive home from school or work. My wife and I feel very safe with him around, having no doubt that he would not hesitate to protect us or our children from any intruder.

I’m sorry to have gone on and on, but we really wanted to let you know what a wonderful addition to and member of our family Bear has become over the past three years. We love him so much that we just wanted to let you know, and to also let you know what a good service you provide for families like us. Attached is a photo of Bear with our two children (Bear's ears are laying back in the photo, but are normally straight up).

Sincerely,

Mike, Debbie, Elliott, Lauren and Bear Purdie

Did you adopt a pet from the Humane Society of Washington County? If so, please feel free to let us know how your HSWC family member is doing.