Remembering Daisy

We lost Daisy Mae three years ago, but she's been on my mind lately. I decided to repeat this post which originally appeared on my Yahoo 360 blog.

It's never easy losing a dog. I don't care if you've had them many years or only a few months. Once they've had a chance to work their way into your heart.....you're hooked.

It was the first week of May, 2002. At the time we had three dogs living in the house: Betty (the beagle mix), JJ, and Esther (both rottweilers). The only outside dog was Jake, a squirrel dog we had been given by a friend. If I remember correctly, it was a rainy day when two absolutely pitiful looking puppies showed up in our yard. We live in a rural area where dogs are free to roam, so dogs would often appear for a day or two before moving on. Usually they belonged to someone and were just passing through. These two had obviously been dumped. Despite feeling guilty, I tried to shoo them on without looking at them too closely. It worked for one night.

The smaller one with the swollen face came back the next day. She had either been hit by a car or beaten. Her jaw appeared broken and she looked near death. We had to help her! Her confidence that we would take her in led us to name her "Hope".

Less than a week later the second puppy came back. She was even more emaciated than before (if that was possible) and looked like she'd been in a fight. This time I couldn't turn her away. My husband was won over when he saw her chase a squirrel across the front yard. (Jake, the squirrel dog, was gun shy and had absolutely no interest in squirrels!) My daughter named her "Daisy Mae".

The vet estimated that Hope was about four months old and Daisy about six months. Antibiotics, baths, plenty of good food and lots of love worked wonders! They thrived and grew by the day. By the end of the summer, they had both been spayed and were settled in to their new life with us.

Daisy never became the squirrel dog my husband had hoped for. Daisy liked rabbits!! I'll never forget the first time we heard her pick up a trail and set out. We thought she had been hurt because she sounded like she was in agony!! Her "hunting bay" was a high-pitched yip that could be heard from far away. I can't begin to count the times I heard her yipping in the distance! She and Hope had an efficient system for hunting. When being chased, rabbits tend to run in a big circle. As Daisy chased the rabbit, Hope would silently bring up the rear and snag the bunny when it circled back. What a team!

I often feared their lifestyle would catch up with them at some point. I didn't know if it would be a car (though they were both fairly "street smart"), getting shot by a hunter (though most hunters in our area knew and liked them) or illness. In the end it was illness that got Daisy.

I first noticed a change in her behavior around Thanksgiving. She wasn't eating well (though this was often the case during hunting season when “deer parts” were plentiful), seemed lethargic and was losing weight. We took her to the vet and discovered she was running a high fever. Her symptoms indicated it was most likely a tick-borne disease. Despite collars, dusting and other treatments, ticks have always been an unfortunate reality for our outside dogs. The vet gave her a shot and we kept her on antibiotics for a month. Within 24 hours of the shot, Daisy was acting like a new dog!! All the more reason to believe it was Erlychia or something similar. Angus, our first rottie, had Erlychia when he was two and went on to live another seven years. I felt hopeful Daisy's life would get back to normal. It did, but only for awhile.

I noticed late one afternoon last week that she was moving more slowly. I got her started on antibiotics the next morning and she spent most of that day in the doghouse. It was cold and drizzly, so I didn't think anything about it. I just assumed the medicine would kick in like it did before. The following morning she wouldn't come out of the doghouse. We were shocked to see how quickly she had deteriorated! Her breathing was labored and she'd lost control of her body. We rushed her to the vet where we were told that her prognosis wasn't good. I had to make the difficult decision to have her put down.

I stayed with her until it was over. I wanted my voice and touch to be the last things she knew.... for her to know that I loved her.

I don't regret my decision. Nor do I regret allowing her to run loose in the woods all her life. She was a happy dog with warm gentle eyes that never left us any doubt that she loved us.

If I close my eyes, I can hear her now. She’s across the Rainbow Bridge, hot on the trail of a rabbit, her high-pitched yip fading in the distance…..

Daisy Mae
c. November 2001 ~ January 17, 2008