Rolling Dog Ranch Animal Sanctuary

Spinner Is A Candidate For Surgery

Spinner had her consultation this morning with Dr. Tony Basher, the veterinary ophthalmologist and surgeon here in San Diego, and she is now scheduled for surgery tomorrow morning.  Because he had not examined Spinner personally, we needed to get through this 'checkpoint' to make sure she was a viable candidate for the surgery.

Dr. Basher will basically cut the tissues that are holding her eyeballs down in their locked position, where they are rotated towards the bridge of her nose. 

There are still a lot of unknowns.  Will her eyeballs 'float' back up to normal position after the tissues are cut, or will they move only a bit?  If they rotate back to normal, or close to it, will they remain that way forever?  Will her eyes still work well enough for her to see? 

I took the first photo of Spinner in the exam room.  She was cocking her head because this was the third photo I took with the flash, and she seems to detect it when the flash goes off.  (Similarly she seems to 'see' the beam from a flashlight shining on her face at night, enough to react to it.)  This gives us hope that she really is visual enough that if we can only rotate those eyeballs back to a normal position, she'll be able to see.

She is highly reactive to smells, as Dr. Basher and his assistant Amy learned soon after I took the photo.  He finished his exam and started washing his hands in the sink.  Suddenly Spinner leaped up off the floor and burst into motion, barking madly with her high-pitched little barks.  This startled both Dr. Basher and Amy, and they looked at me, puzzled by her behavior.  I explained what had happened:  When Dr. Basher began washing his hands, Spinner must have smelled the soap from the sink, and this entirely new 'input' to her senses set her off.

None of us humans could smell the soap in the air, but this dog with her incredibly refined nose could.  And when you're blind and deaf, your nose is all you have to work with.  It took us a few weeks after Spinner first arrived to realize that smells in the air triggered her, just like a 'normal' dog would react to new sounds or sights by barking.  Often we can't notice the smells she can, so it looks like she's just having a spontaneous outburst.  But there's something in the air, and she knows it.

The second photo I took of Spinner on the lawn outside our hotel room when we got back from the hospital.  She spent the rest of the day lounging by the patio, while I worked on the laptop  (thank heavens for wireless Internet).

I'll update tomorrow on the surgery!

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Meanwhile, back at the ranch in Montana, Alayne reports it's been snowing all day!

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Spinner Arrives in San Diego

Spinner and I made it to San Diego this evening.  I took the photo of Spinner in the hotel room, soon after we arrived.  As I write this, she is sleeping on the patio outside the room.  This being San Diego, I had dinner on the patio about half an hour ago, looking up at a palm tree while I enjoyed the warm (70 degree) evening outdoors.

What a difference a few hours of travel makes ... this morning we woke up to a light dusting of snow in Montana, and when we left, it was 41 degrees at mid-day.

Spinner was quite scared at first at the Missoula airport.  Being blind and deaf, new environments can be very stressful for her.  The TSA security guy at the airport had to examine Spinner (say what?), so I had to take her out of the crate.  At first she slinked on the ground, cowering, until Mr. TSA put his hands on her.  Then -- "oh, that's better!" -- she promptly rolled over for a belly rub.  (Canines long ago figured out the art of human manipulation.)

I watched her load at Missoula and then unload in Seattle, each time with a lump in my throat.  I couldn't see her load in Seattle.  When they closed the doors on the plane to San Diego, I realized they hadn't given me the slip of paper that told me Spinner had loaded too ... so I frantically waved down the flight attendant.  (I earlier had told them I had a dog traveling on the flight.)  By this time the plane had pulled away from the gate, and I'm thinking, "uh oh, she didn't make it."

The flight attentant scurried to the flight deck, checked with the pilots and ground crew, and came back to confirm that Spinner was in the cargo hold.  Whew. 

When the Alaska Airlines cargo person brought her out to me at the bustling San Diego airport, all I had to do was blow through the crate door on to her nose, and she wiggled with delight. "There you are!", she seemed to say.

I didn't know what traveling with Spinner would be like.  After getting a bit stressed out this morning in Missoula, she has settled down a lot.  She is quiet, loves to explore, and I think has come to see this as a big adventure now.  Tomorrow we find out if she is a candidate for surgery to restore her vision, and if she is, then the big day is Tuesday! 

A Handsome Boy With A Case Of The Wobbles

This is Buzz, a young Golden Retriever that the Bitterroot Humane Association in Hamilton, Montana, asked if we could take.  They told us he has the 'wobbles' ... a little unsteady on his feet, falls down sometimes, but is otherwise healthy and happy.  We had not seen Buzz yet, but based on what the shelter told us, we wondered if he didn't have a mild form of cerebellar hypoplasia.  Our dog Allie and our cat Wobbles have full-blown forms of that condition.  We asked the shelter to take him to our specialist in Missoula, Dr. Dave Bostwick, for an evaluation.

Dave did an exam and concluded that Buzz's balance and mobility issues were NOT from cerebellar hypoplasia.  It is more likely he suffered some kind of head trauma in the past.  A sure sign he has a more classic neurological problem is the fact that he circles quite a bit.  Allie and Wobbles, for instance, don't circle at all.  Yet he also has far more control over his fine motor skills than they do.

As you can see from the photos, he does quite well standing up.  He can run around the yard just fine.  But then all of a sudden he'll start listing to one side ... he'll turn his head in one direction ... and then he'll circle for a brief moment.  Occasionally he'll list like a sinking ship and then fall over.  Other times he just can't stop or turn in time ... it's like his brain signals can't get through to the rest of his body ... and he'll run into something. But most of the time he can run, jump, and play like any dog. 

When I was taking photos of him this evening, I watched him move at a fast clip across the yard, heading straight toward some logs ringing a small tree sapling.  I could tell he wanted to stop but couldn't, and he plowed straight into the logs.  (There's a reason we protect small trees here.)  When he gets very excited, he has less control and is more likely to lose his balance. 

He is a very sweet, affable and playful boy who gets along with everyone else.  He's also drop-dead gorgeous. Today was his first day at the ranch and he loved exploring his new environment.  Most of the time he seems quite normal, until ... thunk! ... you realize something's not quite right with him!

One final comment:  We need a new name.  Buzz just isn't him.  Suggestions welcome!

(Click on photos for larger image.)

2,500 Pounds of Dog and Cat Food

It takes a lot of food to feed the gang here, and this is how it arrives ... 2,500 pounds at a time.  We  place a bulk order with Natural Life Pet Products in Kansas and get a great price for this high quality pet food.  They ship it out to us on two pallets, and we take the horse trailer to the Yellow Freight terminal in Missoula and pick it up there.

What's on the pallets?  24 cases of canned cat food, 48 cases of canned dog food, 10 bags of cat kibble, and 40 bags of dog kibble.  Total cost: $2,424.92.

How long will it last?  About 2 to 3 months on average. 

In the back of the truck was another 500 pounds of 'equine senior' grain for the horses I picked up at Cenex on the way out of town.  We go through about 50 pounds of the senior grain every day.

Off To The Vets We Go!

Alayne hauled a full truckload of animals to our vets in Helena today.  In the back of the truck are, on the left, Fluff and Puff Hooligan, our 'barn-cats-in-training'.  They needed another eye exam, and Puff needs another round of minor eye surgery (some tissue grew back where it shouldn't).  Next to Fluff and Puff is little blind Ashley, who went in for an eye exam and a spay.  (Hmm, we wondered why the house was so quiet tonight.)

In the back on the left is blind and deaf Spinner, who was going in to get a health certificate for her trip to San Diego, and also bloodwork in preparation for the eye surgery.  On the right in the green crate is blind Sugar, going in for surgery on a ruptured anal gland (lovely!) and also an eye exam.

Behind Sugar's crate is a smaller crate you can't see ... in it is Snowball, a deaf cat who came to us from a gruesome animal hoarder case.  We got him over a severe upper respiratory infection, but we did not have any luck with a chronic mouth infection called stomatitis.  I've kept it at bay with daily Baytril injections, but haven't knocked it out.  We may have to pull all his teeth -- this sounds awful, but we've had to do it on three other cats and it's the only thing that finally gets rid of the bacteria that causes this strain of stomatitis. 

Our vets will do the various tests and procedures over the next two days, and we'll pick up the crew in Helena on Friday.  This was kind of our typical vet run.

Spinner: Is Eyesight Possible?

A month ago we posted a story about Spinner, a blind and deaf dog who recently arrived from a shelter in Spokane, Washington.  At that point we didn't know why her eyes were completely white.  Now we know.

Our vet in Helena, Dr. Brenda Culver, did an exploratory exam with Spinner under anesthesia two weeks ago.  She found that Spinner actually has bright blue beautiful husky eyes ... but they have rolled forward towards the bridge of her nose!  The white we're seeing is actually the back of her eyeballs.  Brenda, who is a regular vet but has a special interest in ophthalmology, had never seen this condition before.  She e-mailed photos of Spinner's eyes and the surrounding tissue to a veterinary ophthalmologist at Virginia Tech, asking "what is this?"

Last Wednesday, he told Brenda that Spinner appears to have an extremely rare condition called 'restrictive strabismus.'  This affects the muscles that attach to the eyeballs.  He e-mailed us a study on the condition from a veterinary journal.  Of the 10 dogs in the study, four had both eyes affected, the other six had one eye affected.  In the end, an international team of vets operated on a total of 13 eyes, and 10 had successful outcomes.  The surgery is very complicated, and obviously it's not a 100% success rate.   But we liked those odds.

On Thursday last week, I tracked down one of the authors of the study, Dr. Tony Basher, who is in private practice at the Veterinary Specialty Hospital of San Diego.  He is a board-certified specialist in both veterinary ophthalmology AND surgery, making him one of only two vets in the world with that distinction.  He is also one of only a handful of veterinary ophthalmologists who has performed surgery on restrictive strabismus cases.  To make it even better, Dr. Basher was also geographically the closest to us of any of the opthalmologists who participated in the study. 

We e-mailed Brenda's images of Spinner's eyes and the other info to Dr. Basher on Friday.  This afternoon, Dr. Basher's office called with great news.  Dr. Basher could see Spinner next Monday for an evaluation, and if all goes well, surgery is scheduled for Tuesday! 

So I hopped on the phone to make reservations for Spinner and me to leave for San Diego on Sunday. We'll fly from Missoula to Seattle, then to San Diego. 

Even if we can surgically correct the problem with her extraocular muscles, we don't know if her retinas are firing or if she has other ocular problems.  There are a lot of unknowns here.  We also may not be able to pull the eyes completely back to normal position, for instance, which would leave her with impaired vision ... but still vision.   We just won't know how this is going to go until we do it.

Yet there's a chance -- and a reasonable one -- that we might be able to give Spinner her eyesight back.  And there is no better gift we could give any animal than that. 

I will be taking our laptop on the trip and hope to post updates on the blog, so stay tuned for progress reports early next week.  In the meantime, please keep your fingers crossed!

(Click on photos for larger image.)

Blind Ashley The Puppy

This baby girl arrived last night at the ranch from the Yolo County SPCA in Davis, California.  The shelter had asked us earlier last week if we could take a blind 10-week puppy who had been dumped in their overnight bin.  Jerry Black, our incredible volunteer who drove to Bozeman on Thursday to pick up Turtle and Mink, went to the Missoula airport yesterday evening to pick up little Ashley and drive her out to us. 

Ashley is a lot smaller than she appears in these photos, weighing all of 10 pounds.  She is the youngest, smallest puppy we've ever had.  She is totally blind but, like our other born-blind animals, completely intrepid.  She marches around, taking big exaggerated steps to feel her way along, and then she puts each paw down with a determined 'thump!'  It sounds like a tiny Roman legion heading our way.

Ashley spent a good part of her first day here exploring the yard.  She quickly found the front steps to the house, memorized the location, and goes straight there when she wants to come in. 

She is adorably cute, playful, inquisitive, and affectionate.  In short, your perfect puppy.  Except she can't see.  But she doesn't know that's a handicap, because she doesn't know what sight is.  She assumes the world is dark for all of us, so she's not at any disadvantage.  That's why our born-blind animals are so confident.  It is truly inspiring to see a little blind girl like Ashley just take charge of life.  It never occurs to her that she shouldn't.

Welcome, Turtle And Mink!

At first glance the title of this post looks like we're branching out from dogs, cats and horses ... but we're not.  Turtle and Mink are two disabled cats who just arrived from the Humane Society of Gallatin Valley in Bozeman, Montana. 

Turtle is a blind tortie who is already quite adept at finding her way around her new digs.  She is a gentle, sweet soul who is a little ... let's be honest here ... on the plump side.  Although she's shy about raising her head up -- I could never quite get the photo I wanted to show you her eyes -- she purred for me as she lay curled up in that bed.

Mink is a true 'wobbler' ... very unsteady on his feet from some kind of neurological disorder.  He kind of lurches across the floor.  We're not sure if it's cerebellar hypoplasia, like our cat Wobbles, or some other issue.  But like Wobbles, he has learned to compensate by using a wide stance with his front legs.  He also extends his tail rigidly outwards and shifts it around to help balance himself.  Mink is quite the character ... very affectionate and playful.  I had to keep picking him up and moving him away because every time I'd try to take a photo of Turtle, he'd lurch right into the frame and then lean against me.  (Warning:  attention hog.)

He and Turtle were together at the Bozeman shelter, and they'll be together in the same cottage here, too.  Turtle will hiss at Mink occasionally when he gets right next to her, but only as a gentle reminder ... "don't fall on me!"

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A note to everyone who wrote in with concerns about Bonnie and Clyde's return to Texas:  The lady who owns Bonnie and Clyde loves them a lot.  They will not end up in a regular shelter.  She had searched for a year to find a place for them before contacting us.  We just weren't the right place because they weren't disabled.  She'll make sure Bonnie and Clyde get the best care.  If we weren't convinced of that, we wouldn't have sent them back.  We know they'll be just fine.

Rainbow On The Ranch

One of the many beautiful things about where we live is the sheer number of rainbows we get to enjoy seeing.  Our valley is officially named 'Kleinschmidt Flat,' after the earliest settlers in the 1800's, but Alayne and I have often thought it should be renamed 'Rainbow Flat.' 

For some reason -- we're not sure why -- we have an incredible number of rainbows out here.  And not just one at at time, but often two.

Today we had a series of rain squalls come through the valley ... the sky would grow dark, the wind would come roaring in, the rain would come pelting down ... and then 20 minutes later, the squall moves through and the sun comes out. 

At about 4 p.m. this afternoon, we saw this rainbow out the back door, looking to the east.  If you click on the photo for a larger image, you may be able to see the second companion rainbow to the right ... it's faint, but coming out of the clump of cottonwoods at the right side of the photo.  By the time I grabbed the camera the light had already shifted enough that the twin rainbow had started to fade.

The main rainbow had one end (what you see here) in our hayfield, and the other end was about 1/4 mile to the north of us in our neighbor's alfalfa field.  We could see the entire glowing rainbow, from end to end.  Of course, the animals seemed singularly unimpressed by nature's glory; they were more interested in the approaching dinner hour.

Bonnie and Clyde Go Back To Texas

You may remember reading about two cats named Bonnie and Clyde who arrived here on October 9th from Austin, Texas.  We had agreed to take them because we'd been told the cats were 'disabled' and had cerebellar hypoplasia, making them wobbly and unbalanced on their feet. Well, after a couple of days lurking in a wide-open crate (see photo), the two cats finally ventured out ... and we learned they weren't disabled at all!

These two cats could run, jump, climb, and do anything a normal cat could do, with no sign of wobbling or any disability whatsoever. They leaped onto window sills, jumped through the open window into the outdoor enclosure, and raced across the cat house floor.

We were incredulous that anyone would have described Bonnie and Clyde as 'disabled.'  We gathered it was a handy way to get them a permanent spot in a nice sanctuary, rather than take them to a local shelter.  Since we have so few open spots and save our very limited room for truly disabled animals, we told Bonnie and Clyde's owner that we would either send the cats back to her, or trade them to another shelter that had genuinely disabled cats.  The owner initially said she didn't want us to send them back.

So last weekend we arranged a trade with the Humane Society of Gallatin Valley, a no-kill shelter run by wonderful folks in Bozeman, Montana.  They have a blind cat named Turtle and a true 'wobbler' named Mink they were excited to send us in exchange for taking Bonnie and Clyde.

Then, yesterday, the owner said she wanted them back after all, so we made travel arrangements for Bonnie and Clyde to fly back to Austin today.  A few hours after making the reservations, the owner contacted us again, now saying she wanted us to send them instead to another shelter in Arizona.  Fed up at that point, we declined to do so and went ahead with Bonnie and Clyde's planned trip.  So I took them to the airport this afternoon, and as I post this, the two cats should have arrived safely in Texas.

Of course, the Bozeman folks had been so gracious about offering to take Bonnie and Clyde, and they were so delighted with the idea of their two disabled cats coming to the sanctuary, that we decided to go ahead and take Turtle and Mink anyway.  Our go-everywhere volunteer, Jerry Black, is heading to Bozeman tomorrow to pick up Turtle and Mink and bring them to the ranch.

The irony here is that because these two non-disabled cats, Bonnie and Clyde, made a brief stop at the sanctuary, two disabled cats will now have a new home here.  In the end, this seemed to work out alright, didn't it?