Donations Needed for Sir

We need donations for Sir if anyone can spare a few dollars. He is still not doing well, and we believe that one of the few floating bone chips in his jaw is trying to come through his gum. If we can get him comfortable today he will go to the vet tomorrow. If not, we will be making an emergency vet visit. We hope it won't be a final vet visit, but if it's time, then we will help him across the bridge with all the love in our hearts.
Because of the immediacy of the visit we are asking for PayPal donations to pughollow@gmail.com.

Holiday Recipe One - Kara's Bourbon Pecan Pie and Cream Cheese pastry

Cream Cheese Pie crust: Make 1 day in advance

• 1 1/3 cups of all purpose flour (if you have Celiac substitute arrowroot flour)
•  8 tbsp salted sweet cream butter, cubed and frozen
• 1/8 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp vanilla 
• 4 oz cream cheese cut into 4 pieces
• 1 1/2 tbsp cold water
• 1 1/2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

 Using a food processor blend the flour, and baking powder, for 10 seconds. Add the cream cheese and process until the flour looks mealy. Add the vanilla, cold water and vinegar. Process again to mix. Add the butter. Process until the butter has been rendered to pea size at largest.

Remove the mixture from the food processor and knead until becomes a homogeneous single ball and is slightly stretchy.  Form the ball into a disk and refrigerate overnight.

Lay the ball out onto a flat floured surface and use a rolling pin to roll the disk into a large enough circle to slightly more than cover the inside of your pie tin. Trim the crust to fit the pie pan, and flute the edges lightly.

Bourbon Pecan Pie

This recipe makes a very rich, custard style pecan pie with a slightly darker flavor than most. If you can get your hands on fresh pecans this recipe will complement them extremely well. 

• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 4 tablespoons butter, melted
• 1/4 cup molasses (1/2 cup dark Karo can be substituted if you don't like molasses)
• 3 large eggs, beaten
• 1 1/2 cups pecan halves
• 2 tablespoons good quality bourbon

Preheat the oven to 375°.

In a bowl, stir together the sugar and melted butter until well mixed. Add eggs, molasses, bourbon and pecans and mix until all pecans are well coated. Pour mixture into an unbaked pie shell, and place on a heavy-duty cookie sheet. 

To prevent over browning of the pie crust, cover the edges with aluminum foil by following the instructions here: lay out a sheet of aluminum foil slightly larger than the diameter of the pie tin. Fold the aluminum foil into quarters and cut an arc out of the middle. Unfold the aluminum foil (the center will be missing in a circle) and place over the pie. Fold the foil over the edges.
Bake for 15 minutes. Remove the foil.

Lower the oven temperature to 350°, and continue to bake for an additional 25 minutes, or until pie is set.

Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack or trivet.

October State of the Dogs

Alright... starting something new. We're going to do a monthly update on our dogs who are under treatment or watch for various health conditions. It's a long list but here it is:

Sir - chihuahua - Still stumping along. He has good days and bad but the good still outnumber the bad. Organ function is good.

Trundle - yorkie - Still blind, but her personality is blossoming. Lots of playing and pissy hedgehog noises. She's got a couple of lumps that we're keeping an eye on, but they seem to be maintaining. Organ function is good.

Joe - chihuahua - His heart is doing ok for what it is. We've had to start him on 37.5 mg of Lasix per day due to fluid buildup in his abdomen. It's come down a lot but not as much as we'd like. He may have an enlarged liver. He's still proud that he managed to pinch Liz.

Julia Fang - chihuahua - Nothing wrong with her except her eyes and her age. She's still opinionated and stinky, and loving life.

Sneaser - chihuahua - Still doing well. He's maintaining on 25 mg of Lasix. He's going through his twice yearly cough as the seasons change, but we will set him right with cough syrup and allergy medication. Organ function is good.

Sophie -Frenchie x dachshund - Still doing great, and still under watch and wait for a lump on her side. No re-occurrence of the mammary cancer so that's great.

Hugh - pug - We just discovered a lump on his side that we need to get checked out. He had a growth on his scrotum but there's no regrowth there.

Cleo - pug - She's gaining weight, and doing well. Her bladder infections have subsided due to a combination of diet and medication. She doesn't appear to have any masses in her bladder. Still wobbly but that won't ever go away.

Hope - chug - the mass on her leg is regrowing. We are keeping an eye on it so that we can remove it when needed. No other masses have come up.

Lovepug - pug - We are still giving her tacrolimus for her eyes. It's expensive but the only thing that keeps her eyes lubricated. She's still got opinions and a lot of sass.

Newman - pug - We are still watching several masses on Newman, but they don't seem to be growing. He hasn't has a seizure in a while and his appetite is good.

Lopug - pug - We need to get Lopug started on enzymes. We did a run of metronidazole but it didn't clear his loose poop up, so the only thing it could be is a pancreatic insufficiency. Otherwise he's doing well.

Peaches -greyhound mix - We are still medicating Peaches for her severe anxiety and monitoring her for the lump on her chest. It's a fatty tumor and while it is growing slowly it isn't impeding anything so we aren't worried about it at this time.

Cubby - chihuahua - still hypoglycemic but his organs are working well, which is good.

Fiona - pug - Her heart hasn't enlarged any further and she's not having problems with her deviated trachea. If she'd stop snarling with Tank and Patience we'd be 100%.

Harry - chihuahua - Still treating him for his allergies. His hair is growing back as the grass dies.

Artie -chihuahua mix - still treating him for his irritable bowel.

Rotten, Mattias, Remy, Mika - chihuahua - still doing well. Matty and Remy have made huge strides in conquering their anxiety as poster dogs.

Faith - chug - doing well. Her eye hasn't seems very steady and not inclined to fall out recently.

Ivan - Pom x pug - healthy and happy

Fizgig - pug - Being treated for allergies. Otherwise healthy.

It's been a while since I've posted an update. Life around the Hollow got busy of the summer with adoption events and other such things that tend to happen more during the summertime.  And things quieted down on the medical front for a bit.

As usually happens though things have swung back the other way and now we have a run of medical bills to cover.

This month was Sneaser's 6 month blood work. He has to have regular checks of his renal function to ensure that his heart medication isn't hurting his kidneys.

At the same time Byron developed an aural hematoma. An aural hematoma is when the ear gets bruised and the blood causes it to puff up, pulling the skin away from the cartilage.  His ear looked like a sopapilla.  This requires minor surgery to drain the ear and re-attach the skin to the cartilage with small stitches.

 

Just after that, Lopug injured his eyes. He scratched one cornea, causing a traumatic ulceration, and developed non-ulcerative keratitis (an inflammation of the cornea) in the other.  So off to the vet he went to have his ulcerated eye sewn shut. 

 

Within the next week we will have to have Cleo the pug in to the vet for blood work and diagnostics to determine why she has started not thriving. She doesn't feel well and she's failing to gain needed weight back.

All totaled we are looking at at least $500 in vet bills for this round, so once again we are reaching out to our awesome supporters for help with the sudden rush of vet bills. If the dogs would spread them out over a couple of months it would work much better, but they like to do things in groups!

You can donate via mail, or paypal via the address and links on our website.
You can also donate via Gofundme.

Be aware that our paypal link and our Gofundme account take a percentage of the donation in fees. If you want to be sure that 100% of your donation reaches us, you can donate via paypal to pughollow@gmail.com and choose "send money to friends and family".

Any donations above our current need for vet bills will go into the Hospice fund for future vet visits.  You know we'll have plenty more of those!

 Aaaannnd here's Vinnie!  This little man is a cup of sugar with a tablespoon of spice. A package of sweet cuddly lap warmer wrapped up in playful, spunky Chihuahua attitude.

And the best part?  After consulting with our vet, we've determined that Vinnie is adoptable!

He's had a spinal cord injury that has impacted the use of one of his right front leg, but it doesn't slow him down, and it isn't getting any worse.  He may need a sock or boot to help keep him from rubbing his foot raw, as he does occasionally knuckle under on his bad foot.

Because of the injury and his size we'd prefer he go to a home without children or larger dogs. However a home with another friendly Chi or Chi-sized dog would be possible.

Vin is neutered, heartworm negative and up to date on shots.  He picked up a little bit of a cough from the vet's office, so it will be a week before he's ready to place out, but after that he's ready to go. His adoption fee is $45

If you're interested in adopting Vinnie, email us at pughollow@gmail.com!

Random science lesson of the day... One of the things that you learn when you're involved in plant science is the "disease triangle".

After a while you also realize it applies to pets and humans as well. Whether it's West Nile, Parvo, fleas, ticks, heartworms.... There are three factors that contribute to an outbreak of disease or pests/parasites. You have to have the pathogen or pest, the host (and a vector if the disease is transmitted by something other than the host) and a favorable environment. They all have to be present in the right amount or you don't have the problem. Outside of that magical combination you never reach critical mass, and you don't have the disease or the pest never becomes an issue. So the key to controlling an outbreak or infestation is to alter the contributing factors to break the triangle.

This year our magical combo has been perfect for fleas. We can't get rid of the hosts and our control over the environment is limited so we have to focus our integrated pest management strategies on the pest itself, and what little environmental control we do have via lots of lawn mowing, flea treatments for the house and dogs, frequent bedding washes, and diatomaceous earth where we can use it. It requires a holistic plan of attack with coordinated application of the various control methods to get ahead and stay ahead of the problem.
Something to think about the next time you have a disease or pest problem in your home or garden....

Pawcircle for Sir

Pawcircle for Sir please. Thursday he developed a little bit of an eye irritation. Friday morning we started him on gentamicin drops.

Today he's at the vet for an emergency visit, as his eye has worsened sharply in the last 24 hours. The vet will sedate him, evaluate the eye, and proceed from there. From what I could see with him fighting me this morning, my guess is that we will likely end up removing the eye. Not a big thing as he's blind already.

The rapid worsening of what started out as a minor eye irritation isn't unusual for an old dog with a depressed immune system (he was on antibiotics for a respiratory infection too) but it isn't what we hope for. 

If he makes it through everything alright we're considering changing his name to "Sir Lucky of Pug Hollow"... What else do you call a one eyed, jawless, ancient Chihuahua?

If you'd like to contribute to Sir's surgery (which will be probably around $150-$175) you can donate via http://www.pughollowsanctuary.org/donate.html

Disaster Prep with Dogs: Part 4 -- Planning PAST the Storm.

This year we're adding another post to the Disaster Prep with Dogs series: Planning PAST the Storm.

We've covered identification, emergency kits, and evacuation plans, but we haven't yet covered the after part of the equation.

And believe me, we know from experience that sometimes it's the after part of the equation that presents the most difficulty from the standpoint of logistics.

You've successfully weathered whatever storm or natural disaster caused you to evacuate or seek shelter in the first place. Now what?

If your home has taken sufficient damage to be uninhabitable, where will you go? If the damage is reparable you may be able to go home relatively soon, but if you have to start over with construction, it could be months or as much as a year until you can return. 

How will you get to shelter? If your car has been damaged or totaled you may need transportation. Most rental cars specify no pets in the rental agreement.

Obviously it's not practical to have a house already rented that meets your needs, but you can at least plan some things.

Could a friend offer a place to stay or a vehicle for transport? Family? Where will your dogs stay if you end up having to stay somewhere that will not allow dogs?  How will you provide the necessary food and accessories?

In the case of Pug Hollow, we had 22 dogs and no place to keep them. Our family was 5 hours away, and our house and all our fencing and outbuildings were gone. So we were scrambling to find a place to keep the dogs until we could transport them to our family for fostering.

Now we have a plan for getting the dogs to a safe place as soon as possible.

 

Hugh wants to know if anyone can help us out....

Both the Hollow's electric mower and the riding mower are toast and mowing is essential to keeping the fleas, ticks and snakes under control around the Sanctuary grounds, which total about 2.5 to 3 acres of yard to mow.

If anyone in the OKC metro or within a 70ish mile radius of Prague, OK has any connections on inexpensive mowers they could share or if you have an older but reliable mower you might be willing to make a Tax deductible donation of we will pick it up and provide you a charitable donation receipt and a Pug Hollow Calendar when they come out in October.
The Wrinkle is that we need electric start on a gas mower. I am not able to pull start a mower due to the injury to my upper back and shoulder. :(

If you want to contribute funds... donations can be made via paypal gift to pughollow@gmail.com or mailed to Pug Hollow Sanctuary, PO Box 244, Prague OK 74864.  
We will not under any circumstance touch donations that have been or will be made to our medical fund to replace the lawnmower, so please be sure to let us know it's mower money.

Disaster Prep with Dogs: Part 3 - Evacuation Plans and Training

Wrangling pets to safety can be one of the most difficult parts of a pet disaster prep plan.  For that reason we suggest a little pre-planning and training.

With horses or large livestock, your evacuation plan will vary depending on the threat. For a storm, sometimes the only thing you can do is let them run in the largest pasture you can. Some people recommend opening your pasture gate to let them get away, but this puts your horse at risk for getting hit by vehicles on the road. If you have a tiny pasture and no other options I could see doing this in desperation, but it is a risk.  I would not keep my horses in the barn if a tornado was heading my way. 
In case of fire or flood, have your horse well trained to trailer. A horse that will enter and exit a trailer readily is a huge benefit to an evacuation. Keep your trailer on your truck if you think evacuation is a possiblity.

For cats we suggest a portable crate that can be readily grabbed and transported. Crate the cat before you absolutely need to do so to avoid having to chase and or struggle with the cat.

For Dogs:

1. Know where your safe zone is, the best way to get there and how long it will take you to do so. This could be in your house, in a cellar or other storm shelter, at a neighbor's house if you're talking about a storm or outside the danger zone if you're talking about flood or fire.

2. Know what you can store in your safe zone. Look at the area. Consider the number of occupants it will need to hold, and assess additional storage capacity. Can you store emergency supplies there or is it a warm bodies only space?

3. Train your dog for the space they'll occupy and how you're going to get there.
           First and foremost, work on your dog's off leash recall.  A dog who will return to you if they get loose is worth their weight in gold, even if it's just for the cookie in your hand. 
           If your evacuation plan calls for your dog to be crated, make sure they are comfortable with the crate, and enter it easily on command.
           If your plan calls for your dog to descend stairs into a cellar, storm shelter or basement, train them to do so calmly and on command. Even if you first have to carry the dog down the stairs, be sure to give them your chosen command and give them a treat. Continue to do so until they are comfortable entering and exiting the safe space.  We use "Underground!" to train our dogs to descend into the cellar. They receive treats when they are down the stairs and safely in their crates.
           If your plan calls for your dog to walk on a leash, train them to do so, both in a calm area and in a noisy, hectic, high traffic environment. 
           If your plan calls for your dog to ride in a vehicle, train them to load on command. Take them for car rides with positive consequences, such as a park visit or a food reward. We like the "load up" command to get our dogs in the van.

So many times you hear "I just didn't have time to get the dogs out..."  How much easier would it be if you could open a couple of doors, yell a command and have the dog do the rest?

4. Pre-plan the storm. If you know you have the possibility of a severe storm, get your dog harnessed and have the leash readily at hand. If you are crating the dog in a cellar, basement or other shelter, consider doing so before the storm gets to your area.  The easiest and surest way to get your dog to safety is to do it before it becomes an emergency situation.  If a wildfire is in your area, consider asking someone outside the area to watch your dog until the fire is out.

Help Pug Hollow get over the financial hill that we’re facing by donating a bag or can of dog food.
The more dog food we collect, the longer we will be able to keep operating.

We currently feed:
Ol’ Roy High Protein or comparable
4 Health Small Bites
Diamond Naturals Beef and Rice
Pedigree ground canned

Any size bag of any of the dog foods, or any number or size of cans of Pedigree will be so helpful.
We will make arrangements for pickup within the OKC metro area.

Contact Kara at pughollow@gmail.com to arrange a donation.

As much as we absolutely hate to do so, we are going to have to actively seek placement for some of our residents.

We have a handful of dogs who are physically healthy, but who needed a stable environment to recover emotionally. We haven't sought placement for them previously, because we didn't want to disrupt their lives.

However, the last two years our donations have been too low and our medical expenses have been too high. We have had to cover thousands of dollars in medical expenses from our personal pockets, and we are drained.

If we don't actively seek placement (adoption or permanent foster) for these dogs we won't have the resources to continue to provide an adequate standard of care for the dogs who still really need our care.

If you are interested in additional information on any of the dogs pictured below contact us at pughollow@gmail.com

Odysseus - 4 year old neutered male Italian Greyhound/Dachshund mix

Pippa - 4 year old spayed female lab mix - Needs special home

Tank & Patience - 4 year old bonded pair. Spayed. Chihuahua/Pug and Chihuahua/Dachshund

Zebulon - 4 year old Great Dane/Shepherd mix, neutered

The Tail of Sir's Dental....

Today's vet visit was one that we left both feeling happy and wanting to go on a headhunt.

Stinky Sir the ancient Chi got to go in for a dental today. He lost 6 of his 8 teeth, but overall did well. He's home, getting LOTS of extra cuddles and enjoying a dinner of pureed Edgar rice.

If you just want the happy part, stop here.
__________________________________________________
We had x-rays done that revealed some really shocking things about Sir, and his history. The last set of x-rays we had done revealed Sir's formerly broken jaw and the missing part of his lower jaw bone. Those were taken with him laying on his back.

This set were taken laying on his side, and we found that he's lost quite a bit more jawbone over the two years since his last set of films. A portion of his remaining jaw may need to be removed if the bone doesn't fill back in a bit.

That wasn't the most ?!?!! worthy part of the film. At some point before he came to live with us Sir suffered a severely fractured skull (the fractures appear on both sides of his head, clustered on the side of his skull with extension to the ocular socket on one side), separation of his spinal column just below his skull and a break in his neck at the C6 and C7 vertebrae, resulting in those vertebrae fusing together. Everything is long since healed, except the separation, and none of it slows him down. We'll have to be careful of his jaw and the spinal separation though... Both could break easily and in a very bad way.

The worst part? Someone had to have done it to him somehow, intentionally or through negligence. The skull fractures are the result of pressure being applied to both sides of the skull. Being hit by a car in a manner that would have created those injures would have killed him. It makes me wish I knew who his previous owners were so I could..... discuss....... the issue with them.

Our vet's comment? "I really don't see how he's alive and thriving... but he's one of your dogs, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised."

Mr. Sir... you may have had a hard life, but we hope we're making up for it now

Roses for Rescue

Our medical fund is almost completely depleted after a rough end to 2014 and a rough beginning to 2015. 

At the end of 2014 we had two mass removals on two of our younger senior pugs. 

Then to begin 2015 we had two of our very old Chihuahuas hospitalized. Mr. Tibbs was hospitalized over New Years, and passed away on the 2nd of January. Frances was hospitalized the 16th of January and passed away the next day.

 Going into the end of January we are now looking at two "must get done" dentals for two of our other very old Chihuahuas and a mass removal on one of our relatively young mixed breeds.

And so, as we're all coming up to Valentine's day, we invite you to join Pug Hollow Sanctuary for a fun crafting afternoon. Learn to make beautiful paper roses that you can keep or give to someone special, and help us put some coins back in the puggy bank!

Click on the flyer to register via pay-pal, or email us with the color rose you would like to make, and pay at the door.  Seats are limited to 18 attendees so register quickly! They're filling up fast!

Frances

Frances left us today.

She was scheduled to be spayed on Wednesday but got sick and started not wanting to eat. Thursday we made an emergency vet visit with her because her abdomen was distended. Friday we diagnosed a uterine infection causing fluid build up in her abdomen and lungs, and a spay was scheduled for Monday to give us time to get some antibiotics in her before subjecting her to the stress of a surgery. 
Friday night we were back at the vet again after hours. Her cervix had closed and her condition had gotten exponentially worse.  We hospitalized her with plans to do surgery Saturday if she made it through the night..

She made it through the night but passed on before we could get her to surgery.

We deal with dogs crossing the bridge on a regular basis as a hospice, but ones like Francie and Tibbs are especially hard. There's always the feeling that, if you had caught it sooner, or if you had treated it more aggressively, you could have changed the outcome.  We act on the best judgement we can make but that doesn't preclude second guessing ourselves.


We will miss Francie-pants light in our lives, but we rejoice that she's free of pain and illness now.

We loved you Frances. Rest well.

The Pug Hollow Beyond the Bridge

Past the Rainbow Bridge, way down at the end of Wrinkle Road, in the Snoring Hills near Curlytail Creek, lies a ranch called Pug Hollow. When you cross the gate, follow the lane on down through the rolling green hills and groves of trees until you see the house. It's a sprawling white house with a wrap-around porch and a big old tree shading the front steps.

The temperature is always perfect, and the door is always open (as evidenced by the pugs and other dogs going in and out and in and out and...). We have sun, rain, snow or fog depending on how we feel that day, but it's never muddy and there aren't any fleas, ticks or mosquitoes around. The house is self cleaning; the beds infinitely expandable and there's always food in the cupboard and biscuits in the cookie jar. (Just remember, everyone gets 2!)

Watch before you sit down or take a step, all our dogs are as spry and healthy as a dog should be and you never know where one might turn up. Especially if you have something tasty in hand.

Now don't think that Pug Hollow is the only house you can find at the end of Snoring Road. There are lots of folk around here. Depending on the time of day and the way we feel, we're within walking distance of them all... or we're not as the case may be.

So build yourself a house in the Wrinkle Hills and join the rest of us who intend to retire to Pug Hollow.

picture by Joel Abroad. taken from https://www.flickr.com/photos/40295335@N00/8710357251/

Mr. Tibbs "aka Admiral Tibbitz" 1999-2015

We let Tibbs go today. He travels on across the Bridge with all the love we could wrap around him, to be met by Edgar and the rest of the Horde who have gone on before. They'll take him to the Hollow beyond the Bridge and we'll join him there when our own journey is done.

He rallied yesterday with aggressive fluid therapy and antibiotics, but his kidneys continued to fail.

This morning his creatinine was pushing the upper limits of the reference range, his BUN was so high that the vet's equipment could no longer read the value and his phosphorus was over three times the normal. His white blood cell count had climbed as well from 30,000 to over 45,000 (Normal upper level is around 15,000).  It was obvious when we visited him that he was growing weaker, and that without the narcotics he would be in great pain. It was obviously time to let him go, and we held him while he went.

We love you, you crusty old Chihuahua. The house is emptier without you.

To those who donated to his vet care, we give our deepest thanks. Your help meant that the only thing left to cover was the cost of helping him across the bridge and his cremation.

Mr. Tibbs "aka Admiral Tibbitz" 1999-2015