On our way up one of our favorite trails, the dogs bolted to go check out their favorite woodrat nest...or so I thought. After not hearing their bells jingling for about 30 seconds I called them back. Nothing. I wasn't worried...that wood rat nest is a hard thing to pull them off of. So I kept walking and suddenly I hear Holly bark. Shit! Holly only barks at wildlife she's trying to catch...and catch it she did.
I gave Danee her emergency recall and out she bolted from the woods COVERED
in yellow skunk oil...seriously, her whole face was yellow! I
quickly leashed her up while doing this interesting little dance to keep her from
rubbing her face on my pants.
Then called Holly...who's the harder one to call off wildlife...but out of the woods pops the skunk, right in front of me. It takes a few hopping steps towards me that said "You want a piece of this too?!". No, I DID NOT and I ran up trail away from it. I see Holly behind the skunk, and being the obsessively idiot dog I know her to be, stays on the skunk. She was COVERED in skunk spray...seriously, almost dripping! The poor skunk, having used up all it's emergency maneuvers, it was now out of spray. But Holly wasn't going to be detered like any NORMAL dog...oh no...she was pissed and was going to kill that skunk for daring to spray her like that.
After barking in it's face for the thousandth time, the skunk made a move to run and Holly went in for the grab. But the skunk grabbed too...Holly now has it by the side of the neck, and the skunk has her by the face! I dragged poor Danee into the woods with me...all the while she's trying to stay back and get the hell away from that skunk. The 4 of us danced around the woods for what seemed like minutes until I was finally able to grab Holly by her harness. I wasn't reaching in there to get bitten too, so I had to give her a kick in the head to get her to drop the skunk.
Fortunately for the skunk, I don't think Holly had a good hold as it ran off pretty quickly. I hope it survived okay.
If we were closer to home I would have made the dogs walk home. But alas, we were not, so I had to load up 2 nasty dogs into my poor car. An hour later, after doing a quick cleaning of their faces and checking on Holly's wounds, we were off to the vet for a rabies booster, antibiotics and some eye goo for Danee. I don't think I need to tell you that the vet didn't actually let us into the building...we smelled really bad.
Holly's wounds weren't too bad, just a bite on her muzzle and some scratches under both eyes. She's lucky the poor skunk didn't scratch her eyes up. I wasn't sure if Danee had any contact with the skunk, but we found some recent scratches under her chin so she got treated the same as Holly; both received a rabies booster and antibiotics. Holly's face was pretty swollen, complete with roman nose and fat lips. That was 3 days ago and she's already looking much much better.
Three days and 3 bathes later, and we're not smelling much better...neither is my car.
Danee learned a valuable lesson...don't follow Holly, and stay away from those skunks. I'd like to say that Holly learned something valuable too...but I'm guessing the only thing Holly learned was that if she's gonna get the chance to kill the skunk for daring to spray her, she'll just need to be faster. Sigh.
Then called Holly...who's the harder one to call off wildlife...but out of the woods pops the skunk, right in front of me. It takes a few hopping steps towards me that said "You want a piece of this too?!". No, I DID NOT and I ran up trail away from it. I see Holly behind the skunk, and being the obsessively idiot dog I know her to be, stays on the skunk. She was COVERED in skunk spray...seriously, almost dripping! The poor skunk, having used up all it's emergency maneuvers, it was now out of spray. But Holly wasn't going to be detered like any NORMAL dog...oh no...she was pissed and was going to kill that skunk for daring to spray her like that.
After barking in it's face for the thousandth time, the skunk made a move to run and Holly went in for the grab. But the skunk grabbed too...Holly now has it by the side of the neck, and the skunk has her by the face! I dragged poor Danee into the woods with me...all the while she's trying to stay back and get the hell away from that skunk. The 4 of us danced around the woods for what seemed like minutes until I was finally able to grab Holly by her harness. I wasn't reaching in there to get bitten too, so I had to give her a kick in the head to get her to drop the skunk.
Fortunately for the skunk, I don't think Holly had a good hold as it ran off pretty quickly. I hope it survived okay.
If we were closer to home I would have made the dogs walk home. But alas, we were not, so I had to load up 2 nasty dogs into my poor car. An hour later, after doing a quick cleaning of their faces and checking on Holly's wounds, we were off to the vet for a rabies booster, antibiotics and some eye goo for Danee. I don't think I need to tell you that the vet didn't actually let us into the building...we smelled really bad.
Holly's wounds weren't too bad, just a bite on her muzzle and some scratches under both eyes. She's lucky the poor skunk didn't scratch her eyes up. I wasn't sure if Danee had any contact with the skunk, but we found some recent scratches under her chin so she got treated the same as Holly; both received a rabies booster and antibiotics. Holly's face was pretty swollen, complete with roman nose and fat lips. That was 3 days ago and she's already looking much much better.
Three days and 3 bathes later, and we're not smelling much better...neither is my car.
Danee learned a valuable lesson...don't follow Holly, and stay away from those skunks. I'd like to say that Holly learned something valuable too...but I'm guessing the only thing Holly learned was that if she's gonna get the chance to kill the skunk for daring to spray her, she'll just need to be faster. Sigh.
No comments:
Post a Comment