He is a mix of American Bulldog and some type of terrier…no one really knows. In fact, no one really knows exactly what day of what month he was born on, all we know is that he was born sometime in August or September of 2003. I adopted him in April 2004 from our local Humane Society. By then he had been in 2 homes and 2 foster homes. He was only 7-8 months old.
Powder owes his life to a kind woman, not his owner, who called the Humane Society president as she was transporting him to the place where he was to be put to death, and begged the Humane Society to take him in. Apparently he was given up by his original family, taken in by a neighbor lady of theirs, and then turned in by her because he kept jumping the fence in her backyard trying to get back to his original home. Irregardless of the reasons, the fact remains that he was adopted twice, and abandoned twice, by people who he trusted and who betrayed his trust. His life would have ended, not because he was sick or old or hurt, but simply because no one wanted him. After being literally snatched from death he went to his first foster home, and then to a second foster home because the kind foster caregiver in the first place already had 15 dogs living at her house, some hers, but most in foster care.
His picture was in the local paper as the "Pet of The Week", a feature the Humane Society uses to try and adopt out abandoned or unwanted pets. I saw that face and something just tugged at my heart, and I knew he was destined to come into my life.
As you can imagine, Powder had some trust issues and some separation anxiety at first. I came home one night from a meeting to find he'd broken out of his confined area and wreaked havoc in my living room – blinds torn down from a window, VCR tapes all over the place, a big hole in the bottom skirting of my loveseat. I freaked out and called the Humane Society president and told her to come get him...I could not deal with destructiveness and I was turning him back in to her. She came over, calmed me down, and suggested confining him to a crate while I was gone. That crate, and Lisa's calm reassurance and reasoning, saved my relationship with my dog. I will be grateful to her for as long as I live.
People, please think long and hard before you buy or adopt an animal. Consider it as carefully as you do when thinking of having a child. That precious animal is a living, breathing thing that is going to be with you for its entire lifetime, dependent on you for its physical and emotional needs, and its very survival. And please remember that animals, like children, don't come into the world knowing the rules. They need to be trained, taught manners, and taught what is acceptable behavior and what is not. If you have any doubt that you can provide a loving stable home for an animal, please don't pursue it.
And please don't buy a dog from a pet store or online. Maybe not all pet stores or online sites get their dogs from puppy mills, but most of them do. They have to in order to keep up with demand. And as long as there is a profit to be made, puppy mills will stay in business and animals will continue to suffer. If you are unfamiliar with or uneducated about puppy mills, do some online research sometime, and what you learn will horrify you. As many loving animals as there are, abused and abandoned every year, that need homes - there is NO EXCUSE for keeping pet shops and online sites that rely on puppy mills in business. States are beginning to crack down on puppy mills, and eventually I hope to see them outlawed. https://community.hsus.org/humane/notice-description.tcl?newsletter_id=10730554
My Powder is 3½ years old now and I no longer have to confine him to his crate when I'm not home. He is such a blessing in my life...my joy, companion and best friend. Everyone who meets him eventually falls in love with him. On cold nights he sleeps with me, with his little body pressed up against mine for warmth. He's such a clown too...sometimes he "gets a bee up his butt" and tears around the house at 100 miles an hour, making me almost split my sides laughing.
He is generally a happy and friendly little guy, but he's still nervous and shy around people he doesn't know, particularly men, or in unfamiliar situations. Unfortunately, I can't undo the emotional damage done to him when he was a puppy, but I can and do love him and give him a stable home and try to make up a little for his difficult beginning. Whenever I think that I almost gave up on him, it cuts to my heart like a knife. He makes me laugh, comforts me when I'm down or sick, and I wouldn't give him up for a million dollars. I love you, Powder!!
Powder owes his life to a kind woman, not his owner, who called the Humane Society president as she was transporting him to the place where he was to be put to death, and begged the Humane Society to take him in. Apparently he was given up by his original family, taken in by a neighbor lady of theirs, and then turned in by her because he kept jumping the fence in her backyard trying to get back to his original home. Irregardless of the reasons, the fact remains that he was adopted twice, and abandoned twice, by people who he trusted and who betrayed his trust. His life would have ended, not because he was sick or old or hurt, but simply because no one wanted him. After being literally snatched from death he went to his first foster home, and then to a second foster home because the kind foster caregiver in the first place already had 15 dogs living at her house, some hers, but most in foster care.
His picture was in the local paper as the "Pet of The Week", a feature the Humane Society uses to try and adopt out abandoned or unwanted pets. I saw that face and something just tugged at my heart, and I knew he was destined to come into my life.
As you can imagine, Powder had some trust issues and some separation anxiety at first. I came home one night from a meeting to find he'd broken out of his confined area and wreaked havoc in my living room – blinds torn down from a window, VCR tapes all over the place, a big hole in the bottom skirting of my loveseat. I freaked out and called the Humane Society president and told her to come get him...I could not deal with destructiveness and I was turning him back in to her. She came over, calmed me down, and suggested confining him to a crate while I was gone. That crate, and Lisa's calm reassurance and reasoning, saved my relationship with my dog. I will be grateful to her for as long as I live.
People, please think long and hard before you buy or adopt an animal. Consider it as carefully as you do when thinking of having a child. That precious animal is a living, breathing thing that is going to be with you for its entire lifetime, dependent on you for its physical and emotional needs, and its very survival. And please remember that animals, like children, don't come into the world knowing the rules. They need to be trained, taught manners, and taught what is acceptable behavior and what is not. If you have any doubt that you can provide a loving stable home for an animal, please don't pursue it.
And please don't buy a dog from a pet store or online. Maybe not all pet stores or online sites get their dogs from puppy mills, but most of them do. They have to in order to keep up with demand. And as long as there is a profit to be made, puppy mills will stay in business and animals will continue to suffer. If you are unfamiliar with or uneducated about puppy mills, do some online research sometime, and what you learn will horrify you. As many loving animals as there are, abused and abandoned every year, that need homes - there is NO EXCUSE for keeping pet shops and online sites that rely on puppy mills in business. States are beginning to crack down on puppy mills, and eventually I hope to see them outlawed. https://community.hsus.org/humane/notice-description.tcl?newsletter_id=10730554
My Powder is 3½ years old now and I no longer have to confine him to his crate when I'm not home. He is such a blessing in my life...my joy, companion and best friend. Everyone who meets him eventually falls in love with him. On cold nights he sleeps with me, with his little body pressed up against mine for warmth. He's such a clown too...sometimes he "gets a bee up his butt" and tears around the house at 100 miles an hour, making me almost split my sides laughing.
He is generally a happy and friendly little guy, but he's still nervous and shy around people he doesn't know, particularly men, or in unfamiliar situations. Unfortunately, I can't undo the emotional damage done to him when he was a puppy, but I can and do love him and give him a stable home and try to make up a little for his difficult beginning. Whenever I think that I almost gave up on him, it cuts to my heart like a knife. He makes me laugh, comforts me when I'm down or sick, and I wouldn't give him up for a million dollars. I love you, Powder!!
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