Ludo meets a celebrity!

Sorry I haven't updated this blog for years. Ludo is all grown up now so there's not a lot of news to report. Her behaviour has improved as she's got older and we all love her to bits.

This weekend we went on a celebratory walk on the South Downs and Ben Fogle was there. (I only know him from Crufts, but he's done lots of adventure programmes too). I got him to pose with Ludo and here is the result:

Cute huh? And Ben Fogle's not bad either!

Ludo on holiday

This year we took Ludo on holiday with us for the first time. We went to North Devon, chosen specially because there were lots of beaches that allowed dogs.

Unfortunately it rained a lot. But Ludo didn't care! She has only been on a beach once before and never in the sea. Here she is on her first day at Westward Ho!


The next day we went to Appledore, which has lots of rocks. Isabel went crabbing, Ludo went climbing. We also met a lovely Dalmatian who wore Ludo out racing around!


Ludo wasn't really very keen on the sea. She viewed it with suspicion, and whenever the tide came towards her, she backed off warily. She LOVED leaping around on the sand though. Action shot:


There is a German Shepherd coming so Ludo has laid down in her 'pounce' position. Unfortunately she is now lying in about half an inch of water mixed with sand. She needed a bath when we got home!

On the last day we went to Woolacombe and I finally managed to lure Ludo into the sea (by putting her on a lead, running in when the tide was out, and holding on tight as it came back in)! She wasn't keen but she put up with it, and eventually got quite used to padding about in the shallows.

It was a doggy good week for Ludo!

Golden Ludo, Superdog

The moment of truth has arrived - this Tuesday was Ludo's GOLD Good Citizen exam!
We're relocating soon and I was desperate for her to take her Gold under the supervision of my lovely dog trainers. We've been going every week for a year, and Ludo passed her Bronze and Silver under their supervision.

Ludo could do everything except 'stop at a distance', where you put her into a sit-stay, walk all the way across the hall, then call her to you. When she's about half way, you tell her to stop and lie down. It is actually quite difficult for a big dog to come to a standstill on a slippy floor, but we worked hard and she could do it (at least some of the time) before the test.

Tuesday 15 July was the big day. The test included walking past a bowl of food on a loose lead without touching it, a two minute down-stay, walking to heel at different speeds (offlead), stopping at a distance, plus an outdoor leadwalk across roads and the usual vet checks etc. She also did a down-stay for four and a half minutes with me out of the room without moving from the spot. SHE PASSED!!!

I think Ludo is the first Estrela ever to pass the Gold GC Award. I don't know of any others that have it. I was told that Estrelas are not good at obedience but Ludo was a complete star and passed with flying colours!


The photo is of Karen Denton, me, Karin Sweryda and of course Ludo. If anyone reading this is interested, Best Pals Dog Training is in Belbroughton (near Stourbridge and Kidderminster) and you can contact Karen on 07968 413543. I highly recommend them - they've performed miracles with Ludo and I! I made them some of my homemade dog biscuits as a parting gift - Ludo and I are really going to miss them.


I'm just so proud of Ludo especially considering she's not quite 18 months old. Here she is at home later that day, chilling out with her fancy certificate:


P.S. I've just added some photos to my previous post if you're interested!

Doggie hysterectomy

Just two days after Ludo passed her silver exam, we had her spayed at the vets. Spaying dogs prevents all sorts of horrible (and potentially fatal) illnesses, plus it stops them from coming into season, plus there is a note on Ludo's pedigree saying Not For Breeding because her colouring is non-standard. All in all, it made sense.

However. Ludo had a pretty rough time of it. She went in weighing 48kg and came out weighing 44kg. She lost a lot of blood because her blood wasn't clotting properly, and as a result the operation took twice as long as anticipated. She went in at 8.45am and I didn't pick her up until 7.15pm. She was very sleepy and wobbly on her feet, which was to be expected because the anaesthetic hadn't worn off yet. She also had a huge 6" scar and all her belly fur had been shaved off.


The next day, Ludo was no better. She managed some chicken and drank some water, but all she wanted to do was sleep. The day after - more of the same. The next day she had her post-op checkup and they said she was fine and that she was probably just lethargic because she'd lost so much blood. The vet gave us lungworm treatment in case that had caused the blood clotting problem.


Ludo wasn't allowed out for walks for 10 days, but to be honest she really wasn't interested. She found it an effort to struggle to her feet. She hated the cone she had to wear at night to stop her messing with her stitches. She was still sleeping for about 20 hours a day.

I began to wonder if I had lost my Ludo forever. I let her sit on the sofa with me because I felt so sorry for her.


Finally, she had the stitches out. Still not back to normal, but the vet said to go back to her usual routine of walks and training etc, and see how she was.

It has been four weeks since she had her stitches out and she is FINALLY back to normal. Her fur is growing back, she's full of beans and she's regained most of the weight she lost. I'm so relieved!

SILVER!

Yesterday Ludo took her Silver Good Citizen exam. This follows on from the Bronze she did in December. It's a scheme run by the Kennel Club.

We've been working towards this for the last six months at dog training class. The hardest parts were the 2 minute down-stay, the walking past food on a loose lead without begging/stealing and the road-walking on a loose lead.

Ludo passed with flying colours! She's been doing the down-stay really well lately and didn't move a muscle. She didn't pull towards the food at all. The most nerve-wracking part of the test was the road-walk because Ludo does still pull on the lead.

I took her to the place where the test is held on Monday and did the walk eight times. I got up at 6am yesterday and took her for a good run in the park to wear her out. When I arrived to do the test, we did the walk three more times. Then the examiner was late, so I let her off lead with the other dogs doing the silver and they wore each other out playing on the field.

When it finally came to the road walk part of the test, Ludo was tired and compliant and pulled it off beautifully. SO WE PASSED!!!!

I don't know of any other Estrelas who have passed the Silver, so we are very proud of her.
Well done Ludo!

Ludo in the snow!

A couple of weeks ago we had snow. It only lasted for a morning but it's the first real snow we've had since Ludo came home over a year ago.

At first, she was a bit frightened of it. I had to open the patio door three times before she gingerly stepped outside, and then she just stood there, sniffing tentatively and looking bemused.


Once she got her confidence up she happily padded around the garden and ate snow off the plants. She seemed to be quite enjoying herself! She is a Mountain dog after all!

Unfortunately it had all vanished by the time we went for her afternoon walk.

Un chien

Recently Isabel and I went to Paris. It was very interesting to see the way Parisiens treat their dogs!

We saw lots of small dogs, like bichon frise and terriers. The biggest dog we saw was a smallish Labrador. We did meet a Hovavart but it lived on the outskirts of the city. Most people in Paris live in an apartments without gardens so it would be hard to cope with a large dog.

One day when we were out and about, I saw a special area in the park that had been set aside for dogs to do their business in. There was even a specially constructed wooden sign:

On a different day we were walking along the street and I saw this specially constructed dog poo bin. I was extremely impressed that not only was there a poo bag dispenser but that it was actually full of bags and being used by passing dog owners!

I fear that if the council set up something similar in our local park, it would only be a matter of days before all the bags were pulled out and strewn across the grass...

CRUFTS

Last weekend we went to Crufts! Ludo's breeder is the Estrela Mountain Dog Association secretary and we'd put our names down for 'Discover Dogs' months ago.


We got entrance tickets that we could use on all four days, which was totally brilliant. Matt, Isabel and I went on the Saturday to have a good look round, then I went again on the Sunday to do the Discover Dogs bit with Ludo. Discover Dogs is the section of Crufts where you can walk round and meet all the different breeds - there were about 180 different breeds. Because Estrelas are a rare breed it is a lot easier to get a chance to go than if you own a spaniel or a labrador! I learned that there are only about 270 Estrela Mountain Dogs in the UK.

We arrived at 8.40am and went straight to the Estrela stand. The male dog was already there, his name was Charlie and he was the biggest Estrela I've ever seen. He was absolutely magnificent. Ludo is quite large for a bitch but Charlie was absolutely enormous - he weighed almost 10 1/2 stone!!


You can see Ludo standing next to Charlie here. She only just came up to his shoulders! Charlie could and did jump up with his front paws on the side of the pen you can see on the left hand side. Standing up he was 6'4" tall! You can see from the photo that his face is much blacker than Ludo's - that's because she's a blue fawn which is less desirable (from the breed standard point of view) although personally I rather like it!

We had a wonderful day talking to loads and loads of people about the breed and our dogs. It was really busy, especially around lunchtime. The most common comments were, "She's so soft!" and "They look just like Leonbergers". Leo's are a different breed which are better known in the UK (there are around 2000 of them) and they DO look similar - although they have very different ancestry.


By the end of the day, Ludo was really really tired. In the morning she was inside the pen, but by late afternoon she kept lying down and refusing to get up to be stroked and photographed. So I let her lie down outside the pen, and she enjoyed lots of fuss and bellyrubs.


We had a wonderful day and didn't leave until after 5pm, by which time we were both exhausted! Ludo slept like a log that night and most of the next day as well. Hopefully we will get to go again next year!

Cani-X

I had never heard of Cani-X (cross-country running for canines and their owners) until my mother saw this article in the newspaper and sent it to me.

Intrigued, I went and had a look at their website. It looked like a lot of fun, and what's more there was a race on at Westonbirt Arboretum! Westonbirt is 1.5 hours drive from here and it's a lovely place, and there was a Dog Day on as well, so we decided to go.

I didn't discover until later that this would involve getting up at 6.10am on a Sunday morning! However we hauled ourselves out of bed and off down the M5 today. When we arrived there were a LOT of people milling around with a huge array of different breeds. We didn't see any other Estrelas though! Apparently there were 150 entrants today.


I collected my number and put Ludo on her car harness (most people had specialised harnesses that make it easy for their dogs to pull them along). When it was our turn, we got in line and we were off! We did the 2.5km race, which is only just over a mile. It was through lovely forest and woodland and the course was clearly marked so we didn't get lost.

Ludo did decide to stop for a toilet break at one point (typical!) but luckily I had brought a poo bag along just in case! We were overtaken by a couple of people but overall I thought we did quite well. Towards the end Ludo was flagging a bit - she was running behind me rather than in front of me like most of the other dogs - but she made it.

Here we are just before we crossed the finish line! My conclusion is that while Ludo didn't mind it, she didn't exactly enjoy it either. I probably would have had more success with a dog that had more stamina and energy - there were lots of huskies running! So I think this will be her first and last race - next time I will borrow somebody else's dog and do the 5km race instead!

After that we went over to the Dog Days section and had a look round all the stalls. We had some tea and watched an agility demonstration. Then Matt took Ludo off to the have-a-go agility and she got her chance in the ring. She was none-too-impressed with that either! Admittedly, the agility equipment was a bit small for her - there was no way she was going through the tunnel!!


There is a large breed agility club in Leicestershire that has specially adapted equipment, but to be honest, all of this stuff is a bit energetic for Ludo. She was bred to sit around on mountaintops, not race around like a maniac. She is just a bit too sedentary for all this frenzied activity.

Tonight, Ludo has collapsed, exhausted on the hall floor for a nice long nap:



Next stop.... CRUFTS!!!

Happy Birthday Ludo!

Today is Ludo's first birthday and we celebrated it in style!

Yesterday she had a pre-birthday bath. The main reason for this is she has finally finished being in season and is going back to dog training this week, so I wanted to wash off any remaining scent as it would be a distraction for the male dogs in the class.


Matt had never given Ludo a bath before, so I let him have a turn. As you can see, Ludo was none too impressed as usual!

Isabel and I made a big fuss of Ludo this morning. She had a card from us (made by Isabel) and one from her breeder, and I had bought her a present which Izzy wrapped up for her. The present was a large juicy bone which kept her busy for most of the morning!


This afternoon we took Ludo for her first walk for three weeks. Originally I was going to walk her on the roads when she was in season, but after speaking to my dog trainer I decided it would be safer just to keep her home. She is a heavy, powerful dog and if she had been really keen to mate with a dog on the other side of the road, bad things might have happened.

So anyway, today she got her freedom back. Here's a picture of her with Isabel. As you can see, she's certainly a big girl now!


After our walk in the park it was time for Ludo's birthday cake! I had found a recipe online and baked this specially for Ludo. I don't think we'll be having any! She enjoyed it very much!! We even lit the candle and sang Happy Birthday!


In case you're interested, here's the recipe:

150g plain flour (I used wholemeal)
1.5 tsp baking powder
110g soft butter
120ml corn oil
1 jar Cow & Gate Beef Stroganoff baby food
4 eggs
85g pack of beef jerky
Plain yoghurt
Bakers Allsorts, to decorate.

Preheat oven to 170 degrees C. Grease a loaf tin. Cream butter until smooth. Add corn oil, baby food and eggs. Mix until smooth. Mix flour and baking powder and beat until smooth. Crumble the beef jerky into the batter. Poor batter into loaf pan and bake for 1 hour 20 minutes. Cool on a wire rack and then ice with plain yoghurt. Decorate with Allsorts or whatever you want. Store in the fridge.

Our garden is a swamp

Before we got Ludo, I knew that the hormones in dog wee (especially female dog wee) could damage lawns. I didn't really care much about our lawn, so I wasn't that worried.

However, I rather underestimated just how much damage it would do. We moved into our new house on 25th May 2007.

14 June 2007
Telltale brown patches are appearing on the left hand side, but generally quite a pleasant garden.

30 July 2007
Hmm, some of those brown patches seem to be getting quite big. But I'm sure they'll grow back, right? It's natural selection - only the strongest grass survives, then it will spread its seed around and it will all grow back. Right?

23 November 2007
Hmm, things are not looking so good. Those picnics in the garden I was thinking of having next summer... so not happening. It IS starting to resemble a rugby pitch rather than a garden. Nevermind, maybe we can just plant a bit of grass seed in the gaps, it's sure to grow back then... right?

15 January 2008
It's a swamp.
Just straight up, a swamp. It taps for black mana. You can't quite tell from the photo, but there are actual puddles, in the middle of what used to be our lawn. Ludo sometimes drinks from them just to mock us.

Pea shingle is the only way forward now.

In Season

Ludo is eleven months and one week old and today she has started coming into season. I was worried that I wouldn't realise, but there was no mistaking the treatment she got from male dogs in the park today. Nope, she's definitely in season all right! It has provoked all sorts of difficult questions from Isabel (aged 6) such as, "But HOW does Ludo have puppies?" and "Why is the boy dog climbing on Ludo's bottom?"

So I am going to have to walk Ludo on the lead for the next couple of weeks, which is a bit annoying as she loves her off-lead runs. Then in a few more months we can have her spayed. That won't be cheap as our vets costs are based on weight, and Ludo weighs seven and a half stone (more than Victoria Beckham!)

SHE DID IT!!!

Today Ludo passed her Bronze Good Citizen exam!

We have been going to training classes for the past four months and today was the exam. There were various parts including walking nicely through a door, weaving in and out of other dogs without pulling on the lead, having her collar removed and not running off etc, but the hardest part for Ludo was the 1 minute down-stay. I had to put her lead down and step five paces back.

In practice, Ludo had only been managing this about one in every three times, but we decided to have a crack at the exam anyway. I did a lot of extra practice with her this week, and got up early and took her for a walk in the hope that she would be calm.

However, seconds before the down stay, she started chasing her tail and biting her lead. NOT the sign of a calm dog. She had only been down for a few seconds when she got up and started biting her lead.

I said, "Ludo, I'm begging you, DOWN" and she lay down again. Then she rolled onto her side, and stuck her legs in the air as if to get a belly rub. I ignored her. The clock ticked. Eventually everyone else got to one minute, and they all held for an extra ten seconds or so until Ludo got there too. It was plain sailing after that!


Here she is posing with her certificate and rosette tonight. Sorry the photo isn't great - I still haven't sorted out getting pics off my camera so I took it with my phone.

We start the Silver Good Citizen classes in January. Wish us luck!

Things Ludo Has Eaten/Chewed/Destroyed Recently

• Isabel's birthday cake
  
• A huge hole in the lino in the hall
  
• A few pens
  
• Isabel's plastic toy Prince Charming

• Isabel's Alice band
  
• A card from the postman stating where our parcel was

• A chunk of wallpaper off the wall in the hall
  
• Two more cards from the postman
  
• A postcard and fridge magnet, snatched off the fridge while we were out

Slightly longer ago:

• Matt's mobile phone charger
  
• A wooden coaster
  
• A My Little Pony - she chewed its legs off, and all its hair was all sodden and matted - nice!
  
• Many, many more pens
  

Ludo's Leap

Last week, just a few days after the birthday cake incident, I took Ludo to the local park. She was playing happily with a couple of Labradors we often bump into, when their owner suggested we walk around the lake.

I agreed and we set off. I normally put Ludo on the lead when we walk round the lake, as it is quite narrow and there are often children/other dogs about. But as the two Labs were off the lead, I let her be. All went well until we were turning the final corner and one of the Labs went snuffling off in the bushes. Ludo followed her in. I called Ludo back but she ignored me. I peered into the bushes - just in time to see Ludo's tail vanish!

I hurtled into the bushes, crashing through to the place where I last saw her standing. It wasn't until I got there that I realised she had reached the top of a 4 ft wall marking the boundary of the park. And then she had jumped off it!!

Ludo was standing on the pavement, RIGHT NEXT to a really busy road, at lunchtime. Cars were hurtling past. I leapt off the wall, coat tails flailing, and walked towards her, shouting, "STAY" in my most deadly-serious voice. Thankfully, she stayed, and I managed to get hold of her and put the lead on, heart thumping in my ears.

That's the last time she ever goes off-lead by the lake. I nearly had a heart attack!

The Case of the Disappearing Birthday Cake

Imagine the scene.... I have spent hours crafting a beautiful chocolate cake for my daughter's birthday. I have lovingly covered it in butter icing and left it sitting proudly on its plate on the kitchen worktop, while I go upstairs to read my daughter's bedtime story.

When I come downstairs, I am horrified to discover that a big chunk is missing from the cake. Additionally, the butter icing has been licked clean all around the sides of the cake. A very, very guilty-looking Ludo is nearby.

Matt was supposed to be watching Ludo, but was playing on the computer instead. He said he heard lapping sounds, but thought Ludo was lapping water from her bowl. Hmmm.

Luckily, the cake was salvageable. I had been intending to cover the cake in jellybeans to match the invitations, but decided to cut the whole cake into the shape of a giant jellybean. I hacked off all the bits Ludo had touched, cut the cake into a jellybean shape (cunningly disguising the rather large missing part) and then made loads more butter icing to fill in the gaps.


Then I covered it in jellybeans, swore Isabel to secrecy and all's well that ends well! I will post a photo when I sort my computer out. We were a bit worried that all the butter might have a, erm, negative effect on Ludo's bowels, but she was fine!

This weekend I was in Milton Keynes. My friend Lee-Anne and I took Ludo for a walk on Saturday morning. We were having a lovely time until we met a lady with two Staffordshire Bull Terriers. (They look like this in case you don't know the breed). Her dogs were both on leads and the lady said that one of them was friendly but the other one wasn't.

Ludo was on her lead too and she was pulling forward to sniff at them. The unfriendly one looked a bit aggressive but wasn't growling or barking. Then suddenly it lunged at Ludo. There was blood straightaway. I tugged the lead to pull Ludo back, she leapt back squealing, then hurtled off in the opposite direction. I went flying onto the path, landing on my bottom with a bump!

After a few seconds, I managed to get up and we wiped Ludo down with a tissue. The damage was pretty minor - she had a cut on the side of her nose and maybe one in her mouth too. There was lots of blood but by the time we got her home it had already stopped bleeding. The Staffie owner was very apologetic and said her dog had never done anything like that before and he was five. Ludo was a bit subdued for the rest of the day, and I have got a gigantic shiny bruise on my arse, but otherwise no harm done.

We hoped that Ludo might have learned her lesson and stop sticking her snout in when other dogs are clearly unfriendly, but she has gone back to her usual over-friendly ways already!

I think I was more shocked than she was! I was really glad I didn't have Isabel with me, really glad that Ludo was on a lead, and most of all relieved that the damage was so minor.

The Estrela Club Show

I've been meaning to do a post about this for ages... sorry for the delay! Unfortunately my computer blew up recently so there won't be any photos for a while. Edit: Pictures have now been added!

At the end of September we went to the Estrela Club Show in Reading. It is a dog show/meeting for people with Estrela Mountain Dogs from all around the country. You can read all about it on the EMDA website.



Ludo was entered in four categories and came 2nd twice and 3rd twice! You can see her results on the above link - her official Kennel Club name is Sturtmoor Marona. Sturtmoor is the name of our breeders kennels - and as you can see, a Sturtmoor dog also won Best In Show, hooray! I have got a photograph of the rosettes Ludo won which are proudly displayed in our kitchen, which I will add later.

We had great fun although neither Matt or I really knew what we were doing in the ring and Ludo was certainly not the best behaved dog there! Nevertheless we had a wonderful day and it was lovely to see Ludo's brother and sisters - five out of six from the litter were there.


Another wonderful surprise was that we got to see the one-eyed Estrela that we first met at Discover Dogs at Crufts when were searching for a breed. It was this beautiful dog that first drew us to the breed and eventually led to us getting Ludo so it was fabulous to see him again. He still looks absolutely magnificent. There are some photos of him and the other dogs at the show on my Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alicey/ (Search for Estrela or Ludo to see many more pictures!)


All in all, a brilliant day out, and of course Ludo thought it was the best day ever!

A visit to kennels!

We've been on holiday recently and Ludo spent nine days in kennels. She hadn't been to kennels before, but I was sure she would be fine because she's used to sleeping in a crate and she loves other dogs so would probably relish the company.

What I didn't expect is that we would all miss her so much. We mentioned her daily, even in Greece where she would've been utterly miserable in the 35 degree heat. I even phoned the kennels using my precious Euro phonecard to check she was doing okay. (Of course they said she was!)

When I collected her, she wasn't as exuberant as I was expecting. Perhaps she hadn't forgiven me for leaving her... Matt and Isabel got the same kind of reaction, so I guess we were all in the doghouse! The kennels staff commented, "She likes a bit of fuss, doesn't she?" and "She doesn't bark much," both fair -- that's our Ludo!

The good news is that she is completely better now. By the time I collected her she was back on her usual diet and looking like she'd regained a lot of her lost weight. Her adult coat is coming through properly now, and the kennels gave her a bath (and whoever did it probably got a free bath themselves!) Here's what she looked like the next day when I gave her back her freedom at the park:


MUCH better I'm sure you'll agree! It was really funny because she had just had a small run at the kennels and hadn't been walked 'properly' - so when I took her out she was exhausted after 20 minutes! Just look at that tongue!

Doggy diarrhoea

Recently Ludo has been ill. She's had a nasty case of diarrhoea, including one particularly horrible episode in her crate. I won't go into details.

I have dealt with all sorts of excretions from my daughter, but somehow dealing with the dog versions is a whole new kind of vile.

Ludo has been to the vet this week and has had a course of prebiotics. She has been enjoying a delicious diet of hand-cooked chicken and basmati rice, and my fingers are firmly crossed that she will be better soon.

She is looking a bit thin, although when I had her weighed at the vets she was 36.5kg, which is coming up to six stone. Yikes! Hopefully she will look a bit better once she's feeling better. She is still her usual self, leaping about with a vengeance!


Here is the latest picture of her, taken today.

Growth bumps

I found out something interesting the other day from Marcia, Ludo's breeder.

The bumps on the front of Ludo's front legs are 'growth bumps'. Oncethey go completely flat, she will be fully grown. Estrelas tend to stop growing upwards between 8 and 12 months of age and just fill out. You can see the growth bumps in this picture (click on it for a bigger version):


The photo was taken on Ludo's first trip to the seaside! Unfortunately it was Weston-Super-Mare, so she didn't get to go in the sea, but she had a great time running around on the sand.

My my, what big teeth you have my dear!

When Ludo first came home, she had tiny needle-like teeth. Here is a picture (you will need to click on it to enlarge it so you can see her tiny teeth). They stayed like that for ages, all through the Biting Everything That Moved stage, but in the last month or so they have been falling out.


The weird thing is, I haven't actually seen any of them around. They don't seem to be falling out in her food bowl, or on the carpet, or on her chew toys. Her adult teeth were coming through and her baby teeth were disappearing, but where to?

Now that's what I call proper teeth! Apparently she probably swallowed them, or lost them in the garden. When we saw Ludo's breeder last weekend, she looked at her teeth and she had both her baby and adult canines. She told me that if they hadn't fallen out by the time she was 6 and a half months, I should get the vet to pull out the baby canines.

The very next time I looked, just a couple of days later, the baby canines had disappeared!

Ludo is very affable about letting me open her mouth and peer inside (that's how I got these pictures). And thankfully, she has pretty much completely stopped biting. Somebody in the park today praised her for taking a treat really gently - a lot of dogs snatch - and I felt really proud that her training is finally paying off!

Ludo Escaped!

Yesterday I came back from a walk and pushed the front door shut behind me before unloading my bags etc. I didn't think any more of it until half an hour later when Matt said, "Where's Ludo?"

Then we realised the front door was open. I must have not closed it properly. Luckily I had been out in the porch 5 minutes earlier and it wasn't open then, so Ludo couldn't have been gone for long.

Matt dashed outside, shouting, "Ludo! Ludo!" I followed him, clutching a handful of raw chicken that I was preparing for dinner. Isabel raced out after us in her socks.

Thankfully, Ludo was not even 100 yards away, standing on one of our neighbour's lawns, sniffing around. She came trotting over happily and gobbled down the chicken, then let us lead her back into the house by her collar.

I thought I was going to have a heart attack. Let's just say I am going to be MUCH more careful about closing the front door behind me in future!

Dog treats: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Since we got a dog, I have been on a mission to find THE most disgusting dog treats in the world. I don't know why but I am strangely drawn to the Freakish Shelf in the petshop where they sell barely recognisable animal parts. I think it's because I love seeing Ludo really getting into chowing down, and in order to keep her interest up, I have had to reach further and further into the realms of disgusting.

I started off buying fresh lamb's liver from the butchers and cooking it up and using it as dog's treats. But that was nowhere near vile enough, so in reverse order:

NUMBER FOUR: PIG'S EARS


You can buy these in any pet shop. They are actual pig's ears. They even look like ears. They are quite freaky, actually. When our vegan friend came to visit, she was quietly horrified, but to be honest as the pigs are being killed anyway, I figure they may as well use every last bit.

Ludo LOVES these and demolishes the entire thing in 30 minutes or less.

NUMBER THREE: DRIED LUNG

You need a special pet shop for this. I am not quite sure what animal this comes from, but any kind of dried lung is pretty vile.


Ludo is very keen on this and can swallow the smaller pieces completely within 5 minutes.

NUMBER TWO: TRIPE

This stuff is truly disgusting. Apparently it is the stomach lining of a cow, and it smells SO BAD that I had to open all the windows and close the door to Ludo's porch while she was eating it, because Isabel and I were starting to retch. In future this stuff is only going to be allowed in the garden. Truly disgusting.


Ludo loves it and ate this large piece in about 30 minutes.

NUMBER ONE: BULL'S PIZZLE

I have seen this for sale but wasn't quite sure what it was. Then I got some pizzle as a free sample when I bought her long line off Ebay. Ludo gobbled the pizzle in literally seconds. So I looked it up on Wikipedia, and as you may have guessed --- yes --- it is in fact, bull's penis. Lovely.

Here is a long and detailed article on pizzle, if you really want to know. Apparently it can also be used for whips and walking sticks! WHO KNEW?!