The one word of advice my mother gave me before I decided to adopt a dog was 'Whatever you do, don't get a hound'.  What did I do?  I found myself the wildest little hound I could find!  Not out of rebellion, but because he literally just melted my heart.  He was bursting with personality.  I took him out for a walk the day I met him, however, it was more or less him dragging me to where he wanted to go ... but at one point, he turned around and jumped up on me and did what I can only describe as his 'thankful, happy, big-eyed, head buck' which is more lovingly described as 'the pony' (he also trots like a pony, very funny).  I knew right then that there was no other dog like this one.  So, I went and picked him up the next day.

He sat backwards in the car on the way back - the first of many strange things he would do.  I have never seen a dog hate crows (specifically) as much as Rustie does.  He had to learn simple things like the purpose of stairs, and how to use them.  He had no idea that his name was Bart, so we re-named him Rustie to give him a fresh start.  It also took some time for him to grasp the concept of having a home, he didn't understand how to just relax and have a sense of belonging.  Rustie was always attempting to run away and hunt, in fact, I have caught him in the act of scaling a chain-link fence.

I once made the mistake of letting him off his leash at my family's farm while he was playing, because I truly thought he was occupied and would give me the time to untangle the leash without running away.  I was wrong.  To make a long story short, I found him in the middle of a group of cows howling at the top of his lungs, looking like he was having the time of his life.  I was narrowly able to get him back, by cornering him in the cow-poo pen.

This was about two years ago; I have had him since February 2006.  It took Rustie about a year to become a little bit more tame and calm, but he has always been a really friendly and silly little guy, with lots of lovable quirks.  Rustie was a fast learner with certain things, like housetraining and 'staying' when told, however, it took him about a year to learn how to 'shake-a-paw'.  His on-leash skills may never be grade A, but they continually improve (he actually makes eye contact with me now).  He is now close to 4 years old and has really taken well to the pampered lifestyle.

Rustie is quite a good looking hound, he gets lots of compliments.  He is a big ladies man, with lots of girlfriends, both human and canine.  He sure knows how to turn on the charm.  He now has a new housemate named Jersey, a mastiff mix from the SPCA Monteregie.  They are growing closer by the day, and love to celebrate walks together in a symphony of happy grunting and bolting around.  Rustie is only satisfied if we catch him to put his harness on, it is always a game.  He puts a smile on my face as soon as I walk in the door - every day, no matter how bad the day was.

So, thank you for giving Rustie the opportunity for a new life, and giving me the opportunity to share it with him.  It wasn't easy at first, but definitely more worth it than I could have imagined.

Update February '09 ...

I wanted to send in a photo of our two dogs together for "Rustie"s Happy Tails page.  Jersey is the one we adopted from SPCA Montegerie outside of Montreal about a year ago, but at the time I wrote the Happy Tail page for Rustie, I didn't have any pictures of the two via electronic version.  So, here they are in their winter jackets together giving cuddles.

Kayla

Back to Happy Tails page