Editorial

My Life With a Dog

MY DOG DOESN’T LIFT HIS LEG when he pees. This is because he had a condition known as “cryptorchidism,” otherwise known as “retained testicles.” His balls never descended from his body cavity into his scrotum. But it is entirely a moot point now because he was neutered when he was around six months old. As far as I can tell, he doesn’t have a scrotum, either, or it is greatly diminished.

My theory is that male dogs lift a leg to pee because if they squatted, like females, they’d bump their scrotums on the ground, and they do not like that. My dog, having no scrotum to get in the way, squats.

My dog’s veterinarian laughs at that idea. He says male dogs lift their legs to mark their territories farther and higher than any other dog. Makes sense to me, but then why don’t female dogs do the same thing? Female dogs also mark their territories, you know.

In any case, it is amusing to see him make this funny little semi-squatting stance when he pees. It isn’t at all like the full-out, butt-nearly-to-the-ground position that female dogs take. It is more like he is genuflecting. The back is straight. His tail is nearly perpendicular to the ground. You could unfurl a flag from it.

How he persuades me to let him outside to pee, or the other thing, is also amusing—or aggravating—depending upon the time of day or night, especially if I am sleeping. He’ll quietly pad into the bedroom (he likes to sleep on the sofa) and sit perfectly still at the foot of my bed, wide-eyed, staring at me, not making a sound. It’s exactly like those understated, yet creepy scenes in modern Japanese horror movies where the ghost hovers near the edge of bed, staring down and nothing else. I can feel his eyes on the back of my head. Although I didn’t hear or see him arrive, I know he’s there, even if I had been asleep. I can’t ignore him. I’ve tried. He intensifies the stare. So I get up and let him out.

The kitchen door opens out onto a fully fenced-in backyard. You’d think this would be convenient for the both of us, especially on cold evenings. But especially on cold evenings, he’ll lodge himself on the door stoop, halfway in and halfway out, so I cannot close the kitchen door, and the freezing air billows in. Or during the summer, the hot, humid, bug-choked air billows in. In either case, he won’t let me close the door unless I go outside with him. He weighs almost one hundred pounds (45 kilos), and it is pure muscle.

Once outside, he knows that I know he’s got to empty the tanks, and won’t desert him lest risk playing out this entire formality once again from scratch, so he’ll casually walk the perimeter of the yard a couple of times, like he’s on sentry duty which, in a way, he is, and then complete his business. I have to pick up after him which I think pleases him enormously. He’ll step a meter or two away from the dump site and watch me patronizingly while I groggily attempt to collect everything in a plastic bag. I’m certain he gets quite a kick out of it.

But that’s OK. I have to keep the yard clean. Like I said, it is entirely fenced-in. The lawn is neatly mowed. There’s a big water bucket on the premises. And many tennis balls, ropes, squeakers, and other dog toys are littered about. I don’t have anything growing that I care for, like flowers, vegetables, shrubbery, or fruit trees. So my backyard is a welcome haven for other neighborhood dogs. This is exactly the way I planned it. My dog’s friends can come over and play any hour of the day or night. So I’m not locked into a scheduled walking routine or trips to a dog park. My backyard is the neighborhood dog park.

My dog likes to play rough. Curiously, his concept of rough play is getting beaten up rather than doing any beating, although he is quite capable of that. It’s amusing to watch. At first he will goad the other dog into chasing him, or wrestling with him. His favorite method is to headbutt the other dog. Or he will grab a toy and push it into the other dog’s muzzle. This often initiates a game of tug-of-war, which he enjoys. But his favorite maneuver is to throw himself at the other dog’s feet, on his back, showing his fangs, wagging his tail furiously. “Play with me! Play with me! Look! I’m wide open!” Tempted to the breaking point, the other dog will pin my dog down like a professional wrestler and act very alpha. At which time my dog executes a barrel roll and dashes off, the other dog surprised but in hot pursuit.

This technique works time and time again with his good friend, Maia, another black Labrador, a female. They are both neutered, so sex is not a factor. Maia’s yard includes a small garage. The two love to run laps around the garage, like it’s the Indy 500. On wet days they can spin-out taking the corners, collide into each other. They will also try to fake each other out. One of the dogs is motoring at breakneck speed in a clockwise direction. The chasing dog will come screeching to a halt, turn, and continue in a counterclockwise direction. Like in a Looney Tunes cartoon. I can only imagine what must be going on in their canine craniums to work out the logistics of this battle plan. Certainly it must involve an advanced knowledge of geometry, as well as the ability to strategize. If dogs had opposable thumbs, they’d be dangerous.

[Arana, at left, at play. His official AKC registration name is Humehill’s Arana Bellotto.]

Back in his own yard, my dog has established a playbook for dealing with the three major species of intruders: birds, squirrels, and cats.

Birds can fly. At the slightest provocation, movement from a perceived predator, loud noise, birds are aloft in an instant where no self-respecting dog would attempt to go. My dog realizes this. Unless the bird is within centimeters of his nose, he’ll ignore it. A too-close flyby and he’ll venture a snap at the perpetrator, but otherwise he’ll stare darkly at the feathered enemy, probably dreaming of a meal should the visitor wander within pouncing distance.

Squirrels, on the other hand, are fair game if they are anywhere within the yard. This even includes on the fence or up a tree. Once there was a fat squirrel resting on the fence along the left side of the yard when I let my dog outside. The squirrel wasn’t paying any attention. My dog was at the fence in an instant. The squirrel jumped its own length and then some, teetering on the fence when it came down. My dog was well aware of this. The squirrel barely managed to hang on as it made a mad dash down the fence toward a large maple tree, my dog at its heels all the way. The squirrel leaped for a low-hanging branch. My dog leaped for the squirrel. The squirrel managed to catch the branch with its front paw, and was dangling from it for a few long seconds. My dog couldn’t believe his luck and frantically waited for the squirrel to lose its grip and fall. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen. The squirrel somehow managed to recover, grab more of the branch, and scampered off to the safety of the canopy.

But this experience has taught my dog that squirrels can be caught. Birds, probably not.

Cats are anathema to my dog and he will go to Herculean lengths to catch them. And I have to go to extraordinary lengths to prevent that. We have a feral cat problem in this neighborhood; they are stubborn, aggressive beasts. I do not want my dog to tangle with them. But this is my dog’s yard!

Several years ago I humanely trapped five cats, which controlled the problem for a long time. I don’t particularly like calling Animal Control, though. Unless the culprit is a kitten, there is usually only one outcome. Trap, neuter, release programs are the better way to deal with feral cats. There are a couple of cat fanciers on my street who honestly believe they are doing the right thing by leaving food out for these animals. I’ve spoken with them in the past about being a colony manager. I’ve even offered to contribute funds toward the project. But nothing happened. They continued to enable cat procreation. Feral cats in heat on a midsummer’s night are hardly a dream; they sound like bloody murder. So I have to resort to Havahart traps to protect my property and my dog.

I'm not sure what my dog would do if he caught a bird or a squirrel. Labradors are prized for their retrieving abilities in duck hunting. Labradors also have a reputation for eating nearly anything. My dog is a champion counter-surfer. He will use his front paws as leverage on the edge of the counter, leap up and forward, and snatch things off the countertop. Often before I realize what he is doing. If I'm drying dishes and I momentarily put the towel down on the counter—it's gone. He's ready to play a few rounds of keepaway. If I mop up a food spill with a paper towel and don't immediately throw it away—it's gone, turned into confetti and strewn all over the floor.

Once I was making macaroni and cheese, the lazy boxed variety. You need to remove the envelope of cheese before you empty the pasta into boiling water. You may have already figured out that I placed the envelope of cheese on the counter. Gone! I didn't even see him jump. I wasn't aware of what he'd done until I reached for the cheese packet and got nothing but air. I looked around, at best hoping to find a dog-mauled envelope, at worst a mess of torn paper and spilled powder. The envelope was nowhere to be found. Apparently, he'd eaten the entire thing. I wasn't overly concerned because the cheese certainly couldn't hurt him, and the envelope was made of thin paper. He's eaten paper before.

Watching him poop out shreds of cheese-infused paper over the next two days was almost worth the loss of the dinner. Besides, I still had the al dente pasta and enough ingredients in the refrigerator to make macaroni and cheese from scratch. Probably better than the boxed variety.

This Editorial has focused on the science of animal behavior lest any of you cynical readers believe I have merely been writing about my pet dog.

Sam Bellotto Jr.