Ch Aragon Desert Willow JC aka Willa/Frejya

                                                            Janice and Willa/Frejya

                                                   


Willa had a rough start in finding her home. Initially Janice was to take her  however her other 2 dogs at home disagreed and she was returned hours later. It broke Janice's heart to return her but she didn't want to put the puppy at risk of being injured or killed. Laurel had expressed an interest in having an Aragon greyhound and when contacted immediately drove 2 days across the country to pick her up. Within a month of Willa leaving, one of Janice's dogs succumbed to health issues leaving with her with one older greyhound and her home open again to a puppy. However Willa was gone and happy in her new home. Janice talked long and often about "her puppy" and she and Laurel became email friends.

Janice missing "her greyhound puppy" got a puppy from a litter sired by a Helios greyhound(Sheryl Bartel)and named him Audie.

Recently Laurel's health took a turn for the worse and Willa came back to live with Janice.

Below is Janice's story: 

As many of you know I was at the birth of Willa and fell in love with her the moment I held her in my hands and saw her beautiful face. I was unable to keep her and when I returned her to Helen a large piece of my heart stayed with that wonderful puppy.

She went to a wonderful home with Laurel Drew who also loved her, gave her attention and training.

We met at Lompoc and I asked that if she were ever in a position to give her up that she consider letting me have her. 

The unexpected happened and Willa came back to join our family. I am overjoyed to have her back (and saddened that Laurel had to make that most difficult decision.). My heart is now healed. Laurel, Helen and I are co-owners. It is a pleasure to share her with so many that love her so much.

I decided to call her Frejya, (pronounced free-yah) the name I gave her when she was my puppy. It means the Queen of the beautiful Maidens in Nordic stories. She is indeed the most beautiful maiden I have ever seen!



Her conformation championship story will be in the next post!

Greyhound Pad Corns

Pad corns are painful, hard, round, raised areas on the bottom of their feet. They can affect single or multiple toes. They are seen almost exclusively in the greyhound breed. No one knows for sure why they form but most seem to cause big problems. I have heard  several theories as to what causes them to form-a viral infection, a foreign body like a splinter in the pad or a more recent theory-lack of a fat pad adjacent to the toe bone. Whatever the cause it makes walking on hard surfaces painful for the dog and tremendously affects their quality of life.

Recently I have had my third experience with pad corns. All of them have been after bandaging the foot post operatively for over a month. Echo had a chip fracture of one of her toe bones and a stretched ligament. She was put in a splint for 4 weeks and the injury healed well. Unfortunately when she came out of the splint she had a pad corn coming through the bottom of the pad.

Her father Merlin also had a pad corn develop after prolonged bandaging post op. I had it removed surgically and it came back bigger than ever. I eventually had his toe removed and that was the end of the problem. But I was lucky he never developed another pad corn.

Echo's mother Lyric developed multiple pad corns also after prolonged post op bandaging. After researching I "hulled" the corn and then placed Vit E and later Tea Tree oil to the base. I had to do this weekly to keep her sound. One day I noticed two more corns starting on the adjacent toe and shortly after that another corn popped up in another toe, all on the same foot. I was getting discouraged by this time and a friend suggest using duct tape on the corns. Rather than hulling/applying ointment etc to them I simply placed tape over the new ones again and again as the tape fell off. Suprisingly they disappeared in a short time. The first one took the longest to heal and I wondered if it was because of all the trauma it went through. It too disappeared some months later and never returned. In fact she competed in agility and earned her Excellent Jumpers and Excellent Standard after the corns resolved.

So when I saw a corn develop on Echo I only used the duct tape trick. Within weeks it was nonvisable and she too remains sound.

I have learned with my dogs the longer they have the pad corn and the more that is done to it,  the longer it will take to resolve. I am a big believer now in duct tape!!!

More New Years Weekend Agility

Whisper got her MACH2 the first day of a three day trial so it took the pressure off of us for the rest of the weekend and we had fun. Because we had accomplished our goal the remaining days courses seemed easy, fast and fun-and she earned the first two QQs towards to her MACH3. Although that isn't our goal, I just loving running agility with her and will keep going as long as she enjoys it.



I generally like Jumpers over Standard as it is faster and more technical.



Besides running Whisper at the trial I ran Echo on the first day. Although she didn't Q in either ring it was only by missing a jump in Jumpers and missing the Tire in Standard. Both mistakes are insecurity mistakes, she tried hard throughout the course to do what I asked and did all the hard parts of both courses perfectly.  Her speed is starting to increase so although we didn't Q I am still happy with her runs.