[Dailydrool] Ignorant dog owners in my family

[Elizabeth Lindsey]

I got an e-mail from my in-laws in Arkansas today that's upset me.  
Because I know the Drool community will understand, I'm sharing it  
here. Maybe someone can offer me a different perspective for looking  
at this situation, or words of wisdom when it comes to talking with  
my in-laws about this. They're the absolute best in-laws I could ever  
have, which makes this more difficult.

Back in early spring I took our Elsinore and young Charlie (that  
helps make this somewhat basset related) to visit my in-laws for a  
few days. They live on the back forty of the back forty. You take a  
winding dirt road to get to their driveway, which is about half a  
mile of more dirt road. Usually I don't take our hounds because of  
the ticks, but I figured it was still cold enough for them to be  
sluggish. The hounds love being there with all those good country  
smells they don't get here in the city.

My mother-in-law likes to keep chickens, guineas, and peacocks. They  
roam the property unrestrained, and she collects the eggs and the  
assorted fowl try to keep the tick population around the house down.  
She's not a dog person. Many dogs frighten her, though, fortunately,  
not my hounds. My father-in-law likes to have a dog or two to serve  
as an alarm system when he's working in his garden at the other end  
of the property and at night around the house, though almost all of  
the alarms that are sounded are for visiting wildlife. Neither of my  
in-laws really actually interact with the dogs. The dogs are sort of  
a peripheral thing, not an integral part of life for my in-laws.

They get their dogs from the county pound. The first dog, Sally, has  
been a real prize. She's a golden lab mixed with something else, but  
mostly she looks like a lab with a bobbed tail. She has a delightful  
disposition and a winning smile, but more importantly--in the  
fourteen years she's been there, she has never touched a chicken. I  
suspect she's never even considered doing so. The other dogs haven't  
been anywhere near as saintly. Over the years, my in-laws have  
brought home a number of pound dogs and then taken them right back to  
the pound because they've killed a chicken. You kill fowl on that  
property and you're packed into the truck and driven off just about  
as soon as your crime's been discovered.

My in-laws come from a dog-owning culture that views dogs as tools  
and as expendable. If a dog doesn't work out or gets hit by a car or  
something, then oh, well. You can always get another to replace it. I  
have a very hard time with this because my dog-owning culture is  
pretty much the other extreme; dogs are individuals, companions with  
which to share all parts of life (including the parts that happen  
inside the house), and each one is unique and irreplaceable.

When I was there this spring, I met their newest dog. JJ is probably  
a beagle-terrier-shepherd mix of some kind. She's petite and compact  
and dainty and adorable. She also longs to be someone's lap dog,  
because every time I sat down, she wanted to be in my lap or at least  
pressed close to me. She's a wonderful snuggler. Unfortunately for  
her, my in-laws don't feel dogs belong in the house, and they're not  
interested in spending time patting or talking to their dogs. I spent  
some time enjoying JJ while I was there, even working with her on  
some basic training, which she picked up on quickly (she loves the  
treats part of training). My in-laws saw her as a replacement for the  
now-ancient Sally, a replacement that Sally could train in the ways  
of staying on the property, sounding the alarm, and leaving the fowl  
alone.

Can you see where this is going?

Today my mother-in-law wrote to tell me that JJ can't leave the  
chickens alone. She's not killing them, but it sounds as if she's  
holding them down and licking them. But that's still pestering the  
chickens, and the chickens always come first. So my mother-in-law  
said they took JJ back to the pound, assuring me that the pound makes  
sure the dogs go to good homes. Yeah, right. Like hers? I don't know  
if the pound is a kill shelter or not. She also asked if maybe my  
mother would like the dog (I'm guessing my in-laws would return for  
JJ and hold her until I could get there?).

So now unhappy thoughts and unanswerable questions are running  
through my head. Why do my in-laws continue to set these dogs up for  
failure by giving them close exposure to fowl? Why don't they just  
keep chickens and give up on having dogs since the countless number  
of dogs they've adopted over the last thirteen years or so keep  
working out so very, very well (that's sarcasm)? Why can't they see  
that they're asking the impossible of about 90 percent of the dogs  
out there? Why can't they be enlightened and educated dog owners  
who'll allow their dogs to be so much more than just a crude alarm  
system? Why can't they see the cost to the dogs they adopt and then  
take back (sometimes in the same day, sometimes dogs who come with  
the baggage of abuse that my in-laws are sooooo unequipped to help a  
dog overcome)?

I would love to bring JJ home for us, but we can't afford to keep  
three. I don't want to start down the slippery slope of trying to  
care for more dogs than we have money for and then everyone  
experiencing a decline in living standards. I could press her on my  
mother, but at the same time I remain unconvinced that my mother is  
up for the full-time responsibility of a dog, and I suspect JJ isn't  
housebroken and would need basic obedience work. Fostering would be  
an option, but she's a real mixed-breed, so I can't think of a rescue  
group that would want to take her on.

Mostly I wish my in-laws weren't allowed to adopt any more dogs, that  
the pound would refuse to send another dog home with them. And I wish  
I hadn't allowed myself to grow so fond of the latest one they've  
just failed.

Elizabeth