What’s New

Caption: Vickie Kuhlmann, West Central rescue coordinator for the American Lhasa Apso Club, gets a snuggly kiss from “Tessa” while “Katu” looks away. Tessa has been adopted, but information about adopting 8-month-old Katu can be found at www.apsorescuecolorado.org. 

Taken from the Rally to Rescue magazine…Finding the Perfect Purebred Rescue…

Vickie Kuhlmann of Loveland, Colo., is the West Central rescue coordinator for the American Lhasa Apso Club. She is adamant about proper research and education before adoption.

“Apsos need to be groomed frequently., she says. “You either learn to properly groom them yourself or you are looking at a commitment of $25 to $40 every six weeks for the life of the dog.

“the biggest issue that we have with Apsos arriving in rescue is child issues. Fully 85 percent of our rescues have bitten, nipped, snapped or growled at a child. An ancient breed shaped by the environment and the need to survive, they are apt to issue a ‘correction’ for what they deem as improper behavior by another pack member, or child.

“Make no mistake, if an owner doesn’t assume the role of alpha, the Apso will. We never place our dogs in a house with a toddler. The high-pitched squealing and the herky-jerky movements of a young child tend to set an Apso off. We also do not recommend them for a first-time owner.”

Here I am behind the roses!

Tess in the Roses

A friend of mine, Kathy, shared this photo with me yesterday. What a great photo!

Above is the dog Katy mentioned and below is what she wrote.

Here’s the Calender Apso for June:  (His name or date is not listed).  You can tell that his “bangs” are cut, though, in between his eyes above his stop, and extending in that inverted “V”.  Maybe some over his eyes, too,  extending back from the outside edge of his eyes; hard to tell.   It also looks as though his muzzle hair is cut on a bit of an angle descending from around his mouth.  And all of his head hair blends in with his long ear hair. 

 I’m going to have to keep Zeke’s hair from draggin the ground, for sure.  If he’ll let me cut it along the lines of his sexy little body, and keep his head and muzzle hair a reasonable length, we’ll be in good shape.  Since I explained to him that it’s just simply not acceptable for Apso’s to have matted hair, and when I find a matt, we go and “remove” it immediately (if possible), he’s been much more agreeable with his brushings.  He also seems to enjoy his baths much more, especially since the weather turned hot!  He’s a wild and crazy guy!   And he seems to know how gorgeous his is (owing in no small part to the fact that we tell his how handsome he is all the time!).  Love the blog!  Katy

Still trying to get the details worked out.. I’ve added a Recent Comments to the left-hand sidebar, which will make it easy for you to see what comments have been added to the different posts. In doing that, I’ve lost the links section. While I figure out how to include both, to navigate back to the main website click here: www.FleetfireTimbers.com 

Julie pointed out that when she hits the red category at the top of each post, she’s taken to a page that looks like the bloghost’s. If you hit the same category in the left-hand sidebar, you’re taken to a page that looks like the FFT What’s New blog. I don’t know if I can customize the first scenario to look like the second. I’ll work on that too.

Avery’s official name is now Champion She Tsabo Timbers’ Magic in the Air. She was awarded 5 majors enroute and finished her title in style with a Best of Breed over her half-brother Fernando. Wow! The icing on the cake is her mother, She Tsabo Timbers’ Chianti is now a Register of Merit dam. Way to go ladies…all of you!

Zeke’s owners are Katy and Ken, both who have already commented on the blog, including that incredible story about Zeke’s warning Katy about the bear. Katy is a nationally recognized fiber artist, creator of fine contemporary art quilts and her quilts have been displayed around the country. She also paints in oil and there is a painting of Ken and Layla - one of their parrots - on the opening page to her website:http://www.katywidger.com/  You can see her quilts and painting throughout her website. Enjoy!

Whether you’re simply reading or posting, thanks to everyone for participating in the What’s New blog! I’d like to point out a few things…The categories and search part are awesome. As the blog grows, these features will be particularly useful. If you’re only interested in one topic, you can simply hit that category and be redirected to just posts in that category. To get back to the main page of What’s New, simply hit those words in the header at the top of the page.

The search feature does just that. Plug in a word and you’ll be redirected to all posts containing that word. For example, Zeke is mentioned in posts in different categories. Do a search on Zeke and up comes an intro for each of those posts.

I invite you to post about your dog, including photos. The comment feature allows you to comment on a subject that’s already been posted. It doesn’t allow you to start a new subject or to post photos. In order to do that, you’ll have to email me - LhasaLhady@aol.com - with the post and the photo and I’ll use my administrative talents <g> to add these to the blog. Comments can then be made from there. I haven’t yet discovered if there’s a way for you to do this directly.

Another thing I haven’t figured out is how to include the navigation bar across the top that is used throughout the rest of the website. I also haven’t been able to include a link back to Put the Pen to the Paper. For the time being, navigation back to the rest of the FFT website is listed under Links in the left-hand column, right under Archives and Categories.

His black puppy hair is growing out and leaving behind silver and gold with black points on his ears, muzzle and tail.  He’s very beautiful! He really seems to want to keep his hair long, so we will accommodate him, as long as he understands that he must be brushed, bathed and trimmed regularly.  And he’s getting much better at that, too.  I’m trying to learn how to trim his “bangs” in that inverted V in order to just keep his vision clear.  And how to trim his muzzle hair to allow him to eat his meat and chew his bones without it clinging to him all day long!  We’ll learn! (My first attempt is growing out:  he was definitely a “moving target”!)  There’s a great photo on my “Apso” calendar for the month of June of a beautiful silver Apso with his long hair cut in a way I’d like Zeke to wear his.  And it’s obvious that this Apso in the picture has an “attitude”, too, just like Zeke. He’s not a show dog, he just likes his long hair.  Sorta like the “Fonz”!    

From Ken:While this may sound a little strange to some folks, I must tell you what happened recently. As a pilot, I am often out of town, and must leave Zeke home to protect my wife Katy and the parrots, goats, and chickens. That is his job: sentinel. He takes his job very seriously too.One night when I was gone, the dogs in the neighborhood began barking. This is not unusual, since there are a lot of dogs in the neighborhood. There are also lots of rabbits, quail, ravens, and coyotes at which to bark. Most people who know dogs know that the alarm bark of a dog is different than the “I am bored” dog bark. Zeke will ignore the routine barking, but he listens intently to the alarm barks. These particular barks elicited a very intense reaction from him. Katy got out of bed and took him outside, where the conversation taking place was more audible. Katy asked him, “What is it Zeke? What are they saying?”Now, I know that dogs are amazing at understanding human speech and responding appropriately, but when Katy told me she received what amounted to a telepathic image from Zeke, I was skeptical to say the least. Yet as she told me the story, I had no reason to doubt her since her love and empathy for critters is well known. She was so excited that she called the hotel to tell me the story.“Bear”, she said Zeke had told her. The dogs are alarmed about a bear. Not a coyote, not a person, but a bear. Now we have never in 15 years had any bears in our neighborhood, or even close by. So I passed it off as a sleepy wife and overly protective Apso and hung up the phone.But the next day, as I drove home from the airport, there was a young black bear in a tree down the street from our house. Game and Fish, and animal control were there along with the State Police. There WAS a bear!Now I don’t pretend to know how this is possible, but it seems that Zeke communicated to my wife what he heard those other dogs say. I have no doubt that many would try to pass this off as coincidence, but I think not. It must be true. Zeke, the Apso said so.

This beautiful photo was taken by the late Barbara Ratledge, Las-A-Rab Lhasa Apsos in Canada. Barbara made several trips to the Himalayas and was an avid supporter of the Gompa dogs. During one of her trips she met, and interviewed, Lama Gyen Yeshe.