Nicket's Shift On The Fly
"Pete"

Our boy,

This gentle soul joined the family Thanksgiving weekend, 1996.  He is our first Aussie and soon had us "hooked" on the breed. Pete is a loving, loyal, and laid-back boy.  From the day we brought him home, he's never really been left alone and spent his first three years going to "Grandma's" house every day while we were at work. EVERYBODY loves Pete, and Pete loves everybody … Almost.  He does possess that Aussie trait of being just slightly reserved and cautious about meeting certain strangers for the first time.

He's a very smart boy and learned early on how to communicate effectively, and let us know exactly what he wanted. Glenn hung a jingle bell on a ribbon at the back door. During Pete's first few weeks of puppy house-training, each time we would take him outside we took his paw and batted the bell.  By Day 3, he was ringing the bell himself to tell us he wanted out. After a few weeks, we couldn't even sneak out of the house without him … He would go to the back door and ring and ring the bell until we let him out. (The bell was soon put away)!

As with most dogs, he loves to go for a ride … In anything! Car, truck, or wheelbarrow, he's not fussy. He's happy to sit on the seat and never leave the farm.  He loves to go with Glenn and a team on the hay rack.  We often joke that when we win the lotto, we'll buy Pete a truck of his own so he can spend his days lazily watching the world go by from the front seat.

We knew even before we brought Pete home that his eyes were affected by coloboma. We chose him as a special "pet" and had him neutered, never wanting to risk passing this serious defect along.  This reinforced for us again the importance of screening tests in all breeding animals.

On Sunday February 22, our best little Petey-boy went to heaven.  The house is so different  without him.  No more heavy breathing! We had noticed in the last few weeks that he was getting old and we were starting to think and talk about what we would do for him when the time came.  Of course, we would never allow him to suffer or be without his dignity.  A week ago, he seemed to have a bit of a bad day with an obvious tummyache and not wanting to eat.  We just let him rest and then walked him and he pooped a few times and then seemed to rally.  He ate his supper that night and for the rest of the week seemed fine, almost his old self.  He’s had a huge need for water in the last couple of months and with all that water he also had a couple of little tinkles in the house, but we forgave him. 

I went to Montana Sunday morning, Glenn had to go into work for a few hours, and when he came home they all went outside to feed.  He said Pete just wasn’t himself and didn’t really leave the yard.  When he came in, he was just laying kind of flat out on the garage floor, seemed to be in obvious pain in his tummy, couldn’t walk without help, and was really shaking.  Glenn took his temp which was up, and then phoned Jodi.  She met him at the clinic and by then his temp was up even more, to 105º (should be about 101º for a dog) and he was in obvious discomfort.  Jodi felt some kind of massive infection.  With the Cushing’s disease he’s had the last year, the immune system eventually bottoms out and she felt he had a massive infection that might be very difficult for him to fight.  Petey deserved the very best, and in the end Glenn made the gut-wrenching decision to let his best friend go.  

Twelve wonderful years with the greatest ambassador of the breed, just wasn’t enough.  We sure loved him and we’ll miss him terribly.  Read more about Pete on our blog at  www.casselcreek.blogspot.com