Digging Holes
If you have bird dogs, many or just one, eventually time will run out. It’s a sad fact that from a tiny puppy to digging a hole in the pasture is a span of time measured in “not long enough”. When they start hunting for you at a year old, until they are the senior dog asleep in the front seat awaiting the call 12 years later, they work their hearts out, and they deserve a good ending. “A good death” is the phrase. My Germanic ancestors call it “dying well”.
We have a dog cemetery, here on the farm. I picked a copse of pines in the pasture and almost all our dogs are buried there. One died in Montana many years ago and is buried overlooking the Missouri River alongside an ancient Buffalo jump. Until recently, all the others are buried in the pasture. Then cremation became an option. I didn’t even know that was a thing until I took a very sick dog to the Auburn University Vet School. The dog passed away (with us holding her). They offered cremation. A few weeks later, Pearl came back home in a small, wooden box. Since then, Ruby joined Pearl and it won’t be long before Cap is there, as well. They are lined up on the walnut writing desk my father made back over 75 years ago.
A good death. I want that for all my dogs. I’ll admit, 40 years ago I thought the way to end a dog’s life was to take it to the vet, let them take it to the back, and take the body home and bury it. I knew that was a tremendous stride forward from the way my father ended the matter. He wouldn’t dream of spending money to end a dog’s life. He took care of it.
But I came to realize how hard they worked for me and how much I was their entire world. It seemed so cold and impersonal to end it on the stainless table in a place they fear. Now, they are in my lap in my truck (where they spent so much of their life). I hold their head, so they don’t even see the administration of the drug cocktail. The last thing they see, hear, and smell is me. My wife is even more demanding. Her dogs are euthanized in our living room in her lap. Recently, her big Lab passed away on its own with my wife holding her head. I never had a dog pass away on its own. I wish they all went like that. I was dispatched to the cemetery to dig another hole.
A good death. Our bird dogs deserve it. It takes some courage to make sure it happens the right way. Years down the road, remembering the dog’s life will always be accompanied by remembering its death. Make it a good one.
