Monty's Dog Blog

Monty went to dog camp for a week recently (aka boarding kennel).

We've boarded him about once a year. I had several things I wanted to do different with this dog, and one of them was keeping him well adjusted to he wasn't overly attached to me, so I could board him if necessary without too much stress. When he was just a puppy he went for an afternoon at a boarding kennel for a try out, and then a few nights here and there every year.

Before this year's "doggie vacation", he first he had to take a trip to the vet to make sure all of his shots were up to date for the boarding kennel regulations. His rabies was 3.5 years old so it was time to update by law.

The vet was feeling Monty's body and looked up at me oddly. Uh oh I thought. What did he just find? Oh please no.

"Do you run this dog a lot?", said the vet.

"Not really, just normal exercise, why?" I asked.

"Well I see a lot of Goldens come in here, and they are all porkers. Your dog is how old? Almost 5? And he is in perfect shape!"

"Whew!", I said.

Monty was a perfect 68 pounds. We are very careful to not overfeed him. He gets 2 heaping cups of his kibble a day, and if I can't easily feel his ribs, we cut out the "heaping" part

I didn't feel good about the kennel we left Monty in last summer. This time we found a local woman on a horse boarding farm who started a small boarding kennel - just 8 runs I think. She loves the dogs and visits them every couple of hours. She takes the smallest ones in to her bed room at night to sleep.

We used to think Monty got kennel cough every time he was boarded, despite him having his vaccine. But a vet recently told me that he might have just really irritated his throat from barking. Last summer, the day after we picked him up, he coughed up red fresh blood. YIKES! But I think that vet was right, and he just hurts his throat at the kennel.

Monty doesn't bark much at all. I think at the kennel, when someone pulls up or walks through, Monty tries to join in with the other dogs and barks like mad. We picked him up on Tuesday and he's been hoarse all week!

He normally walks around "singing" with a toy in his mouth, but now he barely squeaks and sounds like he has laryngitis

Otherwise, I think he had a good time. It is so nice to know we have a safe place to leave him if something comes up that takes us out of town.