Nolan, retirement, and roos

Nolan’s retirement started at a leisurely pace this week, with him not going into work at all till Friday.  When he did go, I took him in for a “visit”, and I stayed with him while we went from resident to resident, and staff member to staff member, licking all in sight, and almost wagging his tail off.  Everyone was delighted to see him as well, and we probably stayed about an hour.  The visit was a great success, but tired him out.  The rest of the week he had spent going for walks, having his bath….and sleeping.

During the week I had been talking to one of the staff members, who is acting as a liaison between management and Nolan, and she informed me that the Manager doesn’t want Nolan to retire.  As far as I’m concerned if ADA Cottage wants to remain as Nolan’s official owner, and is prepared to keep on paying for his upkeep, I am more than happy with that arrangement, but the staff member and I agreed, that Nolan deserves to retire, and that his attendance will take the form of visits, and will only be when he wants to go.  Believe me, he tells me when he needs a “fix” of his oldies….

While Nolan has been slowing down, I’m still just as busy as ever.  I still have to organise both dogs, and Max…and of course I have Clancy of the Overflow….and he is still overflowing!  He is not out of the woods yet, but his health is improving…he seems to have beaten the thrush.  He is well enough now to spend more time outside in the sun (when it shines), and he is drinking more at a go, and with more enthusiasm.  He now gets so excited when it’s meal time that he can’t keep still long enough to take the teat into his mouth, so it’s still a bit of a wrestle to get him started.  Once he’s got the teat in there, he sucks like a vacuum cleaner until his bottle is empty, or almost.  Then he sits there like Jabba the Hutt, (for those who remember Star Wars) with his jaws clenched, refusing to let the teat be taken away.

I got a call from the local beautician who had two little roos brought into her, and could I help her place them.  I visited her so I knew what size roos we were looking for homes for.  One was tiny, with just fur colouring under her skin.  The other was bigger, fully furred, but very scared.  Between us  we managed to find homes for them both.  Unfortunately the bigger one died….the stress was just too much for him, but last I heard the little girl was still with us.  Then one day when I was loading the dogs into the car, to take them down to the river, I was approached by a stranger, who had a sulphur crested cockatoo in his car, on his wife’s lap.  They had found it on the road, obviously hit by a car, and drove over half an hour out of their way to bring it to me.  It was obvious the bird was in a bad way.  The wife was in tears, while I had a quick look at it, and transferred it to an animal carrier.  She asked me to get it to the vet quickly so it could be put to sleep.  I was amazed!  Most people ask me to keep the bird or animal alive at all costs!  She realised how great his injuries were, and so I promised her I would take it straight to the vets, and we would do what we had to as quickly as possible.  As it turned out while we were getting things ready for the vet to do the deed, the bird died in my arms.  So I took him out into the bush, and laid him to rest at the base of a wattle tree.  Then I took the dogs for their walk….

Today I took the dogs down to the river for their walk, while I took photos of the wood ducks and other interesting things.  The dogs had a lovely time exploring and wandering about.  When it was almost time to get back in the car, I saw a water rat, so I went back to the river to try to get a photo.  While I was waiting for him to reappear, a head popped up in the weeds on the other side of the river.  It was a rather large old man roo, about 6′ tall and built like Arnie Schwarzenegger.  He just stood there, crouched over, while we looked at each other.  I managed to get several not very good photos (I wasn’t really close enough).  I might add I forgot about the water rat!  Then he moved off, and I discovered the reason…Nolan had decided he wanted to be a hero, and moved out into the river.  He came back when called, grudgingly…and wet….  Gypsy sensibly remained near me.  Roos always try to get away from what they consider a dangerous situation, but if they’re cornered, the males will fight to the death, and are quite capable of disembowelling a dog.  I’m sure Nolan had no thought of what fate might await him if he, a geriatric, took on a roo, but he had that look in his eye….

I was quite distracted by the roo, and didn’t notice two lots of people approaching with their dogs.  Of course I didn’t have leads on the dogs, and in my rush I couldn’t find Gypsy’s, so I got Nolan’s on and got him into the car as quickly as possible while I tried to control Gypsy without hers.  Fortunately the other dogs were well behaved, and we didn’t have any dogfights.  Then when we got home I discovered a hole in the garden, so I let the dogs out to smell round it, and hopefully deter the return of the rabbit (I’ll let you know whether this works!)….  While the dogs were occupied, a neighbour walked past with her small dog.  Gypsy was so excited with all that had happened she shot up towards the neigbours dog, and snapped at her.  The neighbour picked up her dog, so no harm was done, and didn’t want me to go crook on Gypsy, as Gypsy was just protecting her territory, but as I said, she could have done it with a little less enthusiasm.  Nolan was so busy smelling for the rabbit he didn’t notice….

I eventually got the dogs inside, where they curled up for a snooze, and I got a cuppa!  I wonder what next week will bring?…