The Story of Duke

Duke is with Danny in God's beautiful green fields. While Danny is having fun chasing bunny rabbits around, Duke is happily catching tennis balls thrown by God and his Angels. When I leave this world, I will go there and throw the balls, play rope tug, and run with both of them.

We first met Duke in Whistler Village in the year 2000 while we were on a short holiday getaway from our home in Abbotsford. My wife and I had been considering getting a puppy ever since we moved into the house from living in a small townhouse in Maple Ridge. I have grown up with a family dog most of my life and it felt like the right time to finally get my own. So, while we were in Whistler we checked out the WAG shelter for dogs available for adoption. After a short discussion with a staff member, I was led into the shelter room where there were a few dogs roaming about. A floppy eared black and tan dog came and sat right next to me. He seemed excited to meet me. I thought he looked like some kind of hound because of long ears and his body shape. He was cute no doubt about it. Although we  were hoping for a light colored dog and preferably a puppy, the staff member encouraged me to take him for a walk and told me that Dukey was a great dog but wasn't having an easy time in the shelter. She mentioned that there was a man that came by regularly to take Dukey for walks but he was not yet able to adopt him. She believed Dukey to be about 9 months old. I would discover later that he wasn't a long eared hound breed at all but just had not grown as fast as his ears did. My wife and I went for a walk and realized that he loved fetching a ball. It was obvious that he enjoyed being out of the shelter and needed a loving home. We returned him to the shelter and then sat in the car discussing if we should adopt him even though we preferred not having a black dog. I really liked him and it broke my heart to think that he might stay in the shelter and be miserable for much of his life. We went back inside and told them we wanted Dukey. They signed him over to us after paying the fees and being advised of a current ear infection he had. I believe we drove home to Abbotsford right after that. The staff at WAG called him Dukey but his given name was Duke. We alternated between Dukey, Duke, Mr. Duke, the Duke, and Dukeyboy as time went on. His favorite activity was fetching ball, and he was the best! I would throw a tennis ball as high as I could and he would catch it almost every time. He would bring it back to me as fast as he could but then he would resist dropping the ball from his mouth while making a funny groaning noise. Duke loved to play tug of war with anything too. He had very strong jaws and held on like a vice grip. Every night after I came home from work, rain or shine I would take him out for a walk to the school field and toss the ball for him. I bought a flashing ball so I could see it in the dark. When we got home all three of us would go downstairs and watch a movie. I would sit on the couch and Duke would lay beside me with his head on my thigh and eventually fall asleep. He had a very loud and intimidating bark for his size. He seemed to gravitate toward people, especially men, rather than other dogs. I suppose that was related to his first months before we adopted him. We learned later that he was one of a litter of puppies that someone was going to drown in Squamish I believe. A friend or relative took pity and and put them all in their vehicle to take somewhere safer. Apparently it was little Dukey that crawled up to the front of the cab and be with the people instead of the other puppies. The woman adopted him but then for some reason had to have him stay with her nephew or somebody and he was mostly locked up in a trailer and wasn't being treated properly. That's when the woman decided to take Duke to the shelter for adoption to someone who could give him a better life. That turned out to be us! The reason I found out much of this information is because at some point later, perhaps a few months I can't remember, this woman got my phone number and just wanted to make sure that Duke was ok and to let us know his background. I think that talking to me and knowing that Duke was with a loving family and home comforted her after having to give him up.   

Unfortunately from the beginning Duke had some health issues. The ear infection that he had when we adopted him turned into a chronic problem throughout his life. He also developed skin rashes and hot spots on his body and paws. Several trips to the vet and doses of prednisone later led us to change his diet to hypoallergenic dry food and regular ear cleaning. At some point I decided to create a homemade diet due to the ineffectiveness of the expensive special dry food hew was eating. This appeared to clear up his skin rashes almost completely over time so we kept him on homemade meals indefinitely. At some point Duke had to have surgery once or twice on his paws to remove a lick granuloma? Basically a cyst caused from overlicking his paws which was most likely caused by his unknown allergy. He also had to have surgery on one or both of his ears to remove a hematoma caused from scratching his ears again from his unknown allergy and ear problems. Poor Dukeyboy! I supplemented his meals with fish oils or flax oil at some point to help improve his skin health and it did seem to help somewhat and made his coat shiny. We tried to avoid using prednisone to reduce his skin and ear problems because it noticeably changed his personality causing him to be more aggressive and antisocial. These issues never kept Duke from being a happy dog though. As long as we were with him or playing with him, all was good. The best medicine is love and attention.

Duke was very quick to learn anything that you taught him to do. At some point he began turning backwards in a circle with a flattened soccer ball in his jaws, bucking like a bronco at a rodeo. So from then on whenever we said "Do the bronco!" he would do just that!

He loved chewing on tennis balls while he made a groaning sound. I eventually switched him to red hockey balls because they are less abrasive to the teeth, but now looking back I should have just let him chew tennis balls as long as he wanted. I also taught him how to catch a frisbee in the air in less than an hour. He quickly caught on that jumping into the air and catching it was the coolest thing! I remember camping overnight with a couple of friends at Chilliwack lake and we would take turns throwing his red hockey ball into the dark woods. He would be gone in the dark for as long as it took to retrieve that ball! He was amazing. His sense of smell was definitely top notch. Teaching him to roll over for a treat was also almost instantaneous. Once he got the knack of it, he would do it without us even asking him. I think I have some video clips of him doing it. Such a smart dog he was. He could have made a great tracker or drug detector dog. Maybe he was part hound after all!