Zigmund Jakeson
of Alpine Woods
Airedale Terrier/Labrador Retriever mix
Photo by David Jensen
Copyright Alaska Pet-ography 1998
All Rights Reserved
Used with permission
A few months ago my Veterinarian and the Valdez Animal
Control Officer extended
a personal invitation to me to attend the Annual Open House of the Valdez
Animal Shelter in May. When I arrived at the Shelter Open House, I was
escorted to a kennel containing two puppies. One was black and the other
had distinctive Airedale markings. My heart did a jump, having recently
suffered the passing of my
Lady Airedale to the Rainbow Bridge.
It was a male Airedale/Labrador
mix with a look in his face that seamed to be pleading to be loved. I walked
around and looked at all the other dogs available for adoption, but I was
irresistible drawn back to this cute terrier mix.
I went out to the truck
where Amy and Missy were patiently waiting for me. They both immediately
began to sniff the strange dog smells on my clothing. I began to think
long and hard about the pros and cons of adopting this little ragamuffin.
Since Amy had taken over the alpha dog position in the pack after lady's
passing, I decided to let her make the final choice. I carried her into
the shelter and placed her on the floor with the puppies. She trotted right
over to the male pup with the Airedale markings.
The pup responded slowly
at first, a bit unsure of this little girl checking him out. He soon decided
she was cool and promptly pounced on her to play. Amy responded with a
nip to his nose, but was not overly aggressive. Soon, they were romping
around together getting to know each other, playing tag. Amy was perky
as a Silky can be, joyfully dodging the uncoordinated advances this fresh
puppy made.
That was all it took
for me to decide. This little guy was as good as adopted into the Kenny
Lake Dogpak. I immediately went home to make preparations for his arrival
puppy-proofing the house. After bringing him home, I quickly found out
I had unintentionally puppy-proofed for a Silky Terrier sized dog. It turned
out he had a reach just short of five feet! Nothing below that height was
safe!
I had plenty of help
in finding a name for the pup from my friends on the Silkydog-L email list.
It is a list of super people who share a love of Silky Terriers. The pup
had a "goat-T," of hair that stood out on his face. Names like
Maynard G. Crebbs or Sigmund Freud came to mind. A good friend suggested
calling him ZZZigmund, a play on the Austrian pronunciation of Sigmund.
The day I brought the
puppy home from the shelter, I ran through the list of names that had been
suggested testing to see which one he would respond to. He chose "Ziggy"
as the name he liked the best.
Ziggy is a very smart
boy and is eager to please me and the rest of the dogpak. He is a joy to
watch chasing the snowshoe hare that abound around our Kenny Lake residence.
He loves to spring across the yard in long leaps to better spot the bunnies
hiding in the long grass.
