It’s a Sunday morning. I breeze into my son’s room with, “Good morning, sunshine! I’m gonna need your help cleaning up blood.”
Dalton groans. “Again?”
“Yep! It’s much easier for you to get the baseboards and under the dining room table.”
You may be wondering why. Because Dalton’s knees are three decades younger than mine and my husband’s, of course.
Wait. Was it the blood you were wondering about? Cleaning up blood is simply our new morning ritual. And not because we’ve embraced sacrifice.
It’s because of our dog. More specifically, his tail.
Tankie, our rescued staffy/cattle dog mix, wags his tail with unmatched ferocity. I say this having endured the lashings of master tail waggers. I grew up dodging a chocolate Labrador’s tail. I endured repeated beatings from the tail of Woofie (Dane-Labrador-American bulldog). And I would choose to be hit by Woofie’s tail while wearing shorts and sporting a severe sunburn over being hit with Tankie’s tail in padded gardening pants.
We no longer allow drinks on our coffee tables. Hell, we no longer allow ANY items on our coffee tables. A single whack from Tankie’s tail turns a Kleenex box into a dangerous projectile.
While I do not condone tail docking, I began to understand its history. Especially among cattle dogs.
The funny thing is, Tankie never cut his power tail on anything. I don’t know if that’s because said tail was battle hardened during his time on the streets of LA or if it’s genetic. But his tail could—and did—smash against everything from iron furniture to glass-edged tables to an angry cat’s claws without the skin ever breaking.
It took Tankie’s own teeth to draw blood.
While we were away among the sequoias in March (post to be written some day when I’m not spending hours cleaning up blood), Tankie had anal gland issues. An abscess formed and then ruptured. Our pet sitter thought Tankie stank and gave him a bath. This didn’t help the smell. It took our return and a trip to the vet to identify the culprit as the anal glands, which is a pretty common canine problem, though we’d had Tankie for years without his anal glands acting up.
Tankie got antibiotics and a cone to keep him from licking his butt.
Tankie, who is nicknamed “The Relentless,” because he never gives up trying to get you to throw a toy or ball for him even after he’s walked 5 miles and played ball for an hour, managed to contort himself enough to access the body part closest to his butt: the tip of his tail.
The tail mauling occurred overnight. When Tankie excitedly greeted us at 5 AM the following morning, his tail left a bloody trail on walls, doors, and furnishings.
There was blood on curtains. The tablecloth. The floors. The white kitchen cabinets.
No rug escaped gory baptism.
Tankie’s tail wags with such force and intensity that blood landed in the upper corners of windows.
Future owners of our house will someday find flecks of blood on the ceilings and wonder what gruesome murders we committed here.
We’ve spent the last month trying all kinds of bandaging and cone-like deterrents so the tail can heal enough to stop making our house look like it belongs in Nightmare on Elm Street).
Tankie the Relentless always gets to it again.
Maybe I should simply paint our walls red.
Poor dog, and poor you. That’s such a hard are to keep doggy teeth away from!
I could not believe it when I saw him arrange himself so that even with an XL cone, he could get at his tail bandage with his mouth. Crazy. He requires so much supervision.
I had a dog once who kept going after his back leg after a huge surgery, and he was a loooong dog, basset hound mix, so could reach pretty far. I had to use not only a cone but a blow up donut for around the neck at the same time which reduced his ability to bend his head. It was the only way to keep him from damaging his leg.
A blow up pillow behind the cone? I will try that next! Brilliant.
It looked really silly but it worked! Good luck.
We tried it last night. Tankie manage to pop off the cone but not the pillow. The added time/protection meant that he only managed to get his bandage off and lick his tail a little (rather than chewing) before we found him.
Your dog is quite determined!!
He’s a bit OCD, like many cattle dogs.
You could always concoct a fake story about your house once belonging to the Night Stalker or some equally notorious serial killer and charge admission. Sure, guests in search of the macabre might be an intrusion, but you can put the money you earn into a professional cleaning job once the cone is gone and Tankie quits chewing his tail to pieces!
Right?! I’ll get some luminol and black lights and set it up for Halloween.
He’s such a sweet pup. Too bad he is a banger! 🙂
SUCH a banger. Neither his enthusiasm nor his tail can be stopped.
Gotta love a happy dog!
Wow. Talk about the joys of pet ownership.
Hope poor Tankie coagulates soon ..
At least uninvited people don’t want to come into my house and meet Tankie? (Actually, even invited guests are a little hesitant to come in right now…)
Just offer them hazmat suits with their cocktails and tell them it’s a Dexter themed evening…
Excellent suggestion.
Oh my gosh! Awful! (And funny!) But mostly awful!
The part about your knees being older… oh, you mean the blood? Hilarious. So sorry for your trouble. Ugh, what a pain. I hope you can successfully keep that tail covered and the anal glands (Did you write that phrase as often as possible on purpose just for us?) healed.
LOL, all for you. Anal glands are a real problem. Also, did I mention anal glands? I failed at tail coverage today. Looked at my phone for 30 seconds while we were in the yard with two toys and that was all it took for him to get the bandage off and the wound bloody again. Self-adhesive bandage is currently secured with tape.
This is absolutely horrendous! I’m so sorry for you and Tankie.
A dog only a vampire could love!
Oh, my gosh! What a situation! How long will it take for the anal gland to heal? I wonder how sensitive a dog’s tail is.
He’s been back to the vet three times so far, but it seems to be improving. They’re worried there might be a mass in there and waiting for the scar tissue from the abscess to heal up so they can see better.
Poor Tankie! And poor you!
I hope y’all can find the magic combination to keep him from chewing on his poor tail so it can heal.
The magic combination is probably 24-hour supervision. Do Not Recommend.
Loving reading the full story, written – as ever – with your trademark wit.
But I am sorry to hear that Tankie is continuing to decorate your home, the constant watching and monitoring must be exhausting. I hope you get to the other side of this particular episode soon.
Thanks, Deb! It is exhausting. But thanks to some suggestions from readers, we are doing better at keeping Tankie’s teeth away from his tail.
Tankie’s tail wags are amazing. If there was a doggie olympics for such a thing, you’d have a gold medalist. I am sure it takes a lot of work to keep him, for lack of a better word, contained. Although he is cute, cute, cute…
Most painful tail ever. Though I sometimes wonder about the tail strength of other dogs with traditionally docked tails. Like the Rottweiler.
Wow, I had no idea for ferocious tail wagging. Hope he improves!!! Friendly dog, nevertheless.
He’s improving. It’s just slow! And the cone is so painful–for us!
Poor Tankie. He sounds on the mend, hopefully all over now. A lot of energy even when he’s not quite right! It’s something to see blood up so high
As the others have said, poor you too. Your knees and you sound like they need a rest.
Thanks, Mabel. Tankie’s tail has finally healed up, although it might be a while before his fur grows back.
That’s great Tankie’s tail is healed up. I am sure he has all the energy together with freedom now to run around, be himself do enough for another story that you can write about