Pollyanna Pengelly

TAKEN WAY TOO SOON

Sadly, the beautiful Pollyanna passed over Rainbow Bridge in January 2011. This much loved lady will be missed by so many people.

Fly high with the angels Pollyanna

THE EARLY DAYS IN 2009

POLLY (was Policy) had just arrived from Wales and was in her Autumn years. She has just finished breeding. She was initially fostered in Somerset by Belinda and Terry where she settled in well with their three IRR dogs, Millie, Connie and Abi.

Belinda said “Polly has settled in really well and quickly made friends with the girls – lots of tail wagging. She has a lovely nature, travels extremely well in the car and hasn’t made a murmur at night when we leave her with the girls in the kitchen. She has fitted in perfectly with our routine and so far, no accidents have occurred. She has had a bath and groom and is looking very smart. She was a bit unsettled when she first came but now lies down quite happily with the others. She is very friendly and outgoing and loves having a fuss made of her. An absolute darling, in fact.

She was fantastic when we were out for a walk – had to keep her on a lead and she just wanted to run with the others. She was on a long lead and she was still pulling me! Tail in the air, having the time of her life!

She is eating, drinking and weeing well and after being a bit restless to begin with (I think she found the house rather warm!) she is now quite settled and is lying at my side at the moment with two of our dogs. She went to be washed and trimmed yesterday and it has made a tremendous difference to her coat – she is now lovely and soft to stroke (which she demands when she is not asleep!) and smells gorgeous. She has taken to both Terry and I (the other rescues we have were afraid of Terry to begin with). She travels really well, lies down as soon as we lift her into the car and doesn’t complain at all and she has been as good as gold for the past two nights – she is sleeping with the other dogs in the kitchen.”

UPDATE FEBRUARY 2009

Belinda said, “Pollyanna has been with us for a few weeks. She has now fully recovered from her spaying op and is full of beans. Her cystitis has also gone, so no more puddles. She has the most wonderful nature and is very affectionate and she will just come up beside or behind you, and put her nose in your hand and lick you – can give you quite a shock if you are not expecting it!

She gets on wonderfully with our dogs and every dog we have met on our walks, but, apart from Terry, she still has a major fear of men. We had some friends staying with us recently, one of whom was a man, and she spent all her time on her bed in the corner, not the new Polly at all. When we were out walking, we went to go through a gate and as we got there a man approached from the other side. I had to take her back along the path as there was no way she would go through the gate towards him. Another time we were walking along and a man with a dog came towards us with one of those plastic ball-throwers. He raised his arm to throw the ball for his dog and Polly hurled herself to the ground and attempted to reverse out of her collar and if I hadn’t hung on, she would have been long gone. When she first came to us she was very quiet for a few days and I think now that this was because of Terry, but having got used to him and realised that he wasn’t going to be unkind, she adores him and constantly goes to him for attention. Unfortunately, there has had to be a rethink on the forever home she was going to because there were no women in the household. She would be fine with a couple as long as there was a woman to initially attach herself to until she got used to the man.

Because she is in the Autumn of her life, we think that she would be better with older children as she isn’t as swift on her feet as a younger dog and might find it a bit confusing having young people rushing around, although there is no question of her not being friendly towards them.

Since she has come out of herself, we have discovered that she is a bit naughty where cats are concerned. When she saw our cat on the stairs (who spends most of it’s time upstairs on our bed) she pursued it with great enthusiasm and the cat, very wisely, made itself very scarce. I don’t think Polly wanted a cuddle!!

All in all, Polly is a very affectionate, enthusiastic, mature lovable dog. She is the first to greet us in the mornings, and has settled in to our routine completely. She bounces along when we are out walking and does pull a bit on the lead as she wants to be off running with the others!”

FURTHER UPDATE FEBRUARY 2009

Pollyanna has now gone to her wonderful new forever home in Surrey.

FIRST REPORT FROM POLLYANNA’S NEW HOME

Her new owner said,“I’ve been keeping a journal for you. We went out for an early walk without Jess (2-year-old GSD) on the first morning and Polly’s tail was up and wagging and she had her nose glued to the ground. We met a few of our dog walking acquaintances and she got on well with everyone.

On Tuesday, I took her and Jess up in the car to meet our dog walker Jenny and her nine-month-old Golden Retriever, Chester. Jenny had another dog with her, a West Highland terrier. We went over the Downs and through the woods; Pollyanna had her tail up all the time, got on very well with the other dogs and did a bit of scampering herself.

Overall, she’s come on by leaps and bounds. She found her voice yesterday and did some barking at the bottom of the stairs whenever I went upstairs! Her tummy has settled down completely, she’s doing very well with wees and poos on command, and runs up and down the garden enthusiastically. She has the occasional setback, but generally speaking, she comes up and down stairs by herself and in and out of doors without panicking. I don’t know why these are barriers, but they seem to be.

Mealtimes are still a source of anxiety, as she seems to think that something awful is going to happen and she gobbles her food down in a tearing hurry. One of us has to stand guard next to her. She has to be coaxed out to the kitchen to get the food in the first place.

I was doing some work in Cambridge today, so Jenny came over to pick them both up and take them out with Chester and Jenny’s other elderly Labrador, Oscar. She has left me a note saying that Pollyanna took a shine to a golden retriever they met and her (male!) owner, and followed them off into the woods! Fortunately, she came back! And funnily enough, I had a very similar experience when I took them out early this morning — she was standing by one of the five bar gates on the Downs, sniffing about, when she spotted a fellow walker with a golden retriever waiting to cross from the other side of the road. We stood and chatted for a bit and exchanged the histories of our dogs, in the way you do, and she clearly wanted to go off with them! Although she gets on very well with Jess, and they sniff each other in a friendly fashion and lie together, she seems to be very attracted to other retrievers.

As I write this, she is sitting next to me at the computer, having her ear scratched. Jess is rolling about on her back next to us playing with a squeaky toy. Domestic bliss!

And the very latest news from the front: Jess and Polly both now sleep in the same room which seems to have cemented their bond – Polly actually growled at Jess one morning when Jess bounded into
“her” bedroom! Nothing nasty – but Jess was taken aback! But all well on that front now. It was delightful last night when they settled down face to face for a mutual groom, and then Jess fell asleep with her head on Polly’s paw. What fun!

Many thanks for bringing Polly into our lives.

UPDATE APRIL 2009

We thought you might like a quick update on Pollyanna’s adventures since we last wrote.

We took her to the vet who noticed that one of her teats had become very enlarged, and she thought that there was a 50-50 possibility it could be cancer. We had it removed as soon as possible and asked them to take off another lump at the top of her leg at the same time, since they were operating anyway.

Both growths came off cleanly and they also x-rayed her chest and there was no sign of the growth having penetrated the chest wall. There was a lot of bleeding when she came round from the anaesthetic and for a while they thought they were going to have to keep her in hospital overnight, but in the end they let her come back home about seven o’clock. She was very groggy all night and kept scratching her dressing off which kept us awake trying to stop her doing it. In the end we had to tie her back legs loosely together with a scarf to stop her tearing at the wound.

After a day she was really her old self, running out into the garden whenever the door was open and generally behaving as though nothing had happened. We then had an anxious week’s wait for the test results to come through – and they told us yesterday that the test results were completely clear and she’s fine.

What a relief!

Apart from this adventure, all is well and I was pleased to see that Jess missed her very much the day she was away in hospital — she kept going from room to room looking for her friend.

FURTHER UPDATE AUGUST 2009

Yes, Polly is in trouble again! Now recovered from her brush with the veterinary profession, she is in bad odour with the horticulturists … she has developed a taste for plums and actually broke our 4ft tall baby plum tree at the weekend in her enthusiasm for wresting the ripest plums from their branches.

Other than that, you will see that she has taken up driving lessons and is enjoying lounging around the garden. She is doing very well (not with the driving) and her coat is now flowing nicely. She and Jess are good pals – not soppy about each other, but very chummy.

She has also relaxed a lot more about food and does less of the bossy barging about that she did for the first few months at certain trigger points. Of course, she still has her issues. And various things make her freeze or jump out of her skin. It doesn’t particularly seem to be men that worry her, but certain people do terrify her – including a very gentle female friend of ours.

VERY SAD NEWS

We were all sad to hear that Pollyanna passed to Rainbow Bridge in January 2011. She was much loved and is much missed by her family.

Fly with the angels sweet girl.