Like every day, particularly when it’s hot in summer, I take the dogs to the beach for a swim. After all, the sea is never very far away as we are walking on a peninsula for most of the time. Yesterday evening we went to the beach as normal and I was concentrating on Boris whilst supervising the Small Dogs at the same time. After a few minutes, I looked around to see if Dave had caught up and was nearby. As it turned out he was quite near however he was in the sea in a very un-dog-like swimming position floating almost motionless with his head under the water. I got him out of the sea and emptied the water out of him and managed to get him to breathe again assisted by Luis who was nipping at him to get him to respond. In fact, both Small Dogs were quite concerned by what was going on. Boris, however, was waiting patiently for me to throw his ball…
Dave goes swimming
I left Dave on the shore with his head pointing downward toward the sea as he recovered himself and lay in the evening sun. Boris continued to fetch the ball that I was throwing into the sea. Finally, Dave got to his feet and tottered around still dribbling sea water from his mouth. We walked back slowly to Grammeno and Dave flopped out on one of the cushions in front of his house. I fed the others and he appeared to be recovering slowly. At bed time, his breathing seemed a bit laboured to I lead him to the van so that I could keep an eye on him during the night. Both Fido and Luis were quite vocal during the night, for one reason or another, so I ended up giving them both a collar in order to keep them quiet. On my last trip outside, I left the gate to the van open and Dave was nowhere to be seen when I woke up. I could see that he’d taken himself outside and was laying down by the hedge. Unsurprisingly, Dave declined to come out for a walk this morning so I just took the others. He seemed to be much better by the time I got back from the supermarket and he is now laying in the shade of one of the carob trees. Conclusion: Dave is not a competent swimmer and I need to keep a closer eye on him.
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