Usually, when I have a litter, I don't know which one I'm going to keep
until they are some weeks old. Karma was the exception. In the course of a long whelping,
Rosie got fatigued, and I put on gloves and felt just the foot of a puppy who was blocking the way. I felt
a foot. And I realized that the puppy presenting the foot was probably dead, because there had been such
a long time between pups at that point, and I figured the pup had detached from its placenta for too long.
So I wiggled the foot down, and gently dragged the puppy out into this world. It was warm and limp and we
immediately got working with all the little tricks to get a new whelp breathing. Sometimes, trying to revive
a limp whelp is sad and hopeless, but this one started gasping and wiggling. It's wonderful when that happens.
She had a determination about her, even then. We bottle fed her for just a few days, to make sure she wasn't
left behind some of the others, but then I realized she enough vivacity and determination to live that this
just wasn't necessary. Sometimes they show their personalities early on, and I had the feeling even then that
I would be keeping this one.
I try to breed dogs that I want more of. One of the rules of thumb I use
when thinking about a breeding is, "If I got clones of either parent, would I be unhappy?" And sometimes,
particularly when a dog is gone, I really wish I could have cloned them. But that rarely happens.
The kids resemble the parents in most cases, and they usually have some of their personality traits, but
clones? No.
Karma isn't a clone of either of her parents. But in some ways, she
reminds me very strongly of Suki. Something about her
quiet determination, and a confidence and certainty about her view of things. And Karma has that as well.
Karma is like her mom, though. Rosie,
her mom, was one of the smartest dogs I have ever owned, and cared a great deal about pleasing me. And Karma
has that work ethic to some extent, and the intelligence to back it up. Some people always talk about their
smart dogs as troublemakers (sort of like the way they talk about 'evil geniuses' in crime movies.) I haven't
found that to be true. The only problem about the smart dogs is that they tend to be really sneaky theives,
while other dogs will often get caught in the act, or even warn me ahead of time by rustling paper, or staring
longingly at their target.
Anyway, she's a pretty cool dog to live with. I enjoy her. I'm currently training her
in agility, and she has one leg towards her Senior Courser title.
The photo on this page is of Karma when she "finished" (won the last points towards
her championship). I think it's a nice photo in spite of the fact that she got so excited by the photographer's
squeaky toy, she threw her ear forward. Here's another picture of Karma, taken a few months earlier, at
an indoor show.
