Tragedy and Triumph

Riley's Story

Riley joined the Cottonwood family of Shelties during the summer of 1989. He was bred by Joan Clark of Checkmate Shelties in Eagle, Idaho. His sire was BIS Ch. Happy Glen's Royal Dream CDX, and his dam was Checkmate Bonfire.

 Checkmate RoyL-T O'Cottonwood CICP*
              6/10/1989 to 10/29/2005

I chose Riley based on puppy testing which Joan patiently allowed me to conduct on the litter. As a long-time Sheltie breeder, she knew her dogs, and she already had them pegged. She just smiled when I showed her the test results and picked Riley. :-)

Riley was slow to mature but he retained his quality well into old age. He wasn't ready for the breed ring until 3 1/2 yrs of age. He went on the road with Barb Ross (Happy Glen) and quickly racked up 8 points, both majors, including one Best of Breed. During one of Barb's phone calls with show news, she exclaimed laughingly, "Why didn't you TELL me he jumps like that??" He had stood flat-footed and suddenly flew up into her lap, catching her completely off guard. She also had to put a lid on his ex-pen after he bounced out and tried to follow her.

I looked forward to finishing him myself the next summer, but tragedy struck at the 1994 Idaho shows in Blackfoot. At 2 AM, Riley tumbled from the camper bed. As near as I could tell, he tried to jump down for a drink of water, lost his footing, and arrowed straight into the floor with his head. When I reached him, he had stopped breathing and was twitching like a dying dog. It was several tense minutes before my friend Marti and I were able to bring him back with CPR - twice no less. He was breathing but was paralyzed from the neck down. We rushed him to the emergency veterinary hospital listed in the show catalog. There he was given massive doses of steroids to help control brain swelling. Vets who subsequently saw him credited that action with saving his life.

Long story short (sort of) -- we made trips to the Sun Valley Animal Center and to WSU in Pullman, WA, where he was examined by veterinary neurologists. The bad news was they couldn't do anything for him. He had a compression between the 3rd and 4th cervical vertebrae. But the good news was he would probably recover to some degree on his own! After two long weeks of carting him everywhere and doing everything for him, he suddenly lurched to his feet one afternoon in an attempt to follow me.

For the next several months, Riley received physical therapy that including swims in a Rubbermaid stock tank I set up on our deck (the "redneck hot tub" we jokingly called it). I would suspend him in the tank with a leash snapped to a tracking harness. I figured he was recovered enough to stop the swims when he figured out how to avoid being dunked by spreading his legs out sideways and catching a rim about 8 inches under water. After he foiled the swimming therapy, we were relegated to manual work to stretch his legs. He grew to hate wheel-barrowing even more than swimming!

Eventually, he recovered enough to be able to run and climb stairs. His way of compensating for his disability was to just "go fast". He terrified me by ricocheting off the fence in order to make the corner since he'd lost a great deal of agility. He got very good at banking corners, but he was never again able to bounce high up in the air. Despite that, he could balance his weight well enough to manage little hops when he was excited.

Until three weeks before his passing, he could still race across the lawn to chase the car on the other side of the fence; but there were times he couldn't manage to stand still. His damaged left legs would get kind of tangled up and he'd just fall over. It never seemed to phase him, though. He'd just get up, "smile", and keep right on truckin'.

Memories of Riley - August 10, 1989 to October 29, 2005