A foolish little dog

Oh dear Chandler has done it now.

It's evening and he's in on my bed resting, aching and feeling sorry for himself.

Earlier I'd taken him, Trey and Wendy for a walk to the unused road through the woods near Flandrum Hill.  It's a 1 km road that was created for a development that hasn't happened. 

As usual Wendy and Trey chased the ball while Chandler followed his nose reading mesages in the grass.

At some point we followed a path downhill into the woods. The path started wide and clear but ended up in a tangle of undergrowth.  Clearly it wasn't a path made by humans.  I threw the ball into the undergrowth a few times and the dogs rooted around for it. 

Chandler had followed his nose yet again and was nowhere in sight.  I called.  Off in the distance I heard his excited bark.  He sounded far off.  He barked again.  Was he moving farther away from me ?  I went back up to the road and continued calling and whistling.  The barking suddenly stopped.

 I was fearful that he'd finally gotten lost and had run the wrong direction.   It was ages before he appeared.  I wondered what he'd been barking at.  I bent down and sniffed him.  Not skunk.  Well that was a relief. 

But what was that under his chin ?

Yep.  If you look closely you can see porcupine quills.  It's not like I hadn't been warned.  Chandler is too adventurous for his own good and a friend had recently told me to watch out for porcupines in the area.

I checked and there were no quills in his mouth so I brought him back home and while Kait held him down on the couch, I took pliers and pulled the quills out one by one.  It was an awful process.  Making sure I just has the quill and no hairs in the pliars grip and then -- pulling -- FAST !  As I pulled, Kait would let out a gasp as if she was feeling poor Chandler's pain.  He was really good.  Didn't make even a whimper till we were down to the last five or so.   Then he growled and briefly showed his teeth and became silent again.  When we were all done we'd removed 33 quills.  BUT Kait found one that was fully under his skin so I'll need to take him to the vet tomorrow to have thaat looked aat.

I'm not sure if his free spirit days might be over.  I may have to keep him on a long leash on future walks there if he's going to tear off into the woods.

Chandler is not  dog who learns from experience.  My guess is that he'd have revenge on his mind if he ever encountered a porcupine again.