Archive for the ‘dogs’ Category

Part of online success includes being social, and one of my newer social network strategies is Corky the Shelter Dog on Facebook. The photo here is my Corky Facebook banner graphic. The original was taken at Fleet Peeples Dog Park near Orlando, Florida, and is one of my favorite places in the universe.

Facebook Banner Photo Graphic Used on the Corky the Shelter Dog Facebook Page

Facebook terms of service include a minimum age of 13 years old to have an account. Several human parents of my animal pals on Twitter created Facebook accounts for their pets. Some accounts were deleted for violating the rules. Unfortunately, the Facebook terms are for humans only, and they must be at least 13.

Fortunately, people with accounts can create Facebook pages and that’s the way for dogs and cats, or other pets, to join the Facebook social network. Once setup, you may also link your page to Twitter, so each post on your wall becomes a tweet in Twitter. Cool, huh?

If you are a Corky fan on my site, blog, Twitter, or YouTube and have a Facebook page, please let me know so I can LIKE yours. You may want to LIKE my Corky the Shelter Dog Facebook page to return the favor.

My goal is to promote the adoption of shelter dogs and other rescue pets, so you’re welcome to post related content on my wall.

View more than 100 pictures in this slideshow of Corky photographs which will include a funny video of Corky sneezing.

Did you know? You can click the icon in the lower right box of the slideshow to view this full screen. From there, you can select “Show Info” in the top right options that appear to view a description as each photo is displayed.

In addition, you may select “Options” to view the slideshow as slow, medium, or fast!

Special thanks to “Dad” for giving me a unique set on his Flickr account that allows showing this custom presentation.

If you didn’t notice, some photos are 3 years old and show me when I was just a puppy. Some of the very first pictures of me show how scraggly I looked when first rescued from doggy jail.

Did you see the funny video of me sneezing? That was a once in a lifetime capture! Have fun!

This story is about Harley the Weim whom I met, plus all their dogs, on my road trip to Lifeline Dog Rescue in Okeechobee Florida. I love doggies. I am one! This post is mostly about Harley the male Weimaraner, who was surrendered by his owner in Ohio and transported by volunteers to Florida.

Harley stays in foster at the Lifeline Dog Rescue headquarters, but came to their 3 acre dog rescue facility for a fun day to meet me and have pictures taken. He deserves some fun. He will have surgery Thursday which I’ll describe later.

The photos shown above are (left) Harley the Weimaraner in the beautiful lake at Lifeline with me, Corky the Shelter Dog, then (center) part of their 3 acre dog rescue property and lake, and then (right) my Mom with General the foster horse and me.

Click on any or all of the photos for a 1200 x 900 pixel desktop wallpaper version that you can download to your computer. *Psst – I never ever saw a horse before. Can you tell he wasn’t scared of me? OMD he’s big!

Here’s more about my new pal, Harley, and how you can help Harley by donating towards his surgery and recuperation.

Visit the Lifeline Dog Rescue blog post and ChipIn campaign for Harley for details about his story and pictures of that ugly growth. From the photo above, and the time we ran and played yesterday, you wouldn’t know he had a sore paw. However, that benign tumor on his hind paw continues to grow so the veterinarian and a surgical specialist recommended surgery.

Harley will have an operation to remove that large growth on Thursday, 16 February 2012, and doctors determined he will lose one toe in the procedure. Pre-op costs were $800 for veterinarian bills and the biopsy that determined the growth is benign. Just the surgery is $1500 more. Followup vet visits and recuperation will cost even more!

Harley is a sweet and lovable happy boy (doggy) and deserves to recover his health, and then be adopted into a forever home (like me). Please visit the ChipIn blog post to donate and help defray some of this unexpected cost, plus encourage your friends and family to help out, too.

Lifeline Dog Rescue specializes in the Weimaraner breed, yet provides a safe sanctuary for other breeds of dogs. Please help them continue to help more dogs like Harley. Any amount no matter how small will be greatly appreciated.

The icons in the right sidebar of my website have been updated on all pages to include Facebook. I’ve added a Facebook graphic to the YouTube and Twitter icons because I now have a CorkyTheShelterDog Facebook page to promote pet rescue.

Here are bigger versions of my social icons that link to my social networks on YouTube (20 videos and counting), Twitter (over 3,700 followers) and now Facebook (with X number of likes).

In addition to these accounts, new social bookmarking icons are at the bottom on each page and under the date of each blog post of my website, also.

Those allow you to use your accounts to Google +1, like on Facebook, or tweet about the page you are visiting. Mouse over the share button next to those and a flyout menu offers over 300 more social bookmarking website choices.

Visit my social sites to meet my connections and learn more about adopting a shelter dog, rescue dog, or other pet. When considering adding a pet to your family, adopt instead of buy, and make sure to spay or neuter.

Dad and I went to the park for an early photo shoot at Lake Toho in Kissimmee Florida this morning, and I met a new doggy pal, Saturday. Oops, you’re thinking? It’s Thursday Corky! Yeah, I know.

My new doggy pal is named Saturday! That’s him in the photo here with his Dad, David, plus me standing on 3 legs. Saturday is a lab mix rescue dog like me! He is 1-1/2 years old and loves to run and play, plus he’s very well behaved, so we were both allowed off leash.

Several fishermen walked by us and we didn’t bark. Well, maybe I did once.

Saturday’s forever home story began when he was adopted from the doggy jail (dog pound). He is brilliant when it comes to interview techniques. Again, like me, he leaned into his new parents to let them know he has a whole lotta love to give! Remember that secret if you ever end up in doggy jail. It works!

Saturday and his parents live in Kissimmee and come to Lake Toho 1 or 2 times a week, so we could be friends for a long long time. Guess what? He has a Facebook page, too! We’ll connect later online and have lots of photographs and stories to share.

The chance to meet a new pal is just one more reason to get up and out early. Life is grand.

Lifeline Dog Rescue in Central Florida is a non-profit dog rescue and division of Central Florida Weimaraner & Dog Rescue, Inc. You don’t need to live in Florida to adopt a Weimaraner purebred dog. Lifeline Dog Rescue has options to transport newly adopted dogs including out of state.

Enjoy this Lifeline Dog Rescue photo slideshow presentation showing their property, lake, and many many dogs!

Does Lifeline Dog Rescue provide the food, shelter, and care to place just Weimaraners? No. They specialize in Weims yet accept all breeds of dogs.

If you are thinking of a dog for Christmas, view this slideshow, and then visit the Lifeline Dog Rescue website to find Weimaraners ready to adopt.

One of my favorite doggy places in the world is featured here. View this Fleet Peeples Dog Park slideshow with more than 80 photographs of dogs taken at Fleet Peeples in Winter Park near Orlando, Florida.

Fleet Peeples Dog Park is 23 acres of enclosed land on Lake Baldwin that features the lake for dogs to swim, beach for digging and playing, and woods with trails for dogs to explore.

In addition, there’s a large grassy area with trees for shade, and more fun spots for dogs to romp and play. For pet owners, there’s barbeque pits, picnic tables, benches, rest rooms, and a dual platform dog bathing station.

If you own a dog and live within 50 miles or Orlando, a visit to Fleet Peeples Dog Park provides an excellent atmosphere for letting your dog interact and socialize with other dogs. Best of all, there is no entrance fee. Just make sure your dog is up to date on shots, and wearing a current rabies tag. Maybe you’ll see me, Corky the shelter dog, there, too!

Footnote: Once the presentation begins, mouse over the slide show to display the Flickr controls, then click the box to the far right of the thumbnails and the show will go FULL SCREEN for dramatic full size doggy pix. Press the vertical line PAUSE button to hold a photo for viewing longer. Press the triangle to continue. Press ESC once to return to the blog post view.

Here’s my latest video uploaded to YouTube made especially for my doggy pals on Twitter. Learn my secrets about finding gold in this episode entitled “Corky Lesson on Mining for Gold”. Watch and listen or read along the text narration below. (Play time 03:00 min/sec)

Transcript of Narration of Corky Lesson on Mining for Gold Video

Here I am, Corky the shelter dog, exploring the lake and enjoying the sunset on my vacation in Maine. You can practice mining for gold in a lake but there’s better ways. These ducks are only watching. They can’t do what dogs can do, so I’m not worried about them learning my secrets, but I’m telling my friends for free.

Who would have guessed a doggy could mine for gold? We can. It would be easier if we had thumbs because people mine gold in 2 ways. One – they dig in the ground with a pick to find streaks of gold. That can take years. Two – they pan for gold in a stream. That’s easier and faster – especially if you’re a dog.

One day while on vacation it rained hard for hours. That flooded my private beach and left a stream running through it to the lake. This, my friends, was the perfect opportunity to videotape “Corky Lesson on Mining for Gold”.

Unlike humans, dogs have superior senses… and intelligence. My doggy pals can use their nose to sniff gold, so have your human let you smell a gold ring or necklace so you remember the scent. If you didn’t notice, I made a trail going upstream because digging after you smell gold can muddy the water.

By going upstream you only go through clean water which makes sniffing gold easier. Once you think you’ve found a gold nugget it’s time to dig. That’s something else we can do better than humans. Dig dig and dig some more. You will get dirty and that’s half the fun.

Did I find gold? Nope. Or at least “nope” is the official answer. Find gold and brag about it and burglars might steal your gold nuggets when you go for a walk. Give all your gold to your guardians so they can take it to the pawn shop and use the money to buy you doggy treats.

That’s all you need to know about mining for gold. Sniff the gold. Dig the gold. Pawn the gold. Buy treats.

My site now features new large size doggy wallpapers for people interested in downloading the desktop wallpaper photographs on my website. 267 photographs of me, Corky the shelter dog, plus pictures of dogs and puppies and my favorite dog park were enlarged so now all are 1200 x 900 pixels.

Here’s a cropped version of one of the desktop wallpapers showing me looking up at a black and white spotted great dane.

Bigger, better, and higher quality pet photos replaced the old ones yet kept the same file name, so the links are still good in Google Image Search. As you visit the photo gallery pages, click a thumbnail to view the new size. They were 800 x 600 pixels before, so I made the 1200 x 900 my new standard.

To see examples of the new large size doggy wallpapers visit the Corky Friends Photo Gallery or the Fleet Peeples Park Photo Gallery. On average the file size of each is 5 times bigger.

Click any of the thumbnails and the new 1200 x 900 wallpaper will open on the next screen, and then right-click to download and use as desktop wallpaper on your computer. To save time, you can right-click and select “set as desktop background” to have them immediately replace your old wallpaper. Enjoy!

Just like little Goldilocks, our new resuce kitty Dexter still doesn’t understand. Caught in the act it’s not just somebody sleeping in MY bed, it’s Dexter! I’m Corky the shelter dog shown here squeezing in, but it could ruin a doggy’s reputation sharing his bed with a c-a-t.

Dexter the rescue kitty has been in our family since July 5, 2011. At the time he only weighed 1.1 lbs. soaking wet. He went to 2.6 lbs. in just 2 weeks. Now he doubled that to 5.2 lbs. since our vacation in August.

On the bright side he’s big enough to play wrestle with me. Being a polite puppy I let him win. On the not so bright side, Dexter kitty is likewise big enough that it’s time for a visit to the vet, aka jewel thief. Yup. Dexter has an appointment to be neutered on Monday.

Besides me and Dexter, our older brother Sam the cat is missing his jewels, too. That’s the price we pay for being rescued into a loving family. If you are thinking of adding a pet to your family, PLEASE visit the local pet shelter.

Millions of healthy pets are euthanized every year because too many people buy pets instead of visiting a pet rescue organization to adopt a cat, kitten, dog, or puppy. With unconditional love from a pet who likes to snuggle, you won’t mind saying you caught “Somebody sleeping in MY bed!”