Richmond Park Walk

SUNDAY 27 SEPTEMBER 2009

Meet 11.00am at Kingston Gate and walk to Pembroke Lodge for coffee.

Bring your hound or ask Denise if you can bring one of the kennel hounds.

Jane, Poppy, Bob and Nelly

Next Greyhound Social Walk: 10.30 am Sunday 6 September 2009 Nonsuch Park

Come and take your retired greyhound, or a homeless hound from Hersham, for a stroll through Nonsuch Park


We will walk along the mown paths through the meadows to the Mansion House which has a cafe, picnic area and WCs. We'll stay a while for a chat and of course to admire our lovely hounds.

John Gooch the park keeper and owner of retired greyhound Brandy and Ash the lurcher will be joining us (as they did the last time we had a social walk in Nonsuch Park)

Go to the car park located on the big bend on London Road, near Ewell. The car park is marked with a red circle on this map

You will see this monument at the car park entrance:


Please contact the welfare kennels at Hersham if you are able to take a homeless hound out with us.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Strange how life works out, one day you think "I wonder what a greyhound even looks like close up" and a few years down the line you end up on Utube doing this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=38r2COGpY5kIf you can't guess which one I am....I'm not telling you!I've been playing in the paddocks with the greyhounds, well no if any of the staff are reading this I've been wood staining the fence diligently. Its hard, I mean you are trying to paint away and there is a naughty greyhound play bowing at you, it would be rude of me not to chase him just a little bit wouldn't it? Rufus showed a total lack of appreciation of my efforts to make his environment a bit smarter by peeing in my paint. So all the fences have are now Culprano "Forest Oak brown"- with hint of wee colour.Madaboutgreys is an amazing photographer, she took a load of pics of my fav' greyhound, Missy with her new collar which I won on an auction for her.http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=madaboutgreys&s=recThe last pic is my favourite, she is smiling, I swear it.Homing has been up and down some going home but some coming back. I don't get so worked up about them coming back now because its much better to have them safe with us. One came back after just a few days and seemed so miserable. A few days later she was back to her normal self, greyhounds are so sensitive aren't they? Makes me laugh when I go home at the end of the day and they thank me for doing a bit of work for them. I'm like, no thank you for giving me purpose and joy in my mundane life.

Brave Sam

One of Sanctuary dogs is the bravest hound I know. Last year he had a terrible infection in his anal glands. He was very uncomfortable and we didn't help because we had to keep him muzzled to stop him worrying it. As soon as it clears up, it comes back again so he was put on a course of steroids which makes his coat thick so he suffers in summer. What makes him amazing to me is that he takes it all so well. He does not struggle if you have to muzzle him for example, he is always pleased to see you and has such a waggly tail bless him.

Yesterday he was having a good poke around in a bush......and got bittern by a snake!!! His nose has swollen up and he has a big welt on the side of his muzzle. He looks like a bull terrier and is in a lot of discomfort and pain. He's on medication now and pain killers but is very sensitive on his muzzle. To reduce the swelling we have been pressing cold packets of pees on him- it must hurt and yet his tail is wagging away when we do it to him.

Get better soon my brave, brave black hound you are an inspiration and much loved part of our kennels.

Richmond Park Walks

Everybody seems to be really busy during the weekends over the summer so we have decided to postpone our next Richmond Park walk until the autumn. However, if you get any time off during the week, come and join us on Tuesday mornings at 9.15am during term-time - meeting at Kingston Gate.

Have I gone nuts........or should that be barking crazy?I have pictures of hounds on my walls and my locker at work.No longer have any clean clothes that don't have kennel paint or little rips or holes from over eager hounds.Spend most of my free time at the kennels and forget to do things like buy human stuff.Talk about greyhounds at work to much eg. "Staff meeting today at 9am and no Alex for the hundrenth time we will not be converting part of the building into a greyhound creshe anytime soon."Thinking of trading in the cool sporty saloon for... one of those boxy estate things even though I don't own a hound yet but usually have one in the back at least once a fortnight for special walkies or events. Oh well at least it had better be a very cool estate- is that a contradiction in terms?Forgetting all about social life, which is a good thing my last chat up line was something like "Hi, do you like greyhounds?" Doesn't really cut much ice. Besides all that dating stuff gets in the way of more important things like greyhound walking and grooming.Neglected current friends, they are all at the "come over and meet our new baby!" stage. Why the heck would I want to that? If it was "Come over and meet our new greyhound" then hey now we are talking!Fighting a sudden urge to sniff strangers bottoms. Okay I made that last bit up but its only a matter of time at this rate.Help me!!!!

Daisy-Annie’s Morning of Modelling

Me and Jenny

Hi, I just thought I’d tell you about the morning I spent as a model.
Last Thursday morning (very early, Tiger and I had only just woken up!) Carol came into our kennel and got me ready for what I thought was going to be an early morning stroll. Little did I know where I was going!

A lady called Emma put me in her car and off we set on a long drive, well it was long to me. I was a bit worried as Tiger wasn’t with me and that usually means a trip to the vets. I didn’t like all the traffic much either but Emma kept telling me that we were nearly there so I eventually settled down.

When we finally stopped we went for a walk around a big car park. I could smell lots of other dogs but couldn’t see any of them…it was all very strange. After I decided that I didn’t want my breakfast we went into this big building where the first person I saw was Eve, so I rushed up to her for a big reassuring cuddle. As I looked around I noticed some other greys. Eve was showing Emma a dress, which she didn’t seem to like very much, and pointing to lots of other ladies wearing posh dresses and hats….What was going on???

Over the next hour I munched on lovely hot sausages and lots of my old friends from the kennel started to turn up. It was great to see them all again and of course their mums and dads. I was just starting to think that I was at a kennel reunion when I was lead outside with some of the other dogs and ladies in posh dresses, onto a track. Then I knew where I was…Wimbledon Stadium, I just hoped that they didn’t want me to race these ladies! I really wasn’t expecting what happened next. I was handed over to one of the ladies and then a strange lady came up to me and put a hat on my head, not just me, all the greys, we looked very smart ( I don’t think that Charlie would carry off the black feather number they gave him down the park though!). They then made us walk up and down in a line whilst this funny man gave us orders and took photographs of us. We greys were amazing and really well behaved; I don’t think they ladies in posh dresses did so well.

My Best Side??

After a break for cuddles and more sausages, we were trotted back outside for what I think was the funniest bit of the morning.
They wanted to take a group shot of all 25 greys and ladies in a line; really don’t they know how disobedient these humans are?? The director man started to get a little stressed with us then as some of us greys, not me I was totally professional, wanted to show off their best side, which happened to be their bums!!! Well there were 25 of us and even some of you humans have better looking bums than faces, and we all want our best side in a photo!!!

Total Chaos!

It turned out to be a fun morning which I later learned was for the 25 anniversary of the Derby being held at Wimbledon Stadium. They’d offered a donation for our services so I really didn’t mind going.

Tiger didn’t believe me when I got home and sleepily told him all about it.

I hope you like the pictures. I think the one of me and Jenny has to be the best!

The Kennel Girls