Comment by brandall10
1 day ago
I grew up with a cocker spaniel obsessed with tennis balls to the point of covering his food with them and letting it rot. Looking into his eyes conveyed no emotion and he didn't seem to care much for affection. He was a tennis ball tracking machine.
There was nothing you could do to satiate his desire. If you gave in to a catch session, you could throw it 100 times, he would start coughing/convulsing from exhaustion, yet still drop a ball at your feet begging you to throw it. You could probably have killed him with it.
If no one was playing catch with him he would spend hours scouring the neighborhood for balls hidden in bushes. At one point I believe he had over 20 balls piling up in various places in our backyard. We would regularly take his balls away so he only had a couple, but more would magically appear.
We did have a little fun with this. My dad would use him as a tennis practice 'partner'. And we built a tennis ball cannon powered by M80s (note: this was mid-80s in the SFV when/where things like bottle rockets and blow guns were legal).
I've had to put down quite a few animals, and he was the only one were there was no sadness, only relief when his time came, esp. after 15 long years of having to pander to this obsessive behavior.
My belief is animals experience something similar to autism, and he was as far along the spectrum as possible, to the point where the only thing that defined him was his working instinct. That million years of mind-meld evolution w/ humans? Simply not there.
Our samoyed is obsessed, if that is the right word, with being sociable - with people but also other dogs (and the occasional cat or cow). He likes balls but they are a means to an end - getting interaction from me or from other dogs.
Edit: He gets plenty time with other people and dogs - not its not like he is starved for attention.
It must be a breed trait. Growing up, my neighbor had a Samoyed. My brothers and I would go over and play with him for hours on end and he would wear us out. We were young and had crazy kid energy, but he would wear us out. No amount of attention was enough.
We walk him about 3 hours a day on average - fortunately for him he gets lot of attention from people when we are out.
A friend had a dog a bit like this. She really liked the dog…but I did not understand how what the human side was getting out of the relationship. The dog would probably have been equally happy living with a ball throwing machine.
This is such a funny write .. thank you!