It's a BOY!

Proud parents Keith and Amanda and sister, Kona, are happy to announce the arrival of our new baby boy! He was born about 11 weeks ago somewhere near Artesia, NM. He is one of a litter of 6 boys who were rescued by the Heart & Soul Animal Sanctuary. (The same organization that rescued Kona.) He stayed at the hospital one night because he had cactus needles in his side when they found him. I fell in love with him and Keith actually caved! He currently weighs 12.25 lbs, but that probably changed since this morning since he's a hungry little hippo! He's some sort of a Catahoula Leopard mix. We think he might have either Heeler or Australian Shepherd in him, since he has the markings of a Catahoula, but not the super short hair or hound dog ears. Catahoulas are pretty rare in this neck of the woods, so we're lucky that we snatched him up! Oh, and he's absolutely the most handsome puppy I've ever seen! Very unique markings. We're guessing that he'll grow up to be about the same size as Kona, 50-55 lbs, but his paws are already the same size as hers, so we might have brought home a bear rather than a dog! I guess if he starts to get too big, we'll switch him from large breed food to small breed!

Since his arrival late Thursday evening, things have gone fairly well. Everything is still pretty well puppy-proofed from when Kona came home, so not many changes there. He's a good little guy and Kona's been trying really hard to be good with him too. She likes to play rough though, so we've been on her a lot about being gentle. He's pretty good about letting her know when it's too much, so we let him take care of it as best he can. He has those razor sharp little teeth that he latches onto her lips with and that seems to get his point across. He's pretty feisty! I like it! Kona's gets jealous and reaches a breaking point when it comes to sharing food and toys, so we've been paying her a lot of extra attention and trying to regulate with tons of positive reinforcement when she's being nice. She also gets to go on Kona-only outings so that she can blow off some steam and get some one-on-one attention. She's a good girl and they're gonna have SO much fun together once he's a little bigger! I'm excited for him to have all of his shots in 3 weeks so that he can go to the dog park with us!

Here's where we need your help: He doesn't have a name yet...(surprise, surprise) We were hoping to name him something that has to do with rafting or whitewater or rivers...maybe you can help? Please leave comments with suggestions if you can come up with anything!