Canine Anomaly Tippy

Tippy was found in the woods, and brought home in the mouth of a 175# Black female Great Dane named Katy. Katy's owner was the daughter of the Colonel who would become Tippy's caregiver.

Tippy(long dead now as well as his owner) looked like no other dog I, or anybody else, had ever seen.  From that 7# tiny squeaking baby he grew to be approximatley 60 pounds.  His fur was gleaming, brilliant red.  I mean brilliant red. He had a black muzzle, standup ears, a white chest and sox, and a white tip on his tail.  The texture of his fur was very coarse sort of like an Airedale. It was so thick, though, it's hard to describe.  Anyway, Tippy was more wild dog than regular tame housedog all the days of his long, long life.  He would bare his fangs anytime he felt like an entity, human or animal, did not need to be in a particular place. If anybody had ever told me that the Colonel would have adopted him, I would have said, "you're nuts." But, indeed, the Colonel not only adopted him, he never was without him, from the day he was brought home in his daughter's dog's mouth, to the day he died, except for the time he spent guarding me for five days after my major surgery.

Once, I took Tippy and Penny (my wolf) to work with me, since I just needed to get something in the building. I worked for 3 Periodontal Surgeons at the time.  I left them in my 1974 318 V 8 Dodge Dart Sport that I drove every day for twenty four years. Well, when I came outside, one of the surgeons, Dr. Benton, asked me where he could get a guard dog like that because Tippy's hair on the back of his neck was standing up, and his fangs were out, and my boss really liked that! I said I didn't know, and that he belonged to the Colonel.  Penny, (my wolf) just yawned.  She was the coolest entity that ever strolled down the pike. She was a phenomenal protector,too, but why expend unnecessary calories when Tippy was doing the job for them both. It was like they were man and wife. Weird.

Everybody that saw him (Tippy) said what kind of dog on earth is that? He looked like a foxdog cross. I thought genetically, without studying it, that a fox could not mate with a domestic dog, and produce offspring.  I thought if it could, than some dog mated with a fox because this is a giant, walking fox! Gorgeous, but no one had ever seen anything like him, either in ferocity or looks.

Well, I was talking to my present boss, and he said, Oh, yes, there is. A dog can mate with a lot of similar things that you would think are impossible to produce offspring; namely, coyotes, foxes, wolves, and jackals, if I remember correctly.  He said it was rare, but could happen.  Well, if this is scientifically possible, than, without a doubt, I was made privy to a living example of what a foxdog cross is, and it was awesome to say the least.

Also, as a student of anthropology, I know whatever we thought today was the way it was, tomorrow, with more discovery, backed up by science, it changes, and our concepts must be broadened to absorb the new knowledge.  Every few years, we find man has been around, thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of more years than we first thought.  I say never say a definitive thing unless it is backed up by the Word of G_d, because you most likely, don't know what the heck you are talking about, and some Aboriginal somewhere will prove your degrees are not worth squat because there really is a so and so, or people were there millions of years earlier than you definititively said they were, as were gazillions of animals, and on and on.  I offer that the best way to not sound stupid is to say, at this present time, we have just discovered thus and so, proven by carbon dating, but in the future, that may change, and we may have to again, rethink our findings.  Nobody can ditz you too much with that.

Blessings, Carol