If you love your pet as much as we do, then you might find this article interesting. It’s not meant to be a scientific or research-based paper but more a generalist guide to navigating water ways in Pennsylvania.
Our story begins like most families during COVID times. For a little background, I have had several pets in my life and like most had grown fond of them during our days together. Most of my personal experience was tied to earlier days in my life; the boyish years before you move out of home and go off on your own.
For nearly 25 years, I bypassed getting a pet for a lot of reasons. Some selfish, some emotional and a few others. Life kept moving forward and when you travel as a part of your profession as often as I had done earlier in my career you can barely keep yourself healthy and alive let alone a pet.
If I’m being honest, it found it too painful to lose pets. That’s probably more the truth than any other reason I can share. Some people that know me well would say I show more care and feelings for animals than I do for humans and that wouldn’t be far from the truth either.
Fast forward to adulthood, marriage and raising a young family and those pressures surface around getting a family fury friend. Most recently, I watched a few frogs pass-away, followed by several fish and had heard of friends and other family members losing their pets. It all just seemed too painful for me.
Our children had a hold of their mother’s ear. They had been dropping hints, pushing, and in many instances getting downright angry over my resistance to the idea. Then along comes COVID, a perfect opportunity to acquire a pet as you’ll be home to nurture, care, train and play with it. As dog owner, it really means get up early, go for walks, clean up poop and feed the little guy or gal as your own (flesh & blood) children aren’t going to do it unless you threaten to take all their electronics away for days, months and in some threatening discussions….YEARS!!!
After about 4 months into COVID and living at the lake for months at this point, I think I had either lost my edge, fell victim to my own comfort of being in such an amazing place day in and day out, or some higher power was watching over our family pulling the strings… a gauntlet was presented in the form of a dare.
Our family, along with a few friends were spending a lazy summer day down below Ledgedale bridge, jumping off the cliffs into the water. I had a few drinks working through my system but wasn’t experiencing any symptoms of being intoxicated or inebriated that day. The topic of the dog had once again entered the arena. Knowing that my wife dislikes (is an understatement) swimming in any water that isn’t crystal clear, along with the fact that she dislikes heights, I laid the challenge out.
“If you swim over to the cliff, climb the wall and jump off from to top where we’ve all jumped in from, we can get a dog!”
Not just any dog mind you, the research was already done and the breeder was already contacted unbeknownst to me. How naïve I was at the time, all this ground work was already done and my wife along with our children were waiting for the right moment, the opportunity, the right challenge. As you can imagine, I thought there was maybe a 1% probability my wife would accept this gift I was throwing out there.
She sprung into action as if to not allow me any time to think about what I had just done. The lifejacket was on in less than 10 seconds, meanwhile I’m holding a beer and chuckling a bit still thinking this is all a big joke. As she stands at the edge of the boat prior to jumping in, she gives me one long stare as if to say I hope you are ready. Off into the water she jumped, I’m still laughing but in the other side of my brain I’m thinking she’s swimming like Michael Phelps. As she swims the 100 yards to the shoreline, I’m still in stock that she swam in the water.
Next hurdle is the rock wall, there is no way she is going to make it up that wall. I’m laughing a little bit harder this time but with a slight hint of worry. She tackles the rock “cliff” I should say, like spiderman climbs New York city skyscrapers. Now I’m scared. The realization that she is determined to do this for herself and her family is starting to sink in.
After scaling the cliff to the topmost vantage point, there was a long pause which to me seemed eerie and calming all at the same time. Without too much hesitation there was a small but recognizable yelp on the way down into the water. After swimming back to the boat, a huge smile was visible for my wife who was victorious. She was crowned King for this day as she championed for our family and came out the other end a winner. We all ended up being winners due to her bravery.
A few months later, we were blessed with the pick of the litter. I suggested the biggest pup–the curliest pup because I have allergies. In addition, I noticed something interesting about this one puppy. One of the dogs in the litter barked and stomped his paws when the breeder removed two of the straight-haired dogs out of the pen, this puppy wasn’t having that, maybe most wouldn’t have noticed but that stuck with me. I attempted to not be overbearing in sharing my opinions as I didn’t earn the right. The rest of the family after spending 20-30 minutes narrowed it down to two dogs and to my surprise one of them was the one that I had liked. The final decision was made and we unanimously voted for our puppy.
We needed to pick a name; I had already launched Wally BITES back in 2019 with Trevor and this was 2020 so well after the site was launched. It was also roughly 4 years after acquiring our home at Lake Wallenpaupack. Several names were considered, in the end we named our little “mini” golden-doodle, Wally. We’ve been blessed every day since; he’s an amazing little guy. I consider him a part of our family as I’m sure most pet owners do. Despite my best efforts, we’ve also grown quite close to the point where I think if it was down to either him or me, I’d say – take me.
What does this long, and rambling story have to do with Lake Wallenpaupack? Several odd thoughts have run through my head since we’ve been bringing Wally to the lake. I’ll give you some general thoughts if you care to stick with me for a few more minutes.
Wildlife and Predators
Wally isn’t a big dog–only 34 pounds–but when he was younger, I honestly worried about him getting eaten while we were at the lake. We have two Eagles that often sit near our home, and I swear they would stare at him like he was a smore on a stick during a cool fall evening. Then, I worried about coyotes running around and snatching him up. Next up, porcupines as he is an inquisitive little dog and those quills are expensive to remove from what I’ve heard. What about the millions of skunks, the last thing I want to do is a tomato bath with Wally, especially since we don’t have a tub. The other thing we’ve worried about is snakes, we do have some venomous snakes in our region but ultimately I think my biggest fear was him coming across a mamma black bear with cubs. He’s a smart dog given the poodle in him but he couldn’t resist saying hello to a black bear. Needless to say, these are all worries for any pet owner when your animal is off leash or escapes the house for a few minutes. Given the size of Wally now, I worry less and less about these factors. But my worries don’t just stop with animals getting him. You see, I worry about a lot of things.
We’ve all seen those Facebook posts about people losing their pets while around the lake. It’s gut wrenching. Whether they fell in the water, ran away or were taken by evil villains like the Lady Gaga pet-nappers. We always try to keep a close eye on Wally and whenever we are out on the boat, he wears a vest. Dogs are great swimmers naturally but sometimes they get tired, or the water is too rough, too cold or they get old and can’t move around like they did in their earlier years. I’m sure I’m crazy and people will say that guy Ed has a lot going on in his head…I’ve also heard the exact opposite being said about me… For us, we just try and keep a close watch as much as possible. I’m sure you do as well….
Water Quality
The last thing we consider when being at the lake or any body of water is the quality of the water. I’ll try and end my piece with some background information for Lake Wallenpaupack. Maybe we can end on a positive note. From what I can gather, some of the worst water quality we experienced at the lake was in the 70s. There were several groups formed to help ensure the quality of our water at the lake remains healthy for not only recreational use but more importantly the ecosystem.
There are some ailments that your pet can suffer because of drinking lake water or any body of water really. They range from things like AKI which is a type of kidney disease that is caused by bacteria in the water. Giardia is probably the most common type of parasite found in waterways, aside from bacteria another common ailment your pet could experience while visiting the lake. Parvo is another virus like illness that is typically passed along from dog to dog and can be prominent in lake sand, not sure we have lake sand but figure I’d note it just in case it helps. In all cases, there are several qualified veterinarians to our lake community. We’ve even taken Wally to one and they helped us out in a pinch.
Probably the biggest issue our lake faces on a yearly basis is algae blooms. Never, under any circumstances allow your pet to drink water that has a greenish, blue hue on the top. Our lake experienced the worst algae bloom in 2019 and at that point it was extremely unhealthy for your pets and even you to ingest that water.
The good news is that the lake owners invest in conducting studies on the quality of the lake water. Is it enough, I guess it’s better than zero investment. The water quality of Lake Wallenpaupack is very healthy. There are other groups that are also involved in monitoring and caring for our water ways. One such group is WallenpaupackWatershed.org – there are many others as well…
- Lake Wallenpaupack Watershed Management
- PLEON – Pocono Lake Ecological Observation Network
- POWR – Pennsylvania Organization of Watersheds & Rivers
- PACD – Pennsylvania Association of Conservation Districts
- EPA – United States Environmental Protection Agency
Things are looking up and have been for many years. We hope that you enjoy the lake as much as we do, including those loved ones that have a little bit of hair, fur and/or features – I’ll even give you scales and shells, too.