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Poodle Stories

The supply of stories about the intelligence, bravery, perceptiveness, and playfulness of poodles is virtually endless.  On this page, we regularly select one story from among them that we found to be particularly amusing, poignant,  fascinating, or just plain weird.

Enjoy!

Oops... I Forgot
Copyright J. James. All rights reserved.
Reprinted by permission.

It was hot, unusually hot even for a typical mid-summer day in LA.  The family had gathered around and in the pool to keep cool and enjoy the long weekend.  The kids splashing about always set the dog to barking and running around the pool from one end to the other. 

The dog in question was a small white standard poodle named Lady.  Lady was elegant, smart, mean and spoiled rotten.  No walks through the field or on the trail for this poodle.  No retrieval romps in the marsh.  Only the finest pet food, best grooming and regular rides in the beemer.  And don't even think about trying to keep her from doing anything she darn well pleased... the response was swift and full of teeth.

Most of the family secretly hated Lady but tolerated her for her owner's sake.

So as Lady dashed around from one end of the pool to the other, no one really paid much attention.  In fact no one really noticed when the barking stopped.  No one that is except me.  The barking had stopped because the dog -- who hated water -- had slipped into the pool. 

No problem.  Dogs are instinctive swimmers and heck, poodles come from a long line of water-dogs.  I told myself this as I waited for Lady to resurface and swim smartly to the steps to get out.  Tick, tick, tick.  No dice.  OK, she's just a little heavier than I thought and sank lower than normal, she'll come bursting up through the surface any second now.  Tick, tick, tick.  Still no Lady. 

Getting somewhat alarmed at this point, I rose to get a good look down to the bottom of the pool.  There she was, like a confused seahorse, paddling madly midway between the bottom and the surface and getting nowhere.  It wouldn't take much longer and this poodle would be paddling through that Big Pool in the sky.  I think it was the visions of having to do artificial respiration on the family nemesis that finally spurred me to jump in after the dog. 

A few moments and many deep scratches later, Lady had been bodily lifted above the surface and onto the coping.  The embarrassment of having forgotten even the most basic of hereditary instincts from her proud lineage was palpable.  She slunk out in temporary shame until her owner made enough goo-goo over her that she started to feel better. 

Lady soon returned to her usual mean, snooty self.  I don't think she ever forgave me for the debt she begrudgingly owed and which was as much a surprise to me as I think it was to her.

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Submit Your Story to Poodle Place:

We love stories. If you'd like to submit a short story to us about your poodle, please send it to stories at poodle-place dot com and we'll consider it for inclusion in our newsletter or web site. Please limit your story to no more than 500 words. We will also accept one image per story if it is resized to no more than 250 pixels by 250 pixels. Please don't send us sad stories about the death of a pet -- we're very sensitive and getting weepy-eyed several times a day doesn't make for a productive work environment. We understand though; we've been there too. We love stories about the intelligence, bravery, agility, rambunctiousness and sense of humour your poodle may have displayed. Give it a go. We look forward to hearing from you.