Dog Days of September

I spent most of the day at the annual Dog Days of September, which is held at the Lucas County Fairgrounds. Non-profit organizations and a wide variety of commercial vendors related to dogs gather here each year, and the event usually draws a few thousand people and their canine pals.

Interestingly, I saw new Lucas County dog warden Julie Lyle at the event. In the many years that I have attended this event (and other area events associated with dog ownership) I never saw the previous warden Tom Skeldon in attendance. It was refreshing to see the dog warden walking around, chatting with people and petting the numerous pooches.

Left: Dachshunds running in the Wiener Nationals

Another component of the Dog Days of September is the annual Wiener Nationals races, featuring local Dachshunds and their owners competing to see which of the short-legged rascals is the fastest. There was quite a crowd for the four-plus hours of Dachshund racing, though admittedly many of the dogs need coaxing to reach the finish line on the 20-yard course. Of course, I would want to make sure that my laptop insurance was paid up before bringing along the computer, but that is another story altogether.

So, if you have a few hours to kill on this day next year, you could do far worse than the Dog Days of September. There are lots of dog-related activities and some food vendors (human as well as canine), and non-profit organizations like Planned Pethood benefit from greater exposure and the material and monetary donations collected at these events.