ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, September 15, 1996 TAG: 9609160060
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG
SOURCE: KATHY LOAN STAFF WRITER
Bassets and shepherds and retrievers, oh my!
More than 100 dogs of all sizes and breeds (but mostly even temperaments) were brought to Virginia Tech Saturday for the annual fall dog wash, sponsored by the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine
For $8, owners could get the full-salon treatment for their dogs in the college's parking lot, including washing, drying, brushdown and ear-cleaning. For two bucks more, students clipped the dogs' nails. Dogs were rewarded at the end with a treat and a handkerchief tied around the neck.
Curtis Brown, his wife, Susan, and young son Ryan brought Candise and Carmen - 10-year old mixed shepherd-chows - for their first Tech-sponsored baths.
"They're really being good with them. They're pampering them and brushing them and giving them dog bones," Curtis Brown said.
"She's eating this up. She loves this," he said as Candise was being groomed. "They haven't had a good brushing in about two or three weeks."
Proceeds from the dog wash, held each spring and fall, benefit the Student Chapter of the American Veterinary Medical Association and the Montgomery County Humane Society. The freshman and sophomore classes of the vet school also get part of the profits because they provide the student workers, said Shawna Green, sophomore class representative of the student chapter.
By just after 2 p.m., more than 126 people had signed up to have their dogs washed - some bringing more than one.
Once the animals were signed in, owners waited with them on a grassy knoll or in the parking lot until it was their turn on the assembly line. Two or three students worked with each dog, using water hoses, nail clippers and grooming brushes while cajoling or calming the dogs and dodging the inevitable shakes pets give, impatient for their towel rubdowns.
Aside from the occasional bark or nosy sniff at another dog, most of the pets - all on leashes - were well-behaved and accepted their baths.
Allison Jeffrey, a doctoral student in clinical psychology with an Australian blue heeler mix, brought Penelope back to the vet college for the dog wash as a follow-up to a Christmas photo shoot there with Santa last year.
"She's been getting kind of bored in the apartment since school started, so I thought I'd bring her out here."
Penelope took the bath in stride, just as she does at home, where Jeffrey can leave her in the tub and walk out of the room to retrieve more shampoo without fear she'll run off.
Ginny, a 20-month old Great Pyrenees, stood calmly as two volunteers brushed her then tied a green handkerchief over her collar.
"She is white, after all! She didn't look like it," said her owner, MaryEllen Walthall. "She was looking very beige."
Ginny had endured the whole treatment, from wash to nail-trimming. Walthall considered the $10 charge well-spent.
It took the volunteers only about 20 minutes to do the job.
"I'd be all day trying to do her like them," Walthall said.
LENGTH: Medium: 63 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: LORA GORDON/Staff. Susan Holland (left) and Christinaby CNBOber give cocker spaniel Logan the full treatment Saturday at the
dog wash. color.