It turns out that the 140 lb Rottweiler cross I have been living with on and off with for the past 5 years has a dirty little secret…He poos in my room sometimes, but only when he really has to go and only as a last resort. Nonetheless, it is a stinky terrible mess.

Well, a few days ago, he did the same thing, but afterwards he wasn’t getting any better. He started having bloody stools, so his owner Buffie (my roommate) took him to the vet today. The vet gave him an X-ray, and look what he found:

Yep, that is a bullet! Someone, sometime, shot this poor dog, and we have no idea who, where, or when. He is a total homebody, and only goes out in the backyard and on walks with Buffie. To me, it looks like a 9 mm round, fired from the front of the dog and above. It does not appear fragmented or mushroomed in any way, so either it was a jacketed round, or was not going very fast when it entered his body (perhaps a chance hit from a shot fired in the air?).

There is no obvious entry wound, and so it is a mystery when and where this happened. Buffie got the dog from the pound when he was 2 or 3, and he looked like he had a rough life, so maybe Taiko was some drug dealer’s guard dog or something…and got shot in the process, ending up on the street?

Anyway, the bullet is in soft tissue, and the vet did not think it needs to be removed, so there it will stay. The  digestive problems are unrelated and are being treated with antibiotics. They probably result from consuming some awful thing on the ground during a walk. Hopefully his stinky butt will get better soon. That enlarged intestine bodes no good for anyone nearby….

Taiko: international dog of mystery.