Meet George the Great Dane

From: Ann W.

Sent: 2012-03-19 11:47

To: undisclosed recipients

Subject: Fw: Meet George the Great Dane

Meet George

the Gr-r-reat Dane

The first time we saw George, our beloved Great Dane, he was no

more than a tiny, cowering ball of fuzzy fur. As my wife Christie

opened the door of the crate he’d traveled in, he teetered to a

standing position and looked out at us, moving his head slowly from

side to side, taking in the wonder of it all. Finally, as if weighing us up

and deciding we were acceptable, he tentatively pushed his little

nose forward and gave Christie her first lick.

Puppy love: A young George with Dave's wife Christie. Even as a pup he had

comically large paws .

He came into our lives in January 2006, just a few months after we

had married and set up home in Arizona . We both had busy jobs,

Christie selling medical equipment while I was a property developer,

but she had always planned that, once she had a house of her own,

she would also have a dog.

She wanted a Great Dane as they make great family pets, so we

tracked down a litter of 13, born 1,000 miles away in Oregon .

Their owner emailed us a photo showing a chaotic jumble of paws,

snouts and tails. Twelve were entangled with one another, but our

eyes were drawn to one pup standing apart from the rest. He was

clearly the runt, endearing him to Christie immediately.

Though it didn’t really register, George’s paws were comically large

even then. But all we saw was this cute puppy. We certainly never

dreamed he would one day become the biggest dog in the world,

standing nearly 4ft high at the shoulder, 7ft long and weighing

nearly 18 stone. Right now, he just looked bewildered.

George made the long journey from Oregon to Phoenix by plane and

we picked him up from the freight area, tired but unshaken.. As soon

as George settled into our home, we discovered our plans to be fair

but firm parents were wishful thinking. All the things that make

Great Danes wonderful pets — their lack of aggression and their

attachment to humans — make them more emotionally sensitive than

other dogs. They need to be with their ‘pack’ at all times and at

night the cute pup with intensely blue eyes turned into a

caterwauling banshee whenever we tried to leave him alone in

the kitchen.

No matter how much we reminded ourselves that he had every

home comfort (warm dog bed, warm blanket, warm kitchen,

squeaky bone), each whimper created a picture in our heads of a

tragic, abandoned pup, desperate for his mother. Eventually, we

gave in and shunted George’s dog bed into our bedroom.

Magnificent: George measures more than 7 ft from nose to tail and weighs

18 stone and is the world's biggest dog, but he's terrified of chihuahuas...

In the coming months, Christie really threw herself into being a

mum to George. As well as a photo album, he had a growth chart —

we were soon reading it in awe. At five months he still acted like a

puppy, chasing his tail and playing games of fetch and tug-of-war

with his favourite bit of rope. But he was already the size of a

fully-grown Labrador . He was putting on more than a pound a day

and he bounded around like Bambi, skittering on our wooden floors

and hurling himself at everything he fancied, including us humans.

His displays of affection could leave you pinned temporarily against a wall or a piece of furniture.

His size did not go unnoticed in the outside world. Our local park

had a section for puppies but we were bullied out of it by other

owners, who were scared George would hurt their pups — but the

opposite was true.

The smaller dogs ran around and under him, and he’d be constantly sidestepping them, obviously anxious and jittery. Slowly we realised

that our enormous puppy was a big softie. Besides his terror of

being left alone, he had a fear of water. He’d growl anxiously at the side of our swimming pool, alarmed that his ‘pack’ members would so willingly place themselves in danger of drowning.

If the pool was his most-hated place, his favourite was our bedroom. Eventually he outgrew the single mattress we placed there for him

and preferred instead the comfort of our king-sized bed —

sprawling between us like some over-indulged prince while we

spent half the night clinging onto the edges.

Paws for thought: George's giant feet dwarf Dave's hand

In the summer of 2006, we solved this problem by buying him his

own queen-sized mattress, which he still sleeps on today at the

bottom of our bed. But soon we encountered another challenge as

George reached doggie puberty. Once he had grabbed life by the

lapels, now he was grabbing onto legs — table legs, chair legs, human

legs, he wasn’t picky — and doing what all male dogs do with the

vigour of a canine giant.

He calmed down in the furniture department after we had him

neutered, but then he took up a new hobby, eating as if it were

an Olympic sport. A sausage on the barbecue was like a siren to a

passing sailor. You couldn’t turn your back for a minute. And he was

so tall that he actually had to bend down to pinch food off kitchen

counters.

He could reach the high shelves as well, so we had to hide everything

away in cupboards. Soon, he was getting through around 100lb of

dry dog food every month.

As he approached his first birthday in November 2006, weighing

about 14 stone, it was getting physically impossible to make him go

anywhere he didn’t want to — including the vet’s surgery. He had

not forgotten the time he went there in possession of his manhood —

and came out less than whole. As soon as he recognised the entrance,

he refused to move. So I had to take him around to the less familiar

back door instead.

For all these troubles, George gave us plenty in return, not least

the following year when Christie lost the baby she was carrying.

Evidently tuned in to her grief, George was a constant presence at

her side. When she sat, he sat too. When she stood, he stood and

padded alongside her to wherever she was going.

His personality grew more delightful the bigger he got. A male

Great Dane typically weighs from nine to 11 stone, but by Christmas

2007 George weighed 15 stone — bigger than most men. At this

point, he loved being chauffeured around in my golf cart and would

sit in it, his haunches on the seat and front legs on the floor.

By Christmas 2008, our canine colossus weighed 18 stone. A friend

suggested he might be a contender for the Guinness Book of

Records, but we had other things to think about: Christie had

discovered that she was pregnant again.

With size comes problems: George the giant barely fits in the back

of his owner's SUV

The trouble was, when our daughter Annabel arrived that September

George made it clear he wanted nothing to do with this interloper.

He was used to spending nights in delightful oblivion at the foot of

our bed. Annabel’s high-decibel presence simply wasn’t on.

When she cried, he’d wake, harrumph and then turn over in annoyance.

Once it was clear the racket was going to continue, he’d exhale

heavily again, till one of us finished that mysterious feeding thing

we did with the noisy intruder.

But while he might not have cared much for Annabel, George loved

her dolls, especially a stuffed green one that played a nursery

rhyme when squeezed. Whenever he could, he placed it between

his paws and pressed it so he could hear the tune. It was like a

security blanket. It was a period of such big adjustment for him that

if it made him happy, then it was fine by us and our patience was

rewarded.

Slowly, George understood that Annabel was our pack’s youngest

member and in need of his affection and protection. And on

Christmas morning, he ended his three-month sulk, acknowledging

her presence with a lick of her hand. It was the best present we

could have had — although the beginning of 2010 brought more good

news.

A doggone miracle: George the Great Dane with the Nasser 's daughter

Annabel at home in Arizona

Over the previous weeks, while Annabel slept, Christie had applied

to the Guinness World Records people on George’s behalf. That

February, one of their adjudicators came to watch George being

measured in the presence of a vet. He was officially declared not

just the world’s tallest living dog (43 inches from paw to shoulder)

but the tallest dog ever.

The following week we flew to Chicago to appear on the Oprah

Winfrey Show and were put up in one of the city’s most luxurious

hotels. We had a huge sitting room, dining area and even a bar —

but there was just one problem. There was nowhere for George to

sleep.

As we enjoyed a gourmet meal and a bottle of red wine that night,

he struggled to settle on two roll-out divans provided for him.

Infuriatingly, they wouldn’t stay together. So he had his head on

one and back end on the other, but his stomach was sagging onto

the carpet.

‘You know what we need to do,’ I joked. ‘Give George our bed to sleep on and have the divans in this room ourselves.’

Christie looked at me with a telltale gleam in her eye and I knew

immediately my joke had been a fatal error. An hour later, our boy

was sprawled in splendour in our huge, fluffy king-size bed.

‘Well,’ whispered Christie, ‘George is the star here, after all.’ She

was right, of course, and since his appearance on TV, Giant George

has built a following around the world, with his own fan club, website

and 70,000 fans on Facebook.

None of this, of course, means anything to George. He still spends

his days doing what he has always liked best: eating, playing and

sleeping. Our cherished pet may have become a global celebrity —

but really, he’s just one of the family.

Man's biggest friend: Devoted owner Dave Nasser with George

George weighed 18 stone which is 252 pounds.