Those who have pets will certainly understand me better than those who don’t. But each one of our seven large dogs so obviously has such a distinct character from the others, that is sometimes feels uncanny.

Somehow we seem to associate character variances with humans only, which definitely isn’t the case. Dogs might even have more differing dispositions than we do, perhaps due to the lack of social and ethical pressures and norms.

So it all started a few years ago, when we decided to go to SPCA to get ourselves a puppy. However, upon stating that we had a lot of space and a pleasant disposition, they craftily ‘sold’ us three large ones instead!

It is obvious that everyone wants the puppies first, so it is easy to find a home for these. But it is not everyday that such big suckers as us walk in and agree to take half the damn dogs they have in their kennels…

So this is how we got Lucy, Cessie and Jetty.

Lucy is a light brown, short-haired tal-Fenek (pharaoh hound) and tal-Kacca (Maltese hunting dog/pointer) cross. She is very ‘pointery’ and does actually point quite often. She is a very keen hunter for anything that crosses her way – birds, lizards, insects, anything, or rather nothing – stands a chance. She is most definitely the most human of them all. Sometimes I think that she is inside my head.

When there is someone at the gate and all the other dogs are barking furiously at the stranger, totally fixated at the person there, she is the only one who barks in the stranger’s direction, while constantly looking back at the house to see whether we have noticed or not. And after a while she starts barking more and more in the direction of the house, so as to summon us outside.

She also loves to mimic others. I often notice that when the other dogs pee, she often goes straight there and pees over theirs. But that is probably to smother their scent and lay down hers instead. However on one occasion I kid you not, I was peeing myself in the bathroom while she was next to me, she looked up at me, squatted down over the tiled floor, and started peeing too. She obviously decided that it was pee time for all, and for the first time ever, actually peed inside right next to me.

But what I find by far the most fascinating about her, is that although I do not tend to feed them at exactly the same times every day, and I am always moving around the house for much of the time, the moment I decide to go and feed them she somehow senses this and starts barking and screaming like crazy. How she does this I have no idea. But honestly the moment I get up to go and feed them, in the same way I get up to do a hundred other things, she knows immediately that this time my intention is different, and goes wild with excitement.

Then there is Cessie, who very simply is the other extreme. She is a German Shepherd cross who is part gentle and part grumpy. All she wants is to be left alone. She is extremely docile with us but occasionally snappy with the other dogs when their boisterous nature starts to bug her.

It takes a lot to stir her up and in many cases even when all the others are barking like crazy at whatever caught their attention, she remains still, lying down, and occasionally looks up secretly just moving her eyes, to ensure that all is ok, while pretending that she is totally oblivious to the commotion around her.

As for Jetty, her story is a bit more sombre I am afraid. Her first owners were monsters out of hell who used to beat her as a puppy!! but let’s not go there and spoil our mood… So she has remained extremely skittish and even with us after many years she still tends to go through phases. Sometimes she is relatively fine but sometimes she doesn’t even let us touch her. If for example we need to hold her down to change her collar, pull out a couple of ticks, check her out, or whatever, she is so traumatised by the experience that it takes us many months to gain her full confidence again and to be able even to pet her.

The poor thing tries and when say I am in the middle of them all playing and petting them, she is circling around me coming very close and wagging her tail. But sure enough as soon as I tend my arm towards her to pet her, she dodges it and moves just far enough for me not to touch her.

The poor thing has been marked for life and it would be worse to try and force her. There are the odd moments when she feels safe and lets us touch her. We then give her a big hug and a good scratching on her belly, which she thoroughly enjoys.

She is called Jetty because being a black labrador cross, she is a shiny jet black and beautiful.

About a year after we got our first three, I was walking in the countryside, when I encountered this extraordinarily beautiful puppy. A black, and speckled grey male tal-kacca with truly fantastic features. In spite of his tender age, he was left for most of the time on his own, next to a hunter’s lodge, and visibly fed nothing more than dry bread. However I still realised that he wasn’t totally abandoned and did not intend to take him with me. However after playing with him for ages, he wouldn’t let me go, and as I tried to lose him by rushing off, he did his best to chase me on his little shaky legs.

He followed me on and on for ages, until I arrived on a main road full of people and traffic. It was obvious that if I didn’t take him home, somebody else would have, or even worse he would have been run over by a passing car!

I still somehow felt guilty and imagined his owner eventually going on site and finding him missing. So I called SPCA for advice on the matter. But when I explained the conditions this poor puppy was enduring, they insisted that we keep him as ours.

The poor puppy’s belly was totally bloated due to his diet which consisted soled of bread. So we called him Chubby and we really love him dearly.

As he grew he quickly became the king of the castle, surrounded by his harem of bitches. It is so funny watching him in his typical macho ways. We had a large four-dog wooden kennel built and he loves climbing on top of it barking down at the girls beneath him. Cessie couldn’t be bothered and just glances up at him in scorn, probably thinking what a waste of useless energy. Jetty wouldn’t dare challenge his authority and just looks up at him in awe. Lucy on the other hand, would definitely like to have a go and often tries to hop up next to him. But Chubby always fights her down again, strongly affirming that this is his, and only his, superior perch. Once he has fully affirmed his dominance and unquestioned authority, he happily jumps down again and strategically lifts his leg at every corner, spraying every nook and cranny of his territory with his manly urine.

Then came Maya, a truly stunning Alaskan Malamute who was cruelly kept chained to a parked immobile truck in a garage, before she was given to us, so how could we refuse. Our other three bitches were sterilised before being given to us, so we never bothered snipping Chubby for this reason. But when Maya was given to us, she was nine months old and literally came on heat for her first time on the exact day we got her.

Initially Chubby would have nothing to do with her and tried to ignore her, but she visibly seduced him by constantly chasing him around the garden. She gave absolutely no attention to the girls, but she was really all over Chubby, and kept nibbling at his ears and face. He pulled away time and time again, but she simply wouldn’t take no for an answer. This girl knew exactly what she wanted and she kept grabbing him from the neck and scruff, pulling him toward her.

Then suddenly something came over him and he just went for her and then they were at it all day and night. Suffice to say that in typical doggie fashion they got well stuck on a couple of occasions, until something was obviously well and done.

So Maya is a very hardheaded dog who always gets her way. She has incredibly expressive eyes, always looks directly into yours, as she howls constantly at you, in a manner which perfectly mimics talking. Each time you talk to her she howls something directly back to you, in a very uncanny way. She also turned out to be a superbly dedicated mother.

She gave us seven heavenly puppies which all turned out spectacularly beautiful.

We had to give five away but kept two of them along with our others. My wife kept her favourite one, whom she called Orion. He is now the largest of all our seven dog and looks like a small horse. As may often be expected from a giant, out of all our dogs he is by far the most laid back and docile. Simply nothing moves him. Even to the extent that there were times earlier on when we wondered whether he was perfectly normal. As his sister Baci, who is an enormous terror, bit him and pulled painfully at his ears, he wouldn’t even budge and would virtually sleep right through it.

But now we have come to realise that it is simply his character. Nothing much bothers him and he seems to be a very content dog. Content simply at taking life easy and letting the others tease and torture him while he retains his total zen. Then once in a blue moon, not very often at all, he terrifyingly lets off steam when out of the blue he jumps up, crashes all the others to the ground beneath him, snarling at them with exposed teeth, showing them that he has both the power and the temperament if he really wanted to, before subsiding back into his semi-stuporous state.

So thats leaves the terror Baci, who was my favourite out of the puppies. I called her Baci because she is always licking and kissing your face whenever she can. She is most definitely hyper, a big bully and can also be rather nasty to the others. She always wants full attention, to dominate every situation and has to be the centre of attraction. I wonder why I love her so much…

She is naughtiness caninified! Always up to no good and making a nuisance of herself. But I love her to bits and when she turns up her big brown eyes, seeking both attention and sympathy from me, like the typical female that she is, it feels exactly like having another perfectly spoilt daughter. It goes without saying that I invariably give her what she wants.

Seven dogs, seven tremendously diverse characters, but all so loving and adorable.