A melodramatic dog stages his own death when taken the ‘wrong way’ for his walk. Begbie throws himself to the road and lies motionless if he gets a short route around the block, rather than his usual hour-long trip around fields. Dog walker Michele Bilsland is used to this behaviour, but strangers get alarmed – such as two workmen so worried at seeing him ‘drop dead’ that they stopped to try and help.
Last Friday, four-year-old Old English Bulldog Begbie hit the floor once he turned left instead of right from his cul-de-sac. He realised they weren’t heading up the hill to the woods so refused to move – turning his head away ‘in disgust’. Two workmen then stopped to see if they could help, thinking he had suddenly collapsed. ‘Because Begbie was on the floor and his head was turned away they thought he’d died on me,’ Michele said.
‘I told them he was fine and just having a tantrum and sulking so he wouldn’t move because he was playing dead.’ Begbie staged a minute-long protest before conceding defeat and starting plodding along the road in Muthill, Perth and Kinross. Mum-of-two Michele said: ‘I’ve got used to it now so I know not to drag him along. After around a minute he just got up under his own steam but then did the same again a little later on. ‘It’s such a lovely, unique side to him – I can’t get frustrated at him.’
‘The walk he likes is about an hour and despite his build when he’s out with labradors and spaniels he always tries to keep up.’ After the walk, Michele, who owns Home Alone Crieff, posted on Facebook about what happened. ‘Begbie just has a very strong personality that matches his physique,’ she said. His owners Roz Niblock, 30, and Matt Kennedy, 33, named him after the Trainspotting character due to his larger-than-life personality. Cake business owner Roz said: ‘He knows what he likes and has a strop when he doesn’t get his own way.’
