Today, my son and I decided to find out if our dog, Duke, can swim.

We’ve been deducing things about him since we adopted him in January from the Humane Society in Connecticut. When we got him, aside from his name, we were told only four things about him: that he came from “down South somewhere, probably,” since Duke was sent to them from a shelter in North Carolina; that he had a family for his first four years but they had to give him up for a reason the shelter volunteers either didn’t know, or did know and weren’t sharing with us; that he was extremely overweight, which we’d have to rectify; and that we had won the jackpot because of his sweet, playful nature. That was all of the information we got on him.

So, we’ve had our detective glasses on for five months. Through trial and error, we’ve discovered that: when he is in our fenced yard, if he can’t tunnel out or slam his body against the gate until it opens so he can escape, he will curl up patiently by the back door until we let him in; he will run out the front door if we accidentally leave it open and will probably get attacked by another dog, which will land him at the vet’s and us in the poorhouse; he will eat anything and everything including socks, which must be high in calories because he’s gaining weight instead of losing it; he hates cats and squirrels; he’s fascinated by bats; he thinks he’s a 110-pound lapdog; and his breakfast kibble gives him pause.

Every morning, he hesitates in front of his bowl, but not in the evening. We don’t know what he’s waiting for. I’ve given him permission to eat, I’ve said grace for him, and I’ve walked away. Walking away works the best. When I return, the food is always gone. Maybe he likes to eat his breakfast in peace.

We also had to narrow down his breeds by asking others what they thought he was. My friend, Christine, who has worked in shelters and has seen a lot of dogs, said she thought Duke was probably part malamute, lab, and German shepherd. Once I googled malamute, I could see why she decided on that breed. I think I see some shepherd in him, too, and labs look kind of generic, so I can’t come up with any evidence that he’s not one. Therefore, I’m inclined to agree with her.

However, I saw a commercial the other day that featured wolves, and I could’ve sworn he was in it. Maybe he was a TV wolf before we got him. The former owner is probably getting monthly residual checks while we’re getting shredded, slobbery socks tossed about our house, tumbleweeds of dog hair blowing around the legs of our furniture, and enormous veterinarian bills.

But, back to today. We noticed that Duke has webbed toes, so we assumed he could swim. So, we took him to the nearest public dock. When we got there, it was low tide. Duke was very interested in the thousands of suicidal oysters that had died on the rocks, but he shied away from the water. I eventually lured him in, but he wouldn’t go in further than his ankles. Then he took off running under piers and across jagged rocks, leading me and my son on a slippery chase across mossy stones and through sucking mud and stagnant green water.

When we finally caught him, we rinsed him off and took him home. We still don’t know if he can swim. He might never have seen large bodies of water before. This weekend, we’re going to take him to a lake where dogs are allowed to swim. Hopefully, he’ll see how easy it is and he’ll join the hordes of dogs chasing balls in the lake. Or, he won’t.

Either way, he’s going to wear water shoes. I don’t want him bleeding all over the kitchen floor again, like he did tonight. He must have cut his foot while running across the razor-edged rocks. I had to drug him with Benadryl so that I could clean his foot and wrap it in gauze. Of course, he tore off the gauze and dragged the blood-soaked wrappings across the rugs. So I was forced to make him a boot out of socks and a ribbon of medical tape. It took several tries to tie it on tight enough to keep him from pulling it off, but loose enough not to cut off his circulation.

It was good practice, though, because I’m going to have to make his water shoes out of socks and old tires, since I don’t know where to buy them. Hopefully his dog friends will be so busy making fun of his swimming that they won’t notice his shoes.