Toby, owned by Bevan Annaloro is a "Beagle, Terrier, Chihuahua mix," though he's never been proven to be those breeds through a DNA test. "He has the Beagle coloring, he has the itty-bitty Chihuahua head and he is mostly Terrier in size and shape so I just put it together. That's my own deduction," Annaloro said.

Annaloro got Toby in Hawaii. "I rescued him from a chicken coop on Kaneohe, Hawaii. He was in a chicken coop with a bunch of chickens and he was going to be used as a pig hunting dog. When you pig hunt you need about ten dogs and they clip their ears, and they use the dogs to take down the pigs."

He was referring to the wild or feral pig population in Hawaii where it has become a serious problem.

He paid $50 for Toby when he was three weeks old. That was four years ago.

Two years ago Annaloro moved to Seattle but Toby started to gain weight.

Toby is on a "Toby diet now," Annaloro said since, "his diet consisted of treats for awhile. So now he's on regular dry dog food." When he gets any treats now he just gets bones.

You would think, coming from Hawaii, now living in Seattle that Toby would be deeply familiar with dog paddling. That's not the case. He went swimming for the first time last week in Puget Sound. "He's never liked the water. Even living in Hawaii I could never get him in the water. But now he loves it, and he's happy in the sand. As soon as he's on the sand he wants to run and he runs in circles."

Toby has a pointed personality. "If I'm sitting down he will jump in my lap and he will look me nose to nose and just stare into my eyes. He loves it," said Annaloro,"That's his happiest place."

"All the West Seattle crowd, the dogs here" are Toby's friends Annaloro explained, "there's a pretty big dog scene over here."

They normally walk up and down Beach Drive or Alki Avenue, "anywhere there's sand."

But Toby's real kingdom is at home where he rules over a herd of stuffed animals. "He has a collection of about 30 of them and he likes to lay on top of them all. He's the king of his toys. He claims the stuffed animals. He doesn't like to play with them. He just wants to lay on them and own them."

"He gets up early with me, then he conquers his toys, laying on top of them for a couple of hours then around 9 am he's ready to go for a run and then he will come back, rest until 2 or 3 and then he's ready to go again, usually for a long run."

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