Jack is pretty happy here. He’s back to his normal self. I guess he’s a keeper.
Family portrait! I liked this shot because I got three neat pictures out of it!
Cropped to just the eskies…
cropped to a strikingly symmetrical Barclay. Fun 🙂
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Category: jack
Jack came back!
Jack was so depressed at his new home, despite the constant attention of a stay-at-home mom and visiting grandkids, and daily walks, and a woods to explore, that he stopped eating! So they called me up and said they didn’t know what else to do for him, he was so sad and mopey, and they just wanted him to be happy again. An hour later he was back at our house, bounding around and wagging his tail and playing with the eskies.
He’s a nice dog, so I can’t complain too much about him being back. I was really enjoying having only two dogs for a week there. One good thing is that I was finding I didn’t want to take one eskie and leave the other one at home alone, and now whichever one stays home will always have company.
But I’m still trying to figure out how to take these guys camping at the end of the month.
Jack moves on
First off, I have to say Jack is a very nice dog. He’s well behaved, and you hardly even notice he’s around. He mostly sleeps and begs for food, and occasionally plays with the other dogs. His downsides would be that the baying really gets on my nerves, like nails on a chalkboard, and that he is kind of a third wheel to the eskimo antics that go on around here. The eskimos are in-your-face, lets go have some fun, constant interaction party dogs! They are always thinking of new things to do, and they want you to join in. They bring you stuff to see if you’ll come play or try to get it away. They pretty much overshadow poor Jack in every way, and run circles around him in the yard while he races to keep up with the faster, higher-energy eskies.
So last year I started asking around to see if anyone wanted a dog. I was hoping I could find some friends who were looking so I could keep an eye on how he was doing (though I’m sure he’ll do great wherever he goes). Our Eskie friend Sherry put up an ad for him on her bulletin board at work. But after not finding anyone interested, I had kind of given up and figured he was a permanent fixture now. In fact just a couple days ago I asked my friends on FB if anyone could dogsit him while we go camping next month.
Then yesterday I got a call from someone who’d seen the note on the bulletin board. He came over and met jack and they got on great. He was an older guy, getting up towards retirement. He and his wife had a new property with woods to play in, and he was ready to get a dog again. They have grandkids who visit a lot, and Jack loves kids. Sounds like a match made in heaven.
It was still hard to pack up his goodies and send him on his way, though he seemed happy enough about it. The house seems quieter, which is odd because he would have just been sleeping anyway. It will just take some getting used to, I guess. His new owner promised to send me an update and keep in touch, and bring him back if it didn’t work out for some reason. I hope it works out great. I know he’ll miss the other dogs, but he’s such a good dog he deserves to get more attention, and not be the third wheel like he was here!
I’m looking forward to only having to deal with two dogs! That really should be our limit – one per person!
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Kids, Llamas, Alpacas, and Dogs
I had a fun day today, with a 4H meeting first thing in the morning. We had it at one of our 4H family’s farms, where they have alpacas. Because they recently got in a group of young alpacas they were trying to place in good 4H homes, we got to see kids working with a variety of young animals that were new to all this, which of course made for an interesting morning!
Some were resistant to this ‘jumping over stuff’ idea…
Some did not like the idea of walking on strange surfaces…
And some of them just plain didn’t want to cooperate – even though this llama in particular had years of experience!
Some kids were having much better luck with the obstacles.
Practice and persistence pays off! These kids have a show coming up, so hopefully this little refresher got their animals in the mood to cooperate next weekend!
I took my new camera to the 4H meeting, along with my longest zoom lens (200mm) because that gave me a lot of reach. I was wandering around the field where we were working, and if I saw anything interesting about to happen, I was always close enough to zoom in and get it. Another thing I like about this camera is it takes multiple pictures in quick succession without having to go into a special mode. That definitely helped me get the shot I was looking for more than once.
At home I put one of my shorter lenses (the 28-80) on for taking pictures in the yard with the dogs, because they were seldom more than an arms-length away.
I love this shot of Barclay, but because I was zoomed in, the depth of field is shallow – the result being his nose is in focus, but his eyes are soft! I’d rather have it the other way around! The best solution would have been less zoom, and move closer – but he moves around so much I had to snap it when I could – oh well! So close…
A little bone-chewing action – with the green grass and blue sky.
Then Navi took the bone. I love the way they chew on bones, they’re so concentrated like nothing else exists.
I was so glad I got this shot of Navi! She is such a goofball, but sometimes she’ll hear something and just STOP with this rediculously serious look on her face! She looks so concerned!
Jack
I tried to finish off with a nice portrait of Barclay and Navi sitting in the dandelions, but before I could hit the shutter Navi had to sproing away to go do something else! Well, actually, that pretty much captures their personality perfectly!
By the time I was done I’d shot about 150 pictures today. Thank God for digital cameras! This explains why I couldn’t get into photography as a kid when all we had was film!
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Dog training
I just had a fun dog training session, with each dog individually. I started with Barclay, with my intention to teach him to roll a big ball around using his nose. Since he already knew ‘touch’ (nose to my hand), I just put my hand between him and the ball and had him touch it a few times, then removed my hand and he went right to touching the ball. I stopped then to go work on the soup for dinner, and he kept bugging me to come back for more! So I went and did another round with him, and actually had him double-touching the ball before I ran out of treats – he’ll be pushing it in no time. Then I just have to figure how I want to teach him to move it where I want him too!
Then I did a round with Navi, and worked on ‘Jump up’ like jump up on the couch, and ‘off’ – get back off the couch. And sits and downs. She is so eager to earn her treats, she goes at light speed and offers things so fast I have to click fast to catch her before she decides to offer something else.
For Jack’s turn, we did some starting nosework. I hid a treat under a towel and told him to find it, and he nosed under the towel and got the treat, and was VERY proud of himself (I think he was actually strutting around). After that seemed pretty easy I moved to putting the treat in one of three small boxes. I’d mix up the boxes and tell him to ‘find it’ and point at the boxes, and he sniffed around until he singled one out, and I opened it and let him get the treat – he got it right everytime! That’s a beagle nose for you!
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Barclay and Jack run away from home
Luckily, it was only a very short trip before they were home safe again! Yesterday the dogs were out playing in the yard. Navi had come inside, and I wanted to close the back door, so I called the other two. No response. So I walked around to the front yard and saw the gate was open! Oh no!
Ever since Barclay was a puppy I’ve been working to teach him not to go through the gate without permission. But eskimos kind of do what they please. Worst of all, if Jack sees an open gate he’ll look at it, look at me standing there saying ‘wait’, and then go for it and run right by me! And once he goes the others follow. I’m not saying that’s what happened, it’s entirely possible they raced each other to see who could get through the gate first! I’m just saying that even if Barclay remembered his training and felt even an inkling of a feeling that he shouldn’t go through the gate, it would have been forgotten as soon as he saw Jack charging out.
So I told Dave and ran out to the front field, hoping they were in the fenced area, and calling Barclay, then I started hurrying down the drive, calling Barclay and looking every direction. Which way did he go? Not towards the road, I hope! But I heard dogs barking up the hill, so I looked up that way and saw a neighbor waving at us. I started running and hollered at Dave that they were up here, and he drove up in the car. The neighbor pointed towards the other neighbor’s house and said ‘they were trying to play with my dog but he ran them off, they went back there’. I called again and Barclay came running to me from behind the house, happy as can be! What a relief to see my buddy racing towards me! I grabbed him and hugged him and ruffled his fur and told him what a good boy he was for coming back.
Then the neighbor said ‘there was a beagle with him too’, and I said ‘oh, yeah, we’ll get him too’. Now, it might sound mean, but Jack ignores me when I call unless it’s dinnertime, especially if he’s doing something fun, so I wasn’t going to waste a bunch of time chasing after him. I was just happy to get my hands on Barclay, and I wasn’t going to let him go! I called Jack, but as expected he ignored me. Dave drove up and we put Barclay in the car, and about then we heard baying on the other side of the neighbor’s house, so Dave went around and came back with Jack, looking like he’d had the time of his life!
So our little adventurers were none the worse for wear. I wasn’t too traumatized, but really, what could be worse than losing your dogs? Calling your dogs and not knowing where they are, if they could be a half mile away in any direction, is the most empty, lonely, frightening feeling in the world! [note: this is why I don’t have kids, I’m barely responsible enough to handle dogs!] I mean, can you imagine having to go to bed knowing they were somewhere out there? There’s cars and coyotes and big farm dogs, or they could get into someones field and chase livestock and get shot! Having to put up posters and hoping someone sees them and grabs them and brings them back? The world is too dangerous for a little dog to be out wandering around on their own, even if they don’t know it.
Dave thought I was paranoid for always checking to make sure the gate was closed. I don’t know how it got left open this time, but I guess I’ll keep being paranoid and checking before I let them out. It’s better than the alternative!
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Snow day! Didn’t see that one coming!
Jeeze, I guess I should pay more attention to the weather reports. I had no idea this was going to happen!
I think this is Navi’s first really good snow
It seems to bring out the ‘play’ in the eskies!
Tennis ball + snow = snowball!
Jack doesn’t like it when it’s cold and wet
Let’s go inside and lay on the couch and watch TV – and turn the heat up!
Of course the alpacas have no choice. But they seem to like it. If they didn’t they would have stayed under the shelter, and not have snow on their backs.
Yay! Snow!
There’s just something special about a snow day!
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Alpacas
I don’t know why llamas and alpacas don’t like me, but it’s clear they don’t. I’m guessing maybe I’m too nice, and they figure they can push me around. Well, that’s all over. I’ve worked out some strategies to avoid getting spit on, and they seem to have worked well so far.
To start with they used to be in the paddock when I was getting food ready, and they could see me and start getting worked up about it. Now I shut them out of the paddock, while I get food ready.
Yup, you guys can just stay over there while I get your bowls ready. I’m sure the white one is wondering if his spray could hit me from there.
Once the food is doled out I get Red to come into the garden and give him his food. He gets the most because under all that filthy wool is a very skinny alpaca.
Then I get black and white separated. One gets to go in the paddock (today it was black) and the other stays in the main field.
White is always too excited and starts getting spitty so I don’t even give him the chance now, I won’t let him anywhere near me. When I have the bowl I hold my hand up high (to make myself taller) and make him back off. He seems to be taking me seriously. I definitely won’t let him crowd me or sniff my face anymore.
When he was done eating he went around to the fence to annoy the dogs. Navi doesn’t like the monsters at all! Barclay didn’t like seeing me get spit on, he was ready to come defend me right then. But they aren’t allowed anywhere near the alpacas because the alpacas could hurt them and vice versa.
After they ate their grain I used a bucket of hay to get them all into the paddock for the night. The dogs had to inspect it before I could get across the yard with it. They don’t get it – it doesn’t look like food to them!
Workin’ hard around the yard
We had the most beautiful weather this weekend (our weekend is Tues-Wed). This is why we live in the NW. It was sunny, and in the 50s on Tuesday, 40s today. Perfect weather for getting a bunch of hard work done before the ground either freezes up solid again, or melts completely into a mud puddle.
So I started out with a project that has been nagging at me for a couple years. Several years ago I put in a raised bed garden in an unused part of the yard, and it didn’t really work out there, so it sort of got abandoned, it was hard to mow around, and because it was made of concrete blocks with the holes in them, it was a hazard for the dogs who have been playing around it (especially just recently), and it needed to be removed. But who wants to remove 30-some concrete blocks that are sunk into the dirt and seem pretty permanent? Nobody. But it has to be done.
So I got the mower and the lawn cart, and took a load of wood chips over to the garden area (no point driving over there without taking something along for the ride). I shoveled a bunch of fresh chips onto the path where it was getting bare and muddy. It’s going to take several more loads.
Fresh wood chips on the left, ground that needs some more on the right.
I took the cart over to the drainfield area and started loading up concrete blocks. Each one had to be wrestled out of the ground, wiggling them back and forth like a loose tooth. I loaded 12 into the cart at a time and took them over to the area outside my garden next to the compost piles and..
Used them to build a new compost pile area. I really needed a new compost area to put the alpaca poo I’ve been scooping up every morning.
So that was all yesterday. Dave helped a bit but by the end of the day I was beat. Those concrete blocks are terribly heavy! But I’m really happy with the compost area.
Today I headed right out this morning and got to work on the next thing on my list – the semi-annual cleaning of the chicken coop. (this is the after picture).
The deep bed method had backfired on me as it piled up faster than I was keeping up with it. For the last two weeks I’ve been trying to find time to get out there and clean it up. I cleared out THREE heaping wheelbarrow loads – and I think it’s an 8 cubic foot wheelbarrow! That’s a lot of crap!
I spread the chicken poo thinly over the beds in the garden and put the rest in the new compost pile. Then I took all the straw I removed from the alpaca shelter (which was old straw, sheep poo and pig poo from last year) and scattered that over the chicken poo. I’m hoping all this will break down by planting time (May around here) and make for happy plants this summer.
Back in the chicken coop I got the brooder all cleaned out, because the feed store is getting chicks this weekend, and I want to get some. This way they should be old enough to start laying by winter. In this picture I’ve put straw in the brooder, but I’m going to change that to chips, because I think the straw will be too hard for the chicks to walk on.
Some of my girls moved right back into their clean home. They were a bit put out after being banished from the coop all day while it was being cleaned. Next on the to-do list – put up a piece of plywood to hide the insulation from the chickens. I don’t know how they get to it to tear it up, but they do.
In the coop the dogs help clean up any poo I missed – yuk!
A beautiful end to a very productive two days. I shoveled until I had nothing left in me! It’s great to finally get all those chores done. Now I need a weekend to recover from my weekend!
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Family Portrait
Dog family, of course. One of these days we’ll have to get the people in there too! The cats don’t want to participate at all – typical!
Navi is in mid-bark, Barclay looks like a goofball, and Jack is working on his intense give-me-the-treat stare.
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Steff Does Stuff! 