Lughnasa                                                                          College Moon

Installing the visible fence. The yellow wire fit neatly into the clips I’d put up for the electric fence around the orchard. That was the run of fencing that Gertie, our then and now challenge, defeated by jumping up on the top fence rail, standing with her feet on the electric fence with no connection to mother Earth. Game, set, match. Gertie.

Now we’ll have  different technology. A wireless burst of electricity delivered through a wicked looking collar with twin metal studs that project inward to the dog’s neck. If it weren’t a mild current and if I didn’t love my apple and pear trees, no way I’d use this. I know that’s a strange attitude from a dog person, but training has never been part of our life with our dogs, except at certain minimal levels.

I get little joy out of seeing dogs do behaviors generated by operant conditioning. Wagging tails, smiles, hugs, cuddling, licking, paws out for a touch all those behaviors give me great joy, instigated as they are within the dog’s own world-not my version of what their world should be. Still, I know that obedience training is important when dogs don’t have an acre and half of yard with trees. And, I also know that dogs love having a job and for some obeying their owner is that job.

When Celt turned away from the lure course track and walked over to the donut stand while his fellow compatriots ran off baying at the plastic lure, I couldn’t have been prouder.

The visible fence is an attempt to save the trees. Literally. It will also travel with us to Colorado, as will the electric fence. As I said before, critters to keep out and ones to keep in.

Lughnasa                                                                                    College Moon

Vega cut her right leg near the knee. “Yeah, right there. They’re running, snag something.” The Vet at the Coon Rapids Emergency Veterinary Clinic. Always on a Sunday. Emergency vet care is, by definition, expensive. We try to avoid it, but with the number of dogs we’ve had over the years, things happen on the weekends.

(Vega in a typical position.)

The first place we took her, Blue Pearl Emergency Vet Clinic in Blaine, closed because of the number of critical care incidents they had. They could take no more patients. That’s how we ended up in Coon Rapids.

Vega is stoic. She walked in this afternoon, not limping, but a huge triangular flap of skin hanging down. The cut exposed a tendon and muscle underneath, as if it was an anatomy illustration.

When we brought her home, after the cut had been debreeded and repaired with staples, she paced for about an hour, maybe more, an after effect of a pain medication she received just before leaving the clinic. Pacing is so far from Vega’s normal lady of leisure attitude toward life that it put both Kate and me on edge. She did finally calm down.

Lughnasa                                                                         College Moon

While cleaning out the garden shed, a tarp got shook out. Mice scattered from a nest in one of its corner. Amusement ensued. Vega quickly found a mouse, put it in her mouth and trotted off to slide under the shed and enjoy her prey. Gertie pounced around, finding, then losing a quick grey mouse. Ah. Finally. She has it in her mouth. Then. Oops, it’s out of her mouth on the ground. Gertie’s a retriever by instinct. When the retrieved starts squirming around? Big surprise.

Rigel came out, pounced with her powerful shoulder muscles thrusting her jaws down. She caught her mouse and ate it, all in the same sequence of actions. Kepler nosed the mouse who escaped from Gertie, but couldn’t make himself get interested. He’s a guard dog. A mouse? Not important.

Lughnasa                                                             Lughnasa Moon

The whistle-pig incident continues to have reverberations. Her somewhat dormant hunting genes awakened Rigel has become more, well, dogged. Prior to the land-beaver and its remaining in place for almost 24 hours, Rigel had let our poor defenses contain her. Then, she squeezed under the chain link, taking her sister, Vega, with her. I wired it shut.

That afternoon I opened the front door on my way to the mailbox and there were Vega and Rigel, waiting to be let in from the front yard. Again with the wirecutters and my diminishing coil of wire. Again I found the new place and wired it shut. So. Good.

Then, late afternoon yesterday Vega could be seen standing near the driveway looking across at the neighbors. Where her much more adventuresome sister had gone to say hello. Once more along the fenceline. This time they had not slipped under the chain link, but pawed through a rotted branch, placed along this spot now long ago and gotten past its capacity to add security.

So, again with the wire and this time a cement block to plug up the hole, too. This was at 9 am today. At noon, after I fed them all lunch, I let everybody out. Gertie and Kepler, our two 75-pounders, came back in, as they always do. But the big girls did not. Uh-oh.

(Rigel on the left, Vega on the right, lounging after a sojourn in the neighborhood)

Once more outside I called for them. Nothing. There is about 600 feet or so of fence that runs along our property on the north side. It provides the most often used escape routes these days. Before I could get past the spot I sealed up this morning, Vega and Rigel came bounding along, tongues hanging out, wide smiles on their faces. On the other, wrong, side of the fence from where I stood.

They are now inside. Again, the coiled wire and the wire cutters will come out. Now you may think, why doesn’t he do something about this? Something preventative? I have. Rigel no longer goes over the fence because I ran an electric fence along the top. And, several years back I took badly warped 2×4’s and wired them to the bottom of the fence where I hadn’t wired in large branches from an earlier round of escapes by the whippets. This is around 2,500 feet of fence, roughly half a mile, and much of it formerly covered in dense underbrush.

(the Colorado fence I have in mind)

About five years ago I cut a path all around the fenceline and the dogs have used it, keeping it clear. At least now I can easily find and repair the breeches. This renewed hunting vigor will, I hope, pass soon.

Then, in Colorado, there will be bears and mountain lions. We’re gonna build a different kind of fence in Colorado.

Lughnasa                                                        Lughnasa Moon

Sometime this morning the land-beaver scuttled down from the tree and made good its escape. I think.

His disappearance created a round of consternation for the dogs. So much so that three different times today they dug under the fence and went hunting outside the fence. I found two of the escape spots and wired them shut, but the third will have to be found tomorrow morning.

It’s about time for us to move because the large coil of baling wire I bought years ago is nearly spent.