Lughnasa Waning Harvest Moon
OH, boy. We let Vega and Rigel out this morning and Brad, the neighbor who returned Rigel yesterday, gave us a call about 15 minutes later, “I think they’re out again.”
Sure enough. I drove over to Brad’s, got both of them in the red car and drove home. They are not, it turns out, digging under the fence. They jump over it! This creates a really big problem. We have an acre plus of fenced yard, most of it filled with trees. We can’t watch our dogs on this sized property which is why we have de fence.
This could be a deal breaker for keeping Rigel and Vega. We’re investigating several options, but the bottom line for us is that they have to have access to the whole backyard. If not, they can’t be dogs in the way both they and we like, that is, free roaming, able to do what dogs do within the borders of our fence. It’s a pretty generous space.
They are, however, coon hounds as well as irish wolfhounds. Both have a strong prey instinct, but the coon hounds also have the instinct to follow and tree the prey. Jumping tall buildings, or fences in this case, in pursuit of prey apparently comes with the breed. We didn’t know this until now. It just didn’t occur to us. We focused on Wolfhoundness and neglected to consider the coon hound. Our bad.
This saga is not over, but it is at a very frustrating impasse right now.
They are sweet, kind, lovable dogs just doing what comes naturally. Not their fault. If we keep them, we have to find a solution that lets them roam our yard and not the neighborhood. Aaaarrrrgggghhhhh!
