Calli, Cart, Ball

When we are staying in Oliver we visit the dog park every other day so that the dogs can have a good ball and frisbee session.  Calli had been cartless, and she loved chasing the ball, but her back legs didn't, so she ended up dragging them much of the way.  Last time we were there we decided to put her in the cart and see how that went.  Well, it went much much better, I don't know why we didn't do it before. Slaps forehead...Dah!  The field has a couple of baseball diamonds in it, is nice and flat, we quite often have it to ourselves, what better place to give her in her cart some freedom.  She still managed to tip it over once, but as soon as we got her upright she grabbed the ball and was ready to go again.  When we first started throwing the ball she was running part of the way, but by the time I remembered that the camera was in the truck, she had worn the edge off and was mostly trotting...FAST!   It was exciting to see her run, we haven't seen that for a few years.

After a bit, Jake in particular will start going to the gate (we usually forget to take water).  They know that there is a very narrow creek just past the pool, so if we open the gate they will dash over there and flop in the water, which is much better than drinking out of a bucket in their minds.  We all got a shock this last time, the creek had frozen over, and there was very little water left in it.  We were able to break enough ice to allow the dogs to drink though.

Enjoy!

Helping With Garden Clean-Up

There's someone who is quite happy to eat those old wormy carrots that survived the winter. 

So Little Time, So Much to Do

Here's a picture taken at the agility trial on Saturday, the only one of a bunch that was anywhere close to decent.

Jake : You keep saying 'ball', over and over, and I keep looking at you, and I want to know where that d*mn ball is!

Calli : Lalalalalaaaa.....rabbits, squirrels, I don't care what you say, I refuse to look at that camera....

But would you hurry it up, my back legs are slowly sinking

Luna : I hear you, I hear you....but something way more interesting is happening over there....do they need my help?

It was a good trial. 

Some videos were taken.

You may get to see some someday.

45 buckets of blackberries picked as of this evening.

It's a late but great year for blackberries.

Calli

Calli was having real issues with her left back leg today.  As many of you know, she has major nerve damage to her spine, and does not really have control over her back legs.  Basically they just follow the front legs. 

The story is here.

This morning her left hind leg was weak, was knuckling over, and sometimes was just getting dragged.  We've never noticed this before.  Sometimes, especially if she has had a lot of exercise, the right hind leg gets weak and she starts collapsing on that side, but the left side has always been the strongest.  I dug out the harness I had made for her when she was first injured.  We took the dogs to the dyke this afternoon, thinking that swimming would be the best thing for her.  She had a great time, and had no problem swimming.

We had to use the harness to help get her from the car to the water.  She was so excited that her front end was motoring along, and the back feet were getting dragged. 

If she hasn't improved by Monday, I'll be phoning the chiropractor.

We've always wondered if she would get worse as she got older.  We do have a doggy wheelchair that we ordered when she was first hurt, but then never had to use.  We've hung on to it 'just in case'.  Hopefully we won't have to dig it out from wherever we've got it stashed.

Cow Bell Calli

I've mentioned before how Calli likes to take the path less travelled when we do our bush walk in the morning.  The last few months have been a bit of a trial at times.  We are walking along the trail, maybe talking a bit to each other, or maybe listening to those voices in our heads, and then one of us will suddenly remember and say, 'have you seen Calli?'

And the other one will say 'the last time I saw her, she was....'  Probably she was heading in the same direction as us at that point, but may have stopped along the way to root something up, or do some other disgusting thing that dogs revel in.  She's in her own little world out there.  Some days she doesn't walk down the trail at all, but goes through the underbrush, following the little trails that she and the coyotes have made.

We do want her to have 'fun' out there.  This is the highlight of her morning.  If we go somewhere off the property we don't have this problem, but I think it is that she is so familiar with the walk and since we have to circle and come back to the same gate we started through, that she knows we truly won't be abandoning her.  She has that old dog selective hearing when she's out there.  If she was fully mobile, we'd probably just leave her and let her come back on her own time.  The way she is though, there's a chance she could get stuck or caught up in something, and there are coyotes....

The problem is that we get back to the gate, which we'd really rather close behind us, we don't know where Calli is.  Usually Luna will be waiting there, and Jake too, or he will come when called, even though we might not have seen them much on the actual walk.

So we do a lot of calling, and then yelling, and then listening for the sounds of cracking branches.

You can see how hard it is to spot her out there at times.  Imagine when all those salmonberries have leaves on.

So I suggested that we 'bell' her.  I knew that somewhere we had a cowbell.  Never remembered it until we were already out in the bush, but one morning I did actually remember it before we were more than a few hundred feet from the house, so went back and managed to find it, which is an amazing thing in itself. 

Calli was not impressed.  She was so not impressed that she plodded along behind us down the trail for the whole walk.  She didn't have any fun.  The cow bell was heavy, and it was loud, and she looked like she wasn't happy.

So the next morning I tried a different plan

Four little bells.  She liked it. It didn't bother her at all.  She headed off on her excursion.  We couldn't hear a thing.

Yesterday when I was at the Co-op, I checked out smaller cowbells.  Would that work?

Cheap me decided I didn't want to spend the $9 to find out.

And here's a funny sheep story to go along with that cowbell.

A lot of years ago, well less than 15, I put the bell on April, (our old ewe who is almost 15).  I wanted to put the sheep out in the back hayfield, which is mostly visible from the house, and I thought the bell might help to discourage any coyotes.

April wasn't thrilled about it.  The more she moved the more it clanked.  The other sheep were less thrilled. They moved away from April.  She wanted to get back with the flock.  The bell clanked more as she tried to catch up.  The rest of the flock moved faster to keep away. 

Well I'm sure you can see where this is going.  Before long the flock was racing around the field, with clanking April bringing up the rear.  I thought they were going to run themselves to death.  I think I managed to snag April and remove the bell before that became reality.

The flock said 'thank ewe'

A Special Day

There are three things special about today.  The first thing is that we actually saw the sun today.  It was shining this morning, and then it clouded over a bit, and then we saw it on and off for the rest of the day.  I think the last time we had a really sunny day was 2 1/2 weeks ago when we went for a walk with Pippin, Jeff and Sue on the dyke.  That is a long 2 1/2 weeks of cloud and drizzle and rain, so it felt just wonderful today to see that sun.

The next thing is that today marks the one year anniversary of me starting this blog.  I'm proud of the fact that I've stuck with it and I really enjoy the bloggy friends I've met along the way. 

The best thing of all about this day is that it is Calli's eleventh birthday. 

Happy Birthday old girl:)

She still looks good, a little whiter on the face of course, but doing well all things considered.

My friend Carol who raises beef and sells it at farmers markets brought three large bones for the dogs when she stopped by a few weeks ago.  

I figured today was as good a day as any to give the bones to them.

Calli got the biggest one of course, just as a birthday girl should.

I think she enjoyed it!

Mmm, good. Thanks mum!

The dogs chewed on the bones for a couple of hours.  Calli's looked like this, a gross slimy mess,  but there wasn't too much left of Jake and Luna's smaller bones.  They all got popped back into the freezer and they'll be brought out another day.

Wednesday

It's not Wordless Wednesday or Wistful Wednesday; I just couldn't seem to come up with a good title.

This afternoon I was home by myself, and suddenly there was a flash of sunlight, like a whole thirty seconds worth.  Sunlight is something we've been sorely missing just lately.  There was blue sky out there, and I was all excited.  By the time I had finished what I was doing and got out there, well the blue sky was over to the east, and disappearing fast

I thought there might be better light for picture taking today; it was a little better but not good enough.  Doggy action shots were kind of out of the question.

That's okay, Calli wasn't moving too fast anyway.

First stop was to scrounge up the tiny bit of spilled grain from what I fed to the two old lady ewes this morning.  I don't even know how she found it.

You know, you can feed your dog a grain free diet, and if they get a chance, they just gobble the stuff down.

Then she moved across the hayfield, checking the vole holes

Until she found an interesting one

Luna and Jake played some fetch

All the action shots were a bit out of focus, 

but this one was just fun:)

Jake had taken the bunny out with him, unbeknownst to me, and Luna stole it of course.

The hazelnut tree is full of catkins

The pollen is starting to fly, but it doesn't bother me thank goodness.

It would be nice if we got some hazelnuts off it, but the jays and the squirrels seem to get them all before they are properly ripe.

Maybe I'll call it Wishful Wednesday, 'cause I sure wish we'd get a sunny day.

What a difference!

Here's that picture from yesterday afternoon. You can see how deep the snow is on Luna

Here's that same area this morning.  That's what a night of heavy rain and mild temperatures can do.  Right now it's 10 degrees Celcius or about 50 F.  I was shocked when I looked out of the window this morning.

The chicken trail is redundant.

The chickens might wish they were ducks though.

There is still a bit of snow is sheltered spots.  It's always easy to pick out Calli's tracks.  Those back feet don't have a lot of ground clearance.

She's a lab, what more can I say:)

Maypole Dancing Gone Wrong

We had two farmers markets this weekend.  So of course in the previous two weeks I had spent a lot of time making jam and doing the sewing that didn't seem to get done over the summer.

Yeah right!

It always seems that on the Friday before a market, I am trying to get all the things done that I had thought I was going to get done in the previous week, or two, since the last market we were at.  I also seem to have this inflated idea of how much I can actually accomplish on that one day.

I started out well, we were back inside from our farm type chores and the walk around the bush at a decent time.  So, I was just going to have a cup of coffee and a few minutes on the computer before I got started on some jam.  I just happened to start looking at condos, for that, um, family member that needs a little help to fly the coop again.  Of course a few minutes turned into an hour or so.  

I finally got my act in gear,  and got three kinds of jam made before I stopped for some lunch.  All the while I was looking out of the kitchen window at the beautiful sunny day, watching Larry going back and forth, doing this and that, and it was so nice out there he had shed his jacket and was down to a t-shirt.

And then I threw down the towel, or the ladle, or wooden spoon, or whatever, and said to hell with it, I'm going outside.  

We gathered all three dogs, who really didn't need much gathering, since once they realized a walk was in the works, they were all over us.  Into the car we piled and off we went.  This time we were going to the Hogan Family Nature Reserve, which is only 10 minutes away but in the 24 years we have lived here, we have never been to.  Actually, I lie.  We have been to it, just never through it.   Years back when we used to go out on Citizen's Patrol we drove down there one night to check that no undesirable types were hanging around.  (Not quite sure what we would have done if there had been any undesirables)  It is down at the end of a narrow little road, that is more like a lane.  Basically it is probably 5 acres of bush and a creek with a rough trail through it. Since it was a nature reserve, we thought we should keep the dogs on leashes.  By this point they were beside themselves with excitement, oh wow, a new place, and there seemed to be some really hot scents.

Now I can walk the three dogs on extending leashes by myself down the road without much trouble.  Calli and Luna's leashes in my left hand and Jake's in my right.  After we have been going a few minutes, Calli is usually near me or a bit behind, Luna is towing leading me down the road, and Jake is out in the middle of the lane to my right.  No matter if you walk with the traffic or against it, he always wants to walk out on the road.  Good thing our road is relatively quiet, but he does know what 'car' means, and will move over onto the shoulder if a car is coming.  Most of the time it is like a well coordinated dance.  I can press the button to stop one dog from veering off course and under another dogs leash, which is usually Jake dashing over to pee where one of the other dogs just went.  I picture it as like a maypole dance, which both David and Meredith did in elementary school as kids, and we watched for many years as part of the Mayday celebration.

I'm the pole (although not tall and slender, well maybe thirty years ago..) and the dogs are the dancers at the end of the ribbons, and it usually works with relatively few tangles.  When Larry and I walk together, which is most of the time, he walks on my right (you know, very chivalrous to protect me from the traffic) and he has Jake, who is out to the right flirting with traffic.  I have Luna and Calli, and quite often I am to be seen with my left arm stretched back as Calli stops to smell something, and Luna is straining ahead to get to the next smell.  My sweaters all seem to be short in the arms now.  So for the most part the 'Maypole Dance' works pretty well.

Once we headed into the little park with it's rough, narrow trail, it was a disaster.  Two people, three dogs, extending leashes, hot smells, trees and shrubs and branches and logs and.....well we spent the first half of the walk unwinding our selves from leashes, dogs from other dog's leashes, leashes from branches and bushes.   I just had to laugh.  I couldn't imagine what a non-dog person would have thought if they'd seen the mess were in.  The chances of meeting anyone else were next to nil, thank dawg.  We probably wouldn't have even been able to get off the trail to let them by, as we would have been too tangled up.  Anyone that has seen our three 'well behaved' dogs hanging around at our booth at the farmers market would have had their bubble burst if they could have seen us there.  Finally, after 10 minutes or so, the excitement died a bit, and the second half was relatively under control.  Before we knew it, we were at the end of the trail.  One of those 'been there, done that' and it will probably be another 24 years before we go back.

The walk was so short that we continued on to another nature park where it was open field, and the dancing was more under control, and we could unwind a little bit:)

Come For a Walk With Us

Anytime from about mid afternoon on, every time we make a move to head outside, the dogs start going nuts. It's walkies time!  You'd think they were locked in crates all day.  Some days we stick close to home and just go up or down the road, or around the block.  Other times we go down to the dyke or wherever else we can think of that is a bit of a change of pace.  It's always preferable for it to be at least partially off leash.  Abbotsford has three official off leash areas.  I don't want to go somewhere that has a lot of dogs, as Luna isn't particularly great with dogs she doesn't know.  She is kind of snarky, and then if they want to play and start running, she gets into barking/herding mode.

I suggested we head to the east to the off leash area along the Sumas drainage canal, where we hadn't been before.  You take the north parallel road from the Whatcom Rd/Hwy 1 interchange and park just east of Atkinson Rd on the north side of the canal in the parking area.  This part is called the McKay Creek trail.

There are spots were there is fairly easy access to the water, so it would be nicer in warmer weather for the dogs to swim.

That white bridge in the distance was where we had to cross over to the dyke on the south side.

The end of the trail comes out almost in some one's yard, and you walk right past a small paddock with these two guys in it:)  

I told Larry that Pride needed a goat buddy too.

The we crossed over that white bridge and headed down the dyke on the south side, heading east towards Chilliwack.  

Calli kept going down to the steep bank to the water, and then because she doesn't have any push with her back legs, she couldn't always get all the way back up. Sometimes one of us would have to scramble down part way and grab her collar and haul her up, and every time Luna would charge over and it was kind of like she was giving Calli heck!

In one of the corn fields there was quite a large flock of Trumpeter Swans  spread out.  They are huge birds.  

I don't think I've seen them before.

And on the far bank there was a Great Blue Heron

We've definitely seen those before.

You can just barely see the heron along the bank to the right of center.

Before you get to this area there is a rifle range right up against the mountain.  It was a little noisy.   I thought it might bother Jake, but he was okay with it.

Also, the freeway is about half a mile or so away, so there is the constant roar of that.

And here we came across the rare Sumas Monster, kind of like a cross between a crocodile and a rhinoceros 

We didn't actually get any sun, but we could see blue sky in the distance, shining on the mountain peaks, and the view was beautiful

That's Mt. Cheam on the left

We didn't walk all the way to the end of the dyke, but turned around just past this tree with a large nest in it.  An eagle's maybe?

On the way back we spotted this, a cormorant.  Not what I expected to see here, I would think of them being more along the ocean.

And last but not least, a group of mallards snoozing on a log.

We were walking for at least an hour and a half.  We only met two other dogs, but as we were coming back on the south side, we did spot a few other people heading out from the parking lot on the north side.  It was well worth the drive:)