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April 21, 2021: Shadow’s Dog Blog

I keep hearing the word “spring.” I’m assuming that this word has something to do with the weather – it seems to me that certain words mean certain things. For example, any time Ryder hears the words “Squirrelly Whirly,” she jumps up on the living room chair and stares out the window. Her stare, it’s pretty intense. She becomes very focused and pays attention to nothing else. Alys and Pete say that having this, the eye, is a characteristic of Border Collies.

Me, I’m an Australian Shepherd, or so I am told. I’m also told that I don’t have the eye, meaning I don’t get fixated on anything. I do have my needs, and I make sure they are met, but I don’t lose sight of what’s going on around me.


Ryder looks for Squirrelly Whirly


Sometimes Squirrelly Whirly is there, sometimes not. This, she has told me, is not the squirrel that used to tease her, by hanging outside the window and nibbling at food it found around the place; but rather, this is a different squirrel, one that’s younger. No matter, as they say when Ryder jumps up on the living room chair, “she’s on it.”

Alys and Pete never trained Ryder to herd properly, so she has to be kept separate from the goats. Otherwise, she will bite them, in an attempt to get them to move.

My vocabulary is limited, but it is growing. Spring, I now understand that it follows winter, and that it is a warmer time of year. I also understand that the berms that I love to climb on, get smaller at this time of year. The birds are also returning, much of course to Tyra’s delight. She’s told me that she gets lonely when they head south in the fall, for they are the ones who she converses with the most. She says that a horses’ world is usually pretty small, that is unless they are used for trekking, so she welcomes the birds’ more worldly insights.

Tyra says that she has never chatted with a hawk or an eagle. Her favorite conversationalist was a saw-whet owl who chose one winter to hang out in the compost shed, but as she added sadly, “not for long.”

I now also know “treat,” and “cookie.” “Treat” is something the nice ladies at the recycling center give out when we drop Alys off to sort books. I then usually hear it several times, the word being said by Alys, Pete, and the nice lady. “Cookies” is the word that Claudia Sihler, my dog trainer uses when we work together. I then get cookies when I, when asked, sit, stand, lie down. I also get cookies when we do agility work and I hop on the table, jump through a hoop, bounce through the weave poles.

Alys uses the words “let’s go,” and “focus” when we go for walks and other dogs are loose. I don’t know why she keeps me on leash. I do not like the words “leash” or “harness.”

Lately the pair has been using the words “going into season” and “spay” fairly often. I don’t know what these words mean, but I suspect that I’ll soon find out. Lucky me.

111. 4/22/21: Going the Extra Mile

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