heat wave in effect

I like comments, so feel free to leave some. And don't forget to ask around if you know someone who wants to adopt Duke.

Here is the folder with all the videos.

The following needed leashes or for some reason are not in the blog: Berna... Captain...

Group one is Lucy, Lila, Moki, Cleo, Rocket, Clarence, Sophia. Here they come past the garden, my wife shouts that I have too many dogs out at once (which 7 is a lot with mine, makes 9 but I can't worry about that now!). Here the group goes through the hay field to the pond. This one is embedded above: who will swim, who wrestles for a stick. Now we are heading home. This field is not plowed so those are weeds you see there.

Lila notices the ducks across the pond in one of these and it's time to go.

Here you get a sense of how hot it is although this video is from about 7:30 am. These girls remain calm even when they see a whole pack of dogs.

Here my daughter gets in a puddle. Then we chit chat about Moki. Ollie comes by...

Here we have Macky, Shiela (who runs over to bark at horses), Sola, and Daisy. Sola hurt her foot breaking a fence this morning... she was trying to get INTO another area. Persistent. She's okay. Shiela does not like horses.

Same group as above with the whole family in on the Shiela chase. And Daisy takes an inopprotune poop and raids the food closet.

Sola is the last one home. Here, with whole family.

Olive, with Ollie riding his like-a-bike. Here. Some confusion between Olive and Oliver.

Duke, Olive, Ollie. More here.

Olive eating grass in the rose bush, Duke rolling, Ollie talking about fishing gear. Here.

little bit basic, this entry

So today I just took some shots of the dogs hanging out in the yard. We will go out for a toot later but rain is threatening, so I have to reseed the field now, plus a whole lot of other dumb stuff...

But still, this is after breakfast and everyone is in a good mood. Grover and Hudson seem to be kindred spirits. Beany was out and about, feeling more adventurous and social. Gracie was checking to make sure everyone finished their breakfast. Rooster was with the big guys trying to get in on Grover and Hudson's game. Ayame was destroying some tennis balls. Fenway was barking at me. Betty Lou was trying to get someone to play tug of war with her and taunting Natasha.

I thought I made more than 2 videos... but the camera says I only made two.

Here they are:
http://glencadia.com/videos/08may09b.MOV
http://glencadia.com/videos/08may09a.MOV

sally pulls a sled

This is the SECOND entry of the day. Scroll down to see more.

Here is the high res. Gustov is worse than useless. Good think Sally picked up the slack. Too bad is was raining and miserable weather... if we had some powder snow, we'd be in business.

Below might be low res if blogger cooperates. Sometimes is does, sometimes not.

Leave comments so I know people check this blog out.

post storm blog entry

It snowed, then hailed, then rained last night exactly as predicted. Quite remarkable, the detail of the prediction and it's accuracy.

Here are the dogs that won't stay in a fence.

Here is my big old red barn. It's a 100 years younger than the house... and amazing. Built high to accommodate loose hay around 1900 with trunks that are incredible... especially for such a late period. They might have recycled older beams and re-hewed them because they are machine cut... anyway, it's a great building. I hope it's happy to be in use again. The roof leaks. I fix it and it leaks again... this summer I will patch it when it's hot and dry and that should be the end of it. Famous last words. The roof is 75 years old.

Here all the dogs. I had a video of Malachi not liking to walk on ice. I don't know what happened to it.

When the horse meet up in the morning they kiss and say hello. Here or here.

dog camp and the environment... and a proper blog entry finally

http://glencadia.com/videos/08feb09/

That is the right link for the old videos. But today I will do a proper blog entry, with dogs named, write ups and clear links. Sorry for the delay in getting something nice and clean... if I can finish it before the school bus comes. The last videos are exporting now.

By the way, my old van is back to life. Still need a new one for the summer, though.

1. If you dog got picked up Thursday, 7 Feb 2008, I have your leash. I'm not supposed to have your leash. But I'm leaving them all in the car and hopefully I can get them back to you... but there will be two cars on Valentine's Day, so we'll see. You see why I don't want the leash...

2. Trouble is a terrific dog and no trouble at all... except that she can jump over the fence. She somehow uses the handle for leverage and it doesn't seem to be an athletic achievement, more a problem solving triumph. This is a wood fence 5 feet, 10 inches. I wanted at leash 6 feet but Dan wanted to cut it to make it even... and Trouble is taking advantage of her superior analytic abilities. The other dogs have seen her do it (I haven't seen it) but they can't copy her.

3. Olive, on the other hand, can get of the chain link fence. This is more of an athletic accomplishment. And I've seen how she does it. She uses the side of the barn for leverage and climbs the fence and she can only do it on one spot. Then she gets stuck between that fence and the next one.

4. Malachi was not playing nice so he's by himself. Also, he completely destroyed his bed before he got here, in the car on the way up. I hate dog beds. They are stuffed with this plastic crap, not biodegradable, and if I put them in the barn and they get shredded, the plastic gets mixed with the dog shit, wood chips and other crap in such a way that I cannot dispose of the waste in an environmentally friendly way (dump it in a hole in the woods and let it rot). So biodegradable stuff ends up in landfill. This is another reason to resist people giving me plastic stuff, chew toys, beds...

RANT: Dogs should never touch plastic or get factory produced presents. Give then old shirts, rags to rip up, dog beds of old sheets. Recycle! The dogs like that stuff fine. Don't but stuff for your dog! How about a can, or a used plastic bottle, or anything. They love hay, manure, wood chips, sticks, cans, blankets, wool, cotton... then dump it in the woods and let it rot. Okay, enough on this rant. And I like tennis balls to, old ones that are no good for tennis anymore.

Well, one more environmental issue. I think about how much driving I do with the dogs. One thing in my favor is that if everyone drove here, if I was doing dog boarding in a suburban or rural area, if would be more miles driven per dog than the way I do it. And I try to use the most efficient vehicle I can. That's why I drive the car when I don't have a lot of dogs: it gets over 30 mpg. The van sucks but it's better than a full size van.

Still, it is probably better for the environment for people in the city to take their dogs to a regular kennel with little space and have them pace back and forth on concrete when they go on vacation. Or even better, not have dogs. Or even better we could all stay home and not travel.

And eventually this would end up with misery for all.

5. Old Moses is 15... I think. He keeps on trucking. He didn't seem to like the car ride even though he got to sit up front. He seemed a little woozy. But he's fine now.

6. Charlotte and Freddy are awfully cute with each other. Freddy (the Boston Terrier) won't come when I tell them it's their turn to go for a walk or when I try to get them to go into the warmest room and sit under the lamp, so I get charlotte to do it and then Freddy follows. They have to be together. And they act a little nervious sometimes, both at the same time, so I thought they might take off and run away. They won't, now I trust them off the leash. They are tremendously loyal to each other... maybe Charlotte more to her little friend. Touching.

Okay, let's get to the videos. Here are all of todays in one folder.

Wait, this has no dogs in it. But some good stick to it ness in here.

Here's what I mean about the dog bed. Plus Scuba, Freddy, Hanu, Sawyer... And I get a stick right in my eye, Freddy get's taken for a walk by my dog Gustov.

Same as above... of course if Freddie is there, so is Charlotte. Here.

Hanu, Sally (chasing horses), Moses, Lucky, Sajj... Here. Hanu made himself scarce when the first group was going home and managed to go out again with the second group. Nice work.

Sajj, Scuba... these guys are just too angelic to get write ups. What's interesting about perfection?

Lucky has a flaw, so there's something interesting to write: He likes to be the boss.

Same group as above. Sally as naughty as before. Here. Again here.

Last but not a bit least, Olive, with no fence to jump, as she likes it. She really doesn't like to be on the wrong side of a fence. So she has to do this.