Christmas Travels – Part 2

Dad's place got a lot of snow just before we went out, which made the property more beautiful than it would normally be at this time of year, but also made the half-mile drive a good bit more difficult. Dad made a couple of runs along the drive to help clear a path, but it still required 4-wheel drive. I thought the drive was actually a good bit of fun, but I'm not sure the pups were thrilled with being tossed around in the back of the truck. The worst part of the drive was the last. This picture was taken on Wednesday, so a lot of the ice is gone, but I think there's still enough there to give a good idea. To get to the house, you have to go over a creek (lower right corner), up the hill, make a sharp right turn, and up another steep hill. If you miss either of those turns, its easy to end up somewhere you don't really want to be.


The pups and I were staying the cabin in the old pasture, but we had to park at the house. Until Wednesday, the road from the house to the cabin was impassable - even for the trucks, at first due to the ice and then due to the deep mud-filled ruts. I tried to get a decent picture of that road, but none of them really did justice to the conditions.

This is the cabin we stayed in during our visit. It has a bedroom, full bath, loft, kitchen and living/dining room. On the far right is a second little bunkhouse with another bed, bath, and stove. The cabin is plenty big enough for me and the pups, and between the electric heat and the gas "wood" stove, its easy to stay warm. The tire tracks are from Dad's utility vehicle, which he drove through the woods to get between the house and the cabin.


These three pictures were taken from the cabin porch. This first one was taken about 8:20 Monday morning, using my cell phone. I think it came out pretty well.


I took this one later Monday morning - you can't see much detail of the woods, but the icicles are neat. At that point, it was still cold enough that they'd not yet started melting.



This is Wolfie, Dad and Krysti's wolf-dog hybrid. She's 10 years old now, and you can't tell in the picture, but she's actually bigger than Duncan. And its not all because of her fur - she even out-weighs him by at least 15 pounds. She has to stay penned when we visit because she has a nasty tendency to want to kill my pups.


This is a shot of the lake from just behind the house.


This is the same general view, but this picture was taken from the deck Dad built at the edge of the big hill behind the house.


And a closer look at the lake.


This chimney is left over from the original homestead on the property.


A view of the house from the dam...


This is the trout pond that Dad keeps stocked and the little cabin he built over the creek a few years ago. Looking toward the lake from the house, the cabin is to the right and fairly deep in the woods. The trout pond was low on water and frozen pretty solid.


This cabin is to the left of the lake, not too far from the main garden. The pond in front of it (also frozen) is generally stocked with catfish, but has had too many visits from otters lately.

Christmas Travels - Part 1

I was scheduled to work a closing shift at the kennel on Christmas Eve, and a split shift (opening and closing) on Christmas Day, but I managed to get the 20th through the 23rd off, so I headed west to visit family. The pups traveled with me, and John checked on Niko and the cats while we were gone. During the trip, we covered 635 miles and I took 486 photos. Yep, 486. It took me a bit to get them all checked and cropped, but that task is finally done. Have no fear, I won’t be posting them all at once...

My first stop on Sunday was at my brother Josh's house. They'd had a party for his patrol squad the night before and Peyton was up most of the night with an upset tummy, so everyone was a bit groggy. I didn’t stay too long, since I wanted to get to Dad’s before dark, but it was nice to see the family. Before we left, everyone went outside to see the pups playing in the back yard.

Stephanie, Cooper, Josh, and Peyton

Monday, I went to Rutherfordton to spend several hours with Ganna. We had a lovely visit, catching up on the last several months. Ganna made me two of my favorites – seasoned oyster crackers and my very own cherry pie. Yummy! The pups spent their time on Ganna’s back deck and didn’t seem too upset at not being allowed in the house. Their main concern was just being able to check on me through the windows occasionally.



I spent Tuesday in Forest City with Mom and Ronnie. Poor Mom had to sit and go through a bunch of pictures from the 70s and 80s with me, trying to remember who some of the people were. She held up nicely, though. Mom and Ronnie gave the pups a bag of tennis balls, the cats a bag of food, and Niko a couple of treat sticks. The animals were all very pleased with their gifts. Both pups also enjoyed running around Mom’s extremely large back yard.

Mom and me

Wednesday was a quiet, non-driving day at Dad’s. The pups and I went out walking several times during the day, and it actually occurred to me to have Dad get a picture of the three of us. I’m still surprised that even crossed my mind. Sadly, what didn’t cross my mind was getting any pictures of Dad and Krysti together, but with luck my cousin, Miriam, will send me some from the family’s get-together on Christmas Eve. I did managed to get one of Reyna relaxing near Dad while he was loading firewood…



Christmas Eve morning, I left Dad’s bright and early so I could stop by Ganna’s house for breakfast before driving back to Raleigh. I did that so I could see my Uncle Newt, Aunt Susan, Miriam, and her husband, Buck. They arrived in Rutherfordton last Wednesday evening.

Newt, Ganna, Susan

Me, Miriam, Buck

Me and Ganna

I was only able to visit with them for a couple of hours before I had to get on the road. Traffic was heavy coming back, but I arrived home in time to unpack the truck, have lunch, and get to the kennel on time.

Shiny. Sorta. For Now.

I finally got the muddy truck to Auto Bell today. They did an okay job, considering what they were dealing with. Once I got home, I did some more cleaning – they missed some of the mud in the front of the truck and on the seats. But that’s okay. For now, the truck is shiny on the outside, and fairly clean on the inside. I expect that to change rather dramatically this Sunday. But that’s okay, too. Nothing like a little dog spit to give a vehicle some character.

Such A Guard Dog

I’ve had my muddy rain pants hanging up by the front closet since the herding trial. Today, I finally got around to washing them and my muddy coat. The tag said the pants do best when line dried, so after they finished washing, I hung them up outside on the porch. An important thing to note at this point is that both dogs accompanied me outside while I hung the pants, and Duncan watched the whole time. We all came back inside and Duncan settled down for a short snooze. A few minutes later, Duncan decided he’d rather nap on the chair. As he was climbing into the chair, he started barking. I wasn’t sure what he was barking at until he ran outside – and then stood there, staring at the Scary Pants and barking at them. It was very brave of him to protect us from the Scary Pants, don’t you think?

Diet Woes

Poor Duncan’s got it pretty rough these days. Or he thinks he does, anyway. The vet wants him to lose a couple of pounds (mostly due to his breed and potential health issues rather than being truly overweight), but he’s already been on a diet for several months now. When Reyna got worse and most of our activity (or lack thereof) revolved around how she was feeling, I cut back on Duncan’s kibble to keep him from gaining a lot of weight. At that time, I added pumpkin to his kibble to help make him think he was getting more than he really was, but he never really seemed to enjoy the it. After he adjusted to the new kibble amounts, I phased out the pumpkin, and he’s been doing okay since then. But now we need to cut the kibble just a bit more, so I talked to some of my dog people to get ideas. Courtesy of those discussions, Duncan now gets green beans with his dinner. They’re a healthy filler, so he gets to eat more but doesn’t get a lot of extra calories.

On the flip side of this is Reyna, who is actually underweight. The vet said he wouldn’t push for her to gain weight because of her hips, but she really does seem much too thin to me. And she is always hungry. Of course, she’s a dog, and most dogs are always hungry, so I realize I can’t make an accurate judgment based on that alone. I’ve been giving her a little extra kibble with her meals, but I don’t want her to put on too much weight, or put on the weight too quickly. Plus, she tends not to process a lot of kibble particularly well… So, I decided to see how she feels about green beans in her kibble, too – again, extra food, but not a lot of extra calories.

I’m not sure Reyna actually chews her food enough to notice the green beans, but she certainly doesn’t dislike them. Duncan, on the other paw…. The first night of green beans, he ate a few of them but managed to spit several out on the floor and pick around the majority of beans left in his bowl. Even though they were covered in sardine juice, he wasn’t particularly impressed. Until I called Reyna over and she cleaned the beans off the floor and out of his bowl. Duncan wasn’t very happy about that, which is exactly the reaction I was expecting. The next night, dinner was kibble, beans, and rabbit meat.


Duncan ate a large quantity of beans that night, but still left some on the floor and in his bowl. Once again, Reyna cleaned up his leftovers, and once again, he was not happy.



The next night was kibble, beans, and tripe, and Duncan left some beans on the floor and in his bowl. But he made a point of cleaning the beans out of the bowl while Reyna ate the beans on the floor.


Since then, Duncan has left beans until the end of every dinner, but he’s leaving fewer each night. And he’s not letting them stay long enough for Reyna to eat them. I figured a little sibling rivalry would help move the adjustment process along. I’ve got to go to the grocery store tomorrow, and I’ll be getting more green beans for the pups. Zucchini was also a suggestion, so I’ll pick up a bit of that and see what the pups think about that at dinner time.

Mr. Fix-It

Duncan and I went to Pittsboro yesterday for another work-for-training session. Things started off a bit rocky, with Duncan grabbing at the sheep a lot more than he usually does. Claire watched us for a bit, and then said that part of what was causing us difficulties was Duncan’s need to fix everything he perceived as a problem (whether or not it actually was a problem). She said that every time I stumbled or got pushed by the sheep, Duncan tried to step in and correct the problem. Of course, what that usually ended doing was causing more trouble, because then the sheep would get agitated and bunch up around me, which meant I had more trouble walking, which meant Duncan would try to correct the problem, which agitated the sheep, and so on. There’s not much we can do to make Duncan less concerned, but its good for me to know more about what he’s thinking so that I have a slightly better chance of keeping the situation calm.

While we were there, we did some boundary work and some duck herding. Duncan is slowly getting the idea that ducks don’t herd like sheep. We also put Duncan through a farm chore - Claire had Duncan hold the flock of sheep while she trimmed their hooves. He wasn’t actually gripping the sheep, just keeping the flock in one area. If someone tried to wander off, he would herd them back to the rest of the flock. He was very stressed by this chore, because he had to sit and watch while sheep flailed and Claire worked (my job was making sure Duncan didn’t try to “help” Claire).

With the holidays coming, we’re going to take a break from herding until January. I doubt Duncan will mind the rest.

Swim Fun

The folks at the kennel have been nice enough to allow Reyna to use their pool for her rehab. Today was the first day we made it over there, and if we can use it regularly, I think it will really help Reyna. She had a lot of fun in the pool, and it was the perfect depth – deep enough for her to swim comfortably, but shallow enough that she could stand up with her front paws propped on the side.

How Did…?

I found something interesting in the truck today – clumps of mud. On the ceiling. Not smears. Clumps. Not sure how Duncan managed that, but the boy definitely has skills.

Not As Pretty

I got distracted by other things and almost forgot to post this…

Sunday was the second day of the herding trial in Sanford. The weather was great – cold but sunny – but the ground conditions were awful. There was a lot less standing water than on Saturday, but the boot-sucking mud was deeper. Poor Duncan ended up looking like he had a rat tail, because his was completely slicked down with mud. And I’m very confident that Auto Bell is not going to be happy when I ask them to clean the truck.

Weather and ground conditions aside, Duncan and I managed to qualify again, although I was very surprised we did. Our run was not pretty. Duncan was insistent about getting between the sheep and the fence, and I was just as insistent that he not. It ended up with me using the stock stick more than I probably needed and Duncan trying to circle us and getting very agitated. As usual, when Duncan gets agitated, he gets mouthy. He tried several times to taste the sheep, and I saw him spit out wool more than once. Thankfully, the judge didn’t fuss about the grabbing. He did comment on the stock stick, though – I accidentally popped Duncan in the head once. I didn’t mean to; I was trying to hit the ground right in front of him, but as I was swinging, he shoved his head right up against the sheep’s butt. Oh, well. We also had an incident where a sheep took off, but Duncan did bring it back in an appropriate (non-mouth involved) manner. To top things off, though, I couldn’t get the gate to open the first time, and everyone involved got upset. Sigh. So frustrating. Especially since I’d been told that a lot of folks had been talking Saturday about the big, calm, sweet, easy working German shepherd. Sigh, again. On the up side, the judge didn’t say “thank you”!

Here's us going into the ring, all optimistic.


A couple shots of Duncan working nicely.



Duncan is a very handsome boy, even covered in mud.


And here he's grinning about earning his insurance PT leg.


This was our last herding trial of the year. I've heard that there'll be one in Sanford in April, but the schedule won't start coming out until January. April would work, though - that gives us 4 months to get ready for A Course.

It Asploded

The radiator in my truck has been leaking for a while, and John’s been keeping an eye on it. It started out as a pretty slow leak, so we weren’t too stressed about replacing the radiator immediately, and we’d been doing okay with just topping off the coolant. Saturday, the truck overheated on my way back from Sanford (my fault, because I didn’t realize that the coolant I saw was just residue and not an actual indicator of the volume). I pulled off the road, gave it a few minutes to cool off, and then got home with no trouble. John came over to check it (and brought a new radiator and thermostat with him), and we put in over a gallon of coolant. We talked a bit about the leak, thinking it might still be relatively slow, and decided we’d definitely have to replace the radiator before I headed west before Christmas. Since I was headed back to Sanford on Sunday, we also decided it would be a good idea for me to take some coolant and check the level before I left the farm, just in case. It’s a good thing, too, because I put in almost another half gallon before heading home. I called John on the way, and we decided the radiator would need to be replaced sooner rather than later. John came over yesterday evening to work on the truck, and pointed out that the radiator had basically exploded – the hood was covered with coolant and was actually still dripping late in the evening, when I’d gotten home before noon. So, now the truck has a shiny new radiator, a new thermostat, and a couple of new hoses. John has to make a trip over again today, because the thermostat housing has a hairline crack and was leaking last night. Once that’s replaced, though, we should be good to go. Its so great to have a friend who knows how to fix these sorts of problems (and who has a wife who lets him!).

That’s My Boy!

Today was the first day of the herding trial in Sanford. The weather was nasty this morning – chilly and rainy (although, at least it wasn’t raining sideways like the last trial). To make things really fun, the ground at the PT ring was deep, boot-sucking muck, and inside the ring wasn’t any better – lots of muck and small ponds. They actually had to change the panel layout for safety reasons because of the flooding. We all had a good time, anyway. And thank goodness for rain pants!

I’m not sure this picture does justice to the amount of mud and muck that covered both of us (I think you can get a better idea of that with the video), but you can see the mud on my legs and jacket and Duncan’s front legs. If you look closely, you can also see that his back legs are covered, too. What you can’t see is that his tail is just one long mud slick. None of that matters, though, because we had an excellent run today and Duncan earned his PT title! You may now address him as D’Cans Dark Warrior Dreaming, JHD, PT, CGC.


Duncan was very excited to be at the trial and just couldn’t stop bouncing. Everyone thought it was very sweet when he jumped up and smeared mud on my jacket. Three times. I sure couldn’t fuss at him, though; he was way too happy to bring him down with a scolding. And that was before we even went into the ring. I was a little concerned that he was too excited to have a quiet run, but he settled down as soon as he started working.

We had an absolutely beautiful run. We picked up the sheep with no trouble at all. Duncan was a little concerned about being so far from the fence - we’re usually right near it but the ground conditions forced us away from it. Thankfully, the sheep were in a nice, quiet mood, and Duncan had himself under great control, so the sheep didn’t mind him being right up on their butts. One sheep didn’t want to make the turn with us, but Duncan brought her back to me with no problem. I did my hold near the judge (didn’t plan it that way, it just seemed like a good spot for it), and Claire said later that I actually made a really good choice, because the people at the fence acted as a draw for the sheep and helped keep them still. Right after the hold, you can hear me fuss at Duncan – what you can’t see is the chunk of wool he’s spitting out of his mouth. And where does he grab the sheep? Right in front of the judge, that’s where! Thankfully, the judge didn’t hold it against him. Of course, the sheep didn’t get too upset, either, but some judges would have given at least a warning at that. One of the guys watching said that right after that, when I turned back to Duncan again, I stopped him just as he was reaching for the sheep’s hock (“Just a little taste, Mom!”). I’m thinking two grabs, especially with the second not being on the wooly butt, might have been a problem for the judge. The rest of the run was calm and quiet, with an easy penning.



Duncan got a ton of compliments for his beautiful work, with a lot of comments about how quiet and controlled he was. He was such a Good Dog today. We’ll go back tomorrow and do it again – and this time get some photos, since it won’t be raining. I know we don’t need to do the run tomorrow, since we completed the title today, but I’m really looking forward to going into the ring with absolutely no pressure on us. I won’t be stressed, which should help keep Duncan relaxed, and a nice low-key run would be a great way to end the year.

Cross All Paws

Duncan and I have a herding trial tomorrow and Sunday in Sanford – its our last trial of the year. We need a good run one of the two days so we can finish his PT title. The weather is supposed to be pretty crappy tomorrow, but we’re running fairly earning in the morning, so maybe the sheep won’t be too pissy when its our turn. The weather should be better Sunday – cold, but no rain – so we might stand a better chance. I’d rather have a good run tomorrow, just to get the pressure off. Keep all your paws crossed for us!

Who Knew?

I admit, I never thought the day would come when I’d be excited by pants with snaps and zippers on the legs. But by golly, today is that day. I went shopping for some rain pants to wear at tomorrow’s herding trial (I learned my lesson during the last trial, when it rained sideways for hours), and I found what I wanted at Dick’s Sporting Goods. The pants are great – there’s a snap at the bottom of the legs and a nice long zipper, so I can easily get the pants on without taking off my boots. How great is that? And even better, I got the pants and jacket for 60% off.

Kitty Porn

Mikey and Per’la have always been particularly close, frequently sleeping curled up next to each other, or with at least a paw or tail making a physical connection while they nap. I have several pictures of them snuggled together, as well as pictures of Per’la keeping a watchful eye on things while Mikey slept. What I walked in on last night was a bit much, though.


Mikey has clearly lost all sense of decorum.


Mikey was disturbed by the camera flash, but Per'la doesn't appear the least bit concerned about being caught in such a compromising position.

Family Traits

I was out taking pictures of the pups recently (I know, we’re all surprised), and Reyna was being very gracious about posing for me.

Something I’ve noticed lately is how gray her muzzle has become in the last few months. My baby girl is 3 months shy of 6 years old, which is roughly equivalent to being in her very early 40s. So, I’ve decided that the gray isn’t due to old age. Its because she takes after her grandmother’s side of the family. After all, the Davis’ do tend to go gray early. Great-Uncle Laurence and Mom are good examples. And even me – I have a fair amount of gray hair, too (although, not so much around my muzzle).

SheepGoatDuck Muck

Duncan and I had another work-for-herd session yesterday. Duncan had such an excellent time that he’s still pooped. Speaking of which, its amazing how my prissy boy doesn’t care how deep or nasty the muck is that he’s slogging through, as long as there’s a sheep involved. Between the mud from the rain the night before and the general farm muck, Duncan was covered up to his belly by the time we were done. He was a dirty, happy pup.

We mixed things up quite a bit, to see how he’d do. He had a lovely easy session with two sheep when we first arrived (remember, the fewer sheep in the flock, the lighter (more skittish) they are, so to have an easy session with two sheep means Duncan was very relaxed and controlled). Now, if we can just duplicate that at the trial this coming weekend, I’ll be ever so happy. We did a session of boundary herding, which Duncan handled wonderfully. One interesting thing we saw was that Duncan takes correction from Claire with no problem (when she reminds him about the edge of the boundary), but when I correct him, he goes into Worried Dog Mode and tries to come farther into the grazing area to get right next to me. As long as I’m not correcting him, he doesn’t seem to have any trouble with being that far away from me. Just something we need to work on.

Duncan definitely remembered the goats from our last session, because he made a point of trying to avoid them, even when he was tied to a tree. Apparently, he doesn’t find being head-butted particularly entertaining. After a bit of work, we had another session in the arena, but with a much larger flock. Duncan handled them with no trouble at all, moving the flock around the arena with barely any effort. More work, and then back to the herding. We took the flock through the woods, which was a new experience for both of us, and then to the upper part of the grazing area for another boundary session. At one point, Duncan figured out he didn’t need to keep running the boundary, so he sat down for a break. That was perfectly fine, because as soon as the sheep moved too close to the edge, he popped up and moved them right back into the grazing area. And he did that with no indication from either me or Claire that he needed to do it, which I think is pretty impressive.

After moving the sheep back into the arena, we headed up to the duck pens. Ducks don’t herd at all like sheep, and that was very evident. Poor Duncan kept herding them like he would sheep – moving them in the correct direction and then backing off. Unfortunately, backing off of ducks means the ducks will stop going where the dog was trying to get them to go, and instead they’ll head back to their pen. Duncan got pretty mouthy with the ducks, but Claire only fussed once or twice. At one point, he tried licking a duck into submission. When that didn’t work, he just picked it up (and no, he didn’t hurt it). Claire said he was just doing what most dogs used to sheep do at first - trying to either hold the duck in one place to make it stop moving (balance is very important to herding dogs), or simply picking the duck up to make it go where its supposed to. We’ll have to keep practicing with the ducks.

Now, these pictures have nothing to do with sheep herding (or duck herding, for that matter), I just really liked them.

Yay, Heat!

So, I turned my heat on Saturday afternoon and it didn’t seem to do a whole lot of heating. Sunday wasn’t a problem, since the weather was nice and I worked the afternoon/evening shift. I got home from the kennel Monday to discover that the heat still wasn’t being very productive. I called John and he came over to check things out. Apparently, my blower motor had gone kaput. John was able to find a new motor and came over yesterday evening to get everything hooked up. Thanks to John, I now have heat, and heat is a very good thing.