Late Summer Dog Walks


 Gary did some haying in the creek bottoms a few weeks ago; last month I believe.  He hasn't had the chance to get down there and get the bales yet due to so many well repair jobs and gravel hauling jobs.  The bales make great photos here in late summer though, with the fog or sun on them.

As a general practice I avoid walks this time of year, simply because it is chigger and seed tick season.  I wear tall rubber boots, but still manage to get chiggers, likely from tall weeds that I brush up against.   Since I now have another dog however, I have been taking them down the hill to run a bit in the mornings. They love it.

Every morning down there has its own charm; fog, sun, mist.



The above two photos were of the same hay bale on the same morning, just very different angles.  I wanted to catch the steam coming from it as the sun burned off the dew.  It was the only hay bale steaming like this, and at first it made me a smidge nervous that it was smoke and not steam.  

 

Here is Hope, enjoying her hound dog self.  


Here is Bella watching Hope enjoying herself.  Ha!

It is rare that I ever catch them close together and still enough to get a good shot of them.  

Taking them on walks has become fraught with the possibility now of two dogs taking off on me.  Hope has done so twice.  The first time it was down the dry creek bed, and she came back in about 5 to ten minutes.  The second time was up behind the former milk barn to the east.  She ended up back behind her former owner's place and tried to pay a visit to my sister in law.  She and Gary, who happened to be down there helping mow, chased her off.  She was gone a good 15-20 minutes, and was pretty pleased with herself when she finally made it back for her supper.  I was annoyed, but it is a pretty sound to hear her full-throated bay as she takes off on a scent. I have started putting her on her lead as we are coming back up the hill.  I don't mind as much if she takes off when we are down in the bottoms, but up on the ridge I don't want her ending up at the neighbors' places in either direction.  I have always had to put Bella on her lead at the end of our walks because she will do that as well, though usually she is after squirrels, not coons.  

According to Hope's previous owners she is only trained to hunt coons, so I am not sure if that is for certain what she keeps taking off after. Yesterday morning she didn't react to the deer we startled by the spring on the way down the hill.  Bella watched them, but Hope just ignored them.  I am glad of that; we are forever startling deer on our walks.  Bella used to give chase on occasion, but she has learned that she will never catch up to them.  

Bella and I have seen all sorts of critters on our walks; coons, possums, armadillos, foxes, groundhogs...  If Hope reacts to ALL of them while we are on our walks, things could get interesting.

Here's to an Autumn filled with new adventures!

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