New day (2)

Today is sunny and boy do we all need it. Its still cold here, about 30 degrees but wind chill makes it feel a lot colder. Yesterday on our walk we about froze. The sun gets me thinking Spring and digging in the ground, planing and watching my plants grow.

Interesting how Beeks doesn't mind the cold. He just keeps his nose to the ground, looking for the next crevice or hole, trying to get smells of little critters. I work to keep his head up and moving forward on our walks but it is a constant endeaver. And he has such a great nose. We have lots of deer in our area and they, along with the herd of squirrels cause him to be constantly on guard. The birds have begun to sing more and their songs make me so happy. We have a huge number of birds that migrate through this area,stopping to feed at our feeders. Some of the birds that we have identified are the Indigo Bunting, the Baltimore Orieole, gold finches, medowlarks, nuthaches, wrens, chickadees, cardinals, titmouses, blue jays, flickers and woodpeckers, hawks, and a number of varieties of owls. Once, a few years ago, I watched as a hawk took a young squirrel while its mother screeched in horror. The whole dance between the hawk and the squirrels was breathtaking to me.

This morning Beeker, Max, Chez and I are on the bed. I love this time of peace we have together. I'm on the laptop and the dogs are laying quietly while Chez is curled up between pillows. This seems to be how people and animals should get along. However, I there are many who believe that animals should never be alowed on the masters bed. The thought is that the animal will view its position as an equal to the master and the balance of power will be leveled. What do you think? Our dogs (who can control a cat?) are only allowed on the bed if we invite them up. Max gets this and once he is on the bed is VERY reluctant to get down. Beeker on the other had will jump down at the first little noise he hears. If I get up to get coffee he will also jump down and then want to get right back up when I return. If the cat gets down and moves, Beeker will want to chase or follow him, then return to the side of the bed with his cute eyes looking up at me, begging to return to the top. Beeks also uses his nose as an appendage, flipping my arm to get attention. As cute as this is at the moment, and as persistant as he is when he wants his way, it can get quite annoying when this goes on and on and repeats the behavior over and over. At night I have to turn my back to him, while he begs to return to the bed, having used all his privileges for the night. I want to giggle at the thought of his so sad eyes staring at my back. That is the deffinition of hope and patience. Soon Beeker realizes that I am not going to let him come back to the bed and he begins fussing with his rug (next to the bed). The nesting behavior will continue for a good 5-10 minutes, or until I can not take the sighing and scratching any longer and tell him to settle down. Some times this talking to him will cause him to again, come to the bedside to sit and stare at me, hoping for a last minute reprieve up to the bed. NOT A CHANCE! but it is a funny sequence of events. Poor Beeker.

I thought you might like to see Max and Beeker together so I put a picture on the post. The picture was taken yesterday.

Yesterday I said I wanted to talk about Beeker's favorite toys. Beeks is an aggressive chewer. He loves to chew. Outside he will chew anything,including but not limited to bark, rocks,sticks,bean pods and ice. Inside we have always given him many things to chew including ropes, stuffed animals, rubber bones, hard plastic bones, kongs, and many others. Beeks actually eats most toys so chewing is only a means to consumption. He has eatten a kong tire in about an hour. Interestingly, he has never chewed furniture or our clothes or anything other than his toys. Thank God! However with the concern that he might get a bowel obstruction we decided to stop giving him ropes and stuffed animals as well as cheap plastic and rubber toys that he can consume. We have found a few toys that seem to take longer than others for him to eat his way through. Premier Pet makes the Gentle Leaders that our dogs use and they have toys that are awesome. Some of our favs are the Busy Buddy line. We have used the Tug a Jug which keeps Beeks thinking (he needs to get the treats out of the bottle that is constricted by a rope). We have to keep an eye out when he is using this toy, so that he does't chew up the rope when he is finished working the treats out. The other Busy Buddy toy we like is the Squirrel Buddy that My sister gave us. This toy can be filled with treats also, but unlike the Kong, it has small rubber fingers to restrict the treat flow. Beeks likes to chew on this all the time. Beeks likes the Nylabone dinosaur chew. Since my son is a paleontologist, this seems reasonable. Does your dog have favorite toys? Share with us so we can all find the toys that are right for us. Hope you are able to get outside soon, we need spring NOW!