Monday, November 5, 2007

Meet Our dogs!



This is our newest addition. She is a joy! A customer found her wondering, she had long matted hair and runny eyes, but she was still a happy little girl. She gets so much joy from the simplest of things. She loves loves loves life! She loves everyone she meets! She brings joy and laughter into the lives of everyone she meets. So we named her JOY! Although I'm pretty sure she thinks her name is "Go Potty!"


Murphy and Sheila are cousins. Sheila is about 10 years old now and Murphy is 6 years old. Murphy rides on the backhoe whenever he hears it start up. Sheila tries to herd the backhoe by biting it in the bucket.



Lucy came along at about the same time as Murphy. She was found in the ditch near our house on a cold January morning. I offered to keep her until her owners could be located. That was 6 years ago and we're still looking.


May is our one year old border collie. Her story is interesting too. One evening, I rode with a friend to somewhere outside of Chehalis so she could pick up a beautiful young stallion she'd just purchased. I watched while the little stud, who had just been taken out of his familiar stall, and was parked at the back of a stranger's trailer wondering what was up. An expert was called in to help get him loaded. A female border collie promptly came up behind the horse and without looking directly at him, she began trotting in half circles, back and forth, closing in on the stud's hind legs with every pass. She worked with amazing confident, quiet calm, using her body to passively-persist that he keep stepping forward. He edged toward and finally stepped into the trailer one hoof at a time while he kept one eye at a time on the clever dog. She systematically disappeared and reappeared from his right side to his left side, really not seeming to pay him any mind at all. Yet, she was focused on him with every nerve in her entire body. I was blown away by this dogs incredible natural horsemanship in its purest form. This! My friends, is what Pat Parelli is always trying to get across to us humans. When the horse was safely loaded into the trailer, without one bit of fear, hesitation or argument, she fell to the ground to await any further orders. The words just blurted out of my mouth before I could catch them. “I’ve got to get me one of those!” The owner's response: “She just had a litter of puppies.” And one border collie pup rode home on my lap.

1 comment:

erik said...

Cute little dog!!! I have an 8 year old greyhound. She is part cat, sleeps all day! ernie.