THE OTHER END OF THE LEASH

I am grateful for so much. I often spend time every morning thinking about what I am grateful for, but it seems especially meaningful at this time of the year. Here’s just a few of the many things I have to be thankful for:

I am grateful for Willie’s smiling face and his pink tongue.

I am grateful for the times when he sends his joy spinning out into the universe.

I am grateful to have Lassie still in my life and to be anticipating her 16th birthday party.

I am grateful for the black circle around her eye, and the little brush of black on her ear.

I am grateful for Sushi’s soft, creamy fur, her cat ears and her cat eyes and the fact that she is so very different from my dogs.

I am thankful for every day that I get to spend with her. I am becoming more allergic to her every week, and am trying many, many things to make it work, but am aware that my days with Sushi might be limited.

I am grateful for the colors of fall, the beauty of nature and the amazing luck I have to be able to live in such a beautiful place.

I am grateful to Jim, who has been like air and water to me for nine years. I am grateful to all in his family, and all in mine… how incredibly lucky I am to be a part of their lives.

My own list will go on for pages and pages, but here’s one more . . .

I am grateful for all of you who read this blog, and participate in a conversation about the amazing relationship we have with animals of another species.

What are you grateful for? I would love to know.

I’m inspired to write this after crying over the happy ending of a lost dog saga. A Golden bitch, who had been rescued from a hellish life in a puppy mill, had escaped from her new home and run into the woods. She was friendly and loving to everyone when she was in her foster home, but once she took off she became terrified of human contact. She was spotted numerous times, but ran off every time she saw someone, even from familiar dogs and her new, beloved human. The story reminds me of the time that I lost Tulip. It was only for nine hours, and it was one of the worst days of my life. She was old by then, with a severely weakened hindquarters, and I knew she’d never go running in the deep snow voluntarily.

After hours of searching the woods in a snow storm, calling and stopping at neighbors, we found her late at night, having slid partway down a small cliff, wedging herself between the ground and a large branch. We would never have found her if it hadn’t been for dear, wonderful neighbors, who thought they heard her barking and led us to where they thought she might be. We trudged through deep snow in the pitch dark, ears straining to hear something that might lead us to her. All 4 of us stopped cold when we heard a deep bark floating from the woods. “There she is!” someone said, and I began to cry. Not from happiness, because it wasn’t her. I knew her bark, and it wasn’t her. It was 10 pm and my frail, old dog was somewhere in the dark and the snow and the storm and the bitter cold and it wasn’t her. And then, moments later . . . I could cry remembering it, we heard a second bark. “TULIP!!! That’s her, I KNOW it is!”

We scrambled into the pitch dark woods, still unsure of where she was, and how to find her. Brambles tore at our clothes and the snow fell from branches overhead and melted down our necks, but we had heard her, and nothing was going to stop us from looking more. It was Jim who found her. His flashlight found two glowing eyes… maybe a raccoon, maybe a possum, but no, wait… it was big and got whiter as we approached, and there she was, stuck like a puppy put into a Christmas stocking, held fast by a fallen tree to the side of a steep creek bed.

It took almost an hour to extract her off the steep, slippery slope, and get her back to the farm. She had most likely been pinned, immobile in the bitter cold, for almost nine hours, and she couldn’t move her back legs. She couldn’t walk unaided for a week, but she slowly gained her strength, and graced the farm for another year. I will never forget the nightmare of that nine hours, and can barely imagine what it is like to lose a dog for three weeks (or forever).

I know not all stories end as happily as Tulip’s or the Golden who was found after extensive searching (by over 50 people!) this weekend, but I thought it was a good time to mention some things I’ve learned about finding lost dogs. I hope you all can add to the list, in hopes it will help some one down the line.

If a dog is missing:

First, ask what kind of dog is missing? According to Kat Albrecht, who wrote the highly recommended Pet Detective, lost dogs fall into three categories: highly gregarious ‘wiggle butts’ who go to the first person they see, aloof dogs who were never comfortable with strangers and avoid them until starving or weather stressed and “xenophobic” dogs, who are afraid of new things. Often, as was the case with the Golden, these are dogs who were not given healthy puppyhoods, and freeze and panic in new situations. Once scared, they won’t come voluntarily to anyone.

This describes the Golden who was just recovered. She adores people, once she is comfortable, but typical of this group, she ran from everyone who was trying to help her (even familiar dogs.) She was eventually recovered only because a large group of people canvassed the area, alerted everyone within miles, kept careful track of sightings, put food and clothing with familiar scents out and used live traps baited with food and familiar clothing. She was found, sleeping soundly, in a live trap over the weekend.

I’ve seen several cases like this, in which even dogs who were well-socialized become disoriented and don’t respond as you would expect. One client had a Husky who traveled 30 miles in one day, and avoided everyone who tried to call him until he got to a farm with a lot of other dogs. He was spared from being shot as a coyote only because the person at home called her brother to come kill him, so that she didn’t have to. Once he arrived, the ‘coyote’ was identified as a dog, and they managed to confine all the dogs in the barn. Albrecht says that country dogs tend to travel much further, city dogs stay closer by, in part because of highways and fences. (By the way, she also says that ‘outdoor’ cats vanish because something happened to them.. they are most likely injured or trapped. ‘Indoor cats,’ on the other hand, rarely go far, and are most often found close to home, usually hiding silently somewhere within one or two houses away.)

Here is what I know to do if your pet goes missing (please add to the list if you like):

1. Tell everyone. Go to every house, post signs everywhere, tell the delivery men, the vets, shelters within 50 miles… every one. And don’t leave it to just one visit, don’t hesitate to go back a week later with a new flyer (with a phone number to call)… lots of people will throw the first one away.

2. Put out live traps with food and clothing that smells like you. Check them relentlessly. This is how the Golden was finally captured. This is especially useful in country areas and for dogs who become shy once they are lost. Do not think you can predict how your dog will behave once he is lost in the woods… I’ve seen some amazing transformations.

3. Do not count on your dog to bark or your cat to meow. Jim and I had walked within 50 yards of Tulip hours before we found her, and she never made a peep. While we searched, I had felt sure that she would bark.. she was a Great Pyrenees for heaven’s sake, and she barked more than any dog I’ve ever had. But I hadn’t thought about the context of her barking. She never barked for attention or when she was playing. She barked at deer across the road, when she heard other dogs bark (which is how we found her), when cars drove up and when the coyotes howled. Her barks were alarm barks.. ALERT ALERT! but they were never made to get our attention to play, get food or be petted. I was completely surprised that she didn’t vocalize when we walked past her (she HAD to have heard us, we called ’til we were hoarse), but it makes sense now.

I had a cat, Ayla, who was badly injured by a stray cat and crawled under hay bales to die. By the time I got back from out of town she’d been missing for days. I searched the barn that night and morning, and thought I had heard, each time, one quiet, tiny meow, but nothing else. Pippy Tay found her… as I cried in the barn that morning, sure my cat was somewhere dying in the barn, I said “Pippy, where’s Ayla?” I didn’t expect anything of Pippy Tay, I was just asking for sympathy. But Pip turned and began to dig on top of a 10 foot high pile of hay bales. I found Ayla under 400 bales, almost dead from dehydration and an infected shoulder. Albrecht says that is typical of cats. If they are injured, they go to ground and remain silent, so don’t call for your cat expecting her to call back.

4. Don’t give up. Be relentless. One client’s dog ran feral in the woods for an entire Wisconsin winter, and was captured in spring. He went back to being a happy house pet without a hitch, even though he had been surviving on his own for months.

And, of course, there’s prevention, but that’s another topic. I’ll leave it for now at ID your pet! and look forward to hearing your stories and advice.

And how can I resist adding a photo of Tulip… suitably attired for a Christmas card of years ago?

A few days ago I wrote a post on how to handle signs of impending trouble if you see it in someone else’s dog (Please Believe Me, Trouble Brewing!) I asked for comments from other pro’s on how they handle this situation, and from owners on how they would like it handled. The comments sent in response have been so helpful and interesting I thought this topic deserved another post.

Here is an admittedly brief summary of how readers responded (see the original post for their complete comments and suggestions):

PLEASE TELL US! Several people wrote in with sad stories of clear problems that trainers or vets never mentioned when the dog was younger. Many people wished that someone had said something to them sooner. The trick is how and when you say it (read on!)

KINDNESS Oh please please please remember how fragile and vulnerable we are about our dogs. Expressing empathy and concern goes a long way toward having any comment you might make about someone’s dog be heard.

OFFER SOLUTIONS I cringed reading comments about trainers who said things like “You need to get your dog under control!” and kept walking. Isn’t that, uh, what we trainers are for? Don’t people come to us to learn how to do that? The comments made it crystal clear how unhelpful it is for someone to tell you that you have a problem, and then offer no solution–what good is it to know that you have a serious problem if the person who brings it up offers no help or potential solutions? This might be a brief discussion, an appointment, or a referral to other resources, but “Boy do you have a problem!”–without any help attached is, in my mind, nothing less than an act of indirect aggression.

GET PERSONAL It helps tremendously to bring up a similar situation or dog that you yourself have had. I didn’t mention this in my first post, but I realized while reading the comments that I do it all the time. It helps people see that the “problem” is not their fault, that these things happen to experienced trainers, and that there are solutions/potentials for the future that someone can guide you through.

PROVE IT & BE SPECIFIC It’s not enough to say “Boy are you going to have trouble with that dog!” Carefully explain exactly what it is that you are seeing that needs to be attended to and why someone should listen to what you have to say. (“Do you see how the corners of her mouth are retracted while she’s barking at me, and she is actually backing up as she does so? Those are often signs of fear in young dogs, and after 20 + years in the business I’ve seen so many fearful puppies become adult dogs who get into trouble when visitors come. The good news is that this is almost always a treatable problem. I have a dog right now who was just like that when he was an adolescent, and I had visitors throw treats for him every time they came over. Now he is ….” etc etc etc.)

DON’T EXAGGERATE I like the the suggestion of presenting the “best and worst case” scenario. This is an important way to be realistic, and avoid people from dismissing what you have to say. “It may turn out just fine, but I’ve seen so many dogs like this who ended up in trouble… why gamble with a dog who might be that “one in a million” dog that you talk to your grandchildren about!” It’s a tricky line, I admit–saying enough to get someone’s attention, without overstating the issue such that you lose them completely. But, then, isn’t life often about walking on those thin lines between helpful and tiresome?

CUSTOMIZE If this is a client, it is critical to customize your advice. Every case is different, and cookie-cutter solutions to even common problems often don’t work. Every client needs to feel special, because they are. Every case is different, because it is. People desperately need to feel they’ve been listened to, and that your advice is truly something that can work for them. I often start out by saying “Ideally, we’d do X and Y, but then, there’s real life (and your spouse and five kids to acknowledge).” I always ask if they think my suggestions could work for them, and pay lots of attention to body language that says one thing, and a verbal response that says another.

UNDERSTAND THAT CONTEXT IS EVERYTHING This is especially for non-trainers, because most trainers are well aware that a dog can behave one way in one context and another way in a different setting. A word to the wise: I can not tell you how many times I’ve heard clients complain that their vets won’t listen to them about their behavioral problem because the dog is so good in the clinic. Dogs can behave one way to one person, and be a different dog to someone else. They can be docile and loving at the vet clinic and a terror at home. Etc Etc. If people tell you they have a problem, then they have a problem. It may be a slightly different one than they perceive it to be, but if it’s a problem to your client, then it’s a problem. That said, kukos and body wags to all the veterinarians and vet techs out there who work so hard to educate their clients and work to prevent behavioral problems. All behaviorists and trainers send our appreciation (and our sympathy). It’s tough sometimes. Thus, the next point:

ACCEPT OUR LIMITS No matter how good any trainer, vet, behaviorist or friend, there are times that people simply aren’t going to listen to us. In many cases, it is natural to dismiss something the first time you hear it. (Don’t you do that yourself sometimes?) It’s not until the second or third time that we are ready to hear what’s being said. That’s one reason why maintaining a relationship can be so important, as well as finding a way to stay involved if it is appropriate.

And sometimes, no matter what, we’re just not going to get the response we want. We need to let it go. This isn’t easy for people who spend at least part of their lives learning how to influence and manage the behavior of another (!), but it’s a critical skill that we all need to nurture. Let it go. It’s okay. As James Herriot quoted his mentor in “All Creatures Great and Small,” “Don’t worry son, you can’t kill ‘em all.” And we can’t save ‘em all, either. Neither can vets or physicians. Let it go. Breath. Move on.

One of the ways we all do that is focus on our own animals. And so, . . .

. . . Meanwhile, back at the farm: It is still absurdly warm here, in the 50′s most days, low 30′s at night. Two years ago we had well over foot of snow by now. Does that mean I’m all caught up on the “preparing for winter chores?” Not even close. (All of you who live in warm climates might want to smile now.) There are still hoses to flush and put away, water heaters in stock tanks to check, roses to mulch, and garages to clean out. And the food! Oh my my my. This time of year there is food piling up around us like a nutritious, tasty tsunami. I have a winter share at my local CSA (Vermont Valley Community Farm), and now have enough potatoes and carrots to feed small armies. In addition, I gleaned the fields and now have 12 packages of “extra” broccoli in the freezer. This weekend I’ll be out hacking down left over brussel sprout trees, slicing the tiny cabbage-like morsels off of the stalk and then freezing them after a brief trip into boiling water.

But there’s a ram to get to my friend’s (Redford having done his job at my farm), new gates to buy for the new pens inside the barn that Jim is building, and a meditation retreat on Sunday. Oooooh, I love weekends at home!

Here’s some broccoli, cleaned and trimmed, waiting to be processed for freezing. It’s a little more mature than what you’d want to buy in a store, but it’s still yummy and nutritious.

And here’s my Lassie girl, all 15 years and 11 months of her, bringing back the dilapidated disc. It’s not a great photo, a little fuzzy, but then, it’s my old Lassie girl and I’m an absolute sop over pictures of her. especially when she’s being active and playful.

Just a quick post to let locals know that I’ll be giving a talk on December 1st at the Black Earth Library on my animal-behavior focused trips to Africa. I’ll combine the best of my and Jim’s photographs and talk about the adventures of safaris in Kenya, Botswana, Tanzania and Rwanda. We’ll talk about radio-collaring “Jones,” the breeding male of an African Wild Dog pack, sitting with gorillas in Rwanda and the impact of the current drought on the people and animals of East Africa. If you’re in the area, I hope you can come!

7 pm, December 1st, 2009

Black Earth Library, 1210 Mills Street, Black Earth, WI 608 767-2563, Ext. 3

If you can make it, come up and say hi.

Here’s my favorite photograph from the trip we took in August, on the Masai Mara.

A recent comment motivated this post. It was from a veterinarian who tries her hardest to alert clients to current and potential behavioral problems, and is a tad frustrated on occasion by how few of them seem to take her cautions seriously. I am sure that other vets, dog trainers and behaviorists are all sighing in sympathy as they read this. I sure am. It is such a common problem that I thought it might be worthwhile for us all to have a brain storming session about how to handle it. All of the pro’s reading this blog know what I mean: a 3 month old puppy in puppy class who plays well with others, but growls at you as you approach. Growling at a person at 12 weeks of age? ALARM BELLS! RED FLAGS! DIVE DIVE (the submarine)!!!

So, here’s the question. If you are a pro, how do you handle it when you see signs of impending (or current) problems? If you are not in the business, how would you want someone to tell you that they saw something that concerned them?

Here are some things I have learned that seem to help, but just like everyone else, the more ideas I have the better, so I’d love to hear yours:

1. Make analogies to human behavior. This is where being anthropomorphic can actually help our dogs. I’ll say something like “Right now your adolescent dog is like a teenage son who has drugs hidden under his bed, and is hanging out with guys named Rat Sniffer and the Dude from Hell. He’s a good kid, your son, but he could go either way. He needs you to benevolently intervene so that he ends up living a wonderful life, instead of making license plates in a federal prison.” I’ll adapt the story, depending on the people… making guesses about what will best resonate with them.

2. Don’t exaggerate, and don’t bring it up until you have established a connection. They must believe that you are on their side and that you want nothing but the best for you and your dog. If something happens the instant they walk in the door, keep your mouth shut until you’ve worked with them for awhile, made gooey over their dog (as best you can) and made it clear that you want to be their helper, not someone who judges them or their dog. If you don’t feel as though you are getting through, it is always a good idea to ‘mirror’ their behavior, which means speaking slowly if they speak slowly, leaning forward if they lean forward, crossing your legs if they cross their legs.. etc. Whenever I do it I am sure that someone will notice and think I’m making fun of them, but so far no one ever has. (Until now….. when I meet one of you and you ask me at a break in a seminar what to do about your 7 fighting dogs and I can tell you don’t like my answer. Sigh. Oh well, if you notice, then you’ll know I’m desperately trying to tell you something!)

3. Talk about it from the dog’s point of view. This is hugely important in most cases. It’s how you let people know that you are on their side, but that part of your job is to try to be an advocate for their dog. Again, make analogies and use the good side of anthropomorphism: (“And how would you respond if a strange man walked up to you on the street, grabbed your head and pressed his lips onto yours?”)

4. At the same time, although this might sound contradictory, we also need to be adept at explaining how dogs are different from people. (“Well, your dog probably greets you at the door with head and tail down, licking her lips and groveling because she is using what’s called ‘appeasement’ behavior (give an example from humans), not because she “feels guilty. If you grab her collar and drag her over to the puddle on the carpet she won’t understand why and respond as if she has to defend herself.”

5. Use visuals: Have posters (like the ones from Dream Dog Productions) on your office walls that show visual signals of stress or social discomfort in dogs. Have “before and after” photos of fearful puppies hiding from visitors at 3 months, and and “after” version showing their teeth at two years.

This is a short list, and if I had more time I’d add more to it, but it’s a conversation starter… I’d love to hear your ideas.

Meanwhile, back at the farm: Finally, as of this morning, all sheep butts are red! Yeah, Redford did his job. Took 2 weeks for all of them to come in. That’s longer than I’d like (it’s nice when lambing comes to have the lambs come closer together when you have a flock as small as mine), but at least I know when everyone if due and when they are bred. (They are all due now in late March and early April. You’ll be the first to see lamb photos.)

Here was Will last week, helping me keep the flock safely away from the road.

I’m curious about your experience with dogs who are dog-dog aggressive and what I’ll call “intensive sniffers.” Ever since I heard Sue Sternberg say that dogs who sniff obsessively in her office are often/usually/always?) dog-dog aggressive, I have paid more attention to “intensive sniffing behavior” (I don’t know what else to call it–but hey, I just made that term up, so don’t go looking in the literature!). I’m talking about the dog who enters a room in which other dogs have been previously, puts his nose down and doesn’t lift it up for minutes at a time. I did indeed find a correlation (just observations, no research) that dogs who can’t seem to stop sniffing an area where other dogs have been, are often dogs who have problems with other dogs, especially unfamiliar ones.

I remembered that when I first took Willie, over 3 years ago, to his first vet clinic appt. He was about 8 weeks or so, maybe a day or two older. He first panicked when he heard dogs barking in the background, and I mean panicked. He looked terrified. We moved away from the sound (which was a good 100 yards away–the outdoor area of a doggy day care) and to the front door of the clinic. I put him down and he slammed his nose into the ground and started sniffing loudly and, well… intensely. He would not move from that spot for food, squeaky toys, smooches, clicks or guarantees of an entire chicken for dinner on a daily basis.

I groaned silently, predicting that this could indicate serious trouble down the road. (He had been a bit fearful of my dogs when he first met them, but he was a 7 and a half week old puppy who withdrew but then came right back and let them sniff him. It didn’t seem excessive at the time at all.) I picked him up and took him inside, where he went happy, waggy, flappy body at the vet tech and the vet. As we were leaving the appt, we walked into the lobby to find a Bichon puppy in the middle of the floor. Willie ran under a chair and hid. From a Bichon puppy. As if it were a monster.

Ah, Trisha, you might ask: And why did you keep this puppy? All I can say is that for over a year I said “I’m not sure I’ll keep him, but I just want to work with him enough to keep him out of a shelter or a euthanasia appointment.” As many of you know, he did exhibit horrific problems with other dogs for a long time, and I worked my tail off on it. (I show a video of him meeting a new dog in the Dog-Dog Aggression DVD, including one of the ways I’ve treated his issues. (the DVD is now on sale, my staff tells me I’d better mention, or they’ll muzzle me for life). As many of you also know…. I am stupid in love with him and wouldn’t re-home him for any thing or any body.

Two questions, really: How many of you have seen dogs who exhibited the potential for dog-dog aggression at such an early age? I have no explanation for Willie’s behavior. He grew up around other BCs and Labs, the breeder swore nothing she can think of would have caused any problem. I can tell you that his dam an sire were bred again, and resulted in another puppy with the same issues.

The other question relates to the “intensive sniffing.” I’m curious about your experience with it. I can tell you that I’ve seen dozens of dogs now who are dog-dog aggressive to unfamiliar dogs who attach their noses to the ground and will not stop investigating the scents of other dogs. One of the markers, as a matter of fact, that I used to judge Willie’s progress was how intense he seemed about smelling the scents of other dogs. It makes sense when you think about it… if one is nervous/anxious/deeply concerned about unfamiliar dogs, then one would spend an abnormal amount of time checking “them” out, scent-wise that is. Willie, for over a year, acted as if every unfamiliar dog he saw was a monster. A raving, horror-movie, flesh eating monster. Now when he sees another dog he wags his entire body and whines to get closer. He’s doing extremely well, and I am proud and relieved (but dog parks well never be in our future……)

Here’s the little monster himself….

And here’s some of fall’s bounty, from the CSA down the road. Yum….

Well, I guess I could’ve picked a more subtle title, but it does sum up my topic and attached video pretty nicely. If you are interested in behavior, and doing good ethological style observations, here’s a video for you. I had just introduced Redford the Ram (so called because he is handsome and talented but shorter than expected, like Robert Redford) to the ewe flock.

Before I go any further, don’t worry about his bright red chest, he’s not bleeding. It may look like a slasher movie, but the red stuff on his chest is “breeding paint.” You mix a powder with vegetable oil (I passed on my expensive Olive Oil and used the more moderate Canola oil, but don’t tell him) and smear it on the ram’s chest so that you’ll know who gets bred and when. Any ewe with a red butt has been bred. It’s sort of fun… every morning Willie and I run out to the barn and look for a new red butt…. (5 so far!). In this video, some of the paint has been smeared on the ewes, but he hasn’t bred anyone when it starts. We put them together, herded them into a small pen, smeared his chest and then let him out, so this is his first time back with his ewes since early summer.

The video shows him investigating the ewes to determine who is cycling, including doing “Flehmen,” a behavior in which the male sniffs around a ewe, often smelling her urine, and then raises his head and upper lip. (Lots of male hoofed animals do it, horses included) This posture apparently allows them to more easily pass the large molecules associated with oestrous into their Vomeronasal organ, a sensory device housed in the upper palate.

Redford does find a ewe in heat, and then illustrates his version of courtship behavior, which I’d categorize as something akin to “Nerdy guy performs appallingly lame foreplay.” Most rams do what’s called a “fore leg stab” in which they raise one front leg and push it into the belly of the ewe. If she stands still and doesn’t move forward, she’s ready and it’s worth using the energy to try to mount her. Redford replaces a fore leg stab with a chest pump that seems designed to put off any but the most desperate of females.

But you can see it works. What I find most interesting about the video is the behavior of the ewe in question, Lady Godiva. (She’s all brown, black face, chocolate colored… watch for her early on trying to get his attention). When I watched the video the second time, I paid more attention to her and realized how active she was in the process. She is no shrinking violet. As a matter of fact it looks like she had to work to get Redford’s attention at one point. Notice how she urinates in a place that he can’t miss, and how often she ‘wags’ her tail (and is the only female doing that–the only other time you see sheep ‘wagging’ their tail is when they are nursing, unless they are slapping off flies.)

And yes, that huge white sack hanging at the back of his belly is exactly what you think it is. No wonder Lady Godiva stood still.

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This is an authentic question: ie, I don’t have the answer. But it’s a great question, posed by a seminar attendee, and also by someone who reads the blog. Do dogs think we are mutant dogs? Pathetic replicates who never grow out of our flat, puppy faces (we never grow muzzles) and can’t use our mouths but make up for it endearingly with our cute, floppy paws? And surely they believe we can’t smell–at all. My guy Jim speculated that just as people often assume that animals can’t [fill-in-the-blanks: think in abstractions or strategize or be conscious) because they can’t do it with the depth of skill that we do, perhaps dogs assume we can’t smell anything at all, because we are so horrifically bad at it.

On the one hand, you could argue that dogs behave toward us as they do other dogs: they signal us in ways that are exactly the same as they signal other dogs (not that many dogs don’t behave differently around people as they do around dogs, but that the signals they use are the same signals they use to their own species.) They lick our muzzles, they stare cold and hard into our eyes, they growl and posture using all the same movements and expressions that they use around other dogs. One could argue that this suggests they categorize us as some kind of dog-like creature.

On the other hand, we tend to use the same social signals with dogs as we do people (which gets us in no end of trouble, see The Other End of the Leash!), and we know that dogs are a different species. In addition, dogs have no trouble differentiating different types of dogs (I’m always amused when people ask if dogs can tell a Black Lab from a German Shepherd. Wouldn’t it seem that if we can, they can? They are, after all, dogs, and surely they can tell one another apart more easily than we can! They may not use the same categories as we do.. I highly doubt they separate one another into “Herding” and “Sporting!”, but surely it is obvious to them how profoundly different we are from dogs.) Wouldn’t it be obvious to dogs that we’re NOT dogs? Just our smell alone would make it profoundly obvious.

But, if we’re not disabled dogs, who are we to our dogs? How are we thought of? Ahh… and here’s the real question… Do dogs think of such things at all? Perhaps this is a question a dog has never asked? Perhaps we are just who we are, and dogs have no need to put us into some taxonomic category that makes our brains happy but might be irrelevant to theirs…. but, then, surely they must have some way to identifying living creatures in the world around them. Friend? Foe? Prey? Weird, monster like thing that can not be explained?

This could get circular, but I am very interested in your thoughts on this….

Meanwhile, back at the farm: The birds are emptying the feeders at a heck of rate, I can barely keep them full. Now that it’s gotten colder and many of the insects are gone, the suet and black oil sunflower seed are especially attractive. We have many species coming daily now, the usual Southern Wisconsin mixed species flocks of Black capped Chickadees, Tufted Titmice (don’t look at me, I didn’t give them a common species name), White Breasted Nuthatches, Downy, Hairy & Red-Bellied Woodpeckers, Goldfinch, Purple or House Finch (have to check, we have had both, haven’t paid enough attention last few days), Blue Jays, Cardinals and Doves. More will come as it gets colder, including the Red Breasted Nuthatch (oh so cute).

Here’s a Chickadee… I thought this photo looked like a painting as much as a photograph:

Here’s the Tufted Titmouse, perched and then with a sunflower seed. Notice how s/he holds the seed on the branch with the feet, and then pecks through the shell and extracts the seed.