Word of the Day.....Lachanophobia

Our hounds currently are fed twice a day a basic mix of 2 parts quality dry kibble (Solid Gold brand at the moment), 1 part whole chickens that are cooked for 24-36 hours that are mashed up (bones and all), and 1 part vegetable mix of peas, carrots, corn, green and Lima beans. Sometimes we add or substitute eggs or other proteins, and other fruits or vegetables.
Our Silken Windhound Jewel is a confirmed Lachanophobiac.......Lachanophobia is "a persistent, abnormal, and unwarranted fear of vegetables". Jewel is especially fearful of GREEN vegetables. The actual phobia manifests itself in different ways. Some sufferers experience it almost all the time, others just in response to direct stimuli. Everyone has their own unique formula for when and how to feel bad. Jewel's feelings are evident when you place her bowl in front of her and she glares up at you with her "What's this green s**t again??!!" look. It so happens it's the same look we get when a bath is about to take place.

Here's Jewel's normal meal, note the brightly colored and tasty selection of vegetables:

Here's what Jewel leaves behind: every piece of Green sucked and licked clean:

To add insult to an already distressing condition, most lachanophobia therapies take months or years, and sometimes even require the patient to be exposed repeatedly to their fear. Twice a day, poor Jewel must confront her fear of green vegetables......we hope she can be cured.

PETA and Stuff, to be continued......

"Danger, Will Robinson!" - controversial stuff here to follow! Hey, it's my blog and I can say whatever the hell I want. You have the right to submit your comments in support or contention hereof, and I reserve the right to delete them if they aren't rational.

About a week ago I watched HBO's documentary on PETA and Ingrid Neukirk, "I Am An Animal". I was a bit surprised to find myself agreeing with almost all of the issues and content presented. For example, I do not approve of animal torture or suffering, fur for fur's sake, or the neglect and abuse of animals. I do however eat animals and and wear leather. Most people do eat animals by the way, and I plan to continue to do so. It makes sense to me that if we're going to eat them, we should also utilize all of the animal's by products, such as their hides for leather. Organs for dog food. Hooves for chew toys. I digress!

Today, I went to PETA's website to see where they truly stand on issues, since the documentary didn't really delve into it. Ah, therein lies the meat of the matter and one particular point of contention that I would like to bring up. This is a direct quote from PETA's website:

"All breeders fuel the companion animal overpopulation crisis, and every time someone purchases a puppy or a kitten instead of adopting from an animal shelter, homeless animals lose their chance of finding a home—and will be euthanized."

Okay....so, what if you don't want an unaltered Pitbull/Rottweiler mix? Dogs are not inanimate objects and are as different each one from another as people are. Every dog has it's own personality, character traits and a unique set of behavior issues, positive or not. If you get a dog directly from a shelter, you simply don't know what you are getting. People who are willing to take that chance, I applaud their decision and commitment, especially so when they are able to spend whatever time and money it takes to train the dog to fit with a new family if there are issues. And there often are.

PETA assumes that if there were not dogs available from breeders, that people would then go to a shelter to get Fido. No difference is realized between a Papillion puppy that has been health tested, well cared for and properly socialized; and a 3 year old unaltered male Pitbull found roaming the streets. Which one would you rather have around your children or other animal companions? PETA makes no differentiation between the two extremes. A dog, is a dog, is a dog. PETA's assertion that every dog bought from a breeder means that one will die in a shelter is absolutely asinine and ranks as one of the stupidest things I've ever heard.

For the record, I checked the Tacoma WA Humane Society's available dog listing today. 59 dogs available: 11 are Pitbulls or Pitbull mix, 20 are unaltered.

I wonder how many of those dogs in the shelter today came from a sire and dam that were health tested (eyes, hearts, hips, thyroid, genetics, etc.) by their breeder to determine known genetic or physical problems within their breed? How many were from parents that were selectively bred for good temperaments? How many were health tested themselves by their breeders before they were sold and allowed to be kept unaltered? Let's face it -- Every dog that is not a wild dog came from someone who allowed it to breed. Ummm, what do you call those people...? Oh yeah, BREEDERS!

If everyone did as PETA wished and eliminated breeders, period, then within a couple of generations there will be NO MORE dogs.

It seems to me that PETA would be doing a much better service in their noble goal of reducing the number of dogs euthanized if they were to provide EDUCATION about the difference between GOOD and BAD breeders. Such as, how to select an animal for health, temperament, socialization, in the first place. If puppy mills and disreputable breeders had no market (aka the ignorant public at large) then many of those dogs would not be in shelters facing euthanasia today.

I originally meant to post about breed rescues too, but this is getting too long. More, later.......

Camouflage Borzoi

This morning, I temporarily lost Rowan. I remember letting her outside, which rarely lasts long because she much prefers a soft warm bed to the great outdoors. Call as I would, there was no sight or sound of the big red borzoi.

After several minutes, and my worry growing exponentially that she had escaped the 6' fence (hey, you never know! She's a big girl!), I spotted her just inside the brush of the woods that border our yard. When I ventured down there to see what she was up to, I found her intently focused on a small pile of leaves trying to stir something up. Most likely a mouse or other small critter about to meet it's untimely demise.

I was struck by how well a large red borzoi could be almost invisible, and grabbed my camera. Check it out, it's true!:

Catie's Junior Coursing Title

It was our coldest day of the season at just 24 degrees at 6:00am. In a frosty white pre-dawn Northwest wonderland we loaded up the borzois and Honcho our silken windhound to go participate in the North West Coursing Club's annual two-day Turkey Run. Today's mission was to obtain for Catherine (Catie) the first leg of her Junior Courser title by taking part 1 of her lure coursing test. Rowan and Honcho came along today for moral support.

Lure coursing events are artificial simulations of coursing, they are designed to measure and develop the characteristics of the sighthound breeds. The hounds chase white plastic bags that are strung on 100# test line, along pulleys, around a course. The line is pulled with a machine with the speed and distance from the hounds manually operated to simulate live game, which sighthounds were developed to hunt. The purpose of the competitive lure coursing trial program is to preserve and develop the coursing skills inherent in sighthounds and to demonstrate that they can perform the functions of which they were originally bred.

The purpose of non-competitive lure coursing tests is to offer sighthound breed owners a standardized gauge to measure their hounds' coursing instinct. Catie has attended several practices with us chasing the lure in a straight line, as well as with her breeders in Canada, Greg and Lexy Hancock of Tovaritch Kennel, before coming to us last June. So, she knew what to do, Chase The Bags! Today was her first time on the lure when it changes directions, however.

We were pleasantly surprised to meet another borzoi and her family out for their JC test also. A lovely 2 year old goofy girl (yes, goofier than Catie, hard to believe but true). In our area, hardly no borzoi attend lure coursing events, so we are extremely happy to have finally met other borzoi people out to run their hounds.

After a wait that seemed like hours (oh yeah, because it WAS HOURS, plural, even though the JC Tests were ran before the trial!) in the cold, with frozen feet and ears, it was Catie's turn. Catie wasn't cold at all as she would try to launch her and us off the ground everytime the lure machine started up for the tests before us, then bark-bark-bark her pointy borzoi head off in excitement and try to pull us out onto the field.

As soon as she was released to follow the lure, she took off like a bat out of hell and only had a split second hesitation when the lure took approximately a 90 degree turn to the left about 75 yards down from the start line. She ran fabulously the entire course, and only lost the lure momentarily when it made an turn back up on itself at an extreme acute angle. If you've never seen a borzoi, or any sighthound for that matter, in a double suspended gallop at full speed, it's a sight to behold - poetry in motion.

Tomorrow morning we'll repeat today and should have her JC title by mid morning. We are so proud of our little Catie-bug!

Power Trip - the Doggy Door

About a week ago Rich installed a fancy high end in-the-wall doggy door so the hounds could come and go at their leisure to the back yard. This was fantastic, I thought, because I am not interested in making a career out of being Doogy Doorlady, which seemed to be rapidly becoming my full time job now that the weather has turned cold and the people door is shut all the time.

The Fantastic Doggy Door is not without challenges, however......

#1. Rowan gets on a power trip when the five other hounds are outside and she's not. She lies just inside the doggy door and, God Help!! -- the dog on the outside who wants to come inside. She thoroughly enjoys the power trip of being In Control of the door, and no one is allowed to enter while she is exercising her right as the supreme redhaired bitch of the home. It's the closest thing to a smile on her face that you can imagine.

#2. Jewel refuses to acknowledge that she can exit through the door herself if I'm anywhere to be seen. After all, I live to serve her, and serve I shall......she whines, barks and does everything in her power to get me over to the people door to open it (even though the doggy door is less than 12" to the side of it) rather than just go out her own door. If I refuse, she refuses to go out, and 15 minutes later the Princess routine to get the people door open for her starts again. Sometimes I just give in to her demands to shut her up which I know just perpetuates the cycle. I am well trained am I not?

#3. Rowan, unlike Jewel, flat refuses to go out the door. Although she is a tad too small, she can fit but simply refuses to do so.

#4. With a doggy door, the dogs have more access to the outside to go bark bark bark whenever they feel like it, unlike before, when I could choose to just not let them outside when a barking opportunity presented itself (squirrel, crows, UPS trucks coming up the road, etc.)

I'm not sure that the Doggy Door has resulted in any less energy expenditure on my part. With having to still let Rowan in and out, get up to move her physically from the door so the other dogs can enter, and getting up to call them inside after barking adventures, it's about dead even for me so far.

No More Cats

About a month ago, our 17 year old purebred Balinese kitty, Mocha, passed away. One cat down, one cat to go. The other one we have now, Scooter, is 15....the clock is ticking.

We'd had the little guy who passed since he was a kitten. In the last few years, he started losing his mind - wandering around the house in the middle of the night crying and yowling at the top of his lungs in that oh so NOT endearing Siamese voice. I loved the moron, but on the other hand it's so nice to have QUIET!!! at night. And no accidents around the house if you know what I mean.

A friend send me this below. Every time I think about getting a new kitty I'm going to watch this video (turn up your sound and click the arrow at the bottom under the black screen). Or, -- click here Wake Up Cat if video does not load below for you.

Beaglefest

Yesterday, we attended Howloween Beaglefest, an annual event put on by the volunteers of the Seattle Beagle Rescue. The event raised almost $550 to go to helping homeless Beagles in the Northwest be placed in loving forever homes.

Loren Johnson with Top Dog Pet Photography, a professional pet photographer, was on site taking Holiday photos of people and/or their hounds, so we dressed ourselves up in our Christmas finery and brought all six canines along for the event. It really is a miracle when you can suck it all up into a tight space and look (more or less directly) at the camera, sit or stand pretty for precisely 1/1000th of a second -- no licking, coughing, hacking, giving dirty looks at your neighbor because they shouldn't be that close, and why is their nose THERE?? And, what is it DOING??? Oh, and that was just the humans. Here's our photo:



Beagles are very different creatures from sighthounds. They can be incredibly LOUD for one thing. Our four sighthounds did not quite know what to think of so many beagles in once place (even though they live with two of them), and they don't understand their form of play (what, no one wants to be the rabbit??). As the afternoon went by we could allow Rowan off leash with them in the enclosed area for short periods, but Catherine could only think about how much fun they would all be to chase, and therefore remained tethered to us or took a nap in the car the whole time.

To see a video on YouTube of Beaglefest, Click here.

All in all it was a great day with all of our hounds. Honcho and Jewel were great ambassadors for the Silken breed, making friends with everyone and anyone who had a treat and a pet or two or forty. The Borzois were regal and happy just hanging out with us all day, and the Beagles thoroughly enjoyed their event - sniffing and exploring the grounds, especially hanging out in close proximity to the treat tables for potential droppings. After all, one just never knows what manna may fall from heaven if you watch (sniff) out for it.

Butter Up

I love peanut butter cookies. The big, chewy, homemade kind made with real butter. LOVE them, they are the perfect snack any time of day. Since they are sooooo good, I don't make them very often because they never last very long around here.

As it's been several months since I made a batch, I've been meaning to make some for some time. Over the last month, I've taken two sticks of butter out of the freezer and put it on top of the microwave to thaw, three or four times. Later in the day, when I get around to thinking about making cookies, I find Rich has put it back into the refrigerator or freezer. Odd, I think in the back of my head, but he's usually at work and I don't get around to asking him why.

This morning, again I take out two sticks of butter from the freezer. Put on top of microwave to thaw, then go about my day. See photo.

This afternoon......I'm walking through our bedroom and notice first of all that our bed is messed up. Second, there's something on it........something, like a dog would have left........hmmmmmm

Evidence!.
Evidence close up.

Of course EVERYONE is innocent and no one is confessing who is guilty. I have good reason to suspect that it was a borzoi who is responsible for the thievery, but the bounty may have been shared by several. And, the light bulb clicks on in my head where all those many previously missing sticks of butter have gone over the last month or so.

Borzoi meets Blackberry

It's been several weeks since any of the hounds destroyed anything in the house. No recent shoe destruction, teeth marks on furniture, clothes ripped apart, shampoo bottles chewed up -- NOTHING. A small part of me began to celebrate, quietly and internally, that finally the destructive puppy stages were over.

Your habits get lax real fast when things run the way they are supposed to.

Late this afternoon, I left to run to the bank and stop by the grocery store. The hounds have been so good that I oblivously left them all in the house unattended with stuff laying around. This was obviously a huge mistake on my part.

Apparently the borzois got lonely and tried to call or text message their friends on my Blackberry. Or, maybe they thought they could surf the internet? Search for online dates? Search for a Myspace page for that cute male borzoi they met at the show last weekend? The possibilities are endless.

Here are photos of what a Borzoi can do to a Blackberry:

Those girls are SO grounded from the phone!!

AKC Show Success - Catherine takes RWB

A couple of years ago, when we purchased our first Silken Windhound Honcho, we were introduced to the wide world of dog showing. Silken Windhounds are a rare breed that are not yet recognized by the American Kennel Club (AKC), and are not shown in AKC venues. These rare breed show venues are usually rather informal, relaxed and quite sociable events. There are also as many as six separate shows in a single weekend. We've known dogs in these venues to start their show career and finish as a Champion the same weekend, if not the same day. True story!

It's with this short history of relative dog show success that we forayed into the world of AKC dog shows this year when we began showing our two new Borzoi girls, Rowan and Catherine. What a world of difference! Showing dogs in AKC is the hardest thing I have ever attempted to do. Which, makes any success that we achieve just that much sweeter. As new handlers, we are learning as we go also.

Today, we drove over 150 miles one way to show in the AKC all breed show in Ridgefield, Washington. Although it was a practice day for Rowan, Catherine at 1 year + 4 days of age and her fifth AKC show, took Reserve Winners Bitch with five bitch entries. We are very proud of her as she calmed down significantly (no bouncing, skipping and kissing Mom in the show ring TODAY...) and she moved smoothly and effortlessly.

Although we didn't earn any points toward either of the borzoi's championships, we are thrilled with Catie's first AKC Reserve Winners Bitch (where there was more than one other entry) and are looking forward to the next show in November.

The Blog -- Resistance is Futile!

It seems in this day and age, you just have to have a blog. Everyone's got one kind or another.....you must assimilate, resistance is futile! So, we're joining the 21st century with our blog about a life with our beloved canine companions as we venture to various places and events.

Currently we have two each of three different breeds: Borzois, Silken Windhounds, and Beagles, all of whom you can see on our website, http://winterfellwindhounds.com/.

Thanks for visiting, we welcome email - drop us a note and let us know what you think and how you like our blog as we go along.