Bella's Mixed Bag!

      Not much happening in the life or times of Bella lately. She goes for walks, sleeps, eats just a little, kills her duck (soft toy!), and generally hangs around!

      Last week she needed a new collar so for the first time went with us into the big Pets At Home shop.  So many strangers passing so close! So many smells, including guinea pigs and rabbits, but the experience was too stressful and confusing to bother!  A few people stopped to admire her and ask about her breed, as expected, and not only did she come away with a new collar but also an un-stuffed duck soft toy, with a squeaker in its head!  Quite a hit! After just a week the duck’s eye is hanging by a thread, but otherwise it has so far survived! The special present Megan brought back from Zambia lies untouched next to her bed! She’s a soft cuddly dog and doesn’t like the hard raw-hide chew toy, so she also hasn’t found the treat which is apparently hidden inside!

 

      A couple of days ago hubby was not feeling up to the early morning walk so I (reluctantly) shuffled out and ended up being out for an hour and a half! Bella was really good on the short lead – I don’t use the flexi-lead anymore – and was responsive …. mostly! Once we got to the really muddy bits alongside the River Orwell which she didn’t mind one tiny little bit, but since I only had trainers on, I did mind, we turned around and trudged back home. A 4½km walk which was fairly pleasant – straight out of bed!

     This morning, hubby was again not feeling too well so instead of going out for a walk, he opened the back door and told Bella to do her thing on her own!  She was OK until I greeted her at the bottom of the stairs but I didn’t pick up the lead. It was then she must have decided to take herself on a walk and once again found the secret (that is, we don’t know where it is) opening into the neighbour’s garden!  8am was a bit early to knock on said elderly neighbour’s door to ask for our dog back, so we waited about half an hour, and kept an eye on her from upstairs knowing she couldn’t escape but she might trample a prized flowerbed! Fortunately elderly neighbours are very understanding and allowed her to leave their paradise! Needless to say she was confined to her own bed in the kitchen for the morning and any attempt to sneak into the lounge was met with a stern reprimand from Mum!

(Mine, not theirs!)

     At tea on Sunday evening someone brought up the subject of whether animals have consciences! Despite hearing a preacher adamantly say that dogs don’t have consciences, this someone could tell many a story of how his dogs had shown human childlike traits....... like after stealing the chicken waiting to be Sunday’s roast!

     So life goes on as normal! An early morning ‘good’ walk generally means a lunch time ‘bad’ walk and vice versa! Pleading eyes and ears pinned back beg forgiveness and eagerly accept ................... and forget!

But we love you Bella!

15. Just Bella!

            So I drew the short straw and did the early morning walk today; thankfully the seasons have changed, the clocks have changed, resulting in a 6.30am walk being in daylight and not icy cold!

         Bella was extremely hyper along the puddle littered path (from yesterdays bucket downpour at supper time!), so I switch from the flexi-lead to the ‘short lead’ and we’re both a little more comfortable except that Bella knows she needs to ‘go’, and soon! We pass the village playing fields with all the bunnies rushing around - without a hitch (told you the ‘go’ urge was urgent!) and at the edge of the ‘long grass’ field I switch her back to the flexi-lead – well, I thought it’d clipped on! While I’m left standing with two leads in my hand and the trigger-clip dangling, Bella rushes off into the small field of overgrown grass, nettles, brambles and other unidentifiable weeds.  I was very grateful for that urgent ‘go’ instinct and caught up with her on the squat!  It’s a world-wide accepted fact that Shiba Inu dogs can not be let off lead – if you want them back that is!

        As we walk through the middle of the field on a fading tractor track, two dog owners silently raise a hand in morning greeting across the long grass, hoping our dogs are small enough and the grass long enough to conceal their presence from each other. It works!

(This isn't the 'long grass field' but the farmer's newly planted field above Pin Mill!)

      Alongside the wood the blue-tits, chaffinches and robins post their morning tweets, black-headed seagulls hoarsely try to keep their class in order, pigeons yawn or snore in the trees, and the pheasant tinnily shrieks as he manoeuvres imaginary morning traffic in the farmer’s fields.  The blackbird sings deceptively sweetly as he teases Bella by hopping just out of reach along the edge of the path!

      Bella and I continue on towards the sun which rose just 90 minutes earlier over the incredibly beautiful Pin Mill and Orwell River. As we pass the fences of the yacht club, Bella stops, and her ‘pretty’ face (something everyone comments on when they see her) takes on a slightly dreamy, wistful haze, as maybe she remembers 'The Wednesday' she spent among the yachts – on her own!

       The crunch of pebbles underfoot introduces new terrain and Bella’s excitement soars again as she bounces from the muddy low tide river-bed to the clear water of the Grindle ('a man-assisted stream running into the river'), until we turn towards the river along the Hard ('the concreted area that leads from the land to the estuary') which is still wet and muddy from an earlier high tide. The view from the Hard is spectacular any time of day, but especially early in the morning with the sun drowning the houseboats alongside the Butt & Oyster Inn, and flashing the reflective surfaces of the yachts at anchor in the river. Bella enjoys this too and although she fixates on the seagulls sitting high on the poles as they shout confused orders to their underlings flying chaotically over land and skimming the calm water’s surface, she doesn’t attempt to chase any of them! I could stay here all day! Bella seems to know that this is the goal of our walk and that we’ll be returning the same way soon. Her excitement levels off and we slowly head for home, with Bella no longer so anxious to get ‘somewhere’!

      Understanding the Shiba characteristics in Bella has given us a better idea of how to handle her on walks. She never goes off-lead and it’s quite normal for her not to respond at all to commands – although indoors she’s as obedient as a dog-angel!  There are times, however, when she’s feeling a little kindly towards us and my “Come” command will be rewarded with a Sit, about 20m away on the end of the lead. However, a “Sit” command will rarely be obeyed and no cajoling or gentle pushing (or firm pushing) on her rear end will make her sit properly. Sometimes I’ll get a Squat – ‘You said Sit and my bottom is almost on the ground and this is as far as I’m going!’ “No” is simply a distraction command to turn her away from licking horse pooh to pouncing on an invisible mouse in the grass (it must be invisible because I’ve seen the size of mice and rats around here and there’s no way they couldn’t be seen alongside our path!)  “This Way” is a command I use often and she generally listens as I think she’s learnt from experience that if she doesn’t go ‘This Way’ she’ll probably get tangled in a bush or be on the wrong side of a tree! And of course there are times when the brain is Shiba and the body language is Staffie! That's the fun of having a cross-breed!

      It’s the last stretch of the walk home; she’s calmer and now’s the time to try some sort of disciplined training to walk next to me – “Heel” hasn’t worked for me.  I’d picked up a branch earlier from the wood and by holding it in front of her and at her neck, she walks calmly alongside me – while trying to dodge underneath at any accidental opportunity! It works for me and maybe one day we won’t need the stick. Maybe. One day!

      With most of her excitable energy drained, she’s happy to be close to home. She walks with confidence and satisfaction, until at the corner of our house a two-foot high, extremely snotty-nosed, hyper, unafraid, noisy human child faces her! At this point Bella takes one look and cowers behind me, desperate to escape from the "Danger"! 

Danger past – after an agonising five minutes of chat – it’s home to breakfast and bed – I chatted, Bella wants breakfast and bed. Actually breakfast and bed after a 75 minute walk before 8am sounds a good idea………………….

http://www.orwellrivercruises.co.uk/pin_mill.htm

http://www.beenthere-donethat.org.uk/suffolk/pinmill.html

1. Of Muddy Fields & Tidal Rivers

Do you remember those puppy days? When a walk to the end of the road was pulling, coaxing, and pirouetting around dog and lead?  At 9 months old Bella has had to adjust to a different household but for the first month she was only allowed 10 minute walks while she was recuperating from a broken leg. But after the all-clear from the vet, the longer walk was a Big Thing! 

7.30am. It was a dull, overcast autumn day, with a cool breezy wind blowing past our faces as we stood patiently in the backyard, waiting for said puppy to stop tearing around the garden and to become calm and submissive before the lead was snapped on – as per The Dog Whisperer, Cesar Millan!

She was so good as she walked down familiar tar, smelled familiar bushes, watched with interrupted intensity familiar seagulls in their morning ritual, but soon she got beyond the doggy smells of the lane and into the field where until now she’d only had a whiff of the horse smells. The excitement grew as she started to pull as if she was playing a game of solo tennis! We managed to distract her before a roll in buck droppings, which would have meant banishment from the kitchen bed, and then she quickly learnt the ways of the country stile. She goes under, the lead gets passed under – oops no, she went through the wrong hole – and then human climbs over and retrieves lead - what a palaver!

A distinctly sea, fishy, boat smell keeps her nose close to the ground as we walk single file past the boat yard, with tantalisingly new, albeit yucky, smells mingling about 12 inches from the ground.

For us humans, the sight at the end of the muddy fields and smelly boatyard is the prize of the morning. The sun is just a 40w glow behind dirty white clouds, the air is still, the River Orwell is very, very gently lapping up the slipway and the yachts dotted at anchor sway contentedly. The sight that famous oil paintings are made of!

Bella’s first visit to water – apart from puddles with which she has no problem:   maybe there is no Labrador in her after all! In our human wellies we wade a little way down the slipway to try and coax her to try the healing streams, but apart from her toenails, nothing else is going to intentionally get wet!  Unbeknown to her however, walking four paws through puddles has thrown up muddy splashes to her golden belly, and then like a good puppy, she sits, left leg comfortably tucked under so that her haunches sit fair and square in the muddy puddle!

We are so blessed to have this picturesque spot on our doorstep, and Bella will have many more opportunities to dip her paws into the tidal River Orwell!

Back home, the mud needs to be banished.  Remember those puppy days? Having eventually found the most comfortable spray nozzle that doesn’t make her look like a Springbok in the backyard, she runs off to dry herself under the bushes and to continue the game she thinks we’re playing. Ears up – well perhaps one folded over – she stands on the forbidden not-yet-planted vegetable plot and plops down in that playful pose – and the clean blonde underbelly is magically turned to muddy black underbelly! 

Fortunately she prefers being outside to inside, so humans leave wellies on the doorstep, close the back door and settle down to a warming cup of coffee. Bella will play herself clean – eventually!

(Photo of Barge at Pin Mill by Megan Kelland - http://nutmegphotographyexplorations.blogspot.com/)