Sunday, December 31, 2006
Teenager games,this morning I gave a rawhide retriever roll to each dog. As usual Ayla wants somebody elses instead of just chewing hers. So she abandoned hers to check out what Nanuk has.
Now, I have to say she messes with him all the time when he has anything he finds worthy chewing, she will just tease him and tease him and she revels in getting some emotions out of him as tells her to leave him alone.
She is merciless about inching in just enough to get him to go after her. Nanuk usually starts out being all serious about keeping Ayla away from his treasure, but who can resist a cute teenager?
So back and forth Ayla goes teasing him and Nanuk chasing her off, eventually he usually gets the idea that she is just teasing him and his attitude changes and he starts having fun with it too. 
So they usually end up racing around in circles. Throughout today's teasing game Leydi just sat on the straw bales and chewed her rawhide stick. She doesn't waste her energy with the teasing teenager, she just gives her a scornful look. So Ayla usually sits very close to Leydi while Leydi is chewing her rawhide stick and Ayla just waits for Leydi to get up for some reason and then she grabs the treasure. Ayla herself understands that unless she wants to risk losing her treasure, she needs to bring it along if she is going to chase a car or a raven. 
Friday, December 29, 2006
Ball GamesMy playful duo always finds something to entertain themselves with. The little ball was no exception. Kobi knows how to get Ayla interested "Look what I got" he seems to say and "it's mine and you can't have it".
Well, Ayla doesn't take no for an answer, so when he held it right in front of her she grabbed it and just held up her head, Kobi tried to hang on, but after some time of trying to get the ball back he had to let go.
Of course that wasn't the end of it. Being a terrier, Kobi wasn't just going to give up the ball for good, so a game of tackle ensued. The ball was dropped for the meantime, and before Ayla knew
it, Kobi had the ball again. 
Ayla on the job,
a few days ago I came home and as I drove down our little road I saw Ayla sitting on top of the dirt mound on the corner of our property. This time I had a camera with me, so I could get a few shots of her from outside the fence. When I planned the layout of this property I had included a dirt hill like this in my plans as my Simba used to like to sit on top of hills to observe. Unfortunately by the time we moved here she only lived a few more months and wasn't really interested in climbing hills anymore.
Ayla has always liked this hill, but she spends more and more time there now as she is getting more mature. I would love to build a little shade roof there, but I am afraid the ground might not be tough enough to support a roof. We get really high winds here so it is a challenge to build wind-proof structure.Monday, December 25, 2006
Christmas Day,
We didn't really do anything particularly special today, but then, I really enjoy just hanging out at home, taking the dogs for a walk, having dinner with my husband and working on some projects. So here are few pictures that I took in the last few days that show my dogs and what they do for fun.
We didn't really do anything particularly special today, but then, I really enjoy just hanging out at home, taking the dogs for a walk, having dinner with my husband and working on some projects. So here are few pictures that I took in the last few days that show my dogs and what they do for fun.
Leydi on our Christmas Day walk, this is about a mile from our house, isn't the scenery pretty?
Ayla has this habit of getting up on the couch,then she sits and lets herself fall back against the back of the couch. What can I say, she likes her creature comforts.
Nanuk loves snow, we don't get a lot of snow here other than in the mountains, so we go where the snow is a few times every winter, so he can frolic a little bit in the cold white stuff, he also always has to munch some snow.
At home, they keep an eye on the neighborhood. The ravens seem to enjoy teasing the dogs sometimes, so the dogs keep a close eye on them.
Zazou the senior Pyr and Kobi taking a nap on our new doggie blankets.
Saturday, December 23, 2006
I never get tired of watching the dogs play. 
Ayla sure knows how to have fun. When she gets up in the morning she is already looking for who she can get interested in the first game of chase of the day.
Since it has been rather cold these days, her usual sidekick Kobi isn't all that crazy about going outside, he makes a quick round to do his business, but then returns to the couch until the sun comes out.
Leydi likes to play sometimes, but I think a lot of times she gets rather annoyed with Ayla's constant demands for playtime. Lately I have noticed that Leydi uses her butt to keep Ayla at a distance when Ayla is chasing her. It looks really funny as Leydi keeps swinging her butt towards Ayla as they run, but this seems to work great to keep Ayla from nipping at her while they are running 
Ayla sure knows how to have fun. When she gets up in the morning she is already looking for who she can get interested in the first game of chase of the day.
Since it has been rather cold these days, her usual sidekick Kobi isn't all that crazy about going outside, he makes a quick round to do his business, but then returns to the couch until the sun comes out.
Leydi likes to play sometimes, but I think a lot of times she gets rather annoyed with Ayla's constant demands for playtime. Lately I have noticed that Leydi uses her butt to keep Ayla at a distance when Ayla is chasing her. It looks really funny as Leydi keeps swinging her butt towards Ayla as they run, but this seems to work great to keep Ayla from nipping at her while they are running 
More on Ayla and dog beds, 
I had pulled this piece of foam out of the dog house to get rid of it, because Leydi had dug a crater into it. But before I got a chance to take it away, Ayla discovered that the mattress fit her little butt perfectly and she decided to take a nap on it. This little girl never misses a chance to
find herself a comfy spot.
Update: the next day I put the piece of foam on top of the dog house, Ayla took one look and settled right down on it, carefully putting her butt into the "butt-crater".
I had pulled this piece of foam out of the dog house to get rid of it, because Leydi had dug a crater into it. But before I got a chance to take it away, Ayla discovered that the mattress fit her little butt perfectly and she decided to take a nap on it. This little girl never misses a chance to
find herself a comfy spot.
Update: the next day I put the piece of foam on top of the dog house, Ayla took one look and settled right down on it, carefully putting her butt into the "butt-crater".
Mustangs, today I treated Nanuk, Ayla and myself to a little trip to Cold Creek. I just wanted to get a little closer to the snow and visit an area that I find rather beautiful, it's at about 6000 feet elevation with breathtaking views into the valley that is between these mountains and the Desert National Wildlife refuge.
Lucky for us we also ran into two bands of mustangs as this area is home to many groups of these wild horses. I have seen as many as 5 groups in one day. I find these wild horses beautiful, as they are able to survive and thrive in an environment as arid and barren as our Southern Nevada high desert. Actually this whole area has little paths worn into the ground. They must be coming to these lower elevations in the winter and spring, as those are the only times I have seen them here. I am assuming they migrate to the higher elevations in the summer, where it is cooler and the vegetation isn't so dried out.
The young black and white stallion in the second picture with the four white legs was especially curious. He came all the way up to my car and just stood there looking at me in such a calm manner, I held out my hand and he gently nuzzled it, so I rubbed his nose a little bit, he nuzzled my hand some more. What a magical moment this was.
I took tons of pictures, one of them is a curious youngster with some very unusual coloring. 
The horses in this area are rather desensitized to humans and vehicles, as people routinely stop and take pictures of them the horses seem to realize that cars and people pose no threat. I used to go up to this area a lot and I have always found it amazing how these horses show only some mild curiosity but otherwise just go about their business while people walk around and take pictures of them. I have never seen any of them spook or show any signs of fear nor have I seen any threats like biting or kicking. 
Some of the horses in these pictures have some snow sticking to their noses as they were all busy munching the snow. It's hard to imagine that they find enough to eat in this terrain, I have seen them eat away the yoshua trees, now anybody who has ever touched one of those trees knows how tough they are.
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Ayla supervising the placement of a fence post
Ayla is rather curious, so when her new friend Andy dug a hole with the post digging tool she had to investigate what was happening. She is pretty good at digging holes herself, so I think she was curious to check out the competition.
But what really sparked her interest was when Andy put the post inside the hole and tried to get it into the right position. She looked at it from every angle trying to figure out what the heck he was putting inside that hole. I wish I knew what she was thinking.
Now she had been chewing off a couple of trees that I had planted, so maybe she was considering if this was another tree that possibly would have to be removed by her as it didn't belong here. What really fascinates me about this is that my Simba who sadly passed away last February was just like her. She also was always fascinated whenever I brought home something new, like furniture that needed to be assembled, or a new appliance. None of my other dogs have ever paid that much attention to stuff like that, but Simba did, and now Ayla does the same thing. Recently I got some insulation material for the pump on our well, when Ayla saw me heading out with a bag she tagged along to see what I was up to. She watched intently as I wrapped the fiberglass material around the pumphead and pipes, she got even closer when I put a layer of aluminum insulation tape around the first layer. She was fascinated by it all. As soon as I was done and packed up all my materials, she started to remove the insulation and I realized that it was probably a mistake to let her come along. 
So I brought her back into the house with me to get her mind off the pump and the insulation. But sure enough, the next day when I was gone for a few hours, she pulled the insulation off some areas that somehow didn't meet her approval. I kind of knew this would happen, so I have now enclosed the whole area with straw bales so Ayla can't mess with my insulation anymore. I think I am trainable though, I am slowly beginning to learn, that if I bring Ayla along to a new project, she will try herself in her own version of the home improvement later, and it may not be what I had in mind for that particular project. After todays job was done, Ayla propped herself up on the porch to keep an eye on the neighborhood.
Out for a walk with Leydi
Leydi and I went out for a walk in the nearby desert this afternoon just before sunset. The mountains look so pretty after we got some more snow last Sunday. The first picture shows her telling me to hurry up. She is quite the talker and will make all kinds of funny noises "rerwow" when she gets excited or wants something. In this case she wasn't very patient with me wanting to take pics of her, so she sat down and complained about the holdup.
She is really great to take for a walk, she used to pull and dive after bunnies, so I tried a pinch collar on her as all the yanking was really hurting my joints. I only had to use it one day on a walk. For some reason this made it clear to her that it wasn't a good idea to hit the end of the leash and keep yanking on it.
Our walks are very pleasant now and just like Nanuk and Ayla, she is actually very cooperative when I ask to go "this way" or "come" or "sit". Now, none of them will listen if the right (or wrong) distraction shows up, it's just not something one can expect from an independant thinking dog like a livestock guardian dog. 
So I usually keep them on a leash, as we have plenty of space at home for them to run as much as they want, there is no need when we are out for a walk to actually run.
Now Ayla doesn't agree with that and she sometimes gets the crazies and wants to race around and jump over bushes, so sometimes when the crazies get the better of her I let her off the leash for a few minutes until she has enough of the running in circles. Leydi is more dignified and amuses herself with checking out the sights and sounds of the desert. 
My beautiful girl with snow covered Mt. Charleston in the background.
Friday, December 08, 2006
Kobi's BirthdayKobi's birthday was December the first, this was his second birthday. I am running a little behind with posting, but I think better late than never. Kobi is such a fun dog to have around. A lot of people will ask if my terrier is hyper. And really he is not hyper. He is high energy, but if I sit on the computer he will just curl up on the couch and snooze. He can often be found curling up with his best buddies Ayla and Leydi the Anatolians.
The third picture shows him keeping me company when I am working on my new kennel building. He is a true companion, he usually stays close to where I am. I thought it was really cute how he lies down with his front on the door step.
He is not intimidated by giant size rawhide rolls, he jumps into the flower pot to smell the roses and to beg for a treat. 
He knows a few cute tricks like "bow" and "pretty". He is very 
enthusiastic about learning new cues and to work for treats. He loves to come along when I water my plants, he will bite the water coming out of the hose, chase it and if I put it down
he will grab the end of it and carry it around.
Then, to top it all off, when he is thoroughly soaked, he rolls around in the dirt so he will look really nicely dressed up. What a spirited little dog he is. 