Sunday, February 18, 2007
Trip to Death Valley,
made a trip to Death Valley National Park yesterday, it's only a 30 minute drive from our house to the park boundary line. Our first stop was Dante's View. I had never been there, I think it's one of the best places in the park to see, it's almost 5500 feet elevation, with a view of the whole valley below. Dante's View is actually right above Badwater, which is the lowest point being below sea level. From Dante's View there is basically one steep drop all the way down to the valley.
On the first picture one can see the road to the right of the (white) dry lakebed. When I saw a car on that road, it was amazing how small that car was from up here. We hiked out a little from there, it really felt like being on top of the world. Several years ago after it had rained a lot we had come here and the dry lake bed that is now dry again was filled with water, it was one huge lake, people came out with kajaks to enjoy the rare occurence of that lake. This year we did not see any wild flowers, I am going to insert a picture in the end that shows the wild flowers from two years ago.
We then drove down into the valley, along the way was the "21 mule trail" and since the last time it was closed due to water damage, I had to check it out. Basically it's one or two mile dirt road going through some what looks like sand dunes turned into stone, a very barren landscape. The road can be seen on that picture to the right, looks like a little ditch. 
After we walked around the Borax Museum at below sea level, we drove to Zabriske Point, another view of colorful but very barren rock formations. Nothing distracts from the beauty of this landscape though, all you see is sand and rocks, I love it and marvel at the different shapes and colors. To me the desert Southwest is my favorite place to be,
I call myself lucky every day for being so fortunate to live here.The last picture with the wild flowers was taken two years ago, when we had a lot of rain in the winter.
Monday, February 12, 2007
The Thief,
Zazou is very motivated to find food anywhere. Ever since I had him neutered he has been obsessed with food. He will knock over the garbage can, rip into a garbage bag that I want to take out into the trash and as in these pictures, he climbs up on the crate to get to Kobi's bowl, that
I thought would be safe up there from the big dogs and especially from him, since he is so old and can barely get into the car anymore. None of the other dogs have tried to get up there, but Zazou was determined to get a few extra bites. The first picture shows him face down in the bowl. The second picture is after I took the bowl away. 
Zazou is very motivated to find food anywhere. Ever since I had him neutered he has been obsessed with food. He will knock over the garbage can, rip into a garbage bag that I want to take out into the trash and as in these pictures, he climbs up on the crate to get to Kobi's bowl, that
I thought would be safe up there from the big dogs and especially from him, since he is so old and can barely get into the car anymore. None of the other dogs have tried to get up there, but Zazou was determined to get a few extra bites. The first picture shows him face down in the bowl. The second picture is after I took the bowl away.
"Cutie Pie"
Ayla's newest trick "Cutie Pie", when she is lying down, she does the paw over the face trick, she does a one paw and a two paw version, I am still working on getting both versions under stimulus control, meaning having a cue for each one and getting her to reliably do what I am asking. For now I am happy she is enthusiastic about doing her tricks. 
Ayla's newest trick "Cutie Pie", when she is lying down, she does the paw over the face trick, she does a one paw and a two paw version, I am still working on getting both versions under stimulus control, meaning having a cue for each one and getting her to reliably do what I am asking. For now I am happy she is enthusiastic about doing her tricks. Interestingly she starts experimenting with all kinds of behaviors when she notices I pay attention to her. She really loves it when I praise her and get excited about all the goofy things she comes up with. So initially I hardly ever use treats, she just does something and based on my reaction she repeats it. I then give her some treats too, to get a few more repetitions of the behavior.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Dogs on the big hill:
I finally managed to get some good shots of Leydi sitting on top of the big dirt hill on our property. Unfortunately she had a little piece of dried grass or something stuck to her mouth that I didn't notice until I looked at the pictures.
I was just shooting away and while I did that I noticed that she closes her eyes most of the time when she hears the shutter of the camera. So that's how I end up with her eyes closed on my pictures so often. There was all kinds of activity in the neighborhood while I took pics of her, so I got a lot of shots of her looking alert. 
Ayla watched from the distance for a while, but then she must have felt I paid too much attention to Leydi and she walked right in front of me, as if to say "time to take a picture of ME".
I told her to go and sit next to Leydi so I could get a picture of them together. So she marched right up there and plopped herself into position. She always amazes me, how did she do exactly what I said? S
o I took a few more shots with the two of them sitting together. Ayla is 17 months old now. One can see that she is starting to catch up with Leydi in size now.