To stay in the spirit of the farm, and follow 40 and No Boat's theme of the day, I want to share a dog story with all of you. I am currently spending the weekend at my aunt's farm in the lovely rolling hills of Caledon, northwest of Toronto. And yes, I am picking things out of the vegetable garden -- including 25 cucumbers yesterday -- that are grown in compost that contains manure from the farm's two horses, and I must say, those cukes are sweet and delicious! Thanks for the excrement, Clipper and Brat!
My aunt has always had horses, cats and dogs, one of them always a collie dog, and usually there is a second dog as well who was a stray or was given to the farm by family or friends who, for whatever reason, could not keep the dog any longer. Enter Kanga. A sweet-looking mutt, she is completely and utterly insane, and I now see why the family "couldn't keep" her any longer.
I have been here two days, and I love animals, but if this dog was mine, I would be plotting hard to unload her on a family with 15 children. The dog has some retriever in her and this retriever gene has mutated wildly to turn her into a frantic retrieving automaton. You cannot go anywhere outside or in the house without the dog at your heels, begging you to throw something for her. When I say begging, I mean whining, jumping up on you, literally nipping at your heels, panting wildly, pleading madly. And it never stops. You can throw the ball for her with the stinking ball-thrower for an hour straight, as I did today, and still she harasses you ALL DAY LONG. You can't pat her, you can't talk to her -- she interprets every move as containing the possibility that you might throw that godd***ed ball for her. It doesn't matter how hot or how cold it is. This dog is driven by one emotion only ... "THROW THAT BLOODY BALL FOR ME!!!!!"
As I type this, she is at the window, jumping up at it, hearing me in here typing, whining and pleading frantically for me to come out and throw the ball for her until midnight or beyond.
I am ashamed to say I am having vivid fantasies about throwing the ball in front of a fast-moving train at precisely the right moment.
I have never encountered such an insane animal, and I have been around a lot of animals -- including men -- for most of my life. I spent much of my childhood on this farm. There have been many, many dogs. I have never seen anything like this. Would obedience school fix this sort of thing? Or is she just genetically messed up?
1 comment:
Sounds like a case of canine obsessive compulsive disorder, or COCD, as I like to call it. Really nothing to be done about it. As she gets older, she will slow down. Her "people" will have to learn how to ignore her and/or get her to stop with a stern word. I have seen similar behaviour with sheepdogs/border collies -- anything bred to herd. They can drive any non-farming family completely mad.
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