Okay, I’m not really encouraging this – in fact I’m doing everything in my power to discourage it. But let’s face facts here: I’m just happy he came home afterward without coercion.
The Lair snuggles into the crotch of a complicated ridge, over the lower slope of which is a worn path that leads to Ian’s place. It’s an easy climb, ending in a little plain that looks out over a loop in the wash. On the other side of the wash, clearly visible from the plain, is a large meadow which is essentially Landlady’s front yard. At the moment, and probably for the remainder of the summer or however long the grass lasts, that meadow is covered with cattle as a discarded corpse is covered with flies.
None of this could possibly be kept secret from Ghost and Little Bear. All this area has been their territory all their lives. They take territory very seriously: They’re watchdogs, it’s their function. And now it has been invaded by eminently chaseable … invaders.
Yeah, my optimistic guess about the cowboys confining that herd to the holding pen was of course dead wrong. They just introduced the cattle to the water and grass and let them go. Boy, five years ago this would have been a real problem, since I lived right there. Oh, sure, we got cattle there. But they were basically strays and mostly appeared only in small numbers. Now entire herds are to actually be based there. Just over the rise. Swell.
Hopefully, though, since the dogs and I no longer actually live there it’s just a nuisance. Hopefully we’ll find some new normal in all this cowshit.
Ah, the audacity of hope.
Guess we fenced that apple tree just in time…
Geez, I thought I had trouble with my neighbor because he doesn’t bring in his garbage can in a timely (and mandated-by-the-city) fashion.
Fencing out the livestock can be a real challenge. A friend of mine up by Yellowstone is having a heck of a time. He has to fence out buffalo! They can walk right through most ordinary stock fencing. And they will!
Fencing out the cattle, assuming that were even financial possible which it’s not, would not address my concern. I don’t really mind the cattle all that much. What I mind is the possibility that my dog will be put in danger from cattlemen.
Two years ago one of my neighbors had a dog shot for barking at cattle while inside his own wire. That affected my attitude toward this issue very much. Granted that was a different guy, I’m waiting for clear evidence that my relationship with this new bunch is going to be more relaxed.
Oh yeah! I understand that dog thing very well. I’ve never been able to allow my dogs to roam free, with one thing and another like traffic and people who would shoot them. I’m glad, so far, that the cattle people seem to understand and make allowances for yours, whatever the right or wrong of the laws.
You may eventually come to the place where fencing the dogs IN winds up being the best option. I’m sure LB would love to live his life without the cable.
ML wrote: “I’ve never been able to allow my dogs to roam free, with one thing and another like traffic and people…”
And likewise, I live in a place where dogs simply can’t be allowed to roam free without adult supervision. And now that I think of it, places where that is OK are actually pretty rare. You would think that the AZ desert might be among them, but appearances can be deceiving.
In my childhood there was Lassie, but she had to go free so she could sniff out all of those abandoned wells that her idiot boy kept falling in to.
Hopefully the cowboys won’t actually be around all that much now that the cows are moved in.
Amen and hallelujah, CH. As always. What they don’t know can’t hurt us.