The folks on the Yahoo groups that I belong to are frequently writing about how they keep a small flock of backyard chickens to help keep the ticks at bay. In addition they say that they enjoy all of the fresh eggs that they could possibly want. From time to time they offer up some chickens for sale and my hubby and I discuss the ins and outs of owning chickens. My biggest concerns involve predators and who would care for them if we went on vacation. I really don’t think we just dump a bunch of chicken feed in a trough and leave them for a week.

When my hubby and I moved into our first house, we were so excited to share our joy with our friends. So we had a big Independence Day party; complete with a pot-luck barbecue and pool party. The guests were completely enamored of our litter of five week old keeshond puppies, which were confined inside their six foot tall chain link kennel run.

One of our guests (which I did not want invited but hubby insisted) decided that he would light a string of black cat firecrackers and throw them into the kennel run. The quick bang-bang-bang and yelp-yelp-yelp brought my hubby and me running quickly to see what in the world was going on. When we saw the inebriated guest laughing at the upset puppies, we asked him to leave the party. Needless to say, feelings were hurt.

The next morning when we went out to feed the puppies, we discovered that someone had removed them from their kennel and put them inside the fenced in pool area. The puppies had all drowned in the pool. My heart was completely broken. Later that day we went to the pool supply store and bought a pool cover for our swimming pool in the hopes that this kind of tragedy never happens again. And I never spoke to that guy that had thrown firecrackers into the puppy pen, as we suspect that he was the one responsible for relocating the puppies. It would have been impossible for the puppies to escape their pen and enter the fenced in pool area on their own.

Our hope was that the waterproof dog beds would be able to be washed off easily enough for the odor to be eliminated, but that was not to be. After a couple of weeks of constantly cleaning those dog beds, we ended up just putting them outside in the hope that the sun and the rain would deodorize them.
You may suggest that we “get rid of “ the cat, and although we did discuss that as an alternative solution, his advancing age was also something we had to consider.

One of the most difficult problems I’ve had to deal with is helping our newest pet, a little white dog to learn proper house manners.  He is an unneutered male dog who has a tendency to “mark” his territory inside the house from time to time.  I understand that when he is neutered that should decrease significantly, and we plan to neuter him when we can scrape together the money.  In the meantime, we are dealing with trying to teach him to stop marking his territory inside, and trying to clean up the spots he’s marked.

But tonight he seems to want more attention than usual. When he sits on the bed next to me, he keeps laying his head across my arm and looking up at me and crying. It is so cute! But I can’t move my hand to type with his head laying across my arm. Every time I push him away, he comes right back and cries louder!

I have a cat! Actually, I can’t imagine not having a cat or two to keep me company. They are wonderful housepets.

We have a second dog, who is still here in the house with us.  She doesn’t quite know what to make of the house being all hers for a change!  I think she’s a little bit anxious.  I’ll be glad when the other two are back home again.  The vet said we can bring them home tomorrow.

And our little dog survived just fine.  I was a little bit nervous that he might have a heart condition that would complicate surgery, but they said he had no problems at all.

So the pets are back, and the first day they were here they were a little bit quieter than normal, but extra lovey.  Now they are back to their regular selves.  It’s good to have them home again.