After a rough start to life, Shyla has reached a confidence level that makes me smile. She eagerly greets our contractors at the door, - and and she wins their hearts almost right away. She often brings them a toy as a welcome gift as they come through the door. Then, she stays nearby while they are here.
As a young dog, she was much too terrified of strangers to even go near them. Seeing how she's changed over time is heartwarming.
Last week, I shared a video of a very active mountain lion scrape. It ended with a female caterwauling at the scrape, trying to call in a mate. Many of you said that you were so curious to see how her vocalizing efforts worked.
This video picks up at that point, and the ending is super exciting!
Enjoy the video!
Believe it or not, this was the first place that we'd even looked at an online listing for. The Runner found it, and he confidently told me that he'd found our new home. He was right. I am so thankful.
Here's what I saw during an early morning roll out from our Lab Valley house the other morning.
It is no secret that I am barely keeping up with things these days. With the remodeling of the new house and the traveling back and forth, I am overwhelmed. Add needing to apply for permits for future work to the list of why I'm overwhelmed.
That has extended to my trail cam work. I just recently discovered some footage from October that made me smile. It was from a cam that is pointed at a mountain lion scrape. However, our moose took it over in October during their mating season.
On one day in particular, they spent a lot of the day deep in the pine forest where lions like to leave their scent. I guess that moose have nothing to fear from mountain lions so they can hang out there without worrying.
The cool part of their behavior was their voices. The bull moose whined and sang with such a high voice that it was hard to believe that such a huge animal was making the sound.
Check out the video and keep your sound on!
Hachi's week had a not-so-great part and then a much better part. The reason was that we spent time at our old place and then at our new place. At our old place, the number of people on the trails has skyrocketed, and we were frequently meeting people. Some of them were wonderful people who we were glad to see and some of them were not-so-pleasant people.
Hachi's worst moment was when a person suddenly appeared around a blind curve in the trail during our evening hike. The person was well within Hachi's fear threshold - which means that Hachi was terrified. Then, this person kept striding straight at us even though Hachi was barking and lunging wildly. As this was happening, I was trying to get Hachi off the trail and far enough away that he could handle seeing an unfriendly person (he absolutely recognizes the difference between friendly and unfriendly people). The person got so close that it scared me but at least we managed to get out of his path. The icing on the cake was when the person snickered at us. - That incident replayed in my mind for days afterwards.
Fortunately, during a break in remodeling of our new place, we were able to go to Lab Valley for the end of the week. The peace and tranquility of Lab Valley is like balm to the soul. It is where we belong, and I cannot wait to be there all the time!
Hachi is a different dog at Lab Valley. He relaxes. No one seems threatening, and he can frolic happily.
We love our Hachi like crazy. He had a very bad start to life, and overcoming it is a huge challenge. He has made big progress, and I think that it will zoom forward when this transitional phase is over.
From last winter...
Our Black Dog and I had a fun little outing during a snow storm. He was so happy just to be out having a little play time with me.
On that day, like many others, he showed me that he never wept over what he couldn't do. Rather, he embraced what fun things he could do. We had such fun that day!
Happy Black Dog Sunday!
As she howled, for the first time ever, a coyote answered her. They went back and forth a couple of times with Shyla looking shocked by his voice each time.
It was appropriate because I call this boulder "Coyote Rock" after a coyote who I saw on top of it years ago.
What a wonderful morning out in the forest with my muse, Shyla. Happy Shyla Saturday.
There's a spot in the forest on the edge of a meadow where mountain lions leave their scent. It was a very active place over the past year. Not only did the male lions "scrape" to mark their territory but a female desperately searched for a mate at this site. She was a vocal lion, trying to call in a male.
Here is video from six months at that mountain lion scrape. Enjoy!
The morning's golden light never ceases to wow me and Shyla. And the peace of sunrise is a welcome break from the rest of life.
I am thankful.
The elk rut happens when the world is still somewhat warm, and life is easy for the elk. Since it was warm during the rut, the elk love ponds. While the bull elk is so serious about the rut, the younger elk still want to play. Sometimes they play in the pond and sometimes near the pond.
Today's video is from a pond almost adjacent to the one from last week's video. However, the tone within the herd was quite different. The bull elk was standing in the water banging the water, kicking the water, and then destroying a bush with his antlers. Meanwhile, the females and calves were chasing each other, seemingly swirling around the rest of the herd. I found it to be mesmerizing to watch the whole scene.
Check out the video if you have time.
Happy Hachi!
This was another good week for Hachi. He loves Labrador Valley so much. Running like this a couple of times a day helps him to relax.
We made an interesting observation this week. While we were out on a hike, Shyla paused to pee. Hachi attempted to tackle her to start a wrestling match at that instant. Shyla was not pleased. She barked out two serious barks. Hachi backed away, waited for Shyla, and then they played. That showed me that Shyla can tell Hachi when he's out of line without him getting aggressive. I was previously pretty sure that Shyla could correct Hachi without him over-reacting but it was super to see it with our own eyes.
Hachi's history of resource guarding has made us very nervous about using any treats for training when Shyla is present. Unfortunately, the result of not using treats was that their recalls were getting weak. Over the past two weeks, we've reintroduced cheese for recalls when they are romping together. Our routine is that the Runner calls Hachi first, and gives him cheese when he arrives. Then, the Runner keeps Hachi while I call Shyla and give her a cheese reward. It has worked beautifully, and both of them are coming when called about a million times more enthusiastically. We are not seeing any signs of Hachi being upset about Shyla getting treats. We are so pleased!
He also adored when the snow got packed down, melted a bit and then refroze. It would reach a perfect texture that only he could judge. When it did, he'd throw himself onto the ground, roll onto his back, and wriggle on the snow.
He loved doing this so much when the conditions were right that it was almost impossible to cover any distance on a hike. All that he wanted to do was wriggle! The only time when he refused to wriggle was if I tried to photograph him. He'd leap to his feet and act as if he hadn't been doing anything at all.
What a joyful dog he was.
