Commentary by Christy Solo
I love my dogs – but – I’m super ready for their collective case of Spring Fever to be over, and it isn’t even really spring yet!
It starts pre-dawn, their fever. Even the week before the time switch, they’d begun getting up 30 minutes to an hour earlier. Fear not! They’ve instantly adjusted, and even though it’s dark later in the a.m. they are still getting up at 4:30 a.m. Most days I can ignore them well enough and “sleep in” until 5 or 5:30.
More than their eagerness to awaken though, is their “discovery” of their (apparently?) “brand new yard.”
Dear Reader, it’s not new. It’s the same yard they’ve all lived in for years. I haven’t even planted anything new, though of course early spring flowers and grasses are busting out all over.
The dogs, however, will swear to you that every single thing in the yard is new. “NEW we tell you!” Therefore, every blade of grass, every leaf, every inch and every corner of the yard must be sniffed and explored every time they go outside. Every. Time.
What used to be quick out-n-in potty runs are now Epic Journeys of Discovery! My deadlines are paying the price for this adventurer’s spirit they’ve caught.
There is always wildlife in the yard (when the dogs are inside), every day of the year. But in spring wildlife must smell…extra wildlife-y? Because the digging, snorting and flehmen response-ing is off the dog charts.
The flaming sponosor what now?
Flehmen response: A behavior in certain animals wherein the animal curls back the upper lip thereby exposing the front teeth, to facilitate the transfer of scents and pheromones into the vomeronasal organ above the roof of the mouth via a duct.
In other words, there’s a whole lot of ground sniffing going on.
Add to that the Immortal Memory of Dogs and I might as well just live outside now, can’t get them back in.
Example of Immortal Memory (dog owners will totally get this) – when the dog who can’t seem to recall the meaning of “sit” or “no” or “quiet” from hour to hour absolutely can remember, that one time the found a dead bird by the pumphouse and they will ruthlessly explore said ground by the pumphouse for upwards of five minutes every time they step a paw into the yard “just in case” there is maybe, someday, possibly another dead bird in that exact spot.
Yup.
Each dog has their own Immortal Memory spot too. For Rashford it’s that pumphouse/dead bird spot, for Kiff it’s the ground squirrel hole she dug up (which even when she uncovered it hadn’t had a squirrel in it for eons), for Dizzy it’s dead center under a giant bramble of Himalayan blackberries where…I don’t know? Maybe a mouse walked by a week ago, or a feral cat, or a raccoon, or the fox who “owns” the yard, or, or, or…
In between bouts of staring at “there was a critter here once” spots and flehmen-ing all the other spots, they seek out every bit of bird seed kicked out of one of the eight feeders around the yard. There is not much the birds don’t hoover up, so finding the errant bit of milo or millet is time consuming and results in very muddy dog faces.
Oh and, “Why is your dog wearing a shirt?” Kiff isn’t fashion forward (well, I mean not that I know of) but ticks too are having their own version of Spring Fever so Kiff got the Vectra 3D treatment Tuesday (topical which does not cause seizures) and I’d rather it stay on her and not get rubbed off on every blanket, sofa and item of my clothing in the house while it dries.
I do admit that the Spring Fever hijinks (minus the 4 a.m. wake up calls) are pretty dang cute, I just wish I had a more dog-secure yard (Dizzy the Escape Artist will find any small escape route which might open up) and a doggy door so I don’t have to bear witness to every second of the frivolity.
On that note, please forgive any errors you may find in our March 11 edition, I’ll be editing, formatting and uploading until the 11th hour due to Spring Fever delays!
