Blondie & Bonita

Blondie was with Stormy when we came back to the house after a couple years absence. It always seems that it takes Stormy a while to realize who we are. He will stand there with a blank look on his face, then he starts barking up a storm. He came over for his usual round of "lovers". Jumping up in the background was a gawky yellow pit x lab x gershep x xxxxxx. She kept a respectful distance, but her enthusiasm was in the stratosphere. She is my kind of girl, fast friends.
2009 when we first met Blondie we were only here for a couple of short visits in spring.

The island dogs or satos as they are called her have a symbiotic relationship with the people who live here. Both side have benifit. The people dutifully bring out their leftovers, place them on the curb for the dogs, who hang around and protect the property. As long as the dog population does not grow too much this relationship seems to work out for the most part. By feeding the dogs the people put less food in the garbage for the rats, which are every where just out of sight. The dogs will eat the rats, if they are not overfed. When I'm in town seems to be the only danger of that.
People usually shoo off female dogs, not Blondie. Our neighbor lady who had put the collar on Stormy wanted to keep Blondie. She would close the gate dog inside, dog would come back in when she opened her gate in the morning. This big happy-go-lucky pit will bite any one coming down her road at night that she doesn't know or so the story goes in the neighborhood.
Bonita is another story. In her I see the cruelty of what passes for nature here. Stormy and Blondie gorge themselves on the food humans put out. They could hunt, but why fight a rat if you don't have to, right? When we got here these two dogs would bite and terrorize Bonita into staying away from the food. They didn't break skin, but from the sound of her screams and their postures, I could tell that they were applying a lot of jaw pressure. It took a few training sessions before the relapses in this behavior stopped.

My neighbor lady that wants a dog is the sweetest lady in the world. Her English is like my Spanish, so we have a few minutes of hi, how are you; isn't the weather nice sort of thing. We gesture a whole bunch and smile. She has so much love in her eyes, I want to go home with her. In her seventies, she is slender like a girl from walking these hills. Blondie decided to have her pups at her house. The times that the gang is there I've seen them racing around her yard like puppies themselves.


Bonita, who was looking into the reaper's eyes, is getting spunky with both Blondie and Storm. Blondie is quick to reinforce her status with her daughter; no over correction nice. So far my emphasis has been to let her feel safe. Now, she feels good, she's growing; I have to get her fixed. This means I'd better step up her socialization plan.

When Blondie is on my porch, she is aware of her puppies. The other morning she was face fighting with Storm. Both dogs were lying down, play positioning teeth and growling; when she became perfectly still. Her ears and eyes were in the direction of my neighbor's house where her babies are. She was so intense, I could feel her energy head down hill, only her ears flicked slightly. I thought in a second she would be gone, then she put her head down. I don't know where Stormy went I was so focused on her.
It makes me wonder what it must be like to have five times better hearing than we do. And we yell to get our point across they must think we're a stupid lot.

Well, my laundry is calling me the water lines are finally fixed. I can do clothes. Happy Valentine's Day