Since I know all of your dogs pretty well, I thought it only fair I let you get to know (all 8 of!) mine a little bit. Since I think my dogs are SO cool and cute, I'm not only going to yammer on excessively about them here; I'm going to go that way-too-far extra distance and create individual webpages for each one as well! Yippee!--fun reading time ahead, huh?
I know 8 dogs sounds like a lot, but we are so used to it, it seems almost...well, normal! OK, "normal" might not be the first word that pops into your mind when thinking about anything to do with me; but really, our canine pack is less work than some of my students' "only-children-dogs!" (I'm not mentioning any names--you know who you are!) And I know this not only because you pay me to help you train them; let's not forget some of your four-legged best friends have stayed with us at camp!
Here's how we manage our eight-pack, in case you are wondering:
First of all, I have Dave well trained! (Just kidding--luckily he isn't an internet kind of guy!) He is the lucky one who feeds all of the dogs (they eat out in our kennel, production-line style, except for Fifi our standard poodle, who is getting older now and likes to eat inside). More importantly, Dave is the one who scoops all of that poop! I've made it easier for him by making sure we have nice concrete runs, hot water, and a powerful nozzle for our hose! That was considerate, huh?
Second, I have the dogs well trained; but you kind of guessed that, right? Since it would be too chaotic to have them all in the house at the same time, even with all of that advanced education, I rotate them between house and kennel. When they stay in the kennel they sleep together in pairs. When I bring them in the house during the day it is sometimes all alone, for one-on-one bonding; but often I'll have as many as six in the house at a time. I practice training with all of them, and they get a lot of work being "demo-dogs" during my classes. During the day when they are inside they mostly just lie around.
Some of the dogs have their own designated people, which especially helps with sleeping arrangements. Fifi belongs to my daughter Stephanie, and sleeps with her every night, along with one of our miniature dachshunds, Mr. Winky.
Willie the Wiener Dog and Nefer the Pharaoh hound belong to my daughter Monica, and they sleep in her room with her. Sometimes the three hounds roll in smelly stuff in our yard, as hounds love to do. On the nights they've "annointed" themselves and no one has time to give them baths, they are banished to sleeping in a stinky three-dog pile in the kennel!
Our golden retrievers Buddie and Rowdy belong to my son Jake and husband Dave. I'm not going to talk about them too much here--they now have their VERY OWN WEBSITE!--www.goldenachievers.com. They also are new parents, as of Valentines Day, 2004!
Blue the Australian cattle dog (known as a "Queensland blue heeler" down under), and Joker, the German Shepherd I imported from the Czech Republic, are primarily "my" dogs. I hate to say that, because I think of ALL of the dogs as "my" dogs; and I love all of them equally though they are all so different. These two guys are both wanna-be alpha males, and for that reason never get to hang out together; I doubt Blue would be having a very "good'ay" if he spent three seconds alone with Joker! I'm afraid he'd be a shrimp on the big guy's "barbie," and I just don't risk it. This has created the one problem in our dog world. Blue ALWAYS slept in my room until I got Joker. Since we needed Joker as a protection dog after our bad experience with bad-guys (ask me sometime if you want to know), he had to become the one that sleeps inside with me at night. This bends Blue's little speckled snout out of joint like you can't imagine. He is resigned now to sleeping in the kennel, but I know he doesn't like it. I compensate by using him as my primary training demo, and by taking him with me when I run errands or go anywhere dog friendly. I also let him follow me around all day in the house, while Joker hangs out in the yard, surveying the landscape for "bad guys"--his absolute favorite pass-time. (Important hint: NEVER walk into my house, kennel, or especially yard unless accompanied by either Dave or me!)
In case you haven't hit the saturation point and just can't wait to read even more about my dogs, keep checking back! I'm really going to keep working on this site until I get pages done for all of them!
(and of course the horses, the cats...my guppies...the coyote...)
