Sticks!

 

Sticks!

Dogs like sticks. They chase them and chew them and carry them, the bigger, the better. Small sticks are a hazard – extricating one from the roof of a dog’s mouth is difficult so we always try to distract them from anything smaller than 10” x 1.5”.

All our dogs have enjoyed retrieving and carrying. The Jack Russells used to work in concert, two going forwards, one going backwards on the same stick with a great deal of noise. 

                Here are Sam (long tail) and his mother, Biddy, at the seaside. Sticks can be found everywhere!

Sam JR collected sticks and would not be parted from them when it was time to go home, Consequently, we accumulated a substantial wood pile.

Our first Dalmatian, Cariadd, specialised in very large sticks, more like tree trunks. She was immensely strong and very intelligent and would always find a way to manoeuvre her telegraph pole through a narrow gap. 

Here Cariadd waits for Barry to toss the 'stick' for her while Bethan watches.

The Labradors are stick merchants of a slightly different cast. They are bred to retrieve and not to give up until they have picked up their quarry. In water, they thrust their noses under the surface to sniff out their objective. 

Dogs can smell underwater and can be trained to locate things in rivers or lakes or other bodies of water. They are sometimes called cadaver dogs and 

will indicate when something or someone is many feet deep in water and

 mud. 

Yesterday, Roxy’s stick disappeared. We don’t know whether it was waterlogged and sank or got tangled in something. Whatever the reason, she could not find it. Eventually, she had to be enticed out of the pond with the promise of ‘biscuits’. Even then, her response was not immediate, but she soon found another stick and all was well in her world again.