Dolly Taught Us To Do a Trick.

This post is a bit tricky to do without giving the little surprise twist away right at the beginning. I like to save those for either the end of the story or near the end . I will say that having a dachshund as a pet can be a bit complicated at times.

 Gretchen loves to stay up late watching YouTube videos or chatting with her friends on the Backwoods Home magazine Forums. There are some good folks  there and we have made friends that without the net we'd have never known existed.

 It was midnight and Dolly came trotting out of the bedroom in a very happy mood. She walked up to where Gretchen was and sit down. About the only time she barks at us is when she needs to potty and even then her habit is to breeze right past you to go to the back door and bark. If she wants or needs something else she will come to one of us, sit down, and look at us quietly. There is no paw on the legs or anything to get your attention. She just sits patiently. 

 That particular night she had her little grin on her face. I call it a grin but it's actually the look she has in her eyes plus her body language. She was happy about something.

 When Gretchen saw her she did the "Hi how ya doing Dolly?" routine. Dolly remained seated It was obvious she needed something.  At times like these we ask her questions like "Are you hungry?" "Do you need to potty?"" Can i pick you up?" She got no response from her questions. When can't guess what she wants we say "OK Dolly Show Me! Show Me!"  Well she did get a response then. 

 Dolly led Gretchen to the kitchen where she stared at the kitchen sink. Gretchen said " Oh you are thirsty." "The water bowl is full Dolly but let me get you some fresh."  This comment produced some tail wagging so we were on the right track. Gretchen re-filled the water bowl but Dolly would not drink. She kept glancing at the sink. Gretchen says "You don't like the water bowl any more?" Dolly did not respond but she still looked at the sink. We were back to a guessing game. All of us talk to Dolly like we are talking to another human."  We don't expect an answer but I think she understands a bit more than we realize.

 

 Sometimes a bit of inspiration helps. Gretchen dug out my old green  coffee mug. The one I quit using because I was afraid I'd break it.That particular mug is no longer sold. I used to take it to work with me. Gretchen filled it with water. Dolly drank huge gulps of water out of it for a long time. Her usual habit even when she is thirsty is to take several short laps and walk away. These were not laps they were gulps and when she was finished she did the "Oh my humans are so smart !" performance with several "Thank You!" looks thrown in. She gets happy when we figure out something she's trying to tell us. 

 I used to take that mug outside with me in the morning. Sometimes Dolly would steal coffee out of it. Sometimes I'd let her have a little.

 Now here is the twist I was talking about earlier. I quit using that cup four years ago. In fact we did not even own Dolly then. She was owned by my next door neighbor. I took it out during the summer when Dolly hated our family. We eventually became friends and Dolly came over every day to visit. Like grew to love and love grew to a deep love. That summer has a lot of good memories. When the neighbors divorced that fall Dolly decided that I was going to be her new owner. I retired the coffee cup that fall.

 So I had a bit of a mystery on my hands. I know that a smart dog will remember somebody they love for years. I have used several coffee cups since then. She should have forgotten that cup a long time ago. It was only used for a short time in the mornings. Better yet what caused her to remember it?

 I think I know but it's just a theory and another twist to the story.  Dolly had been asleep. I think she had a dream about it. I know she dreams by how she acts when she sleeps on my shoulders. She moves her legs as if she's running, her tail wags, and on rare occasion she even barks. It's not a full bark, it's more like a sleepy "Burrrff " I think that night her mind had gone back to that happy summer when she was still a pup.

 We have not seen her use the water bowl for a few days now. In fact she even quit policing it. She lets the cats do as they wish with it. However every night when it is around midnight she comes out of the bedroom and wants water from my old coffee cup.  She gets it in the morning too.  This has turned out to be a good thing. Dolly has dry skin and she's now drinking more water on a daily basis than she used to. 

 Dolly is the most unusual dog I have ever owned. She is also the best and we all love her very much. I believe she loves us more.

 

There is Always Something new

Dolly has developed a new habit. It started when I planted some sweet corn in our second garden which is across the street behind my neighbors home. I can access the garden by way of he alley that runs next to it. To save my back and knees I ride over on my John Deere GT245 riding mower.

I'll start the mower up and head out of the garage. If I stop and offer Dolly a ride at this point she will refuse.  When I drive on she will follow. She follows as if she's going on a great adventure with me. Some days she struts, other days she prances. It's as if she is saying "Look at us!" I'm  with my wonderful master and we are going exploring!"

As soon as we arrive she will go on patrol. Patrol is serious business to her. The area must be checked and cleared of any threats to her master. If she could talk I'd ask her how a 10 pound dachshund is supposed to defend a man who is 6 foot 6 inches tall and weighs 300 lbs.

Once the area is clear of threats it has to be checked again for new scents. We have to see how many critters have been in the area and file away that information in her mind. She's a good little tracker. Just this morning I spotted her tracking my son who had just returned from a walk. She did not know he left and she loves going on walks with him.

While she's doing all this I'm usually doing various things in the garden. Most days it don't take long and to be honest I really don't have to do it daily but I do it anyway. When I'm done I'll fire up the John Deere and head out. This is the point where Dolly will jump on the mower and climb up on my lap.

I know this sounds dangerous but Dolly has her own very strict rules on how this is to be done. Rule number one is never jump on the mower when it is moving. Rule number two is; Get away, far away from the mower if Mr. Carl has the mower blades running. Rule three is get the heck off the mower if Mr.C turns the blades on when you are riding. I did not train her to do these things...She trained herself. the only part I play is to praise her when she does this.

Once she's on the mower with me she will plant her rear legs in my lap and park her front legs on the steering wheel. When stranger sees us for the first time they usually stop and take a second look because it looks like she is steering. If i have to turn the steering wheel she will move her feet accordingly. This don;t work on sharp turns. At those times I lift her off the wheel with one hand and turn with the other.

Normally it's a short ride back home. She enjoys the ride so much that I just go ahead and make it a nice long one. We will drive along and she will occasionally function as the horn. If anything gets in the way of the mower she will bark at it. If we get behind something that's moving too slow she'll bark at that too.

Yesterday things were different. it was almost time for me to go back in the house for the day. I was sitting in front of the fan when Dolly appeared. She sat down and looked at me with a very sad expression on her face. In my opinion no dog does sad like a Dachshund. I knew what was wrong. If  I had said to her at that point " Dolly what's wrong?" "Show Me!" Show Me!" she would have lead me directly to the John Deere.

I did not take the John Deere out of the garage yesterday and she missed out on her mower ride. She may have wondered about her ride the entire time I was outside. She was doubly sad by the time she came to me. She also knows that if there is something wrong I'll figure it out and try to correct it.. In fact I think she has assigned me that job. We all have our specific jobs she has given us. Gretchen is for food and attention, Richard is the one to go to for fun things. Me, I am the correcter of wrongful things plus my shoulders are a great place for a little dog to nap.

I was too hot and tired to take her for a mower ride. I knew we needed a few groceries. I said to Dolly "Truck Ride" and Ka-Ching! her ears perked up and sad was gone in a flash. A truck ride is not as much fun as a mower ride but the truck has that wonderful glorious Air Conditioner that Mr.Carl knows how to set the vents just right to make a little dog feel mighty comfortable.

If Dolly were human she'd wear her emotions on her sleeve. Usually those emotions are happy ones. Sad is fairly rare and when it shows up I am compelled to find out why. I did not know that our mower rides meant so much to her. That's why I gave her two today lol.

I enjoy doing things for her. She in turn almost always lets me know she is grateful. I get many "Thank You" looks and lots of " I love You" looks too. She don't hide her feelings. The only thing she hides is when she is in pain.

A Late morning Post

I overslept this morning. I go out into the living room to find our Doxie making noise inside of her crate. I pull the covers back and see a bright eyed girl puppy looking back at me. Her tail is wagging so hard that the whole crate is shaking. She definitely wants out. So I get settled in and let her out.

She was so happy to see both of us. She wants to go outside too but she also wants to give us some attention first. After she gave me my attention she waited patiently for Gretchen to come back. Once Gretchen comes back she gives her a lot of attention but after she sat down Dolly strted her I want outside routine. I put her back in the crate. She's doing her whine and grunt routine now.

The problem is us old folks bodies don't wake up as fast as hers and it is very cold outside. We are supposed to get between 3 and 6 inches of snow today.  We need at least one cup of coffee before we can do anything. It is hard on me to set here drinking a cup of coffee while little girl pup is sitting in her cage looking at me with a pleading desperate look in her eyes.

Gretchen went ahead and took her out before we adequately woke up. That would have taken another hour or more because I am hurting worse than usual this morning. She took her out while my lazy butt stayed inside. I did prep Dolly for the trip out. I removed the cone and put her harness on. She got excited when she saw the harness and tried to help me put it on her. She did this by trying to stick her head in the loop. It's really more like rooting her head through the loop.

It turned out that all she wanted was to go outside. It is highly likely that once out she got too excited to use the potty. We will try again in an hour or so. What happened was her dog friends showed up. She has not seen them for a week or so and she was wanting to play. This happened at the end of our walk yesterday too. One of her buddies appeared. He is a dog that is smarter than he acts. He was very curious about the harness and belly sling on Dolly. She in turn had forgotten about all that and was wanting to play with her friend.

This morning a bunch of her buddies showed up and I am doing this from Gretchen's description. Dolly was really excited and tried to get away. These town dogs have never seen a dog in a halter and on a leash much less one in a belly sling. These are the same dogs who last summer encountered a toddler wandering around town lost and half naked. They knew something was wrong but they did not know what to do about it. So they stayed with the little boy. When adults showed up they seemed to be satisfied and calmly wandered off. I think they were protecting him.

This morning they were like "What is that human doing to our friend?"  Gretchen told them to get away but they would not leave. They hung around looking at her suspiciously. One dog she'd never seen before started barking at her. Perhaps they felt they needed to protect Dolly. I hope that's what it was. Perhaps once she gets better if she gets attacked by another dog they will jummp in and defend her. I saw this once before years ago with a different group of dogs.


It was in 1997 right after my first knee surgery. I was off work and I'd been told to exercise my knee with short walks. My lab Sparky usually went with me. The neighborhood dogs would see us and join in. When I first started doing this the dogs would come out and raise hell with me. I would stand there and talk to them in a calm tone of voice then invite them to come along with me. They'd look at me then look at the other dogs and it was like "Oh this looks like fun!". They would then join the group and I would try to make it fun for them. Occasionally a new dog would come out and attack one of the group. I would scold them until they stopped. I'd do my talking in a calm tone of voice and soon they would go into the "This looks like fun" routine and join the group with no trouble.


If another human would stop by and talk to me during these walks the dogs would all stop and start looking suspiciously at them. I felt very protected. One day a dog came out and attacked one of the smallest dogs of the bunch. It was a severe attack that no amount of scolding would have stopped. i was trying to come up with a way of breaking it up when I looked up and saw Sparky running to the fight. His hind end seemed to be moving independently of his front end. He looked like a runaway log truck coming down a mountain road. I was very concerned at the time because I thought he was going to join in the fight by helping the aggressor dog.

In any dog fight I had ever seen in the past, once one dog is down the others join in and maul the one that is down friend or not.  Sparky jumped the aggressor dog much to my amazement. Sparky tried killing the aggressor dog. The other dogs came to his aid. The fight ended in a Mexican stand-off. No one was injured. I scolded the aggressor dog. He went into a submissive stance. I knew that dog because when I would be out bar b Q ing he'd stop in to tell me hi.

I have gotten off track here.WhenDolly came in she was happy. She settled into my arm and went to sleep. After a bit she signaled that she wanted back in the crate. I put her cone thing back on and gretchen put her back in. If anything funny happens today I will edit this post.