Annie's Treasure Troves

There’s a cry goes up every morning in the Lollipop house – “Muuuuum! Where’s my socks?” The answer used to be easy. Either they were in the top drawer (where they have always been kept, but only Mum remembers) or, if they’ve been worn for five minutes and then taken off again, they were in the same place they’d left them (but, of course, that’s a mystery as well).

These days, though, there’s another possibility. Out in the garden there are three piles of miscellaneous rubbish. One is under the clothes line, one is by the swing and the other is in a hole under the bottlebrush tree. Now when socks (or shoes or undies or favourite soft toys) go missing, the first place we look is in the three piles of miscellaneous rubbish. For these are where Annie keeps her ‘treasures’.

No one ever sees her snaffle them from the house, but she’s got a lovely big mouth and she keeps her head down as she sneaks out. The other day, she came running to me at the car with a stick in her mouth. As we walked back to the house, she found a bone. Rather than drop the stick, she pushed it further back into her mouth and picked up the bone up as well. Then she found a piece of pipe about two inches in diameter. Aha, I thought, you’ll have to make a choice now. But no, with a bit of manoeuvring she managed to lift that as well. She carried them to one of her favourite spots and dropped them in, then looked at me as if to say ‘Says who?’

We’re beginning to wonder if she’s a Retriever or a ‘Pincher’ (Pinscher).

Oh, dog of little brain...

I’m hoarse tonight. I’ve just done rather a lot of shouting.

It all started when I was cooking dinner and suddenly realised that Annie wasn’t in her usual spot by her bowl, staring at me with those big brown eyes, waiting for me to fill it. I asked the kids, but they hadn’t seen her since they’d come in for their showers. I asked my husband, but he hadn’t seen her since he’d come in a little later. I went outside and shouted, but no Annie.

By now I was getting worried, so I left Eldest in charge of finishing the dinner, grabbed my torch and set out to look for her. First stop, the road. I nervously shone the torch up and down, but couldn’t see her. That was a relief. So, back the other way to the barn and back along the creek, shouting my lungs out. By then, I was getting pretty frantic, so I headed up the hill to the shearing shed, still shouting. No luck there either. I came home close to tears.

Meanwhile, P had jumped into the 'ute' to go up and down the road and up the track at the top of the hill in the opposite direction. She loves to run up there...lots of old sheep bones. No sign of her. He came back to three very miserable children and an even more miserable wife. We ate dinner in total silence.

Did you maybe lock her in the workshop by accident? I asked after dinner. No, I haven’t been in the workshop answered P. In the fertiliser shed? I haven’t been in there either.

So I donned a big thick coat and set off again. A closer inspection of the ditches at the side of the road this time, a good look in the creek. No sound of any dog, just foxes, owls, frogs and wild cats. Then, just as I decided to head through the paddock, P came out again with another torch. A minute later there was a commotion and a very excited retriever shot out of the garden and jumped all over me.

‘Found her’, said a very sheepish husband.

He’d locked her in the woodshed when he brought wood in for the fire. The woodshed is right next to the back door!

I should have thought of it. He’s done it before to a cat.

But why didn’t the dopey dog bark?

And then there were two.

Meet Splash. Splash is a short-haired Border Collie/Kelpie cross and is the latest addition to our menagerie, much to Annie’s delight. Actually she’s the new farm dog, expected to start chasing sheep in just a few months time. Hard to believe isn’t it? She’s so tiny.

We went to pick her up on Sunday from a local farmer who runs his dogs in competition trials and does very well. I wasn’t going to go, but I’ve chosen two of the last three farm pups and P reckoned I’d done a pretty good job, so he wanted me to do it again. I have to admit I know absolutely nothing about what makes a good sheepdog, I just go on intuition...I just get a feeling about some dogs.

I can’t say how many pups there were to choose from. The farmer came out with his arms full and deposited them all on the lawn, but it was hot and they all immediately skittered under the nearest bushes. One had already been chosen by the farmer for himself and his niece had disappeared with another that she didn’t want us to choose (I could understand why when I saw it. It was pretty - a very unusual silver-grey, with blue eyes, but very timid).

Splash was actually the first pup to come out and inspect us. Another little grey one came out after her, but Splash just had ‘it’, whatever ‘it’ is. She’s a lovely pup, full of energy (she has to have to keep up with Annie). I ended up naming her too, because P couldn’t think of anything. The white on her legs and chest make her look as though she’s just pounced into a tray of white paint and splashed herself. And, unfortunately, just like Annie, she just loves getting wet. She also loves to hide which has given us a couple of worrying moments, but when she disappears she’s usually curled up under something, fast asleep.

Both pups are exhausted tonight after a long day of romping around the garden. Annie looks so huge next to this little one and I worried at first, that she’d hurt her. But every so often, Annie rolls onto her back so that Splash can have a turn at being top dog, so they’re happy. In fact, when I went to lock Annie in the laundry while I went to town this afternoon, I found them both curled up in the outside kennel. So I just shut the gate and left them there.

Annie's first month

A whole month (and then some) has gone by and I’ve been very restrained and not blogged Annie seven days a week. I can’t hold back any more.

The amount this pup has grown in a month is incredible. She’s quite a big bundle of mischief now. The cats are gradually getting used to her. One went AWOL for a few days, but we eventually found her in the kids’ ‘cubby’ house in the garden – a safe five feet off the ground. Now she’ll come in, but only if Annie is locked up for the night in the laundry. If she meets her in the garden, she’ll give her ‘the eye’ and if that doesn’t work, she takes off under the house. The other cat just sits and swats at her with her claws if she comes too close. Annie usually gives her a wide berth.
I’ve started training her, but so far we haven’t got much past ‘sit’ and ‘come’. She has a definite mind of her own. If she thinks something is silly, she just refuses. She had Dynamo and Sausage in stitches the other night. I was trying to teach her to ‘stay’. I’d make her sit, then say ‘stay’ and walk backwards away from her. But after two steps she was following me. We went over and over it until, at last, I managed to walk right across the room with her still sitting. I was thrilled. “Good girl, come!” I said. She just sat and stared at me. The look on her face was quite clearly “Come? Now you want me to come? What do you think I was doing all those times you made me sit down again?”

She’s the same about walking on her leash. I kept trying it on the farm and she would just sit down and refuse to move, with a look that said “All this space and you want me to stay with you? Funny one!” Yet last week I took her to town, put her on her leash and walked her along the river. She trotted along as if she’d been doing it forever. She didn’t pull, she didn’t sit down. She just padded along with her head in the air, wagging her tail at the admiring passersby and having a ball.

Some good behaviour has just seemed to happen naturally though. She has always just sat and watched as I filled her dish for dinner. She doesn't jump around and go mad like most dogs do at dinnertime. She's very well mannered. And house training was a breeze. She actually seemed to prefer going outside. That's not to say we didn't have a few accidents, but generally she's been really good.

We won’t mention her penchant for mud. I’m going to have to do something about that before winter.