That sounded good over coffee but it wasn't long before Sadie demanded to take the morning walk.
The temps (low 70's) are perfect and they look to continue for the next week or so ... except for tomorrow where the high will be 59°. Sadie was more than happy to get started and always starts the walks by grabbing my left hand by her mouth as if she were leading me out into the field.
Stella veered off left almost immediately but was only looking for a spot to dump her tanks ... then ran back to join Sadie.
Recently there seems to be a lot more scents making them more active. When I see them moving like that I make sure my camera is ready to take any pictures of deer jumping out of the woods or running in back of the field.
I let both hounds roam without calling them. At the point where we turn to head home, I stood and waited for them to finished their exploring.
Before I turned around, Stella was trying to sneak off into the 'no fly zone' ... yet, she came immediately when I called her.
With Heidi back at home outside I decided to check Sadie to see if she could find her when I asked "where's Heidi".
I could see Heidi up by the trees wagging her tail when she saw us. She will not go on walks with us but likes to hang out in that part of the yard while we are gone.
Sadie meets Heidi.
Here Stella thinks she is going to escort Heidi back inside but Heidi had other ideas.
The sky looked like rain was on the way. The radar showed some small storms a state away so I figured I had time to rake the leaves from the bank or fence line up to the middle of the gravel driveway ... where I burned them. There wasn't much of a chance of the fire spreading, in the middle of gravel ... but I did keep my eye on it.
Since there are still a lot of leaves on the trees I am not concerned about getting every leaf right now. It was good we burned them when we did because by 2:15pm it was pouring rain.
Some suggested I brush the hounds weekly to cut down on the amount of dog hair caught in the FJ. I use two tools on all three hounds. Sadie has the softest coat of all and I can practically brush her non-stop with the rake and the mitt, never running out of hair. There is not one time I move that rake lightly through her coat that I don't get some excess hair out of her.
Heidi rarely sheds any hair and it doesn't matter what the season is. Using the rake very lightly across her coat, I might get just enough to cover the tips of those metal prongs ... with the mitt, close to zero amount of hair.
Stella loves to lay down and get brushed anytime that I want. For some reason she also rarely sheds hair. If I run the mitt across her coat multiple times ... I get nothing. If I move the rake across her coat a few times lightly ... I will not even fill the rake with hair.
Sadie is the dog hair culprit in the FJ.
We are going to wait a few hours to see if it dries out a little more before we take an afternoon walk. Last night our 2nd walk of the day included the 25' retractable leash on Stella and no camera.
As I write this it's a little past 4pm and I can feel a siesta coming on.
Another good day here in 'the tropics' of southern Indiana.