Stella Finds New Territory

Little did I know just how interesting Friday's morning walk would get. Needless to say Stella acted like her 'old self' today starting the minute she woke up.

We were up early again and while I was taking my first pictures of the day, Sadie and Stella were out trying to identify what had been in their yard while they slept last night. It was just a few minutes past 7am.

I know it will take a while for Stella to regain the weight she lost but it looks to me that I am seeing fewer ribs showing from the side. Heidi gained her weight back, so can Stella.

Being up earlier meant the coffee was consumed earlier, the reading finished and Sadie showing up at the corner of my desk chair earlier, letting me know we needed to get our morning walk in before the forecasted afternoon rains. With that early departure, the field was even wetter than normal.

If you do any reading about the breeds of the basset hounds and bloodhounds you will notice there is a difference in them, besides their size. Bloodhounds have one purpose if hunting ... to flush out deer. Basset Hounds have one purpose if hunting ... not only to find rabbits but to chase them into thick brush where the rabbit will panic, stop and catch them.

{my basset hound in 1990, named Sadie, did that exact thing. I saw brush moving, that was so thick I could not walk in it. I heard her baying and a little later a happy basset running back to the car with signs that she had a rabbit lunch}

I found out yesterday afternoon that the bloodhound writeup was absolutely correct while Heidi stayed back in yard.

Sadie was near this area yesterday afternoon, although this picture was taken in sequence this morning for Stella's venture, when not TWO FEET AWAY from Sadie's nose a rabbit hopped out of the ground and moved as fast as possible into the woods ... neither Sadie or Stella even noticed it.

This morning was a different story as you have seen from the previous two pictures. Although, NO rabbit was involved. Stella reacted so strong to a scent that she walked into the green brush. Ignoring me calling her name. I knew when Sadie joined the party in the previous picture I could have a major problem on my hands. I could tell that both were excited.

Stella sprinted into the wooded area and I had no doubts that she was headed off into the gully by the way she ran. As I tucked my camera, yelling her name, I sprinted into the same wooded area where I was barely able to catch Stella coming back from where ever she had gone.

Luckily I got both hounds back out into the field and finding out myself just how many of those bushes had thorns ... I'm glad they didn't tear my jacket sleeves.

Stella had to recheck that spot one more time before she left to catch up with Sadie. To see her jog, not trot, to catch up to Sadie was a blessing in disguise. She was going faster than a trot and looked like her old self compared to the past few weeks where she walked the whole way not much faster than a snail.

The deer scent was extremely strong this morning. They were both more active than normal, always out in front of me and at times past the line of comfort.

When Stella changes directions with her nose in the air I am aways ready to take off running after her. You never know what she has picked up and you never know if she is going to go after what she has smelled. That trip this morning into the woods proved that.

This morning was much different than past walks. It was the first time in a long time that she spent 99% of the of walk in front of me with Sadie instead of dragging her feet walking behind me. By her energy this morning, she has to be feeling better.

I added this picture just to show how far out in front of me they are. With Sadie's nose down like that I thought they might take off on me again so I started jogging up the path to catch them.

When they ignore you because of what they are smelling, that can be potential trouble unless you are in the mood to get some running in.

Stella is sure the deer went this way. She would be correct because that is a common place where the deer jump over a small hidden fence and take off into the corn field.

By the time I convinced Stella to turn around and head home, Sadie was trotting way in front of me. Again, it was great to see Stella take off running to catch up with her. I also like seeing her tail upright which shows she is feeling good.

Not quite a full run, but a jog faster than a trot ... and far enough away that 200mm zoom was needed to catch up to them.

Sadie reminding Stella to keep it at this pace.

Close to home and still moving faster than normal.

Sadie walked it in but was always on the lookout for a new scent to identify. The rain may or may not show up and that will determine this afternoon's activities. In the meantime Stella is back to destroying her Nylabone.

It can never be a good sign when a concrete truck pulls off the highway to check their load. I wonder if a warning light on his dash told him to pull over and get out to look or did he hear something out of the norm?

Not sure of my plans today but it feels like a day to read books, a game or two of Mahjong on the computer and an afternoon hound walk if it doesn't rain.

The temps are trying to crawl back to the 70's today but have a long way to go, here in 'the tropics' of southern Indiana.

The Hounds Enjoy Monday

Heidi knew as early as last night that it was cold outside. She headed to bed early and borrowed my Marmot sleeping bag, even with a warm room and the heat turned on. With the ballgames over, and I'm not being a big tv watcher, the evening ended pretty early. Sadie and Stella decided they were too comfortable to move from the living room and spent another night sleeping in the same spots they took hours earlier.

The daily routine is slowly stepping back to the one of the past two years. The hounds are still waking me up a little earlier than I like but that seemed to have started with the Daylight Savings time change in November. So they wake me up, they go outside quick for their first trip of the day. They always think breakfast is served when they come back inside, so they do not stay outside long.

At 6:00am or 6:30am, their breakfast is not served ... nor at 5:35am. What is different, recently Heidi is up before any of them, with a full body shake and enough flapping ear noise to wake me up. She has actually been going outside every morning with the other two hounds. That has not happened in months, if not years. She was a sleep until lunch type of basset hound.

We return for about an hour of sleep with breakfast being served around 7:30am. The thing that bothers me is not the hounds waking me up but when I glance out the window and see it is so cold that the storm windows are completely covered in frozen condensation. That means the temps are low teens if not single digits.

With bloodhounds temperature will not make a difference. They don't want to wear jackets, sweaters or shoes ... just nose to the ground or inside the snow and away they go. One thing I have to be really aware of though is Stella is starting to expand her traveling past a "house rule" boundary. One of those "give 'em an inch they take a mile" type of things.

Luckily the couple of times I have had to scream her name as I am running toward the suspected location - she will turn around and come sprinting towards me.

There wasn't much done this morning with the temperature at 9° our first trip outside and 13° at the 9:15am trip outside. Heidi never even opened her eyes when I asked if she wanted to go outside for the 2nd time of the day. She had moved to 'her' other spot, on the chair in the living room.

Sadie and Stella though charged outside for about 15 minutes of searching, sprinting and a little play. Once again my trusty Nikon D3200 failed when trying to focus to take photos of them playing. I cannot say that after a year and some months being a Nikon owner that I am a happy customer. I just realized that in my recent posts this past week I may have said D3100 instead of D3200. The D3200 is my correct model number.

I would go back and edit those posts but I have a fear that Blogger will move that old post to the most recent post after I click "update" ... that seems to be an issue lately. Is it time for me to seriously consider moving the blog to WordPress?

I started making some afternoon coffee with the temps hitting a high today of 24°. I found out I was down to my last cup of grounds so it was off to the store buy some, a 25 mile trip. Maybe I'll start buy coffee online and keep one bag of coffee ahead. Plus, stay warm.

There was still time for some afternoon jogging by Sadie and Stella. About all Heidi did for the afternoon was a quick trip behind the Yews to dump tanks and come back inside.

Sadie had been pretty nice to Stella since she arrived last August, they are great friends ... that is until Sadie has "her" container of The Greek Gods Greek Yogurt to lick out ... I don't think she is into sharing that.

Later on they still wanted to go out one last time for the day and double check that no one had been in their field while the snow flew. They would probably be able to stay outside all the time because they love it so much ... in the end they are always happy to come back inside where it's warm.

Yes, it does feel different without Winston around. He loved the snow and loved licking out the container that had the very last part of  yogurt, cottage cheese  or on a rare occasion ... pudding.

It's heading for the 40's here in a few days in the "tropics" of Southern Indiana .. all that snow will turn to mush and a really wet and soggy backyard / field.

Stella Continues To Expand Her Boundaries

Although it's a beautiful day outside, I haven't accomplished much. You can do that when you are retired but at times it surprises me since I use to be called a "workaholic". In fact the photos I took are probably the only thing I will get done for the day, unless I rally before the NFL game tonight and get some dishes washed.

A dog walk is definitely on the schedule later today. The recent heat wave that baked the leaves off the trees, increased the process of corn and beans coming close to becoming ready for harvesting.

I wanted to try something different today by using the 75-200mm lens on all the photos. I normally only use it if the hounds are out in the field some distance away but today I wanted to shoot it when the hounds were close to the house. The results were different of course but it is a result that I liked.

Winston and Sadie started the day like all others ... sniffing their yard for anything new. Stella stood and watched, not sure if she wanted to get her feet wet from the heavy dew this morning.

Stella continues to expand her territory and personality by the hour. Yesterday she played with Sadie for the first time. This afternoon when they came back inside, they touched noses and starting playing and running inside the house. Luckily they stopped on their own soon after and were asleep after their sudden burst of energy.

She also checked out the front part of her territory, looking in the direction of the highway. Not for long as I called her name and she immediately turned around and headed in the reverse direction. All the other hounds were glancing that direction probably wondering what she was doing as they too are not allowed any further than that corner of the house.

Late yesterday after Sadie had brought out her "big" bone to chew, she stepped away to get some water and at that time Stella decided she would check it out herself. She liked it so much that she laid down, held the bone with her paws and was chewing on it when Sadie returned.

There wasn't any kind of fighting or growling. Sadie slowly passed her giving her the eye and laid in her normal spot under the coffee table. Today the same thing. Each time I tried to get a photo of them playing or chewing the large bone ... they both stopped. This photo was about the only one I could get. It was also taken with the 75-200mm lens. She lifted her head when she heard the beep of my auto focus ... I have turned that off for future photos.

I really like how Stella has merged into the pack of hounds without any issues. It's been an unexpected smooth transition. I was expecting at least one period of disagreement.

I don't know about you but I think that Heidi's skin is improving. For those readers looking at her for the first time, it probably looks pretty bad, but believe me when I say that her skin has improved a lot. I am continuing with the Epsom Salt soaks. I am also logging into a spreadsheet her condition, rating her skin 1-5 with 5 being the worse and the kind of food, any treats or shampoos.

Her rear shoulder was raw a few months ago and the vet told me that hair would never grow back in that area. You can see the white hair still making it's attempt to come back. All of the skin that is hairless is soft compared to hard and crusty before.

With the temperatures dropping almost 10-15 degrees I am wondering if the temps that were in the 90's played a factor in her outbreak last week with redness and some hot spots? Hopefully the lower temperatures will mean improving skin.

I can't believe it's already Thursday. Yet being retired I am rarely aware of what day of the week it is. That will change with the NFL and College Football starting their games on tv every Thursday night. I'll know the days from those scheduled games.

With the recent merger of AT&T and DirecTv, I am getting bombarded with offers by mail to come back to AT&T plus more discounts added since I was and am a DirecTv customer before the merger. They keep getting higher in their offers ... today was $500 in credits, and double the data per month and something I had not seen before with data plans ... unused data would be carried forward.

I took a close look at that since AT&T now has 4G service in my area, which they didn't have when I changed to Verizon in June 2014. When I played around with their different plans, my monthly fee would still be $120 more per year for what I have now. Also I would have to pay Verizon a fee for breaking my contract 10 months early. I estimate that would be around $150 added to the cost. I still might have to go back and take a closer look at that.

It makes you wonder just how much companies over charge you and get away with it, when they can offer you a $500 credit. Just last month when I told DirecTV I was thinking of taking the cheaper option and flipping to DishNetwork, they gave me a $20 per month discount for 12 months plus I had to extend my contract only 2 months longer than it was for to begin with.

I wouldn't have switched because I had already check out the sports channels with different packages and the cost for me would have been close to the same. Still another company giving a $240 credit just for talking to them.

I need to call more I guess.

Here is something a little different to end this post. Here is a photo of the weather prediction for this winter by the National Weather Service. El Nino is the factor this winter for weather. I have stated previously, I am not sure I want to tent camp this winter in the SW with them getting more rain than normal, just to stay warmer. I know it doesn't rain much normally in that area but from all I read they will be getting a lot of rain. Rain is rain if you know what I mean.

I am not sure why my profile photo is not showing up when I make comments on other blogs and reply to comments on my blog. I have removed and added the same photo on my profile but no change. Any ideas??

It's another great day here in "the tropics" ... I need to get ready for the daily dog walk, we are hoping that Heidi joins us this afternoon.