The Hounds Enjoy Their Weekend

First of all I hope all the blog readers that experienced tornado weather yesterday that moved through the south made out okay without any kind of damage. We had nothing like that yesterday but woke up this morning to signs of heavy rain last night while we slept. These first few pictures are from an exciting Saturday ... as you will see the hounds didn't do anything different from any other day.

Stella and I had a good Saturday morning walk. I planned on posting just one blog post Saturday later in the day, thinking I would get some activity from Heidi. That did not prove to be a correct assumption. She didn't do much, didn't want to do much and following her lead ... Stella and I ended up not doing too much on Saturday either, with great weather outside.

With a weather forecast of rain most of next week I was going to mow the yard while it was dry. In some spots the grass was tall enough to mow but I knew if I waited another two to three days after the rains, then it would be too tall to mow with a lot of excess grass lying around. After seeing some water standing in the field this morning and my neighbor's culvert I was happy I mowed yesterday.

Like I said, Heidi didn't do much yesterday. Did that short burst of sprinting and getting airborne on Friday afternoon take that much out of her? She spent a little time outside after her lunch but wasn't interested in anything else besides sleeping the rest of the day. She had to get ready to watch the Reds game at 7pm. I decided to spend the day reading books.

Stella felt the same way. Took a look around, then turned to head back inside. She was in her afternoon siesta mode within minutes of stepping inside the house.

I never heard rain last night while I slept. I did close all the windows though because the temps were going to drop to the low 40's during the night. This is always a sign that it has rained a lot. The water comes from under the edge of the shed wall, yet when I sit a level on that carport floor ... it is level.

Even if the standing water is small in this part of the field I know by that, the path in back will be saturated under the leaves and there will be spots of standing water on the path the further we get into the field at a higher elevation.

What a shock I had when I stepped around the car this morning. I had forgot to put all the stuff back in the shed after I mowed the yard yesterday. That just shows that we did not get back outside much yesterday afternoon and I evidently did nonstop book reading right up until the time the Reds game started. Only the mower was rained on.

I was also a little surprised that Stella was going to go on the walk this morning. I took a step onto the path and had water coming up the sides of my boots, over the edge of the soles of the boots. With more rain on the way, about 40 miles west of us, we didn't have much time to get this walk in this morning.

Stella didn't take long to decide the path was too wet and she moved off to the side as we started. The field grass is growing fast, faster than my yard is.

If the path was fairly dry she walked on it. Once it became to saturated with the rain water, she moved off the path just like always. She is smarter than the AKC thinks she is.  :)

We are nearing the back of the field, about 40' higher in elevation based on facts from my Apple Watch, and there is standing water on the path. That is not out of the ordinary.

I made some minor adjustments today in my clothing. With it being 44° at 10am I went from summer clothes back to wool socks and a thermal long sleeve undershirt. I am a wimp the older I get when it comes to cold weather. It did snow lightly the first week of April last year so in comparison this weather is not bad.

Stella didn't investigate a lot of scent nor did she eat deer scat this morning. She acted as if she wanted to get this walk over as soon as possible. Walking at a pretty steady pace we knocked off 3 minutes from our total time for the walk.

You might notice her collar has a slightly different tint of red. (faded) The other bright red collar I tried the other day was just too small for her. Late last night I opened the closet door in the kitchen where I have all the older hound collars hanging along with my three 6' leashes. I found a collar that was a little longer. I moved her current rabies tag to this collar and slide it over her head this morning.

She whines when I take the collar off of her as if she likes wearing one. So she was pretty happy this morning to have a different collar to wear. Heidi does not wear a collar until she makes a trip to the vet. Sadie and Winston didn't either

Most of the day is going to look just like this. With more books to read and the Reds starting at 2:30pm today, it can rain all it wants to outside.

I've gained all the weight back I had lost a few weeks ago. At least I know the reason for that and my spreadsheet confirmed what I thought the reason was. One is eating 500 more calories per day, bumping it up from 1500 to 2000 range. Along with that is an increase in carbohydrates. Like I have said before, carbs and I do not get along, with added weight and slight indigestion when eating food that is called healthy.

I do best somewhere between Keto Diet and a Paleo Diet compared to a meatless diet or one with a lot of grains and fruit.

I thought we might take the older path home but at the "Y" Stella kept walking our newer path we started a few years ago. It's the one we take the majority of time and ends up putting her in the northern part of the backyard.

She got an early start of cleaning her legs up and didn't wait to get in the house to start her daily routine after a walk through the wet field. She will lick to dry her legs and all of her paws dry. I have not mowed the north side year nor this north section of the backyard yet.

She was about as close as she could get next to the house. Closer than she normally does and I can only assume it's because of how wet the walk was. I still have not decided what to do about the area where the river rock is. Mulch or grass?

With temps in the 40's, a cool breeze and no changes predicted for the day, you can expect Heidi to do this most of the day. She does demand the sleeping bag though, even when she moves to the couch. I know that when she is staring at me shivering she is wanting me to bring the sleeping bag to her on the couch.

I heard about Trump's new idea for placing the illegal immigrants in the US ... giving them a bus ride to the sanctuary cities.  LOL ... isn't it interesting that those politicians that support sanctuary cities do not support that plan to accept them. I still say, the Democrats are 'giving' Trump a landslide win in 2020.

The NBA Playoffs have started I guess. I never watch the NBA and I can't even tell you who won the championship last year. For being a sports fan and a college basketball fan it is a little strange how I have no interest in professional basketball.

I found a Toyota FJ on AutoTrader last night that had everything I wanted in one but have not found that combination since I traded my first one in November 2017. It was silver instead of blue, it had the rock rails and the TRD package just like my first one had. The color and features are what I've wanted every since I traded that first one I had.

It is very tempting to make the drive to Northern Kentucky just south of Cincinnati to check it out ... but I won't. I remember why I traded my last Toyota FJ just last August. That lingering sharp pain in my hip joint every time I climbed into the seat. Plus I am on pace to drive less than 3,000 miles total for 2019 unless something drastic changes in my driving habits for the next 8 months. So what difference does it make what kind of car I drive, when I drive so few miles?

IF Heidi decides to shock me today and I can take some outdoor photos of her, I will and add those to my next post. That is highly doubtful but you never know with her. In fact this morning I woke up to her barking from the hallway ... that has never happened, ever. She sprinted to the door when I walked by her and then tip toed around the standing water in the carport to get just off the edge of it to pee. She has always been the perfect house dog.

All is good here in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.

Heidi Barks To Take Walk

She interrupted my book reading by barking nonstop. That usually means she not only wants to go outside but also take the afternoon walk. As you see, that wasn't the case today. She just wanted to get outside to enjoy the last bit of sunshine with cool breezes.

Stella Cancels Morning Walk

From the signs of puddles in the carport and in the field across the highway, it rained pretty hard last night as the forecast said it would. I didn't hear a thing even with the windows open. Evidently Stella knew exactly how much it rain and just how wet the field would be because no matter how hard I tried to coax her into walking, she refused!!

It was still nice weather though. About 25° cooler than yesterday morning, a little more windy but there is an expectation of sunny skies later this afternoon. That will put the lawn back to mowing height for Saturday afternoon.

What I wouldn't do to be able to crawl inside the brain of a bloodhound to see what's in there, how it operates and how they think. It is one of the funniest breeds I've owned yet there has only been two breeds in 32 years of hounds. The basset hound and bloodhound is as far as I have ventured into the world of dogs.

I knew when I turned around to take this photo of Stella, there was a 'slight' chance she wasn't going anywhere.

When I saw this familiar look, I KNEW she was not going anywhere. Was the ground of the field really that wet? Standing water in spots along the path? How does she know?

I was even willing to let her lead the way, expecting her to turn left along the side of the house, veer up the small incline heading toward the north end of the yard and possibly walking on the 'return' path to start our walk. I would follow her along the way with no problem.

She did an about-face without any hesitation and headed for the door to go back inside. In fact she was so quick that by the time I turned the corner of the house trying to take a photo of her heading back to the door, she was already at the door waiting for me to open it.

So ... there will be no bloodhound walk on Friday morning. Maybe later, maybe not.

I started my day in a fog, it didn't feel like I slept that soundly. The hounds were not going to let me have more sleep, they wanted breakfast. I usually get between six to seven hours of sleep per night and close to half of that is sound sleep. Yet, that new bag of Seattle's Best Coffee (not Starbucks), smelled fantastic as I took a whiff inside the bag. It tasted even better and before I knew it, my brain activity rapidly increased.

I had the urge to drive the local area and look at some dog food, different from what I have been feeding the hounds since February 2017. If I were to go to the local farm supply store which has a wide range of dog food brands, grain-free and otherwise, I could also walk the aisles looking for something new to buy for lawn care or maintenance.  Maybe some winter vests or jackets would be on sale, which I don't really need.

Basically it's just a restlessness I get sometimes.

I like the dog food I have been feeding the hounds. It has limited ingredients and helped Heidi with her allergic reactions with raw chewed skin a few years ago. Stella is my new allergy puzzle though. It's never a fun puzzle to figure out either.

Could it be the dog food or those Glucosamine supplements I give her?

That's the million dollar question. If I don't give her the supplements, she has a hard time walking sometimes, well yelp on occasion and has a family history of bad hips based on what the previous owner told me. A vet a few years ago when looking at Heidi's skin issues told me his studies on dog food allergies resulted in finding out that dog food is not the major cause of allergies in dogs.

That makes the puzzle all the harder to solve.

An old friend of mine living in Phoenix has an older Mastiff that started having some severe issues with his skin. Luckily it took only one vet trip for him to find a solution. It was something I had never heard of during the long time I have had hounds. "Hypoallergenic Protein" was the key word and the key to solving the Mastiff's problem.

Dog foods that are good for allergies always try to stay away from chicken, beef, dairy and eggs. My ingredient lists of every dog food I used, listed on a spreadsheet showed that even the best limited ingredient, grain-free foods with a protein source other than chicken or beef .... ALWAYS has some sort of chicken (flavor or meal) lower down the list.

Maybe it's not chicken that is bothering Stella. There are no kinds of meat in the GlycoFlex Plus supplement. But there is some chicken flavor in her lamb meal and rice food.

The symptoms of an allergy can include skin rash, hives, itching, paw biting, obsessive licking and sometimes nausea or vomiting. She shows only those highlighted in bold print. Especially the paw biting and itching. I have scanned every inch of her looking for fleas ... I did not find any on her or me.

So I am very tempted to go the route that my friend took with his Mastiff because he saw a sudden change within 8-12 days after switching to a dog food with hypoallergenic protein. Basically that is food with lower protein, lower fat and more carbs. His vet still tells him to feed the food for two months as prescribed before they decide what food to move to.

Looking back through photos of blog posts of Stella in the past four years that she has been here (August 2015), there have been times she has stopped in the field to scratch. So then the question is .... environmental allergy? That is a major cause of dog allergies. We tried weekly shots with Heidi to combat environmental allergies with negative results in 2015. She only improved when I went to the limited ingredients dog food I use now.

A blog reader suggested last month that I splash a little yogurt on her food every meal. Just a teaspoon of it, recommenced by her vet and that showed results. A few containers of yogurt is a lot cheaper than a 20 pound bag of Hypoallergenic Protein dog food ... unless I started eating the yogurt.  :)

I admit I am not a fan of trying to solve dog allergies. My curiosity to try different foods will get the best of me. Plus I need to walk through the aisles of that farm supply store and tell myself no a million times when I ask if I really need this.  LOL

As long as the Cincinnati Reds continue to win, weather and dog allergies are not a factor in my day. Strange how sports can do that to you mental outlook. It's like I told that California State Patrolman in 1984, on a Sunday afternoon celebrating Cinco de Mayo cruising the coast highway back home to Carlsbad. I was driving my 1967 mint condition VW Bus, with the stereo blasting loud enough that I didn't hear his siren through downtown Encinitas. My friend saw him in the side mirror and said "Floyd, I think that guy behind you want to talk to you."  :)

As he arrested me he told me I was the happiest drunk he had ever arrested. I told him "my Reds are on a 7 game winning streak!!!!" ...

The winning streak ended THAT NIGHT.

Well I am off to look around at Orschein Farm Supply store .... maybe I'll buy a new lawn mower instead ... and some hypoallergenic dog food for Stella  :)

All is good this morning in 'the tropics' of Southern Indiana.