It's tragic how many people have misconceived ideas about pigeons. No thanks to the pest control companies who are largely responsible for starting many of these myths about these wonderful, peaceful birds.

 

The first misrepresentation concerning pigeons is that they are disease carriers. The pest control companies make it sound like pigeons are the only carriers of avian diseases. A gross misrepresentation. All birds, including domestic birds, can be carriers of disease. In fact, chickens - not pigeons - are likely to carry more disease and that is because of the way they are warehoused.

 

Newcastle is a disease that is common among pigeons - in other parts of the world - not Canada. There hasn't been a case of Newcastle found in a pigeon in Canada for over 30 years. In fact, the last case of Newcastle was found in a shorebird, not a pigeon. This is something they fail to teach animal health technicians and vets.

 

Here's a good one. "Pigeon's poop is highly acidic and will disintegrate your building."  I guess that's why there are no buildings in Europe or statues left standing in Trafalgar Square. My pigeon house must be built out of miracle wood because it's still standing and I've had pigeons for quite a few years. Go figure.

 

Most people don't know that pigeons (and doves) are the only birds that produce a form of milk for their young ones. Pigeons (and doves) are the only birds that suck up water instead of pouring it into their beaks.  Both parents take turns incubating the eggs in the nest and both parents care for the young.

 

Most people have never taken the time to watch a pigeon fly. It's truly a marvelous sight as these birds are aeriel masters. Some pigeons are even acrobatic in their display of tumbling, somersaulting and gliding.

 

Pigeons come in a variety of colors, sizes and feather & body types. Some fancy pigeons have long tails like a magpie. Some have feathers on their feet. In some tropical regions, some of the pigeons are as colorful as parrots. In my coup, I have a variety of beautiful birds of assorted color and breed. I have a few Indian Fantails, whose tails fan out like a peacock. I have some beautiful black pigeons whose feathers have a combination of purple and green iridescence to them. Also among my flock are a variety of feather footed pigeons - some steel grey (Ice pigeons) and some white with black. Some of the faces on my pigeons are more delicate because of their "swallow pigeon" heritage and some, like the homers are more study and solidly built. Many wild pigeons are the result of lost or runaway show pigeons and therefore, any pigeon that you see in the wild that isn't the standard grey with blue bars (even some of those) are likely mixed with some domestic qualities.

 

The next time you see a pigeon, take a closer look at it's features. Watch it fly. Most of all, don't worry because you won't catch a disease.  You should know that a sick bird will usually be a loner and not travel with a flock.

 

 

Quite a few people have told me how if your dog is getting into stuff, coat it with cayenne pepper and they'll never do it again. Ha!

 

There is this kitchen chair that is between the door to the kitchen and the door to the outside. Kachina has to pass by it on the way in and out. Avatar, the Raven, likes to hide her hard boiled eggs on the chair and other misc pieces of meat. Kachina, when coming in, makes a bee-line for the chair and vacuums anything that may be on the chair.

 

Today, I remembered the cayenne pepper thing and coated the remnants of a hard boiled egg in the cayenne pepper. Kachina grabbed the egg (as expected) and gobbled it down, cayenne and all. She was even looking for more. In other words, I just spiced a snack for her. Shesh! Tabasco sauce?

 

We were out at the park today. It was deserted. It was also -25C. Kachina was oblivious to the cold and was running around having a great ol time. She's a wimp without her winter boots though. lol

 

Bruce was telling me about an episode of Dog Whisperer where a person had a dog that engaged in similar behavior as Kachina at the dog park (except this dog was worse in that it also chased people - everything). Apparently Cesar felt that the dog was giving the message that it owns the park and it chasing other dogs and behaving as such was it's way to convey that message to all.   That sounds about right for Kachina also. Hmmmm well - I think all the evidence points to Kachina shouldn't be allowed to roam freely at the dog park.  I will enforce it when the weather warms up and we can go for longer walks. For now, it's a way for her to burn off steam - providing there are no other dogs around.

 

We need to pick our battles and the Kachina vs Marisa and ownership of the dog park will take place soon.  :)

 

Stay tuned!

 

Well the dog police paid me a visit today. I wonder if my feelings are similar to what a parent feels like when the cops bring home their kid for causing trouble?

 

First, none of my comments are intended to excuse Kachina's behavior. Her dominating other dogs is wrong and does need to be fixed -no doubt about it.

 

Did you know that if you call your dog and it doesn't come, you can be fined $100 for "not having control over your dog". The law expects you to have 100% control over your dog 100% of the time. Interesting notion if it was actually possible. Maybe if you're a dog trainer with a zillion years of experience, it's closer to possible than the average dog owner.

 

Anyway given that, the dog park is a fine just waiting to happen.  

 

It kind of pisses me off that Carrie did file a complaint. I wonder what she thought she'd gain by this act? It certainly doesn't make me want to apologize to her. It certainly doesn't make me want to speak or act kindly toward her. Unfortunately there are many Carries in the world and the only thing we can do about them is avoid having anything to do with them. Thus I will think of Carrie as a stinky carcass and avoid her putrid energy.

 

In the mean time, I guess Kachina gets to be on leash 98% of the time and if I go to the dog park, it will be when no one else is around.

 

 

 

 

The "Illusion" collar (created by Cesar the dog whisperer) that I had ordered arrived yesterday and I thought that I'd try it out on our walk. It did what it is suppose to - stay up on the dog's neck. 

 

Was I more successful in controlling Kachina with it? No. She saw other dogs running and really wanted to join her and it was virtually impossible to get her attention from them to me. I found that I was "correcting" her constantly.  That was after I let her run a bit and get some of that energy out.  I tried standing in front of her - blocking her vision and she strained to see around me. Finally I just crossed the street and let them get way ahead. 

 

A few minutes later I crossed back over to the park. We ran into a Golden Retriever (Ben) that she knew and I let them play for a few minutes. She was good on the leash after that.  I did find that it was easier to control her with her harness than with the choke collar.  I would say that the Halti is still the ultimate control device and then the harness. The pinch collar (one with the "spikes") comes in third and then the choke collar (including the Illusion). 

 

The other thing about the Illusion collar is that it looks rather odd on her because of her furry neck. Maybe the collar works better on short haired dogs or perhaps it's me and I'm not using it correctly or I'm not doing the corrections correctly.

 

Maybe I shouldn't try to work with her at the dog park? I thought it was a good idea because there are so many distractions? I don't know.  Today I'll take the Halti with me and put it on if I can't manage her with the harness. You got to give me credit for my persistence and determination. lol

 

Two other things happened on the dog walk yesterday.  There was three bigger dogs playing and running around (the ones that caused her distraction later). I let Chena off the leash and she ran up to join in the play. At one point, I heard the growly noise that indicates the beginning of a problem and yelled "hey kids" and the altercation stopped. One of the dogs had a muzzle on and I'm not sure if that dog started it or Kachina. After I stopped them, they did go on to play okay.  Kachina kept running back and forth from them to me and so she got a bit of a work out. She didn't want to stop when I wanted her to and that was what all the pulling on the leash was about.

 

Later I was sitting on a bench fiddling with her collar and another dog (lab) came by with her owner. Kachina lunged at it for absolutely no reason. I gave her s*&T for it and, of course, got a dirty look from the owner. Hey, she was on a leash!

 

The rest of the walk went without incident. I kept her on leash for part of it and off leash for part of it. She came when called and walked nicely when I used the harness (I had both the collar and harness on her).

 

Puppy-teen-hood is difficult!

 

Meanwhile, we are having some success on the fence fighting side of things. I've put obstacles in front of the fence where she and the neighbor's dogs like to get into it. It's a bit of a deterrent but it doesn't stop the act. I do go out and correct her every time she engages and I stand between her and the fence and she is beginning to control her self better and not engage so readily with the dogs.

 

It'll be interesting to see what today's walk will bring

 

Reflecting upon yesterday's incident, I'd like to share my thoughts and feelings in retrospect.  First, Kachina's behavior was wrong. Obviously I don't want her dominating other dogs, nor do I want her traumatizing their owners. At the time, I really wanted to apologize to Carrie for Kachina's behavior. I wanted to make sure her dog was okay.  Given her behavior, that really wasn't going to happen. She walked away cursing me and my dog's existence and wasn't in any state to listen to reason, or apologies. I can now be more understanding of her behavior.

 

One mistake that she made was to immediately pick up her dog and cuddle it. If the dog was upset by the incident, she made it worse by her actions. The best case scenario would have been if she had kept her dog there while I disciplined Kachina (pin her to ground in a like manner that an Alpha wolf would pin a subordinate for bad behavior) and then let her dog sniff Kachina while Kachina was on the ground. That way Kachina would be submitting to her dog. If that could have happened, it would have turned the situation around and given her dog confidence. Instead, by her picking up the dog and then continuing to be highly emotional - that behavior likely upset her dog more and also caused an bad anchor to the situation and dogs that are bigger or the same breed as Kachina.

 

I wish I could explain this to Carrie. I wish that she was the type of person one could reason with. I would try but I recall the last time I tried to reason with her when she went off on a rant about how all gophers should be poisoned - eradicated because they "kill horses by digging holes in the fields". 

 

Sidebar: While at first one may think she has a point because there have been incidents where horses (and other animals) have been injured by stepping into a gopher hole. Then if you think about this further, you must realize that it doesn't happen all that often and gopher holes are a constant in a horses life.  Then we must keep in mind that poisoning any animal is morally wrong and dangerous to the rest of the eco system. I doubt people like Carrie realize just how important "pests" like gophers are to the eco system as so many species of animals depend on them for food (hawks, coyotes, foxes, lynx, bobcats and eagles).  Poison one gopher and you could be killing an eagle.

 

Taking everything into consideration, I don't think that anything could would come from any further communication with this woman - good intentions or not. I do have control over my own behavior and I will just avoid her and if that is not possible, I'll put my dog on the leash as soon as I see her and just simply refuse to engage in anything with her. That's all I can do.

Kachina had been doing so well. She was listening and I was able to stop her domination of another dog verbally. I was so pleased.  I knew it was too good to last.

 

There is this woman - Carrie -  at the park who has these two little jack russels. The dogs are okay but this woman has the personality of a Yeti, a skanky one at that.  When I use to see her during the summer she would always find a way to be offensive in her opinions and she has lots of opinions.  I prided my self in being polite to her, despite the fact that I'd like to shove her down a gopher hole.

 

So today, I'm at the dog park with Kachina. She played with a young lab, walked around a shitzu that wanted a piece of her and came when called after two other dogs got into it. All was good and then here comes Carrie. I say a polite hello and her little dogs are jumping all over me. Kachina gets mad at her one dog and gets a little "up close and personal". Oops. Carrie starts screaming, yes screaming at me while I pull Kachina off and discipline her. She's yelling how vicious my dog is and telling me to never come back to the park etc.  I tried to be nice. I tried to talk to her about it. Still she spewed. I don't know what she said but something she said flicked my switch from calm to not. I lost it (verbally) on her. It's been a very long time since I have been so angry with someone that I wanted to throttle them.

 

Sigh.  I'm more upset with my own reaction than with her actions. She always was a nasty little ... and that she freaked out is really typical of her. Me, on the other hand, should know better than to let someone else's words get to me. I guess both Kachina and I need some work on controlling our tempers. LOL

 

I had to bring Kachina home because I knew that my feelings would telegraph to her and nothing good would come from it. 

 

Carrie said she was going to call the "dog cops" on Kachina. I doubt anything will come of it as Kachina didn't actually hurt her dog.

 

I will still take Kachina to the park. I will turn and walk the other way when I see Carrie and I will practice great restraint to not say anything to her.  I will not stuff her down a gopher hole. I will not stuff her down a gopher hole. I will not stuff ... .  Affirmations LOL

 

So the training continues for both Kachina and me.

It's a cold and foggy day here in Calgary and that means that there were very few dogs at the dog park. We started out doing some obedience work (healing, sit and stay) and then I let her off leash for a bit. We practiced our recall a few times as well. We ran into a Vizsla, "Copper" that Kachina has known since they both were puppies. They had a great game of chase.

 

After they finished playing, I put Kachina back on the leash and did some more heal work.  I saw a standard poodle ahead and so I made her sit and then let her off the leash. The standard poodle was 8 months old, male, and they played well together. I heard a bit of a growl (the beginning of a dispute) and countered with a stern "Hey" which stopped that from going any further and so they resumed their play.

 

We saw a Port Water Spaniel who was very shy and didn't want anything to do with Kachina, so I called her away from the dog. No problems there.

 

Met up with a labradoodle, they nose sniffed and that was it.  I noticed that Kachina is okay with the nose sniffs but not good with the bum sniffs.

 

The final dog encounter was with a shitzu which actually went after Kachina and she avoided it. I know! What a surprise. What too small of a snack for her? ha ha.  I was really proud of that fight averted. I had Kachina on the 12 foot training leash and could have curbed her if there was a problem. 

 

The key to my success today was in being calm and vigilant as to what my dog was doing and who was ahead of us in the park. I think that the initial obedience work was a good idea because it established my leadership more strongly while in the park.

 

We'll see how tomorrow goes!