A tale of two litters

Merlot (age two days) and his mother, all puppies in this litter are alive and well - see the last paragraph

By in large the British treat their dogs as if they are members of their families, indeed their dogs regard themselves as such. A generalisation with undoubted exceptions such as genuinely working dogs, I know.

The urban French I imagine are much the same, less so their country cousins. M Bernard, the friendly farmer who owns the vineyards and farm neighbouring our maison secondaire in the Charente Maritime, is a charming man who has offered us nothing but help. He speaks zero English but at least speaks French slowly so I understand much of what he says. His mother, in her late eighties lives at the farmhouse (he lives elsewhere).  The dogs on his farm are farm animals and treated as such. An elderly yellowish Alsatian cross guard dog is chained to a tree. A couple of labradors, a black male and yellow bitch seem to run free. They regard themselves as having an easement into our garden so as to avail themselves of its facilities. He also has a couple of spaniel types who are given their head when the shooting season starts in September but otherwise seem to live in a pen behind the farmhouse. All dogs seem to live in harmony with free range flocks of sheep, geese and hens.

A couple of years back an aggressive boxer/something cross joined the menagerie. Rocco and I had a couple of confrontations with him during our September holiday. The next month, whilst the English lady, who looks after our house whilst we are away, was talking to the farmer, the dog ran out of the farmyard and bit her on the leg, an entirely unprovoked attack. The farmer drove her to hospital. She stopped looking after our house, but for other reasons. Representations to the local mayor (Mairie) of the commune failed to get any resolution. An English woman bitten by a French farm dog gets little sympathy from a Mairie, himself a farmer. Rural France is run by and for its farmers. You might add this is also pretty much true of the EU. 

Clearly we couldn’t let the house out to holidaymakers with this dog on the loose. The following spring, the first time we were back in France after the attack I went over to the farm. I had mugged-up on as many variations of ‘Your dog must be under strict control or put-down’ as my schoolboy French could manage. Fortunately, the new lady now looks after our house, volunteered to join me, she speaks very good French. There was no sign of the dog, the farmer was out and we met his elderly mother. Her farm kitchen, earth floor and pot of stew hanging over the fire in the hearth, was straight out of a nineteenth century Zola novel. I was able to present her with a Dundee cake I had bought and after talking at cross-purpose for a while, we brought-up the subject of the dog.

“Oh, that dog was shot in the winter,” she said, “it attacked one of our farm workers.” It turned out to belong to the son-in-law of the farmer’s girlfriend.

Last year when we were again out opening up the house for the season, the farmer waved me over to talk about our barn, which we keep locked-up. I was not sure what he was on about but opened up the large barn door for him. It turned out that his Labrador bitch had found a way in and had just produced a litter of puppies behind a mountain of straw. The farmer and one of his men removed the straw and a few hidden empty oil barrels and got the puppies out, we provided a large cardboard box and admired the litter. The farmer seemed uncomfortable with our interest. When I saw him the next morning I asked after the puppies. They had been drowned. One can't help concluding that this is cheaper than having the bitch spayed.

Merlot and sisters

On a happier note back when the renovation of our house was underway we were over in May for a conference with our builders. We stayed in a gite owned by a British Airways pilot and his wife who had retired from flying. The have a pair of splendid retriever labradors one of which was due to give birth. We ended up taking the soon-to-be dad out for a long walk so that his partner could have some peace. We came back to admire six splendid tiny retriever labradors. They were all spoken for except one fellow, now called Merlot, who has stayed with his parents.

omg

just snoring now

omg, omg, omg.

rocco here, I think he has finally flipped. he’s got spotify on his mac – sounds bad - and it is. it was sort of ok but hes found werewolves of london by warren zefon and he thinks it funny to sing it on our walks. any singing is bad but the lyrics – if they can be so described – mainly comrise of 'ahhooo, werewolves of london, arghhoooo, arghhoooo,' etc, embarrassing or what. he thinks he is being funny. omg. stop him somebody, shooting is too good, or get him back to van morrison, he doesn’t know the lyrics of van’s stuff despite having heard it all for years and years. omg

sorry can’t manage caps on the keyboard.

More on our pack's thoughts

Ou est les chats? Rocco en France - nothing to do with this post - just wanted to publish this shot.

A Princess

The Princess walks out so as to provide the rest of the world with somebody to adore. She trots along confident in the cut of her fur and that her topknot is just the smartest thing - as indeed it is. But there is another side to her…

…One of Richmal Crompton’s William stories concerns Violet Elizabeth Bott, dressed in a frilly pink frock, demanding that she join William and the Outlaw’s red Indian games in the woods. They did not want her but as ever she bent them to her will. That evening William tried to return her to Mr & Mrs Bott at the Hall, but they failed to recognise William’s mud-covered companion as their own sweet child. Eventually, as she was led away towards the bathroom, Violet Elizabeth wistfully lisps ‘I like boyth games.’ The Princess also sometimes likes boy’s games and her owner is unimpressed by my returning with a bedraggled Tibetan terrier.

Baxter, a spaniel we walked when we first started looking after dogs, was a retired police drug sniffer dog. Nobody had told him he was retired, needless to say he could be fun when walking on Barnes Common on a sunny day. Sadly now he is employed in a celestial squad checking that there are no angels hiding dubious stuff in their harps.

Humbug, actually a delightfully affable fellow, we suspect of mentally compiling a long, long list of things not quite up to scratch on his stays with us. Hrumph, see that? Got fed third bowl down, not first. And another thing, the dalmation has grabbed the corner spot on the sofa again. What did the brochure say about sofa positions? And another thing…

What to do on a walk

Many years ago when Jumble our last dog was a carefree un-neutered male a walk contained for him numerous elements. Of course, he would meet various of his mates, check their digestive systems, watch out for cats, squirrels and other annoyances. Even if he saw none of the above there was the olfactory importance of reading the parish notices, checking his mail and leaving answering messages. Not least were the lonely hearts advertisements to post and answer – ‘Handsome stud seeks hot bitch to pursue mutual interests’ etc.

Fast-forwarding to today’s world, every male seems to be neutered and the importance of leaving pee messages has diminished. Certain trees, bits of street furniture and landmarks on the common, formerly covered by invisible message boards, once oh so fascinating, are passed without so much as a sniff, not that I complain, but I recently got to thinking about what each of our floating population of pack members looked for in a walk.

Coca, for instance looks for the admiration and love of friends and strangers, ever keen to sit on a foot (immobilizing her admirer) and bask in their affection. Beyond that she looks for supplements to her diet, ‘I say, there’s fresh bunny poo over here’.

Mooli lives for the opportunity to ‘bounce’ some poor other dog. In the distance he sees a Fothering-Thomas of a pooch, happily minding its own business, saying as it were ‘Hallo Clouds, Hallo Sun’ in the way that attracted Molesworth’s scorn. Mooli’s head goes down into hunting mode, he pauses, then he charges, growling fearsomely in the hope the Fothering-Thomas will turn and run and be good for a snarling chase. When he returns oozing self-satisfaction he finds it hard to comprehend the lack of admiration. Admiration is what he clearly deserves as any fule kno.

I am ashamed to admit young Mooli developed this appalling behavior in association with young Rocco - yes this is a secret of the otherwise laid-back Rocco’s guilty past - Mooli acted as Rocco’s henchdog. Needless to say Rocco nowadays is above all this, ever keen to control his pack to walk in a crocodile holding hands. When I see Mooli’s head go down in hunting mode, I distract him sometimes with a ‘treat.’ He has amplified this into a protection racket - when he sees a Fothering-Thomas he catches my eye, ‘gimme a treat or that wimp gets it’.

Nessie, a black Labrador, is chiefly interested in food, (it is said that once a couple of centuries ago, a Labrador missed a meal, the breed have vowed never to let this happen again). Nessie (‘oh, no not Nessie’ used to be her full name) launches herself at any picnic or any person suspected of picnicking like a heat seeking missile. Otherwise, it must be said, she is a delightful companion. 

Archie is a natural scientist, ever interested in the flora and fauna, flotsam and jetsam, etc and etc that he comes across. He plays a reverse version of ‘Grandmother’s footsteps’ – whenever you look back to see where he has got to, he is twenty yards behind you trotting happily, bound to catch-up with you in a moment. You look away and know he will instantly stop to examine some fascinating leaf. You look back once more and he is twenty yards behind you trotting happily, bound to catch-up with you in a moment…

Bobby, the greyhound we are fostering, never looses an opportunity to greet people to impress them by his affability otherwise he is a keen squirrel chaser though a fairly hopeless one, he works up such a speed that he will over run the tree up which his prey disappeared by twenty foot.

More to come...