Divots
i have the wrong dog in this picture, but riley wouldn't stand still long enough for me to snap the shutter.
a few months ago, i wrote about how hard it is for us to have a nice lawn in the back yard. it was no problem with toby and boscoe, but riley was a puppy of a different kind. a destructive, lively, intense, divot-making kind.
a couple of years ago, we finally gave over half the yard to wood chips, because riley was digging holes, running in circles, and destroying the grass. but we still try to grow grass on the other half. we will never give up!
every spring, the grass half of the yard looks like this: notice the mud pit-slash-path encircling the tree. that's from riley, doing his figure eights.
so we fence off the yard in march or april, haul in the dirt, put down seed, water water water, and by june we have a nice thick head of grass. and then we start feeling sorry for riley, and we open the fence every now and again so he can run.
result: divots. big divots. here's riley last night, playing with the frisbee i brought him back from Dollarama in Montreal, making divots, wearing a path. (and here's a link to the video, because that YouTube imbed doesn't work very well, for some reason.)
riley divot video
8 comments:
Cute. He looks so happy.
My brother's dog had a path she always followed, too. Whenever it was time to play, go for a walk, or a ride in the car, she would dash around the yard first to the pine trees, then around the garden, then back by the sand box, circle the arbor vitae, then turn around and look at you, ready for anything. You couldn't do anything with her until she'd rather compulsively finished her route.
with riley we call that "securing the perimeter." he does that when i get home from work--dashes out, secures the perimeter of the yard, and only then runs back to greet me.
i guess it's a holdover from his time in the war.
The video worked fine for me on the blog page. Seems as if Riley likes playing keep-away more than fetch.
Riley is getting some good exercise there, just doing laps around each part of your yard. And what a lucky dog! All your dogs have been lucky, to have you.
How do you get a video on your blog??
I think I need a dog - Riley looks like a lot of fun.
That looks like tons of fun!! I too like to play keep-away or tug better than fetch. Running around in circles is good, but chasing the humans (or kitties if I'm inside) is even better!! -Kesey
Why don't I get to do stuff like that? -Riley
That's what you get for being a cat. -Kesey
I can match that but I need two dogs. The beagle does the pattern running, and the new guy is a divot maker. The Pug just is.
Oh yeah, the beagle does what Riley does and wants you to chase him to get the ball back (which you do very well incidentally), but the new guy always drops it at your feet.
jim--you're right. riley loves to run flat-out and be chased. but he'll only do it if he has something in his mouth. a stick, a frisbee, a puffy toy, a tennis ball.
p.miller: it's easy. i'll show you.
katie: he is!
riley & tiki: is kesey a dog? i'm a little confused.
willow: toby used to drop the ball at my feet. riley does not want to be compared to toby. ("in a box, in teh closet.") so he plays a different way.
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