Spring is in the air - at least I hope it is! The lousy thing about March is it is a major "teaser" month - one day it will be warm and then the next we could end up with a foot of snow!
Anyway I was thinking back to our first spring/summer with Brittany. Seems like it was so long ago (well I guess 10 years is a long time). It wasn't that easy back then because we didn't have our yard completely fenced so poor Britts couldn't really enjoy the yard like would have liked her to (at that time anyway - we eventually did get the entire yard fenced but that wasn't until about 4 years after Britts came to live with us). Anyway our yard is quite large so I could actually send her out there and just keep an eye on her - see our yard was partially fenced but the part that wasn't fenced was on the sides of the house so if she went straight back she was fine. So most of the time when I would send her back there she would just wander around and if I would call her sometimes she would come and other times somehow miraculously she would loose her sense of hearing :o) So Scott or I would stand there like idiots yelling her name and there you would see that hunk of fur scurrying and sniffing out all the interesting parts of the yard. One thing about Brittany she LOVED her yard - every time she would go back there it was like the "first" time she'd been there. She would have to walk slowly and sniff every part of the yard. Then there would be the times she would be walking slowly and then heaven knows why but she would suddenly sprint across the yard and when she would run it was so funny because for some reason her butt would kind of go "under" and so would her tail and we would see her run by with her ears flapping LOL! OH well getting back to us trying to get her to come in - yes it was not easy to get her back in when she was busy back there so eventually one of us (usually me - are you surprised?) would go back and collect her (if I could catch her that is) and bring her back in the house. Now honestly this didn't bother me all that much most times but when it was rainy or chilly I would kind of NOT really want to have to go back there and chase after her so I tried to think of something that might entice this little stinker to come to me that way I could get her back inside without having to get wet or cold or whatnot. So thinking thinking hmmm what does Brittany love - I though maybe if I squeaked one of her toys and called her that might do the trick. Nope she didn't bite! Then I thought hmmm maybe if I "knocked" on the back door that might get her curious enough to come see "who was there" and nooooo that didn't work. So now what - what did Brittany LOVE that I could use against her LOL! Ahhhhh now it came to me - MILKBONES!!! OMG that dog went bonkers for Milkbones. So I decided what the heck so one day while she was way in the back of the yard "inspecting" Scott and I stood at the back door and called her a few times - she looked but of course went back to what she was doing UNTIL she heard a noise - a noise only SHE would know and that noise was the box of Milkbones shaking shaking shaking!! OMG when I tell you that little stinker ran like the wind it was SO cute so as soon as she came close enough we held out the bone and lured her back in the house. And that is all it took - after that we did this whenever she wouldn't come back in on her own - and it worked! Brittany liked many different types of people food but the one "dog" treat that she always loved all her life was Milkbones - so much so that we always bought the gigantic box from Costco.
And she knew that box was hers. We would put it up on the counter and she would stand by the counter and just look up and stare at the box - then she would spin around a few times and then look at it some more until finally someone would notice this poor starving pooch and come and give her what she craved LOL! They say Mastiff aren't one of the really "smart" dogs but to me this one was pretty darn "crafty" LOL!
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