Chicken

Hi there friends. This is The Daily Bone and I’m your lovable doggie reporter 

Chester L. W. Spaniel.

My esteemed colleague Joseph (Joey dog) Spaniel and I thought it would be a lazy Saturday today. In fact, we spent the morning lounging around.

But then things started to get interesting. Dad decided to get out the Beast and finish chipping all those sticks. We went out to investigate and soon discovered he had left the back yard gate open. So Joey decided to take a little walk on his own. Fortunately he didn’t go very far. (We doggies are not supposed to be out of the yard without a leash. That’s the law in our town.)

Once back in the yard, in a feat of amazing courage, Joey dog went over to the big scary noisy Beast machine stick-chipper brush-grinder monster thing, while it was running, to make sure Dad wasn’t putting his arms and legs and fingers and toes in there. Satisfied that Dad was OK, Joey quickly returned to the safety of the garage.  

We decided it was better to stay indoors and check our email and blogs. You know how much I like to learn new words, right? My good friend Charlie from Australia used a word on his blog that I never heard before: chooks. What the … ? So I looked it up. It means chickens. What a coincidence! This morning, Miss Charlee Puppy from Boca Raton, Florida just sent me some pictures of a rooster running around in the street by her house. Apparently in her neighborhood, a few people raise chickens in their yards. Charlee says there is someone who comes around and inspects the chicken keepers regularly. One guy had too many roosters, and so he tossed one over the fence when the inspector arrived. This now free ranging rooster has set up shop and harasses all the stray cats in the area. Charlee's neighbor, Spider Mike, indicated that he might just catch that old rooster and put him in a pot for dinner one day.  

Wow! We had no idea what a chicken looked like. We always thought they looked like this: 

Yum. Well, you learn something new every day! 

There was one more thing I learned. There’s another definition of the word, chooks, and here it is: 

A handsome, loving, cuddle extraordinaire who always makes you laugh when you're feeling down. A person who's smart, generous and adorably dorky. Someone who always knows what you're thinking and is always your partner in crime. They're happy to travel with you to the ends of the earth, or just to the end of the couch. They're the 'Mario' to your 'Luigi', the 'cup' to your 'cake' and the love of your life. 

That seems to describe Joey dog and me to a tee, don’t you think? Are we a couple of chooks? 

Here's Charlie's blog address: 

www.charliedownunderinoz.blogspot.com 

Nap time. 

Angus Returns on Donut Day

Hello squeaky toy fans! This is The Daily Bone and I’m your exuberant doggie host 

Chester L. W. Spaniel.

Today we finally got some pictures of our respectable Border Terrier friend, and former UK citizen, Angus. If you’ve only just started to following The Daily Bone, you can learn more about him on the post dated 8/27/13 entitled, Angus and the Bunny Militia.

What is Agent Double-O Angus up to these days? In a word, camouflage. Angus says that using this technique of blending into your surroundings, you can scare the crap out of the Evil Squirrel Cartel , the CCC (Conniving Chipmunk Consortium) the Bunny Militia, those obnoxious grackles, and other trespassers. What a clever little chap!

Can you see him?

However, Angus, as well as the rest of us doggies, had better keep on our toes. Here's the latest top secret video of the Evil Squirrel Cartel summer training camp. Grrrrrrrrrrr!

And now for the dessert portion of our show. Today was National Donut Day! Hooray! I wish I had known about this earlier, so I could have had the chance to go out and get some donuts. My esteemed colleague Joseph (Joey dog) Stephens was equally disappointed. But all was not lost. Much to our surprise and delight, one of our humans just happened to have a couple donuts, and shared them with us. Yum! We plan to spend the rest of the day in a sugar coma. 

Tranquil Thursday

Hello. This is The Daily Bone and I'm your humble doggie host Chester L. W. Spaniel, along with my senior colleague Joseph (Joey dog) Spaniel.

Today we have nothing to report. It was cool and overcast all day. We spent some time just lounging on the soft grass, enjoying the nice breeze.

We didn't neglect our homeland security duties, though. Upon patrolling the yard, we found a bunch of bird feathers. They were very soft and downy, so we doggies suspect they were from a baby bird that may have been caught by a hawk. It wouldn't be the first time we've found things like that. There are a lot of hawks around here. We were pleased to hear that the grackles have decided to raise their raucous brood in the neighbor's bushes rather than ours. Hope he likes squawking!

There was no activity from the Evil Squirrel Cartel today. They gave up their real estate plans pretty fast this year, and probably went directly into foreclosure. Well, the housing market is tough in this neighborhood when it comes to squirrels! We did hear a few chipmunks discussing their options in flipping the half-demolished squirrel abode for a profit, but we doubt it's worth the effort. Oh, the drain pipe is still available, and it includes running water and free barking.

There's also quite a desirable plot still available back here, if you happen to be a toad! 

Whew! Being a real estate agent is a lot of work! 

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Can You Dig It?

Hello ladies and gentlemen and doggies! This is The Daily Bone and I’m your enthusiastic doggie reporter Chester L. W. Spaniel.

Today was a great day! My humans started taking the branches off the top of the compost pile so I could finally do some serious digging for the mousies or shrews or whatever else was living in there. I bet all you terriers out there thought you were the digging pros. Well I’ve got news for you! I dug quite a respectable hole. Hooray for cocker spaniels! We’re  all-purpose doggies! Just look at my excellent digging prowess:

What lovely rich soil in there! Last year all that dirt was kitchen scraps, like pineapple cores, wilted lettuce, egg shells, and potato peels, and yard waste, like weeds, grass clippings, and leaves. I found lots of big fat worms, grubs, centipedes and beetles. But, alas, absent from the vicinity was the Miscellaneous Mousie Mob. I suspect that after they heard the tremendous noise from the Beast yesterday, they vacated the premises. 

I got good and dirty! 

Wooooooooohoooooo! Look at the big hole I dug! 

My observant colleague kept up surveillance during all this activity and was sure to bark whenever trespassers were sited. 

My humans eventually got all the sticks sorted and moved and ready for the Beast, which they'll run tomorrow. Enough work for today! I was so dirty from my dig that I had to have a bath. I love playing in the water too! What a great day! 

Fire Up the Beast!

Hi everybody! This is The Daily Bone and I'm your humble doggie host Chester L. W. Spaniel.

Today Dad fired up the Beast! This is the machine that makes little chips out of branches and brush. As expected, it made a beastly big noise!

I watched from a distance for a little while.

My associate Joseph (Joey dog) Spaniel watched from the garage. 

Soon we both wanted to go inside the house. I don't know how my humans were able to work with it for an hour. What a noise! It might take a couple days for them to chip all the sticks that are piled on top of the compost pile, so I couldn't catch the shrew that lives in there yet.

I'll get you my pretty! And your little grubs too! Grrrrrrr. 

In the meantime, I want to tell you our story about starlings. We have lots of starlings around here. Did you know that if you whistle a tune to a starling for a while, it will soon learn to imitate it? Then you'll regret it because you'll be hearing it for the rest of the summer! In winter we see big flocks of starlings like the ones in the video link below. They like to eat the wild grapes that grow everywhere. My humans say you should never park your car under a flock of starlings because it will soon be covered with purple poop! 

In summer they build nests in the most unlikely places. One day in early spring, we opened up the gas grill, hoping to have the first barbecue of the year. We found it was totally filled with sticks and weeds and trash. It was a good thing we didn't just turn the grill on without checking or else the birdies would have had quite a surprise! Boom! Dad has since put wire mesh into the sides so they can no longer get in there. 

Another year they built a nest under the eaves of our house where they found a tiny opening in the soffit. We doggies alerted the humans to its presence. We smelled something terrible, and went into the room with the trap door in the ceiling. We stood up on our hind legs and pointed to that little door until the humans opened it and got a whiff of that awful stink. Then Dad climbed up the ladder to the roof to investigate. He found that starlings had crammed the entire space with starling nesting stuff. It was enough to fill a 40 gallon trash bag! A couple of their babies had died in there and that was what smelled so horrid. Dad patched up the hole, and we all lived happily ever after.

The starling nest was underneath that section of roof in the picture above. Now there's an alien space ship standing over it.

Yawn! Time for sleep.

Good night.

This just in:

five-out-of-fashion-dog-breeds-this-vet-misses?

For Our Squirrel Chasing Friends

Hi there everyone! This is The Daily Bone and I’m your humble doggie reporter 

Chester L. W. Spaniel.

This one’s just for all you squirrel chasing doggies out there. Maybe some of you have just joined our blog and haven’t had the time go read everything. I’ve written a lot! So today I’m putting in a link to an older TDB that has funny videos about squirrels.

Yesterday, I was sure I heard a shrew in the compost pile. They make a really loud, high pitched squeaky sound. I know this because I caught one once and chased a few more. Shrews are members of the Miscellaneous Mousie Mob. They eat all kinds of things like worms and grubs and sometimes even mice and snakes. My humans say I should leave them alone because they have a toxic bite and are actually good to have around, especially when the slugs start eating up Mom’s hostas. They also like climbing up the inside of the aluminium siding of our house. More than once I’ve heard one squeaking halfway up the corner molding. We’ve since plugged up those openings. There is a link below to the TDB in which I actually caught a shrew.

Here I am trying to remove some branches from the pile so I can get to that shrew.

Then there’s the Conniving Chipmunk Consortium. They are a type of squirrel, but are a lot smaller than the members of the Evil Squirrel Cartel. Once I chased a chipmunk up a drain pipe.  I kept it in there for quite a while before my humans came out and took the pipe apart so the chipmunk could get out. Now I regularly inspect this drain pipe for chipmunk activity.

Dad says he might start up the Beast tomorrow to chew up that big pile of sticks. That should be a very interesting day! We'll be sure to have an up-to-the-minute report on The Daily Bone.

Finally, here's a video with my favorite narrator, Zefrank. Humans really are a dog's best friend! Hope you had fun today! 

Silent Sunday