cairn on cairn fun

[pkcrossley]

redmon heard the cheep of a chipmunk in the rock pile at the back of the garden, and suddenly it was 1854 all over again, and he had to rid the his personal cairn of the vermin...

[Nikki]

cute!

[kayharley]

Chipmunk chasing is the BEST!! Too bad they're so darn cute or it would be a victory when our Cairns caught one.

Great pics...

[RockStarz]

Nigel says, "Oh yeah!! Now that's just good fun!"

[pkcrossley]

the chipmunk wasn't caught. it is not permitted to catch them here, as they are too cute. i refused repeated requests by the cairn to dismantle the cairn.

[CathyAnn]

Piper is so prey driven and determined that he probably would have that all dismantled himself!!

NOTHING gets by him, nothing!!

[pkcrossley]

yikes! not good on gardens is he, then?

my dog is a bit confused on the prey drive at times. there are rabbits, guinea pigs and hamsters in the house, where he can rub noses with them. he knows they are all under my protection (crazy as he considers that), and so he seems to generalize it, at least in the case of rabbits, which he sees constantly lounging around the lawns of my mother's suburban town, and now he hardly looks at them twice. chipmunks, however, don't live in my house, so he considers them fair game. unfortunately for him he still gets scolded if he chases them too seriously, which takes the fun out of it for him somewhat. it would be nice for him to enjoy the unfettered joy of trapping and killing cute little animals, but i haven't been able to bring myself to go along with it. let him eat newman's own peanut butter treats.

[kayharley]

We have gerbils and none of mine ever give them a second look....even when I'm cleaning the cages and the little critters are more easily seen.

Guess we're just gonna have to get ourselves a pet chipmunk, eh?

[pkcrossley]

it is strange, you think of cairns as having such specific primal drives, but clearly they quickly internalize some human values. redmon is still very aggressive in the usual situations and and prey-driven in a very general way, but he can make exceptions on the basis of how he believes the world he shares with humans is organized. if he lived with a hunter or an enemy of small furry animals, i'm sure he'd be as quick to jump at and kill rabbits as they next guy.

hence my faith that as we humans struggle everyday to channel aggression in the right directions, our cairns can be right by us doing the same thing themselves.