Sheepdog Trials

We went over to see a bit of the Sheepdog Trials Saturday.
It was pretty interesting. The Fuzz's Sweetie saw something about it in the local paper. We had heard of it before, but never thought to go.
As you can see in the picture above, there were a lot of these black and white dogs there.
This was a first for us. The Fuzz's Sweetie brought along a friend who was interested also. The folks out there seemed nice enough. They were willing to answer The Fuzz's pretty basic questions about what was going on out there. We enjoyed it.
First the dog has to run all the way across the field to get the sheep. These shots were taken with a zoomy-type lens so the distance is a bit distorted. It was really a pretty good ways across.
The dog has to herd the 4 sheep back across the field to the handler, who I guess is a sheepherder. On the way they are supposed to pass though a gate out there in the middle of the middle. You can see that happening in that 2nd pix. After they get to the handler, he/she sends them back out to pass though a couple more gates out in the field. The handler is using a whistle to tell the dog where to take the sheep. When they get back again, the dog and handler have to separate the sheep into two groups. This seems to be a bit tricky as the sheep don't seem to like it. That's what they're doing in those next couple pix. After that, they put them in a small pen. All this has to happen in 9 min. The dog in that next pix looks just a little different than the others. The woman said it has a bit of Bearded Collie in it. What ever it was, it seemed to do the best out of the few we saw.And here's a couple of the spectators taking it easy in the shade.

Turtles Of The East

Since we're on this Turtle Thing, The Fuzz thought it might be a good time for this wonderful
Turtle Combo.

This was a collaborative effort by a couple of local unknowns.
Hope you enjoy it.

More Turtles

And since we're on the subject, here's a look at some more Turtles in a rendition by one of The Fuzz's favorite Little Known Local Artists.

Slow Visitor

Things have been a bit slow around here lately. We have been staying busy, but not much of anything new or exciting. Until now.
As The Fuzz looked out the window the other day, (We won't go into detail on what he was doing at the time) he saw this visitor out in the yard by the edge of the woods.As you can see, he's a pretty good sized fellow. And mean. I suppose The Fuzz might have aggravated him a little, but this does seem to be a bit of overreaction.
He couldn't even get along with the Kitty Cats. What a Grouch!The Fuzz doesn't understand why he was so unsociable, but in the end there was nothing left for it but to just leave him to himself. But The Fuzz was thankful to still have all his fingers. We got tiered of waiting for him to leave, so we just went back to our own affairs. Later in the day, he was gone, who knows where.

Alice Packer

The Fuzz took Alice camping this weekend.
His Sweetie and Young Daughter went too. Here is a picture of Alice, his ALICE pack. In this shot Alice has been removed from the frame The Fuzz rides her on. This is a handy feature since it's easier to squeeze her into the tent with His Sweetie and himself. The Fuzz picked up Alice one day at work some time ago. That was back before the New World Order where the trash is never handled by real people.
In that situation, Alice would have been doomed. But thankfully, those were saner days, and Alice was rescued. Still, she had no visible means of support at the time, but that big hearted Fuzz took her in anyway. Just a little modification was all that was needed to make her a match for his old pack frame, and they have gone on to serve together quite effectively.
They did have a fine camping trip. It was short, only 1 night, but the weather was excellent. It was good to get off into the mountains again even if only for a short time.