A lot of people are wondering how our dogs cope during severe weather, like our current "Snowmaggedon", the blizzard from the week-end. Ben and Sophie, as the seniors going on 11 years old, are house dogs as soon as the temperature starts dropping in autumn. If we had puppies, they would also be inside. As for the others, our kennel is well built with drop doors to keep the dogs inside during heavy wind, snow or rain. Friday night, we dropped the doors and with their heavy show coats, the dogs generated enough body heat to keep their water buckets ice free! When I opened the doors on Saturday morning, the dogs made short work of making paths in their runs and packing the snow down. That night, I wasn't comfortable with closing the doors, after hearing too many reports of collapsed roofs, including on a barn. The kennel is surrounded by trees and even our sturdy building would not be a match for a couple of those massive oaks. I was concerned that if a tree came down, the dogs could be trapped inside. The only effect has been that we've had to break ice in the water buckets morning and night which delights Sadie. She's an ice cruncher! She dunks her muzzle into the bucket, fishes around for the biggest piece she can find then happily crunches away while the water drips off her whiskers.
The dogs love to play in the snow and they were more than ready to go out on Saturday. I wasn't in the mood to stand outside while the snow pelted my face, so they had to wait until Sunday for a chance to play. Lauren couldn't wait! She barked incessantly at me as soon as I went outside with their breakfast. Once she ate, she started jumping against the gate, pleading to go out. I had a couple chores to do inside before they could play and as I was moving around the house, I could see Lauren steadily staring at the window, willing me to come back out. But when I let them out, Lauren found the snow to be too deep for her liking and she kept to the couple paths we had made in front of the kennel. Gibson, Dixie and I made two huge circles around the play yard, then everyone came running through. Actually, for Claire and Phoebe it was more of a short stroll. They can become quite the princesses in snow, acting as if they are too delicate to romp with the others. Claire did forget for a minute that she couldn't be in deep snow and started to run with the gang, then made my heart skip a few beats as she turned towards me with her front leg held high, her paw dangling. I was afraid she had somehow broken her leg, wondering how we'd get her to the vet's, only to find she had ice balls between her toes and she wanted me to take care of it!
This morning's play session found us making more paths through the snow in the play yard. Gibson, Dixie and Sadie forged ahead and found a spot along the fence that is so packed down that they did not break through the snow. They could have easily hopped over the fence and I could see the wheels turning in Dixie's head as she was starting to figure that out. Somehow, she communicated that to Sadie and the two of them stood at the fence, almost like they were double daring each other to go over first. I decided play time was over and got everyone but those two back towards the kennel before the pack mentality started to kick in and everyone thought about hopping the fence. Fortunately, I can bribe them with the promise of a cookie and got most everyone in, but this morning Sadie and Dixie weren't buying it! They picked up on the panic in my voice and refused to come back. They started teasing me, taking a couple steps away from the fence and down the path, then bouncing back on the snow and towards the fence. Finally, the lure of cookies brought them in. All I could envision was them getting over the fence, finding packed snow on the other side, jumping on to the drive and running out to the road. We don't have too much traffice yet, but the road is basically one lane and treacherous.
Tonight's forecast is snow through the night and heavy winds, causing drifts up to 6 feet. I'm planning on doubling and tripling the dogs into the runs on the east side of the kennel to concentrate their body heat. I'm not looking forward to tomorrow morning and the prospect of battling wind gusts of possibly 40 mph and blowing snow to feed the dogs.
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