Turtlewoman

Empty Nest Syndrome May 31, 2009

Saturday, May 30, 2009

First, an update on the number of babies. We had a most pleasant surprise about 3 days ago to discover there were two babies, not one.

Mama left the nest today for long periods of time. When she finally returned she perched on a branch about 5 feet from her babies no doubt trying to encourage them to leave the nest. Dad was there also but instead of trying to help with the babies he was trying to mate. Poor Mom – she had her claws  full trying  to homeschool  her children and deal with an amorous mate all at the same time. The babies spent the hot desert afternoon fluttering their wings wildly strengthing them for their first flight. Do baby birds fear that first solo flight?

Sunday morning, May 31, 2009

Baby Doves, May 2009

The babies are not in the nest. My heart is in my throat as I search the entire yard inside the fenced in area. I am worried that our dogs might have gotten them but there is no sign of the babies anywhere. No feathers floating about and no signs of struggle. Suddenly the parents appear, flying about in an agitated state. The babies have to be nearby, but where? I continue my search for a good 10 minutes. Finally I notice the parents on the ground on the outside of the fence. We have our own small Mesquite bosque (forest) in this area, perhaps the babies are in one of the trees? I crouch down low to the ground so I can see the parents and then I begin to carefully scan the trees. There they are – huge sigh of relief and big smile. They are safely perched together on a low branch of a Mesquite on the “safe” side of the fence well away from our dogs. Mom and Dad are standing watch nearby. Did the parents know they had to get their babies away from the dogs? Were they well aware of the danger? Of course, the  babies are not totally safe anywhere. As long as they are young and just learning to fly they are at their most vulnerable. Somehow I am able to accept that they might not survive the hostile desert environment. I find it far more difficult to accept the idea that they might not survive the equally hostile human/pet environment.

Roadrunner: a Cuckoo Bird May 17, 2009

Roadrunner perched in the Orphan

I was standing by my kitchen sink fixing a glass of iced tea on this warm Sunday afternoon when a Roadrunner hopped into view in the fenced-in portion of our backyard. This fellow probably came for a drink of water but first decided to check out the Mesquite tree which shades most of this fenced in area.

We live in the Sonoran Desert on a 5 acre piece of land. We have views that stretch out on 2 sides of our property and go on for miles. We fenced in a small portion off the back of our house and installed a doggy door when we first moved here nearly 14 years ago. This small area has since grown into a miniature oasis with mature plants,  two Mesquite trees (one named The Orphan – but that’s another story) which provide shade for most of this area, flagstone in part of the area, benches, gardens, and water in various places for our dogs as well as for visiting wildlife. Before going to the water this guy decided to check out the view from the Mesquite and that’s when I was able to get a picture of him.  Roadrunners are fun-to-watch members of the ground cuckoo family.  They are quick enough to catch and eat rattlesnakes which make them beneficial to have around. However, I have never actually seen them eat rattlers. They do catch and eat many of the Collared lizards we have around our house.  They make a coo coo coo sound which becomes extremely loud when they have just caught their prey. Although these birds are able fly they are called ground cuckoos because they are a rather heavy bird in relation to their wing size and spend most of their time on the ground. The fellow in this picture flew into the base of the tree and then climbed to get to his perch on a branch about 18 inches over my head.  When he decided it was safe (I had gone back into the house) he climbed down to get his drink.  I watched him from our kitchen window and as he drank he was continuously on the lookout for danger, alternately raising and flattening the black crest atop his head. When the crest was flat it looked very much like a slightly off-kilter toupee.  He must have had other business to attend to because as soon as he had finished his drink he strutted off through the back gate and was gone.

Fog in the Sonoran Desert January 24, 2009

Today, Saturday, January 24, 2009, we awoke to an anomaly in the otherwise sunny and dry Sonoran Desert – FOG!  I took my dogs walking in it. Adjectives such as ethereal, ephemeral, and ghostly came to mind. This is something that happens infrequently – say once or twice a year – here in the desert. When it happens everyone gets out “in it”. Everyone talks about it as in,  “Did you see the fog Saturday morning?” “Wasn’t it beautiful?”  Since I am working on learning how to take better pictures I went back for my camera. Two dogs on two separate leashes and having only two hands proved to be a bit of a challenge while trying to also hold my tiny camera and take pictures that weren’t wobbly. Here are two that turned out – well, not too badly:

Fog in Aguila 01/24/09

Fog in Eagle Roost 01/24/09

The mountains in the near distance in both of these (above) pictures are not visible through the fog.

. . . and then the fog burned off, the sun came out, we were back home after a 4 mile walk and our girls decided a nap in the sun was in order. . .

A nap in the sun following a walk in the fog. 01/24/09

That’s Daisy on the left. Daisy is our resident couch potato. Molly is taking lessons on proper napping techniques from Daisy.  It appears Molly is a good student. Plants in background are showing signs of recent cold weather damage but they will survive. Sage in red pot and Lemon Balm in green pot. If it isn’t in a big pot Molly digs it up. The two tiny pots just visible between the big ones are baby Rosemary’s which I started from the mother plant. They are being protected from the elements until they are a bit bigger.

Time to get back to the laundry.

Onward and Upward – Lindy

Once a Week Intention :) WHOOPS! January 24, 2009

I ordered two linocuts of turtles from Sherrie York of Brush and Barren in Salida, CO (one of my very favorite places). I was able to finally frame them this weekend. I took a number of shots and the one that turned out the clearest is the one with the flash in the pic. You can see the thin black frame I chose for the pic – I didn’t want a large frame to detract from the turtles.

Turtle Linocuts by Sherrie York, Salida, CO

Single Turtle - at top of frame

Two Turtles on Log - bottom linocut

 Read Sherrie’s blog at “Brush and Barren“. You can connect to her website directly from her blog.  Sherrie’s service is excellent and very friendly and her art work is, in my opinion, beautiful. I really love my turtles :-D.

Onward and Upward –

Lindy

Catch-Up January 11, 2009

I’m going to try and play catch-up here with a little bit about a lot of things. My goal for 2009 BTW – to blog at least once a week. Here’s hoping I can do it.

First, I want to thank all of you who have visited, read and responded to “Molly’s Puppies”. The latest word we have from BARC is that all the adoptive parents are saying the same thing about our babies, “sweet, adorable, funny, cute, enthusiastic, curious, intelligent, socially well-mannered, playful”. I am, of course,  thrilled to hear this. We did not set out with the idea in mind to make them “socially acceptable”. However, who can resist picking up, holding, cuddling, and playing with puppies? Certainly not us. 😀

Molly resting with her Dad 😀

This pic. was taken after Molly ate the couch. She actually only ripped into the middle cushion. The couch shall remain with us and remain covered with sheets until Molly has decided she no longer has to literally eat us out of house and home. At that time we may get another couch – but this one is still soooooo very comfy.  Molly is all healed as you can see in this pic. and is obviously in 7th heaven. I think her Dad was about to fall asleep with her when I snapped the shot – he looks a tad surprised (no, he’s not angry:).

My favorite Irish pooch, Coco sent us a doggy “Hi” from Ballinamore, Ireland. Coco was also a rescue and Liz believes her to be about a year old now. Liz has gone through similar chewing incidents – goes with the territory that comes with adopting a young or frightened dog.  We just accept it and move on. One thing about Molly – she knows the minute she sees the look on our faces when we discover a new chew that is not approved of – she is devastated. She gives us the most sorrowful, big-brown-eyed look one can possibly imagine. Our hearts melt.  If you would like to see Coco in action as well as some great pics of Ireland click on the link to Liz.

Knitting: My MIL is 86 and instead of needing anything they are planning to get rid of much of what they have accumulated and move into an assisted living apartment. So for Christmas I knit her a small satchet stuffed with fresh-dried lavender that she can stick in with her undies or linens.

Lavender scented satchet

My thanks to Melissa owner of and knitter extraordinaire at Inish Knits, Cedar MI for this pattern. I also purchased the yarn from her; an absolutely delightful-to-knit-with Debbie Bliss Primo, a blend of bamboo and wool.  I have ordered more of this yarn in many different colors from Melissa and plan on making more of these little sachets for gifts in the future. Melissa blogs at The Land of Wool and Honey.

Wolf Moon: I went outside last night at sunset to see this moon.  It was so beautiful – made me think I should write a poem but I’m not a poet.

Wolf Moon over Sonoran Desert 01/10/09

Used the telescopic lense on Exilim

just another angle. . .

 All three pictures were taken looking east and slightly to the north from our carport.

As the rabbit says, “That’s all for now folks.”

Namaste and the best of the new the year to all of you,  Lindy

Molly’s Story September 6, 2008

Molly - August 2008

At approximately 5:00 p.m. on the afternoon of Thursday, August 14, 2008 the phone rang and I answered it. Doug, my husband was calling to tell me he was on the Salome Rd and had just found a dog. The Salome Rd. is a basically deserted 9 mile stretch of paved 2-lane ribbon in the desert with nothing at all on it – no houses, no easily available water with very little vegetation due to severe overgrazing. In fact, this area of desert has been so overgrazed there are no longer even any cattle out there. We use this road to get from the freeway to the road we need to get to our house. There is a canal that crosses the Salome Rd about 1/2 way along this stretch. The canal, heavily fenced presumably to stop people from jumping in, delivers water to the Phoenix metro area 50 miles to the east from the nearly depleted Colorado River 100 miles to the west.

 The dog: she appeared to have been abandoned, the temperature was 105 degrees and she was trying desperately to find some shade to protect herself. Doug told me she looked like a Beagle and that she was pregnant and probably very hungry as her ribs showed through her skin; she had no collar. What he did not immediately see were the burns on her body which were covered by fur; she was covered in ticks. I told him to bring her home if he could catch her. He said she was already lying on the front seat of the car.  When Doug pulled into the carport 45 minutes later I immediately opened the passenger side door and looked into the loneliest little face and widest brown eyes I had ever seen on a dog. I immediately, with no previous thought, called her Molly and it stuck. Doug said she had been asleep the entire trip home. She was friendly, obviously relieved to have been rescued, and thoroughly exhausted. We brought her in, fed her, and gave her all the water she wanted. She slept in our dog carrier that night. Our dog, Daisy, and our 2 cats were curious but for the most left her alone. Friday was difficult because I had to teach and Doug had to go to work so we made her as comfortable as possible in our shaded backyard. We have a doggy door from our house into the backyard which was left open for Daisy to use. Molly was not happy at being left all day and was very happy when we returned home. Friday evening we gave the extremely dirty Molly a bath which she seemed to truly enjoy. She learned to use the doggy door that same evening by watching Daisy and not once in the 3 weeks she has been with us has she messed in the house. Saturday morning we had an appointment to take Daisy to our vet because she had developed an eye infection Thursday morning  and we took Molly along as well. Nicki, the vet technician who had named Daisy when we had rescued her (another story entirely), scanned Molly for a microchip and found none. Our vet gave her a quick check up and a rabies shot telling us that the rabies shot is a “dead” vaccine and would not hurt the puppies but that all other vaccines would have to wait until the pups were born and no longer nursing. We took Molly home with us, told her she had a new home and we would take care of her. We gave her a bright red collar which looks great next to her jet black fur. Doug put the rabies tag on her collar and ordered an ID tag for her just like the one Daisy wears thus proclaiming Molly to belong to us. She now proudly wears both tags.

A very pregnant Molly resting peacefully in our cool house.

  As for the pregnancy, Molly was huge but we did not know how close she might be to giving birth. Fortunately Doug was off on Monday and she began birthing at 8:00 a.m. and by 2:00 p.m. had delivered 9 puppies – all of them as black as she is. Molly is black with a brown muzzle and brown paws. It has been two weeks since the puppies’ births and they are still in their nesting box under a little used desk in our office. There are seven pups – she lost two of them within the first 48 hours. The remaining pups appear to be healthy and happy and very well fed as they all have developed round little bellies. Molly is a good mother for such a young dog – probably not quite a year old.

Ayla checking out our newcomer.

 The above picture was taken on Molly’s first night with us – the only night she spent sleeping in the carrier. We did this not only because we had no idea how this stranger-to-us little dog would react to our household while we were asleep but we also had no idea how our dog, Daisy, and our two cats would react to Molly.

I do want to add here that we used PetFinder, FidoFinder and PetSmart to report a Beagle mix of her description as being found but no one has ever responded to the notices. Doug and I had also gone back and driven the length of the Salome Rd. and adjacent areas looking for signs for a lost dog but found nothing. When we said that Molly had a forever home our vet officially declared her as belonging to us.

Molly and her seven puppies.

 Molly, 7 wriggling puppies. Some of her burned areas showing.

 As mentioned earlier, Molly was covered with ticks which took nearly 2 days to remove before finally getting all of them. During the removal we felt some rough spots on her back but thought they were places where the ticks had bitten her. On Wednesday morning, 2 days after the puppies’ births Doug decided to really investigate and found what he thought might be mange or some other parasite on her skin. It was difficult to see these spots because they were covered with fur. He was able to take her into the vet that same morning. What was discovered was even more horrifying. As the vet shaved the hair off around these spots it was discovered that Molly had been burned. Two of the spots were quite deep. The vet shaved around all of the burned areas, and provided us with a treatment regime for the burns which included a mild oral antibiotic twice a day so as not to harm the pups plus a topical antibiotic ointment which we applied directly to the burned areas as often as possible. Molly kept licking the ointment off but we didn’t put a collar on her because she would have been unable to care for her puppies properly with that thing around her neck not to mention that she could not get out the doggy door wearing that contraption. Some of these burns are quite deep and all of them are still healing as of this writing. Molly was also given calcium tablets to put in her food twice a day to help with her milk for the puppies.

 As much as both Doug and I love dogs Beagles are a breed we knew next to nothing about. We are learning! Molly is extremely curious and into everything. She is a bit pushy but not in an obnoxious way – she simply knows what she wants or she is trying to learn about her new family and is not shy about getting her way. She is bright, learns quickly, and fortunately continues to get along with everyone in the household. The cats are beginning to trust that she will not chase them nor try to harm them in any way and Daisy, being the tolerant dog she is, has accepted Molly into her world.