Dogs and Cats....Cats and Dogs

We love all our farm critters.   The "inside dogs".   The "outside dogs".  The barn cats.   The cows and chickens.   Yes, we love all our animals.   But these Pyrenees puppies have stolen Joel's heart.

They greet us every time we step off our back porch.   They keep Joel company each trip he makes to the chicken coop, sitting at the gate waiting patiently for him to return from completing his bird chores.  They walk to the mailbox with me every noontime, and proclaim "A package has arrived from UPS" as the delivery man puts the parcel in a bin we keep outside our entry gate.

And whenever we have any work to perform in the barn they are always there, guarding us(you know that's a very important job for a Pyre), keeping us company, and "assisting" with shooing the cats around the barn.   When we mucked out the barn a few days ago I looked past the gate separating the cow pen from the rest of the barn and there were the puppies, lying quietly and keeping an eye on everyone and everything that was happening.

We were gifted our barn cats the month we bought the alpacas.   There was a Mama cat and her three kittens.   Mama was pretty feral, as were all the other cats at the farm where we bought our alpacas.   I've never had a cat as a pet before and so I had no expectations of what kind of relationship we would develop over time.  

Well, it wasn't long before Mama cat actually let me pet her, occasionally, as I was feeding her and her babies.    She not only tolerated my petting but started to meow her request of "more, please!".   It wasn't too long and her babies were also allowing me to stroke their soft furry backs....some were happy to receive the added attention, others not so much.   To this day, Chloe is the most stand-offish of the four cats.

How do the cats and dogs get along, you ask?    Surprisingly, really well.    When the puppies first came to the farm they would try to satisfy their curiosity about the cats by walking right up to them and attempting to sniff them.   Ha!   That was usually met with a quick swipe of a cat's paw to their nose.    The puppies soon learned their limits with each of the cats and now the four cats and two puppies have developed a healthy respect for one another.

The cats have grown bolder in their attitude toward the puppies and I've even caught them(the cats) lying on their back, taunting the puppy to move in ever closer.   And then just that suddenly, the cat will bolt up and run thru the large open weave of the wire walls separating the pens in the barn.   It's quite a dance these critters perform and they never seem to tire of playing with one another.

Except for Chloe.   She had just about had enough of the puppies on this particular day and she swiftly climbed her way up, up, up higher into the rafters of the barn.

Nope, I'm not high enough yet!

"Ah, yes.  Now that's better." she says.   And the puppies walk around below her all the while wagging their tails because they know soon enough she'll come back down and play once again.

The weather was so beautiful on this one day last week that Joel and I decided to take a walk down off the farm into the valley below.    I never tire of the view of the majestic bluffs that line the lower portion of our farm.  We feel so blessed to be stewards of this land for a few years and love our time spent with the critters running around the farm.   Come and see us sometime and we'll show you why living here makes us so happy.

Looking forward to acquiring more critters this Spring,
Debbie