Dogs Watching the Bunny Show & Gearing Up for a New Project

Sheba watching a bunny

Sheba watching a bunny

When Sheba was younger she would not stay in the yard.  So I used a radio collar on her to limit her wandering.  She learned that the bunnies were always out of reach, so eventually gave up chasing them.  She no longer wears the collar, and once in a while she will chase bunnies into the woods.  But it amuses me that both of the dogs will often just watch them for entertainment.

Sheba watches, but Sunny pays no attention

Sheba watches, but Sunny pays no attention.

The other day Ron and I were laughing at what kind of dog we have that won’t chase rabbits when I starting singing, “You ain’t nothing but a hound dog.  You ain’t never caught a rabbit; you ain’t no friend of mine.”  😀

The dogs lose interest

The dogs lose interest

The bunny is still there after the dogs have moved on

The bunny is still there after the dogs have moved on

I’m gearing up to replacing the Casita’s translucent door window with a clear, smoked glass, opening window.  I am really looking forward to being able to open it for added ventilation, and having another window to enjoy the view through. 

And it will be especially nice to be able to see who is at the door when I hear a knock!

 

Wild Edibles, an Owl, Gorgeous Flowers & Dog in the Pond

At the edge of the pond

At the edge of the pond. No alligators here, but a juvenile raccoon raids the apple snails (escargot) every night.

Today was a visit and do chores and laundry day.  So I’ll just share pictures of our beautiful free campground here at Ann and Cecil’s.  Driveway camping at its best!

Blackberries are budding

Wild blackberries are budding

Cecil's greenhouse, built on skids so he can move it with his tractor for optimal sun exposure as the seasons change.

Cecil’s greenhouse, built on skids so he can move it with his tractor for optimal sun exposure as the seasons change.

Cookie and Sheba.  Sheba has calmed down enough that Cookie enjoys her company now!

Cookie and Sheba. Sheba has calmed down enough that Cookie enjoys her company now!

Cookie, Sunny and Sheba

Cookie, Sunny and Sheba

Evening primrose.  They bloom after the sun goes down and all parts are edible.  Cecil has a field of them!

Evening primrose. They bloom after the sun goes down and all parts are edible. Cecil has a field of them!

Look closely and you can see fish in the pond.  They must have forgotten my attempts to catch them last visit!  :)

Look closely and you can see fish in the pond. They must have forgotten my attempts to catch them last visit! 🙂

More fish in the pond

More fish in the pond

This owl perched in the tree near our Casita.  He's a bit fuzzy due to my camera being at maximum zoom.

This owl perched in the tree near our Casita. He’s a bit fuzzy due to my camera being at maximum zoom.

Red honeysuckle blooms

Red honeysuckle blooms

A rose is a rose....

A rose is a rose….

Sunny and Sheba

Sunny and Sheba

Wild onion.  Cecil calls these Egyptian Walking Onions

Wild onion. Cecil calls these Egyptian Walking Onions

Closeup of wild onion tops which will form new plants.

Closeup of wild onion tops which will form new plants.

I just missed the prime bloom season for the wisteria.  These are all that is left now.

I just missed the prime bloom season for the wisteria. These are all that is left now.

Bunnies are Safe Here

Late today, uncharacteristically, Sheba began insistently barking.  I finally went outside to see what was causing all the commotion.

Over in the corner of the yard was a young bunny, munching on grass, calmly ignoring both dogs who were  barking their heads off at it from the deck.  Sunny didn’t see the bunny. He was just barking because Sheba was barking, so he figured he should, too.

Once I came outside, though, Sheba got brave, tore off the deck and chased the bunny into the woods.  What a dog!  😀

I have almost everything packed in the Casita except the refrigerator foods.  Tomorrow I’ll wash the trailer, and we plan to leave for Mississippi Saturday.

Ron will take the truck back to the Chevy dealer again tomorrow to see if they can fix the electrical problems with the 7 pin plug.  After they worked on it last time, the running lights burned very brightly for about an hour, then they all blew.  The bulbs were completely blackened.  Now the new bulbs don’t work at all.  Also, it’s not charging the trailer battery when we tow.  But the brake lights and turn signals work.

Sure hope they can get it right this time!

Slow Day at Cotton Hill

Another view of the Casita from the water, taken yesterday.

This morning was the hot, sultry kind of day that saps all of your energy and ambition.  There was a bright side, though.  It also sapped some of Sheba’s overabundant puppy energy!

A nice alternative to staying penned up

Then this afternoon clouds rolled in and thunder rumbled for a couple of hours.  We got a short little shower, then the storm moved on.  But it left cooler temperatures and a nice breeze in its wake.

While Ron visited other campers, I worked on a counted crosstitch project.  Every two hours I walked the dogs.

It is a real trip walking Sheba and Sunny together.  Sheba races out the full extension of her retractable leash, lunges for butterflies and wasps, picks up pine cones, hickory nuts and sticks, tosses them in the air and catches them, sits to examine bugs and leaves and whatever, then races madly toward Sunny, attacks him with fearsome dog fight noises, then tears off in another zig zag direction at full speed until the leash yanks her, then repeats the process the entire walk.

Bags on board. The greatest solution for carrying poop bags!

I have resisted the idea of a pinch collar, but I think when she is a little older I might consider one, primarily to avoid injury to myself!

Geese families

I’m tired today.  It felt good to just hang around camp and simply enjoy being here.

Camping at Mom’s Place

Casita-scale birthday flower arrangement from Hope

We left Ann’s house after lunch and moved to Mom’s place a mile down the road.

My sister Hope greeted me with a birthday card and a beautiful birthday bouquet just the right size for the camper.  So the removable coffee shelf that Rob built for me has yet another use — flower table!

Mom had visited a friend in the hospital before we got here this morning, then stopped by the furniture store on her way home and bought herself a new mattress.  So Cecil and Ron picked it up for her this afternoon to save delivery charges.

Magnolias high up in the tree

Magnolia closeup taken last year when we were here

 

The magnolias are blooming.  But they are so high up in the tree, it was difficult to get a good photo of them.  So I’ll post a photo taken today, along with a closeup taken last May when we were here for Mom’s birthday.

I kept the dogs in the pen when we first got to Mom’s.  But later this afternoon I relented and let them out.  They headed for the cool dirt underneath the trailer.  Sheba, of course, started digging a cool spot to lie in until I scolded her and put a stop to her project.

There is bare sand covered with fallen leaves underneath the live oak trees, so a hole on the edges of Mom’s property isn’t the disaster it would be elsewhere.  Especially a little hole.  🙂

I’m not digging, Mom. Honest!

Sunny with a leaf hanging from his muzzle

Half a tea ball makes a perfect sink strainer

Parked at Mom’s place

 

I had been looking for a strainer for the camper’s sink, but hadn’t found a store that carried them.  But while we were grocery shopping, I found a mesh tea ball that I thought might work.

I got it home, took the two halves apart, and it just happened to be the perfect size!  No more coffee grounds in the gray water tank now!

 

Poliglow is Finished — and Dog Digging Foil

The trailer is so shiny that you can't really tell where the grass reflection ends and the trailer begins!

I got the PoliGlow right on the bottom of the trailer.  No bubbles, just tough. clear shine!  The reason it worked better on the bottom than on the top is that I did away with the applicator that came with the PoliGlow.  Instead I used a synthetic chamois.  It held the perfect amount of water and I  could maneuver it exactly where I wanted it.

What a difference in ease of use and quality of application.  I was so pleased that I may strip the the top next fall and redo it like I did the bottom!

No dig dog pen!

Sheba has become a digger extraordinaire when I put her outside in her playpen.  I had almost given up on my plan to take the playpen to help contain the dogs when we are camping.  It would be a pain to have to keep them on leash with us all the time.  But today I had a brainstorm.  I found some hardware cloth in the shed.  I put it down, then anchored the pen over it.  It works!

They were outside with me the whole time I was working on the trailer today, safely contained and able to enjoy the goings on!

That roll of hardware cloth will ride in the truck along with the pen whenever we go camping now.  What a lifesaver!

Poliglow

The top half of the Casita is poliglowed

Yesterday and today I got the top half of the Casita stripped and treated with PoliGlow.

I made mistakes.  When I sprayed the applicator with PoliGlow, wind drift deposited bumps of it back onto the trailer.  And I have some bubbles from pushing on the applicator too hard.  And there are some streaks I can’t get rid of.

But at least I know that the fiberglass won’t continue to oxidize and get dull.

I’ll work on the bottom half next week.  It is not severely oxidized — is only beginning to show a little.  And maybe I’ll do a neater job on the bottom half!

Sheba is a digger.  She dug out of her playpen and Sunny followed right behind her through the hole.  I filled in the hole and put both dogs  back into the pen with orders not to dig.  Didn’t work.  🙂   So I’m not sure how I’ll reconcile this with camping next month.

She is makng very little progress with potty training.  Basically if I take her out when I think she needs to go, she cooperates.  But when I figure she will be okay in the house for a half hour or so, she never fails to do something on the floor even if she did both jobs outside 30 minutes earlier.

I’m tired this evening.  Too much climbing up and down ladders and trying to fix streaks and bubbles.  Maybe I should have just waxed the Casita really well!  🙂

 

 

Which is the Guilty Dog?

Hope you enjoy this video as much as I did. It turned a rainy, cold, bleak day around for me!

Rural Ramblings

Tonight Ron and I were sitting on the back deck right before dark.  We looked up and saw a most unusually colored deer browsing the  tender weeds at the edge of the clearing.  She was darker than a normal whitetail and had even darker markings that looked like shadows in the dusk.

Sunny barked, and she kept on grazing.  But then I scolded Sunny and told him to stop barking, and she eased back into the woods.

My flowers all died while we were on our last camping trip.  I used to love vegetable and flower gardening, but learned that you can’t garden and camp a lot.  The two are mutually exclusive activities.

That’s okay.  I’ll take the camping.  I can feast my eyes on the breathtaking wild gardens we encounter on our travels.

While we were gone, someone around here shot some more dogs.  It’s a periodic problem around here.  Usually they shoot dogs that roam whose owners won’t keep them home.  But this time they shot two fenced dogs.

We are keeping a close eye on Sunny.

I am having camping withdrawals.  I can’t wait until we are back on the road again.

  • Enter your email address to subscribe to Tinycamper's blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

    Join 962 other subscribers
  • Cool Stuff!

  • My Blog Topic Categories

  • Blog Stats

    • 1,029,028 hits
%d bloggers like this: