Introducing Sophie & Fletcher

1 May '07 8:54 am

Fletcher would certainly be welcome in my lap!

I re-posted two photos in the guest book - thanks to being newish but feeling welcome myself. I'll post others - it's fun...I hope you will be sharing a lot of pictures, too.

Fox the cat won't be appearing with many garden backdrops - he spends all his time plotting escape, so I try not to be distracted with a camera when I bring him outside. (Though I have to admit, Sketch busted him out the other day while I was at work - she opened the front window somehow - but he was home when I got there.)

1 May '07 1:28 pm

Hi Julia,
I remember you saying how the pup had been hard on your garden. I don't think I mentioned before but when Sophie was a puppy 12 years ago, she chewed up every bit of my very elaborate drip irrigation system. With her sharp little puppy teeth she punctured or sheared every single line, and this in the space of no more than a couple hours. (I very rarely leave them in the yard for long unattended.) Now she is the most law-abiding dog I know, gruffly imposing the rules as she understands them on Fletcher and an older dog, Matilda, I took in several years ago. I didn't catch your pup's name, or was the pup the one, Sketch, who tried to help free the cat.

Sounds like Fox is an inside cat. For the best for everything but the happiness of the cat I suppose. The number of birds and other animals taken out by cats each year is astounding. My father-in-law's little cat has caught hummingbirds, blue jays and other birds as well as and bats and every kind of rodent you can imagine.

2 May '07 3:20 am

Mark,

Yes, Sketch is my little Attila the Hound. I'm too scared to try putting in an irrigation system. She conquered the vegetable garden within the first week of her life with me (she was about five months old and had already survived a high-kill animal shelter, two foster homes, and a rescue society). She ate my 6-foot peach tree a few months later (leaving nothing but a deadly-looking stake in the ground that I had to pull up), one rose bush which she happily uprooted herself, a potted elderberry, and Leonard (my baby loquat tree, who so far has survived the ordeal with just a few scrapes that look healable).

She's getting better, but thanks to her rough start in life she has been a difficult dog to train. Luckily, though she's stubborn, at least she's also intelligent - she'll learn a new command in four repetitions. Unluckily, she doesn't see commands as imperative.

Sophie sounds like the perfect mentor! My family had an old miniature poodle who used to train all the incoming puppies - the easiest way to train a dog is to let another dog do all the work.

Fox is mainly an indoor cat - I do bring him outside when I'm home, but only when I can watch him. My front yard is fenced in but he finds too many escape routes, and I don't want him killing things, either.

21 May '07 12:25 pm

Last weekend my sister Barbara came up with her boyfriend Mike and their new dog, Tater. Apparently they were inspired by Fletcher to get one like him. It turns out that Mike's sister breeds these dogs so they got a little boy from them. Tater is about 7 or 8 months old. What he gave up in size to Fletcher he made up for with youthful energy. I think he may finally have worn out 8 year-old Fletcher. No matter how ferociously Fletcher would wrestle him to the ground and growl through a mouthful of the hair around Tater's neck, the second he let up Tater would be up and pressing for more. They sure did have a good time together. Here are some photos.

The photos make Fletcher look very vicious, which is exactly what he was trying to convey to the pup. Tater called his bluff.

23 May '07 11:56 am

I'm glad you explained the photos Mark. Fletcher does look pretty viscious with those bared teeth. But then, you have to have a stern attitude with those youngsters sometimes.

23 May '07 3:39 pm

I teach middle school you are absolutely right about the usefullness of a stern attitude when dealing with youngsters. If I had Fletcher's teeth I would no doubt get a whole lot more respect.

8 Oct '07 2:14 pm

For no special reason I thought I'd put up a couple new photos of the dogs. A few are new.

8 Oct '07 9:00 pm

Mark dear, ALL your dog captures here are so sweet! But the last one of old Sophie has stolen my heart!! Lucky Mark! Lucky doggies!

8 Oct '07 10:16 pm

Now if I remember correctly, Fletcher is some breed that I'd never heard of?? And Sophie? Or are they, like my dogs, just dogs? Or, as we call them in SA, 'pavement specials'?

Fletcher sure has the air of being special, but I suspect Sophie is simply a natural aristocrat...

9 Oct '07 12:50 am

I just gave Sophie a hug especially for you Liza. She is aging amazingly well. We just took her on a couple mile hike yesterday and she trots along at nearly 13 with the same easy movement she has always had.
Jack, I've always had mutts but I know the breeds of these two. Sophie is a cross, half Labrador and half Golden Retriever. Fletcher is an Australian Shepard or 'Aussie'. The Aussie breed is a fairly recent american invention with no known ties to Australia whatsoever. Fletcher is my first purebreed which we inherited from Lia's uncle. He is incredibly smart and active. At 8 years old he has calmed down some. I would never have deliberately chosen a dog with a long coat but I like his temprement so well I would get another. (My prefered approach to grooming him is to get him buzz cut in the spring.)

Introducing Sophie & Fletcher

Lap Dogs

Puppy madness.

Mad pups

Barbara's Blue Merle Australian Shepard Tater meets Fletcher

Tater and Fletcher

Isn't that the truth!

More Sophie & Fletcher pictures.

Dog Portraits!

Breeds?