Jaci Dawn

I spent part of this weekend trying to get one step ahead of Harvey.

It isn’t that he’s all that smart.

It is that he dreams of greener pastures and he is always trying his boundaries.

His first 10 months with us consisted of staying on the long lead while Murphy ran circles around him. Harvey dreamed of having the freedom that Murphy enjoyed in the backyard. And sometime after my dad died, we started allowing Harvey to roam the backyard untethered.

And then we started allowing him to be alone in the backyard for 15-20 minute increments.

He seemed to be content with peering under the boards for neighborhood cats.

Don noticed Harvey was chewing on the boards and pulling at them. He moved in some concrete blocks and screwed some old boards to the damaged ones.

I suggested we not leave Harvey alone for more than 20 minutes, but of course we would forget he was out and he would have time to plot another possible escape route.

He hasn’t done much damage to the backyard because we have managed to catch him at every turn. He tore out a board on the back fence this weekend and was halfway through the hole when I caught him. That hole led into the backyard where two Labs live (one is named Daisy but I don’t know if Daisy is the Yellow Lab or the Black Lab. I only know they have a Yellow Lab and a Black Lab and their fence is falling over into our yard in increments).

I stapled chicken wire and buried it in the dirt. weighing it down with more concrete blocks. Murphy noticed. I don’t think the people with the Labs have noticed. Harvey just moved on.

He pulled back my bamboo screen. I happened to look out a window to see him jumping up and down in the corner, trying to figure out how to scale the four foot chainlink in the corner.

On the opposite side of my little prayer garden, he pulled the bamboo screen and escaped to… our yard! Silly dog! I was merely blocking the dogs from making a traffic area behind the garden shed.

I have stapled the bamboo back up in the corner, purchased some wire fencing to stake along the base to discourage digging, and I’ve painted it all with some foul-tasting mixture called “bitter apple”. I gave up on the other corner and opened it to dog traffic, all the while chuckling about how Harvey finally managed to “escape”.

Today he saw a cat in the yard to the south. I purchased more little wire fencing and put it in the ground to discourage digging and chewing his way out. I put more wire fencing in the ground along all the cat trails through the back yard.

The cats come through when the dogs are kenneled and tease them. I’m sure of that now.

Then there’s the garden gate.

The wood shrinks when the summer heats up and the latch no longer reaches. And Harvey figured this out. And Harvey has been in the forbidden garden, hunting invisible cats.

The chair isn’t a deterrent. It merely slows him down. he gets his nose in there and begins to inch forward when no one is paying attention. Inch by inch that garden gate gives.

And Harvey thinks he is free because he is in a different section of the yard.

He’s been tied up a few times this week. But I think I am ahead of him for now. The rains are not far off and he will simply have to be tied up during the rainy season: we can find him to bring him in. Next summer we may just have to bury chicken wire along all the possible escape routes. <sigh>

The good news is that he doesn’t try very hard. Either he isn’t that bright or he’s not that motivated to escape, but his attempts have all be easily foiled. When I first brought him home, he made an easy job of scaling the front fence. I caught him teetering on the top edge of the fence. But he was a frightened dog in a strange place then. Now he loves it here. His only motivation to escape are the many cats that make our front yard their “home” away from home.

I am hoping my little fences are enough deterrent that we can still allow Harvey to be a dog loose in a fenced back yard for at least 20 minute increments of time. He’s a good dog.

And you didn’t hear it here, but they both are good dogs.