Monday i took squirt hiking at treasure falls on the continental divide. Ive never been there, its usually crowded, so we went early. It was a really nice steep hike but not something ill ever do with squirt again. For 1 squirt tried to jump off a bridge to get too the water (bridge in pic) and 2 the trail was narrow and that makes other dogs an issue. So the dog agressive behavior can be redirected... but whats the likelihood ill have a river or waterfall everytime she gets squirrelly.

I always dread the narrow trails if they are setup where I can't get off them. We do a large land bridge trail out at Dixon and if we met another dog there it would be a hairy meeting as the trail winds up and down the mountainside. It's a steep drop off on the outside of the trail and the inside of the trail is a hill face you can't get up. I've had to pick kenzi up before to keep her from eating a dog on the trail but haven't had to do that since adding 2 extra dogs.

The bridges that have the open mesh grating for floors are the worst to get across. Mine had to deal with one of those at Cumberland Falls a couple years back. Both interesting and frustrating.

I dont think she noticed the bridge just the water below she wanted to play in. Ive found some good trails i can let her off leash on but i stick to more used spots during hunting season. Squirts favorite thing is anything involving water or chasing fish. Narrow trails that consist of steep switchbacks are usually bad for squirt passing other dogs. Ive got her to where she can be inches from another dog with no reaction so long as the other dog is also nonreactive, but to assume another dog is going to be nonreactive would be dangerous

Ugh, yes, passing on the narrow trails is tough!

For us, it's usually looking around desperately trying to figure out how to avoid some dog that is going berserk and has gone past the point of no return...like, isn't hearing a word his/her owner said. Usually we can step offtrail into the woods a bit, or go behind a boulder, or backtrack back to where the trail widened...

Nowadays I just avoid the narrow trails on weekends/popular times. We do our real hikes on weekdays between 9 and 5 (since I freelance, can hike whenever). We stick to the wide trails if we're going at peak times...it's a lot more relaxing with a passing distance of at least a leashlength!

I always meet those people who have one tiny dog who steps off the trail (doesn't pick up their tiny dog) and then wants to wave me by with my 3 giant dogs. Um, no, it's far easier for me to just hold my 3 dogs in one spot off the trail out of the way than it is to try to move all 3 of them past your rat on the ground. It just doesn't seem to compute to some that their one dog is just easier to move and they should be the one walking on, not me.

I have less issues with small dogs, more issues with offleash dogs owned by people who think yelling "hes friendly" then going back to whatever they are doing is acceptable. That scares me because she did kill a husky/american bulldog a few years back and technically if she is on leash and gets in a fight with an offleash dog the owner of the offleash is responsible but id feel bad about it. Speaking of annoying rats i can no longer walk my dogs on the street i live on. New neighbors dont believe in leashes or fences or keeping thier chihuahua and pitbull from chasing people down the road.

Went to pagosa springs today. It was 54f in the Colorado mountains so of course squirt went swimming,in feb, in Colorado lol

That looks really fun for her!

It was so nice out yesterday! That's a neat looking bridge.

The bridge goes to the pahgosa hot spring resort. My favorite thing about pagosa springs is the a very strict about enforcing leash laws, that and better cheaper groceries.

Squirt should weigh about 35 lbs and shes closer to 40 and the water resistance along with taking the stress off her joints is very good for weight loss, i just lucked out that she loves water

So today was a disaster. It didnt start that way but the background is im done with my stupid dodge so Thursday the house is being appraised to pay off the dodge and have a down payment on a new vehicle. So because of appraisal i had the house cleaner come today. Squirt was out and the other 3 were in the bedroom and jerry accidentally let them out. I grabbed spider and literally threw her in the bathroom, but i didnt see squirt go for splinter. She had never attacked splinter but she did this time. After the 3rd time jerry punched squirt she let go. She tried to kill splinter. Splinter is ok but he was shaking for hours and every time squirt barks he is running under the bed.

If i had any doubts about squirt being the problem they are all gone now.

Oh no...poor Splinter!

What are you going to do?
Dog Aggression is hard to live with on a daily basis...
are you going to keep all of them?
Would Squirt would be happier as an "only dog"...

Rehoming can be rough, and sometimes hard to do if an animal has to go to an only-animal home. As not proud of it as I am, I have opted for strong ecollars on some dogs before and laid them down for bad outbursts. Parents have a cattle dog that is worthless and she on more than one occasion has needed to be dropped for attempting to attack calves. It's not pretty, it's not nice, but it can save the life and livelihood of your other animals in those instances that doors/gates don't get checked or someone slips through.

From a legal standpoint i can not rehome squirt. We have a routine that works for musical dogs. Really i should have either put squirt in the truck or sent her to the kennel for the day.

Ive discussed everything from rehoming to putting her to sleep to pulling all her teeth. We have an ecoller i may need to pull out.

And then there are her other issues. An old vet wants squirt but im not sure if someone in need of in home care could manage her. I worry also that the person wouldnt believe me about her issues and she would end up being put down. So right now the local animal shelter is charging people to drop off dogs and really why would anyone intentionally adopt a dog with issues when there are so many without issues.

Oh and squirt bit my hubby once. He bit her back and that ended that.

Yesterday was buying dog food day. Me and squirt went to pagosa springs and i would swear the tourists missed tje coronavirus outbreak. They were everywhere even though almost nothing was over. But really the trip started bad.

I have really good tires on my 2wd truck. When i left it was snowing pretty good. Before you start going up you wind through the canyon. There is a creek where the white lone should be on one side and a rockface where the other white line would be. So this safeway 18 wheeler is coming down way too fast and snack down the center of the road. There is no shoulder. Slammed the brakes, left a huge skidmark on the road. The truck missed me by inches. So i pulled over in the chain station about 100 ft from where this happened because i was shaking. So opened the door to let squirt out and check the truck when the "i almost died" realization hit, and so did the "i need to puke" feeling.

Other then the blizzard the rest of the drive was uneventful. The grocery store had tons of people and no food. And it a whiteout on the way home.

Squirt did not get to get out in pagosa springs but she still likes going. But she did give me some strange looks as i was wiping everything down with Clorox wipes before they went in the cooler or the cab of the truck.

Squirt partial haircut.

So i could give you exact directions but im not sure if i was in the san juan or rio grande national forest. Continental divide trail wolf creek pass area. It was way way too hot up there but still fun at almost 13000 ft.  

Also the very top southern headwaters of the mighty rio grande dont seem so mighty when its dry.

Gorgeous country 🥰

I can't wait until we get all our medical issues figured out and can get back to going places to do real hikes. That is beautiful. my in-laws were in CO last week. Think they were staying somewhere near Pueblo but they drove all over.

Me and squirt are prepping to go to the caldera and i dont plan on camping. Its roughly 8 miles one way. Currently a 16 mile hike would kill us both

Kye couldn't do a full 16 mile swing anymore either. Kenzi probably could. We used to do trips with my mom every summer and we would do 10-15 miles a day for a week. Didn't get to do that this year for obvious reasons.

Lostmaniac wrote:

Me and squirt are prepping to go to the caldera and i dont plan on camping. Its roughly 8 miles one way. Currently a 16 mile hike would kill us both

Sigh. We walked about a quarter mile yesterday on a path with only occasional gentle slope. Right knee and big toe, left hip, painful on weight bearing, both lower legs on the outside moderate burning

amymeme wrote:

Lostmaniac wrote:

Me and squirt are prepping to go to the caldera and i dont plan on camping. Its roughly 8 miles one way. Currently a 16 mile hike would kill us both

Sigh. We walked about a quarter mile yesterday on a path with only occasional gentle slope. Right knee and big toe, left hip, painful on weight bearing, both lower legs on the outside moderate burning

@amymeme, are you referring to the dogs knee, hip, etc or your own??

Not the dogs, me. At the moment, except for the heat, I cannot exercise enough to stress the dogs. I was just expressing my awe and envy of those who are doing 4,5 10,16 miles in a day

We only did 1.5 that day but ive been told the altitude makes a huge difference. We were at almost 13000 ft and by the time i got back to the jeep i was high as a kite from oxygen deprivation. I used to walk squirt about 10 miles a day but neither of us is in shape at the moment and wearing mask made it much more difficult. And i wasn't wearing it because of covid but because of the smoke from the fires. Air quality is real bad at the moment.