There is a feral cat in our neighbourhood , a street wise looking cat who seems to hang out around our bungalow quite often . I like cats , I respect cats and have owned cats, well as much as anyone ever owns a cat, free spirits that they are The annoying thing re this cat is that it enters our back garden by scaling the high side gate, which then rattles , alerting the dogs . In truth , Sam cant be bothered, its not worth the effort quite frankly, but Millie is a sucker for a chase , running to the door if she hears the rattle of the gate, flying around the garden, fur all puffed out in an attempt to look threatening . This is a sort of Tom and Jerry game , the offending cat often just sits on the top of the fence , as she tears around, I swear the cat is mocking her from a height . This morning, the cat slipped up after making his usual entrance , he jumped down into the garden just as Millie rounded the corner at top speed, she had it cornered and I feared for its safety , needn't have worried as she stood before this spitting hissing apparition , wagging her tail and then throwing herself onto her back in submission , Cat 1 - Millie 0
Haha, I so wish you had a video of that Shadow "flushed" a cat this morning on our walk. It darted out from under a bush he had run past, and belted off down the mountain. I feared he would set off in hot pursuit, but he was so dumbstruck, he just stood there, looking after it in amazement. That cat was hiding in a place it had no business being.
Good move Millie, always back down to a cat. Tarka and Lochan are extremely respectful to our ancient moggies who trained them well from puppies but sadly have not read about positive reinforcement training and simply mete out disproprtionate punishment for anything viewed as unacceptable. Unacceptable includes but is not limited to the dogs breathing, moving, staying still, being in the same room, not being in the same room, using the garden, not using the garden, looking at them, not looking at them and anything else that crosses their "irrational evil dictator" feline minds. I'd love to have seen Millie on her back and wagging; she was lucky - she would have been punished for that too from my tabby cat!
Lol . I'm waiting for the day that a squirrel lands in our garden......they often sit on the fence and must make some kind of noise that I can't hear as Harley can be sound asleep, but wakes up and is at the door as soon as a squirrel is on the fence
I'm still waiting for my cats to get on with training Ripple, they keep running away much to his delight . My previous two labs were trained by a, sadly now departed, rescue cat who had been found on the moors in Durham eating out of waste bins. Consequently he wouldn't give up his spot on the settee with a good view of the kitchen for anybody, and certainly not a Labrador puppy - his puppy training skills are sorely missed.
We often pass a house on our walks where a cat sits on the front yard, watching the world go by. Ella gets excited every time we approach the house as she's looking around for the cat. One day the cat was sitting on the path infront of us, rather than the front yard. Ella froze! The cat took a step towards and she tried to run the other way! Haha, silly Ella
I'm glad it all ended well! Charlie is SO strange - he cares not a jot for cats, squirrels, foxes, rabbits, anything.....he'll look at a cat, perhaps be a little excited in a "Oooo, what's that?" way (which is not news, he'll do that at a paper bag...) but that's it. Couldn't care less.
Oh my word - cats will always have the upper hand! Tatze is a terrible cat chaser. I blame my friend (Zaba's mum) as she doesn't stop Tatze chasing her own cat when Tatze stays with them - poor old Boots gets chased all over her house - I wish he would learn to stand his ground! Twiglet stays with people who have cats and all is well, the cats are used to pups and just sit and look at them. You can't chase something which doesn't run!
Perhaps I could sell the services of two intolerant irrational feline dictators for puppy training? Hmmmm at the grand old age of 17 they could have a new career!
