sheepdog

When chosing a family pet, remember to consider that the breeds original purpose is. Beagles are a hunting dog. And many beagles are still being used to hunt, so the instincts are still very much intact in the breed, unlike other breeds that have been bred away from their original purpose to make them more acceptable as pets. Beagles of course, bark, they are supposed to do that to let you know they have found and are following prey. (rabbits in most cases.) And as hunters, they like to hunt, and are bad to roam around looking for rabbits. It will take a very securely fenced yard to hold a Beagle. Beagles are a bit slower to accept the concept of housebreaking than other dogs. They can be a bit stubborn about training, they figure they allready know how to hunt, what more could you possible ask for?? The good news about Beagles, they are generally very kid friendly and very tolerant of even smaller children. And since they are still considered a hunting dog, they are generally healthy and hardy. The short hair coat does shed, but there is no need of fancy grooming like there are on so many other breeds. As for needing 2, a lot of that depends on how much time you plan to spend with your dog. If you are gone most of the day to work and have an otherwise busy life, it is good to have 2 dogs to keep each other company, but this is true for any breed.

I have wondered how Cacti got on the easy to grow list, I have killed every single one of those I have ever had. And I have tried a bunch of them. They just don't like me, I have tried numerous varieties, from those with the loud colored ball on top to the purple ones with a flower like arrangment of leaves on top, and then there are burro's tails and strings of pearls that I just love but can't grow to save my life. The only succulent I have any luck with is Aloe Vera. But for really easy, try the Mother In Laws Tongue. You just can't kill that stuff. It is a dark green with straight spike leaves. there is also another one that has lighter green leaves with yellow borders. (it may be a different plant or have a different name, but it is equally as tough.)

Appearance is of course, very important, but please keep in mind the type of job you are applying for. For example, here at the kennel, if I hire some little teenage girl and she comes in the first day with those 1/2 inch long fancy fingernails, I know dang good and well she is not coming back after the first day. Be honest with your prospective employer. I would rather hire someone who said, "well, I don't have any experience, but I would be willing to work and learn" than someone who lied and said they had experience that didn't. And along with that goes don't brag too much. If you go on and on and on about how wonderful you are your prospective boss may quickly realize you are just blowing smoke and in reality you don't know your butt from a hole in the ground about what you are talking about. And for gods sakes, if you want a job ask for it yourself! Believe it or not, I have had Mothers call for their children, and wives call to get a job for their husbands. I figure if someone is too lazy to pick up the phone and ask for a job themselves, they are too dang lazy and I sure don't want to hire them. Those get eliminated right off the bat.

Thanks guys! Interesting input on a very interesting book. Of course, now I will have to keep an eye out for the other 2 books in the bargain book boxes!

YIPPEE!!! You found it for me, thanks so much! I had overlooked your underlined first link when I first read your post, silly me. But sure enough when I followed it there it was! It is a long drawn out process, takes 5 days, but I have them made now, and boy are they ever good! Thanks for helping me out. When I finished the recipe, I had about a quart of the syrup left over, so I put it in the fridge, thinking I would find some use for it. (it's mostly sugar/cinimon and red hots) and a few days later I got the brilliant idea of drying some apples, then soaking them in the syrup and then redrying them, and boy that turned out good too. Except they are a bit sticky and I may have the devil of a time digging them out of the jar. Sure taste good though. Thanks again!

Sorry I missed your questions, I haven't been in here for awhile. Sorry about your dog. Sounds like she has mastitis. This is a serious infection in the milk glands. However, in many cases, the infection will be limited to only certain teats, and she may have good milk in the others for the pups. She will definatly need antibiotics, and it helps to keep the infected gland milked out. Be careful about removing the milk, do not let it come in contact with anything, especially her other uninfected teats, or your hands either for that matter.

Oh Lordy!NO, not even!!! It is the ovum. Menstral flow is the human female end of cycle cleaning and flushing of the blood that accumilated in the event that her ovum was fertilized. Chicken Biology 101 The chicken egg is the ovum. Chickens produce these for a certain part of the year on nearly a daily basis. No rooster nessary. Just like a female human will produce one ovum per month, she does not have to have a man around to ovulate. If a rooster is present, he can breed the hen once, and she will store the sperm cells for quite some time, fertilizing her eggs as they are formed. Only fertile eggs will hatch. Store bought eggs are not fertile. The general buying public would be upset with even a freshly fertilized egg, they would see the little round dot forming in the egg, and since they are not used to seeing fertile eggs, would probably freak out and think the eggs were bad. Egg farmers have no need to feed the rooster who is not producing a saleable product. (eggs.) A rooster would be a waste of space and feed. And would produce a product that the general pupblic would not appreciate.

I think forums are great, at least if you find the right forum for your specific needs. Many forums on the internet are run over with morons and trouble makers who just like to stir the pot, but if you get a really good group of people together they can be wonderful. Take for example one of the dog breeder boards I am on. We often get animal rights wacko's posting and tring to start fights, but the board has been around for a very long time, most of the people actually know each other, we have various levels for memebership and you do have to sign up, so it is not hard to weed out the trouble makers. It is a great place to go to discuse any of the MANY topics related to dog breeding, a great place to go for question, comments, to help other breeders, and to get help when you need it. And since we pretty much know each other, it also is a very good place to go for just plain old moral support. There are people there that have gone threw what may be giving you heartache and can sympathise and console you when you need a friend. It is also a great communication tool. We have breeders from all over the country, and if issues come up it is a fast way to get the information out there to the people that can do something about it. Animal rights nut jobs are always trying to pass various new laws that would make pet ownership more difficult, and in many cases, an absolute breach of your constitutional rights of ownership and privacy. We get the word out and can write letters to the congressmen and others to voice our concerns, and don't let things get slipped by us without a fight.

Ok, Ok, I know I am way behind on the times, the movie is allready out and gone and I just now got around to reading the book. First off, so you know, I'm a cheap skate, and just happened to see the book at the swap meet for a quarter, so I decided I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I remember a lot of controversy when the movie came out from the religous sector. And boy do I know why now, after reading the book! Talk about a serious stab at organaized religion!!! At any rate, it was a good story and I did enjoy reading it. Sure kept me guessing. I even guessed wrong, thougt the "teacher" was the cop. What I am curious about is how much of the book's background is real and how much is fiction? Of course, we have all heard of the search for the grail and all that but what about the godess worship and other old religions it mentions? The Priory of Sion and the Opus Dei, are those for real? Yes, I know there is a page in the book that says all of those are real, but it is a book of fiction anyway so who can believe that?

Well, I sure wish I knew what kind of animal orientation behavior is possesing one of my Goats! Every day, sometimes twice a day, the stupid thing sticks her head threw the fence and gets stuck.(she is a horned, 50% Boer cross doe) Head goes threw easy as the horns are curved backwards, but then get stuck when she pulls back. For awhile I was going to name her Pita, (pain in the *bottom*) but we mostly just call her Crazy. She is getting scrawny cause she spends most of her time with her head stuck in the fence. We run the fence a couple times a day, but she still spends a lot of hours standing there, unable to eat after she finishes off whatever she was reaching threw the fence to get in the first place. My better half heard her bawling before daylight this morning and has allready got her out of the fence today before 6am. Talk about a true believe of "the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence!" I would certainly love to keep my livestock happy, but this goat is just nuts. A few weeks ago we even tried to wire a piece of shovel handle to her horns so she couldn't get her head threw the fence. We had several days of peace before she managed to get it off. Getting her out of the fence is no easy job, she still fights you after all these times of getting her out. We have had other goats to be frequent reach threw the fencers, but those learned quick that you were trying to help them and would not fight with you and would just let you twist their heads around in whatever way it took to get them out. I usually end up getting cut on the top strands of barb wire getting the dumb *bottom* out, and I'm getting pretty dang sick of it. My hubby fell down one day after getting her out and landed on a rock and cracked some ribs over this stupid got. She came pretty close to the nasty job of getting her horns sawed off after that one. If she keeps on, I may do it yet!

Well, actually, to me it sounds like you are off to a pretty good start. It takes a long time to adust to new jobs, you have not only the job it'self to learn, but the nature of the boss and other employees you have to work with and understand what they want and expect from you. Most bosses understand this and expect some mistakes at first. If you are trying hard (which it sounds like you are) and learn from your mistakes, I think you will be just fine. I once sent a new employee to the back area of the kennel and told her to bring up a pregnaunt dog. (this was a Standard Poodle, extremly pregnaunt, belly big as a county fair blue ribbon watermellon) When she finally got back with the dog, she had brough up the MALE!!!! I didn't fire her, but sure did laugh over that one. I never dreamed training a new employee would involve the sex education aspect, the difference between boys and girls at any rate.

Just think of the 2 hungry buzzards sitting on the fence...... one says to the other, "patience hell, I'm going to kill something."Sometimes it takes awhile to get hosted. Be patient. If a couple days go by and you have not heard anything back, contact one of the moderators. Or catch somebody in the shoutbox and talk to them. jlhaslip and St. Micheal are nearly always there and both are great at helping with any Trap 17 questions. Don't give up so easy, this is a pretty great hosting site.

Oh it's KFC, hands down!!! First off, McDonalds food pretty much sucks. I do truely wonder about the contents of their food. A "sanitation engineer" used to bring me home bags of food from there that had been tossed after setting on the rack too long. My dogs would eat the bread and pickles, and my SHEEP would eat the burger patties! Now that's scary! But my biggest gripe about McDonalds is the way they caved in to PETA over animal rights issues. McDonalds tried to tell chicken farmers how to raise chickens, and I'm sorry but they are giant coperate burger flippers, and have no business dictating to farmers about the proper handling of livestock. Their expertise is in marketing, not animal agriculture and proper animal husbandry. About the only sandwich they have I did like was the egg mcMuffin, which has gotten so blasted overpriced, I just won't hardly ever buy one. I have to eat at least 2 of them, and am usually still hungry when I do. And they do give me indigestion. Love the taste, but not the aftertaste.

Sure you can play! Love a good reasonable debate! Basicly yes, procreation is the reason we are here. It is the most primal biological instinct. Lets face it, if you were not created, you would not exist, and could not contribute anything to society. I assume that you have no children because you made the decision not to. Modern medicine has some very effective methods for birth control. Or you have some physical problem that prevents you from reproducing. (In which case, I apoligise if you want kids and can't have them) Injuries can occur, after we are born, and the development of the fetus in the long 9 month gestation is a delicate and complicated process, and quite often things do not go perfectly. Sometimes threw the process you may end up with a birth defect that prevents you from reproducing. Very few, if any, specimins of any species are born completely perfect. We all have our little flaws. I see no paticular reason to "group you in with the homos" if it is by choise or design that you do not have children. If you chose not to, that just means you made a decision based on your life's experiences not to reproduce. It is quite possible to resist biological urges if one sets their mind to it. Homosexuals are not any different from any other human, except of course, in their sexual preferences. They have the same needs and wants and capabilities to give love and want love as any one else does. So adopting and loving children is really not all that unexpected. I suspect there are a lot of lesbians that actually do artificial insemination and pregnancy in order to have a child to love and nuture.

Yes, we are definatly out in the boondocks. Wouldn't have it any other way. It does lead to some interesting times some days though. Hubby was watching Tv the other evening and a black snake came crawling along the porch rail, and if he had just been a bit lower, like on the ground instead of the rail, he probably would of come right on in the house. As it was, he bumped his little snakey nose on the glass in the screen door. Just a couple inches lower and he would of been at our "doggie door," and could of come right on in. Our screen door doesn't have a bottom panel in it. Ever see the movie "Turner and Hooch?" If so, remember the scene where the Doggie De Bordeaux plowed threw the bathroom door? Well, in the movie it was a machanical dog head, but our screen door was taken out by the real thing! Our old Bordeaux male decided he wanted to go out and couldn't wait for us to open the door so he just puthis head down and away he went.

Ah...there it is again, the magical age of 16, when children wake up one morning and decide that they are adults, and are smarter, wiser, and know everyting in the world there is to know and are definatly smarter then their parents at any rate. News Flash for you. Your not an adult. You have not lived the life experiences your parents have. You have been around just long enough to have some ideas about the way things are and should work, but not enough practical experience to understand how things work in the real world. It's going to be another 20 years or so that you will look back and suddenly realize that your parents may of actually been a lot smarter than you gave them credit for. But that's the future. For now, you have to realize that it is the job of the parent to raise their children the way they see fit. That is what parents are supposed to do. To bring you up acording to their beliefs, in the hopes that you turn out to be a decent, responsible human being with some real intelligence and common sense. Right now, your parents feed, clothe and put a roof over your head. And until you are capable of doing all that for yourself, you are just pretty much stuck with dealing with your life and the belief of your parents. They are not stupid because they believe differently than you do, and you should NEVER think that of them. They want what is right and best for you. Let me play the devils advocate for a minute. Your parents object to homosexuals. Well, if you look at it from the perspective of right and wrong, you will see that it IS actually wrong. The survival of the human race is dependant on us reproducing. Homosexual's cannot reproduce. The human race would become extinct if no one reproduced. So at least in that respect, it is wrong.

I appreciate your help. I suck at search engine stuff. I did try to do some searching but came up with places to buy jewlry (rings) and all kinds of apple reciepes, but still haven't found the one I want, and the zuchinni are really stacking up around here! I did print out the recipe for the spiced apple rings, but with the difference in consistancy of the fiber of apples vrs zucchinni, I don't think it would work right. I did see some interesting variations on zucchinni bread that I am going to have to try though!

I really thought once the kids were safely on the ground and a few weeks old, things would lighten up for us here work wise anyway just a little, but boy was I wrong. Our pastures didn't look real bad, still had plenty of grass, but a few weeks ago the goats started loosing weight and we lost several kids and even a couple of the adults. The rainy season we have had this year has definatly promoted the life cycles of internal parasites that plague goats and other livestock. We got them all wormed and moved next door, which was really grown up as nothing had been on it yet this year. Since it was so grown up, it was about impossible to do a very good job of checking the fence before we moved them. But they sure checked it out, and now I have goats scattered everywhere. We have been rounding up a few here and there, brought in a big bunch last night, but still have quite a few down in the woods behind the house, and they don't drive well and there is really no place to bring them back threw to where they are supposed to be. The group we got in last night had gone completely around the place, and were happily munching along the highway medium. Fortunatly, it's along the road where there is a steep hill and they weren't anywhere near the actual traffic. And it's a straight shot up the hill and threw the front gate back to the house, although a lot of damage to my flowers and plantings were a big risk, fortunatly we got them past most of my stuff without a whole lot of damage. Of course, we were just coming home from a quickie cool off down at the creek near the house, and it was still bloody hot, and running threw all the weeds and briars got me all heated up and itching again. And what's really got me bummed is I lost my favorite doe kid day before yesterday. She and her mom have been hanging out in the woods right behind the house. Her mom was an older doe and had been having some problems, and I figured she was about to dry up on her milk, so we had been supplementing the kid with a bottle. The kid was one of the smartest goats I had ever seen. We had made jokes about how she would end up sitting on the couch with us watching Tv at the rate she was going. She knew when it was chore time when they were still over here and would leave her momma (something that kids normally just don't do) and come to the barn for her bottle. One day when we were running a bit late she came threw the fence and was half way to the house looking for us. When I went to feed her I could see her momma but didn't see her. I called and started looking around, and suddenly she just appeared, I guess she had been laying just behind a tree where I couldn't see her. She took just a couple quick sucks on her bottle then started to cough. She spit out the bottle and coughed a little, then tried to suck again, then started to walk forward and just fell down. By the time we lifted her over the fence she was dead. I couldn't believe she was up walking around then fell down dead in what could of been no more than a minutes time. Just made me sick. She was so cute. She was one of the few kids we had actually named, had been calling her Baby 5. (Her mother was one we bought that had an eartag, number 5) She actually knew the name and would come running when we called for her. So, I still have goats to round up, it's hotter then the hubs of hell, and it's just really been a bad week.

LOL, of course their rigged. Carnies have to make a living too. Seriously, why should anyone be worried about Carnies ripping them off when you have all these casino's and lotteries and other gambling events that you have about the same snowball's chance in hell of winning? Not a bit of difference. Except with state run lotteries, the money from them goes to fat, lazy politicians, at least the Carnies' earnings go to keep him in food and a travel trailer over his head and gas money to the next stop. At least the Carnie is out there earning it. Not taxing the citizens out of it.

I do love summer. It's great to be able to just bale out the door without having to spend 10 minutes piling enough clothes on to keep you from freezing to death. I love playing in the creek, if I could ever get some time off from the kennel that is. And I really enjoy all the outdoor activites and fun stuff that's always going on in the summer. But there is one thing about summer that drives me crazy. It's the ITCH!!!! Why is it that everything seems to make me itch???? Bug bites, stinging weeds, blackberry brambles, heck, even zucchini has little pointy spines that make you itch when you pick it. And then there is all that dog clipping I have to do. I have a couple pairs of really good dog clippers, that shave hair like a hot knife threw butter, but there are all those tiny bits of hair floating around in the air that stick to my sweaty hide like bugs on a windshield. In my eyes, up my nose....itch itch itch!!!! I can't wait to hit the shower after a grooming session. Hair in the eyes is the worst, you can blow it out of your nose, but you sure can't scratch your eyeballs! Even after a good rinsing, they still itch for hours. Oh sure, I get a little dry skin in the winter that itches a bit, but a good slathering of hand lotion takes care of that. But in the summer I find all this little bumps and scratches and blisters that just drive me crazy. And my feet are really thin skined on top, I can be sitting watching a little TV and scratch at them for a minute without even realize I'm doing it, and then next thing you know, I go to put my shoes on and find I have a sore spot where I've brought blood from itching. And it's always right where the sandle straps hit it. There must be a million varieties of bugs that bite. While ticks and chiggers don't like me, and rarely bite me, I still get skeeters, and those really nasty little sweat bees, and a few million other bugs. They all leave little welts that itch for ages. And of course, there are those sneaky little back biters. They manage to bit you in just exactly that one spot on your back that there is no way you can reach to itch it. Back scratchers just don't seem to help. Nothing is as satisfying as good old hard fingernails, which by now, mine are worn quite short and hard from all the scratching. Plant life is just as bad. So many plants with stickers and noxious sap that itch the bejabers out of me. For some strange reason, I only get poison ivy/oak about once every 15-20 years, so it isn't a big concern. I can pull the plants up and it won't bother me. Wish I could say the same for othe weeds though. Goats got out the other night and I had to chase them threw some brush, I itched for hours aftwards. The only thing I have found that helps much for releaving my miseries, is some homemade lye soap a friend of mine made and gave me some years ago. He gave me a big boxfull, and boy am I glad, I have most of a lifetimes supply if I just use it for my summer time blues.

Very cute pup!My Dad had some Norwegian Elkhounds years ago. I really liked them, they were very sweet natured, and nice to get along with. Smart too, I taught several of them some quick simply tricks, like shake hands, that sort of thing. You will need to keep a good dog brush handy, their biggest downfall is the tons and tons of dog hair they shed out.

Oh Goodie, somebody else to talk dogs with! My favorite subject of course!Dogs Dogs Dogs, that's all I do. Would love to see some pictures of your dogs. The one thing I have not yet had the chance here at Trap to figure out is how to post pictures, so maybe we can get someone to explain that one for us. I don't have Akitia's, don't really know a lot about them. Saints......well there you have a mixed bag of personalities. I have seen some really nice Saints, and some real nasty ill tempered ones. When I was a kid there was a lawyer that lived up the street from us that had one that would chase people that walked or kids that rode bikes past the house. If he hadn't been a lawyer, he probably would of been in a lot of trouble. I was passing by there one day and the dog came charging out at me. I just stopped and stood there, and started giving the dog a good cussing, and he just stopped and looked at me and went back to the porch with his tail tucked between his legs. He never bothered me again. He started out after me a few times, but almost immediatly would recognise me and would turn and go back. Typical of most bullies, someone who wasn't afraid of him was no fun!

Well, I am not sure exactly how I would want to go, but I damn sure know how I DON'T want to go. Earlier this month a long time friend passed away. About a year ago he was diagnosed with lung cancer. He went threw all the treatments, Kemo, radation, all that jazz. He suffered trememdously. All the hair fell out, first he lost weight, then started retaining water and ballooned up from 130 to 180, then lost it all back. Some weeks before the end, he had a stroke which temporaraily paralized his left side, which he mostly came out of, but then he had another stroke that affected his right side, and ended his ability to speak and swallow. Things went downhill quickly after that, but he lingered for a long time and I know it was a long and painful demise. Too some this may sound cold hearted, but I just don't believe a human should have to suffer like that. People talk about "animal rights" but at least if an animal is sick or injured, you are not a murderer if you end their suffering. People don't have that right. You have to lay there and suffer until you leave this earth, and that is just not right. So...when I go, I really just hope it is quick and painless. Painless is the big thing I guess. Not fear of death, but the suffering before you check out. I've thought some about it, and there aren't many things that you can do that you know would be painless. Sure, you could shoot yourself, but what if your aim was bad, and you missed something vital? Or you ran your car into a bluff, and only broke up your spine and had to live as a total invalid? Heck, even if you jumped out of a plane, with my luck I'd land on a nice big hay stack and survive mangled and miserable, but alive. Going to sleep and not waking up sounds pretty good about now........

Thanks for the tip, I haven't read that one and will definatly check and see if my local library has it. Maybe this winter anyway, I sure don't have time to read dright now. Have a new Steven King book and have renewed it twice and still haven't even started it. I loved the Lord of the Rings serious. Great reading. But the movie! What can I say but WOW!!! The graphics are totally amazing! I love to watch it just for the scenery. And the computerized "actors" are so realistic! That is one of the best points in the Harry Potter series too, while the story lines are all about the same, the graphics and critters they have are just beyond amazing. I could almost swear that th Phoniex is real when it drops those tears on Harry's wound from the Basilisk.

Some years ago I had this great recipe for using the big tougher zuchinni by turning them into spiced apple rings. You know, those red things they often use in restuarants for a garnish on a plate? I remember it was a long drawn out recipe, they had to soak in lime water for a long time, and one of the ingredients was cinniamon red hots, but that is all I remember. And they were really good. I can't even remember what cook book it was in. Anybody have that recipe? I sure would like to make some.