House Bound

Well Summer is on the way;

• Spring flowers everywhere, especially snowdrops and daffodils with some tulips competing for attention.
• Spring equinox has come and gone.  Now there are more hours of daylight than darkness.  Hooray!
• Soon the clocks will go forward.  That signals to me it is time to be out in the van and exploring far and wide. 

BUT  -  this is not possible.

WHY?

Pearl is in season.


As a rule of thumb a bitch's season lasts 3 weeks.

• Week 1;- dogs are interested in her but she is not interested in them
• Week 2;- dogs are interested in her and she is very interested in them.  I have to be careful.  I have found that after the dogs have had a litter they  are inclined to run off after a dog they fancy.  Fortunately Pearl is not nearly as bad as Ruby so it is not too much of a problem.
• Week 3;- dogs are interested in her but she is not interested in them.

The best way to avoid this inconvenience is to have the bitches spayed.  

I have not done this with my dogs until they were quite old because I have had a couple of litters with each of my dogs.  

I first did it because I wanted to keep Ruby's line going. Well a bit of her is in lots of puppies now. 

Later I did it because although it is a full on intense enterprise I enjoy seeing the whole experience.

So I will have to wait a while before I can go out in the van.