On Patrol

Some poor, unfortunate critter made a very bad real estate decision and moved into the fir trees in our back yard. About two days ago the girls spotted whichever critter it happened to be and they have been obsessed with one corner of the yard.

Every morning for their first pee of the day they tear through the door and off the deck to the corner of the last sighting. All day long this hunt continues until the last trip out around midnight when they take their last, long, addicted look of the day.

What they are staring at...

There is also a huge brush pile on the other side of the fence in that corner and Chima is sure there are some rats over there and I'd guess she's right. Because she's so sure and because she is also sure she MUST kill them, I am always back in the girls' corner with them in case Chima decides to try to dig her way under. She hasn't shown any signs that she will, but I've seen that intense, glazed over look in a terriers eyes many a time and it means that the humans need to be very watchful since pretty much all parts of their brain except the MUST KILL PREY part has been turned off.

Chima sniffing something in the brush pile on the other side of the fence

These girls definitely shouldn't go to a family with small animals or a cat even. When this first started I couldn't even get them to break their focus long enough to pee and getting them back inside was a nightmare. However with a couple days of reinforcement and Premack, they are able to leave the trees to check in with me occasionally and also to pee before they head back for a last look before racing to the sliding door for the jackpot they know they'll get if they come inside on their own.

It must be a dang good find since they usually get over squirrels as soon as the squirrel runs off. I'm guessing it's raccoons since we've had babies in those trees before.

Past inhabitants of our fir trees - these two drove Frodo to near insanity a few years back

Anyhow, that's what this pack has been doing the last few days. Critter hunting, critter obsessing, and working on refocusing on a human when there are much more interesting things across the yard in a tree.