Messages
by Diane Johnson
March 28, 2017
I’ve been hearing from the lower animals lately. Lower meaning dumb, (unable to speak, not stupid). However, if you listen closely, and watch carefully, quite a bit of speaking goes on.
First of all, ‘Old Roy’ dog food is not satisfactory. Charity Dillon, my 10-year-old Corgi stopped eating it all together. I’d fill her bowl, put it in the regular place, and she would look reproachfully at me and go lay on her cushion, her face to the wall. She wouldn’t eat at all for several days. Finally, I stopped at Bob’s and bought her some ‘Purina Beyond’, not good, but better. Then Ace, corgi and lab cross, and Pricilla Jane, the 5-year-old corgi, stopped eating ‘Old Roy’. I knew they were supplementing their diets with mice, gophers, and road kill, but usually they ate a little dog food. Not anymore.
This morning when I stepped out on the back porch, I saw a dead gopher lying across Pricilla Jane’s dish. It wasn’t fresh. It had been buried and dug up. I got the message, “we want meat”.
I’ve been having trouble with the chickens. I thought it was warm and light enough to turn off their heat lamp in the chicken house. The chickens were not happy. At dusk, they stood around on the sidewalk by the front porch, murmuring in their little chicken voices. Finally, I started turning the light on and they would go into the chicken house for the night. I got the message, “we want light”.
Yesterday morning, tragedy struck. Silly Jane kept going to the horse tank and standing on her hind legs to look in, barking. She did this several times while I was feeding hay, checking for eggs, and getting the newspaper. Finally, I got the message, “look in the water tank”. I went over and looked in, one of my beautiful hens was floating, dead, in the water. I got the message, “the chicken waterer is frozen”. (The horse tank has a heater in it.
Usually, when I lock up the hens at night I count beaks. I forgot night before last. One hen was left out, she must have gotten thirsty and tried to solve the problem for herself.
I was feeling pretty bad. I love all my animals and try to take good care of them. I gave the chicken a decent burial and started for the house. I heard a nicker from one of the horses. “What now”, I thought. Annie had pulled her halter from the hook on the corral fence and was waving it at me. She wanted to go for a ride. Life was looking up. I got the message. . . “We can still have fun.” I didn’t have time to ride her just then, but I curried and brushed her, which she loves, and gave her a treat. Now, I’m ready for another day. I am so glad animals can’t talk in the regular way. I already have as many messages as I can stand.