The Dog Fence

My dog is a Houdini. The mad, parti-eyed Husky can escape anything, and has, until finally my home began to look like Stalag 19 with six feet of double-layered mesh reaching above the colourbond fences and another three feet of chicken wire dug in or zip-tied around the lower edges of the yard and building. We named him Sid Vicious – because he was dark, demented and destructive. We even taught him to pull sandboards up and down the dunes, although we couldn’t teach him to come back when he was called. Now he’s a little older, a little less erratic, but still we’ve lost six chooks to him and a neighbor-cat’s tail so I dread taking him out to the block, which is surrounded by sheep. There was a time when we couldn’t walk him past the neighborhood horses without him almost pulling the kids through the fence like cheese through a grater. In fact, we used to joke that he thought they were caribou and was just reverting to his roots. It’s not so funny now that there’s only thin electric fences between us and 1000 head of sheep, valued at $80+ each. If he ever got out we’d have to have his dead doggy carcass and a wad of cash waiting to assuage the current owner before he even discovered the losses. There’s no second chances for sheep-killers around here. Before Sid, I had a Dingo-Coolie cross we called Sabre (why, I don’t know, except the kids insist all our animals have ‘s’ names) who grew up with TheBoy, the way Sid is now a mascot for TheToddler. In fact, TheToddler enjoyed chasing Sid up and down the trench Daddy was busy digging today (to lay the chickenwire, to stop the dog getting under the fence that Jack built) and throwing clods of dirt at his shaggy companion if he looked like winning the race. When Sabre died, age 16, of stomach cancer, I was easily talked into a puppy for ‘the kids’ sake’. Especially when the breeder convinced me that Sid, with his crazy eyes, would never be able to be shown and might even have to be put down (soft, so soft!). That won’t happen again. When one day Sid passes (or commits suicide by sheep) I’m going to enjoy a dog food/bone/biscuit-free budget and going away for weekends without guilt. In the meantime, we’re going to need a giant dog run, a tracer line and a whole lot of luck before we move Houdini out to sheep-central.