FESTIVE BARKING

[Jen]

With the festive season in full swing - our road may well be mistaken for Blackpool Illuminations at the minute........which is all very nice BUT - the house behind us has one of those father christmas dummies climbing up their wall, as if to be climbing in a window.  It looks quite real I must admit....but obviously - I KNOW it's a decoration.....poor Monty doesn't amd he's getting into a frenzie every time he goes in the garden.  We thought this was quite funny at first....but now it's getting beyond a joke....the only time he goes quiet is at night when he can't see it (thankfully it's not a light-up one).  I've had to close of the dog flap....which is a shame as he's so used to trotting in an out as he pleases......any suggestions how I can stop this behaviour....or else I'm not getting any Xmas cards of the neighbours this year :wink:                    

[Shirley]

Hi Jen

I'm afraid I don't have a solution to your problem    but I'll be watching this very closely as we live next to a garden centre which has an enormous inflatable santa and snowman out front and Morgan obviously sees them as his arch enemies    - the fact that they bob about in the wind doesn't help matters  :?  He went out the back and was barking and growling at something earlier - I went out to see what it was........... Eric had bought a christmas tree and left it at the back door.  It's still in the net so I dread to think the fuss we'll have when I put it up  :?   :?  :roll:

Hope someone comes along with some ideas otherwise it's earplugs til January!!                    

[Colin]

Jen, do you know the neighbours well enough to ask them to shift the Santa out of poor Monty's sight ? I'm sure they would be happy to do this if their ears are being assaultesd by his barking too.

Funny that Morgan is terrified of the Xmas Tree, Jimmy was too at first last year. I was almost pleased because I was worried that he'd cock his leg on it. :roll:  Luckily he didn't. He was a lot braver when I brought this years tree home yesterday, although a bit confused.  Misty of course viewed it the same way she views anything new...... is it for eating ? She's already tried gnawing at the wooden base and pulling at the tinsel. :roll: I had to surround it with her, now disused, pen when I went out as she leads Jimmy astray and I'm sure I would have returned to find the pair of them having a tug of war with it.

We always say our Cockers are daft, they must think the same about us at this time of year, bringing trees inside and hanging all manner of weird things up around the place.                    

[Jen]

I don't think Monty likes this Christmas season....today I come home to discover that my lovely twinkling outside lights weren't on - popped around to the outside plug (which you have to climb over and behind a playhouse to get to)  - and there is one chewed up wire and a cowering cocker :x  I have no idea how he managed to squeeze behind the house to get to the wire - or indeed how on earth he knew it was there :evil:
It's just sooooo annoying...especially as he KNEW what he had done was wrong!......and he's still barking at that blinking santa    BAH HUMBUG!