Dutch Shepherd Forum

Tyson just killed and ate a mouse...
I know I feed raw, but

LOL, so how's that prey drive working out for you?
When Roo was about two, my youngest daughter took her on a hike around the bluffs out here. When they hit a sage lined part in the path, Roo bounds up into the air and lands in the shrubbery on the one side. She comes prancing out a few feet down from where she went in, all prim and proper, head held high......

With a snake in her mouth.

It was the most entertaining stick she had ever caught.
Freaked my daughter out.

Dried snake guts/slime aren't so much fun cleaning off a dog. Or those from any critter. But when the prey drive is directed toward "socially acceptable critters" (skunks, coons, moles, etc.), we don't like the suffering, but it taps into our own primitive appreciation of our dogs: it is awesome to see the nature of the beast in drive.

Revhendo wrote:LOL, so how's that prey drive working out for you?

It's not the catching part so much as the eating part.
My other 2 dogs are avid hunters... mini-schnauzer and min-pin. The schnauzer is a mouser deluxe and the min pin shakes both mice and frogs to their deaths. But they don't EAT them!!! LOL
Tyson has killed mice before, but this was the first time he made a meal of one: chomp, chomp, gulp.
BLECH!!!

Stacy_R wrote:

Revhendo wrote:LOL, so how's that prey drive working out for you?

It's not the catching part so much as the eating part.
My other 2 dogs are avid hunters... mini-schnauzer and min-pin. The schnauzer is a mouser deluxe and the min pin shakes both mice and frogs to their deaths. But they don't EAT them!!! LOL
Tyson has killed mice before, but this was the first time he made a meal of one: chomp, chomp, gulp.
BLECH!!!

Roo didn't eat the snake. It became less fun when it quit moving...

As far as I know, she hasn't eaten any of her captures. 3 couches, yes, little critters, no.
Her "sister" Morgan the Retriever/GSD mix on the other hand considers them mobile happy meals.
It's actually something to see. Morgan is BIG and direct. Roo is smaller, agile and way smart. Should some unenlightened opossum, squirrel, or field mouse wander into the yard, Morgan will charge it. When it turns to run, Roo has already cut around behind it to chase it right back to Morgan. It's something to see, really. Dinga Roo is the first dog I've ever seen that can cut a 90° turn at a full run.

I am laughing my butt off picturing that!! You should film it and post it

Revhendo wrote:Dinga Roo is the first dog I've ever seen that can cut a 90° turn at a full run.

Roo and Tyson would make quite the pair! Especially since they are long lost twins!!

Moko can do that tight rapid turning, too. Yesterday at the farm, as far as "Mighty Hunter" tales go, Moko and Freyja cut a hysterical visual as they leapt and twirled and snapped at the air like deranged zombie ballerinas! Their prey? Grasshoppers. (Ahem, and yeah, y'all haven't heard about Freyja yet... sneak preview, it would seem I've inadvertantly found myself a 3-dog household once more. Maiyou was once the youngest of 3... then 2, then an only dog until we got Moko, and now she is the eldest of a pack of 3. Freyja's rescue story is too involved to get into just now, but I've been doing it in bits and pieces as a word document during brief breaks at school and will post my epic update by Tuesday or Wednesday.)