Chris Meistre

Earlier this year we went on an Animal Communications Course.  Although skeptical at first, we had an awesome experience because we decided to keep an open mind.  We now try and practise as often as possible to hone our newly required skills.  If you’d like to help us practise, why not check out our website called Listen to Me.

Anyways, this post is actually about what I’ve learned from Kodi recently.  I’ve been going to the lady that presented the course a few times to help communicate with our own animals.  During the last visit, I decided to ask Kodi a few questions about his reactions to his new sister, Lola.  It seems like he doesn’t want anything to do with her.

Immediately after asking Kodi this, the lady burst out laughing.  She said that Kodi wants to know why do we want him to mate with Lola, because he really doesn’t want to.  I was confused wondering why Kodi would think that we want him to do that.  We managed to assure him this was not the case, and that we only want him to be friendly with her.  We continued with a few more questions when I suddenly realised why Kodi thought we wanted him to mate with Lola.

Whenever I speak to Kodi, I talk of his “girlfriend” Lola.  When we asked him about this word association, he told us that word to him means that he needs to mate with her.  I had to laugh, because he was so happy to hear that he didn’t need to mate with her, and that he must see her as his sister.

Just goes to show you, that pets dogs do understand our words!

It’s been such a long time since posting anything about our babies.  We even have a new addition to the family.  I’ll dedicate a whole post to her, Lola, soon enough.

Here’s a beautiful photo that Bernadette took.  It may look like it’s Photoshopped, by mommy actually got them to sit still like that!

Tux, Kodi and Lola

Check more of Bernadette’s work at Raven Photography.

EC Offroad Adventures organised an event to Brakkeduine 4×4 Sand Trail. Lexi, our bull terrier, wasn’t feeling good and because of medication we had her on, we decided that Bernadette would stay home with them just in case something happens. I took the opportunity to take our other doggie, Kodi, with on the outing.

I thought about it carefully before finally deciding to take him, because I didn’t really know how he would react around so many people and being in the car for such a long time. But, nothing ventured nothing gained, so off we went.

I had to leave early on the Saturday morning, so I made sure that all the doggies ate early in the morning already. To distract the other doggies, we gave them chew treats while I got Kodi into the bakkie. When he noticed that he is going to come with me he got very excited. Even while excited though, he listened to me and stayed on the passenger seat.

There were DVDs to be dropped off at the video store and diesel to be put in before we could head towards the 4×4 trail though. I took this time to see how he will behave, by leaving him in the bakkie while the fuel attendant was busy while I went into the shop. When I came out he was still sitting there with a big smile on his face.

While we drove off in the direction of Humansdorp I shared the muffin I had just bought with him. The drive is about an hour, and you could see he was getting a bit bored and a bit worried about why we’re driving so long. He is used to 2-3 minute drives to the beach to run around.

Just before Humansdorp I pulled off the side of the road so that he could relive himself. I thought he’d be scared by all the cars rushing by, but he didn’t even take notice of them.

Our next stop was at the Humansdrop Engen Garage. This would also be the meeting point for everyone joining us on the outing. I was about 30 minutes early, so I parked the bakkie and got Kodi out on the leash and walked around Humansdorp with him.

The people joining us for the outing then started to arrive, and Kodi didn’t like all these people around him so he opted to go back to the bakkie and wait for me. Once everyone was there we headed off for the 30km trip to Brakkeduine. When I got into the bakkie Kodi had discovered the cookies Bernadette had packed for him. He didn’t rip open the packet though, and was just staring at it.

The road towards Brakkeduine was quite bumpy, but he didn’t seem to mind. He did seem to take notice of all the cows that we were driving past, probably wondering what type of dogs they were.

At Brakkeduine I let him out again while I got all the people to sign the forms before we could start on the outing. He took this chance to stretch his legs a bit on the soft grass at the camp sites.

We took the drive through the bush and once we got onto the dunes Kodi’s eyes lit up. He loves going to the beach, and probably recognized the dunes as being a place where he can run and go wild. At the first obstacle we stopped and I let him out. You could see he was very excited and darted off in a direction, turned around and raced back to me. He repeated this a few times while I was walking towards where the action was happening.

The guide had decided the drive so far had been too boring, and wanted to try out a different route. This turned out to be quite a challenging part of the trail and thus more interesting. We stood around and checked all the 4x4s for quite some time, all the time with Kodi hanging around me. Once the action was done we were heading onwards again.

Kodi looking on

Kodi was getting used to this 4x4ing thing, because I noticed that as soon as I started revving the bakkie higher in anticipation of climbing a dune, he would brace himself against the back of his seat. He behaved him very well throughout the trail.

When we got to the Langbult, there was a long time that he had to run around and be outside the bakkie. By then it was already very hot so soon after arriving there he chose a shady spot to go relax in while watching all the 4x4s attempt the Langbult.

Colt at Langbult

Then it was my turn to try it, and he got into the vehicle to join me. Once again he braced himself just before we got to the dune and sat still as we made it up the dune and, for the 2nd trip in a row, actually completed the obstacle. Normally the Colt runs out of power on this dune, but the last 2 times at Brakkeduine, I’ve been able to drive it out. It used to be my Achilles heel.

Kodi at Brakkeduine

From here the only part left was the Roller Coaster, where you need quite a bit of speed to get up a very steep sand dune. We did this with relative ease while Kodi was sitting on my lap this time.

Some vehicles were a bit over eager to get over the dune.

Boring

Getting some airtime

We took a slow drive back to the camp site, and once there the owners of the trail invited us onto their boat for a bit of a cruise down the lake. I wondered how Kodi would do on the boat, so we decided to stay a while longer and go on the cruise.

He got on with me, took a seat next to me, laid down his head in my lap and sat like that for the duration of the cruise. He was obviously very very tired from not being able to have taken his naps during the day.

On the drive back home I let him sleep on my lap, but he was just like a child, didn’t want to miss a thing. His head kept nodding off, but as soon as his eyes closed he’d open them again, just to make sure there isn’t something he missed.

At home, he just went to the couch and fell asleep. So next time, we’ll try and see how one of the other doggies behave!

Our next baby was Kodi, or like I call him The Kodester.

This was one of those unplanned babies   We volunteered to help out at Save a Pet after donating food to them a couple of times.  The day they were there they had these puppies there.  We played with them a bit just before we left, and we immediately fell in love with Kodi.  Instead of just making a rushed decision we first went home and discussed it.

Kodi, the Abandoned Puppy

We phoned them, and the next day we picked up Kodi.  From day one, he has been the most obedient dog I’ve ever seen.  It was like he was so grateful that we took him into our home.  He was just a couple of weeks old when we got him, and we still don’t really know what breed he is.  It must be a corgy crossed with something like a sheep dog.  He even has the wrangling in him.

When we introduced him to the other doggies, you could see Tux was wondering, “Why another one?”.  For a few weeks at least Tux had someone smaller than him in the house.  He has gotten to love his pal and they all play together so nicely.  When we go walking in the afternoons, you can see Kodi sort of keeps an eye on Tux the whole time.  This afternoon I actually asked him where Tux is, and he immediately seemed to start scanning the area we were in to see where he is and was so happy when Tux came around the corner.

Kodi and Tux

Kodi and Lexi

He loves running, and he doesn’t ever seem to get tired.  We try and take them at least every day to go run around in the bush and little sandpit we have here in the bush.  You can see he really enjoys it.

Kodi

Kodi