Spring Hunting Expedition

Friday was a picture-perfect Spring day. Saturday it rained. And rained. And rained some more. For the most part, the showers were intermittent. Until late afternoon when the serious storms rolled through — with thunder, lightning, and even hail — dumping three inches of water on us.

You can only imagine how saturated the ground is.

The good news? The morning-after light and clouds made for a very cool picture (if I do say so myself).

The bad news? The saturated ground made for some very dirty dogs. Especially since they were hunting.

K is our most-dedicated (fanatical) hunter. Belle has been learning from K, apparently. She discovered this rotted stump earlier in the day on Saturday. Rotted stumps seem to be the preferred homes for mice and other woodland rodents.

Later in the day, while we were walking between rain showers, Belle revisited the aforementioned rotted stump.

She was so obsessed, she stayed there, digging, while I walked to the end of the road with the other girls. That is VERY unlike Belle, who usually doesn’t like to let me out of her sight for more than about 30 seconds.

This is the look I got after calling her name repeatedly. She was obsessed I tell you.

The girl was definitely on a mission. But she did finally give up and leave her stump, near the end of our driveway, to return to the house with me. Maybe because it had started raining again.

Later (right before dinner), Belle and K were tag-teaming whatever critters were lurking under this stump, which is very close to our house. In fact, I could watch them from the kitchen.

I knew they had to be getting dirty. But every now and then, just like with kids, you have to say “what the heck” and just let them have their fun.

Dirt washes off, right?

Belle was the only one who would even stop when I was calling their names.

I actually caught a shot of K’s face. She wasn’t completely ignoring me after all.

That glimpse of her face was definitely fleeting. She was back at in in milliseconds.

They did eventually give up on that stump. Maybe because it was time for their dinner?

During our after dinner walk, Belle was back to the original stump.

She did not want to give up. Notice how dirty her legs have gotten?

I shot a video, too, which I’ll have to share later. She dug and dug and dug. Finally, I tipped the stump over so she could get at whatever it was she was going for.

There was nothing there. Just some old nesting material. Either it was an old nest or the residents had decided to get out of Dodge during Belle’s earlier assault.

She did finally give up on that stump. But even after it got dark, despite the fact that it was raining, she and K kept running in and out, digging (I assume) at the stump right behind the house.

During the course of the evening, Belle got progressively dirtier.

By the time bedtime had rolled around, she was one DIRTY dog.

So much for our cute little princess.

I think she was even a little embarrassed. But that didn’t stop her from going out for more.

This was the last shot of the evening. She even had mud caked around her eyes.

A short time later, after she’d dried, I noticed that the top of her head and sides of her face were crusty with dried mud. I couldn’t let my baby girl go to bed looking like that, so I washed her face for her.

You should have seen how brown those paper towels were. Yuck!

Have your critters been enjoying the wet Spring as much as mine have?