If you're interested - ignore if you're not - a few things with Abby and Keeper from Saturday, re-visiting a few of our favourite places . . . .

O' noble Abby, ears lifting off in a stiff breeze along our favourite frozen lake walk . . .



Abby surveys infinity, ice clean enough to skate on if I'd only brought the blades . . . we've shown you this lake before but its always wonderful going there, essentially a private park with no one for miles and miles, a great place for dogs to run . . .



A happy Keeper with open prairie to run . . .



After a few hours walking along the lake, we hop into the vehicle and go about 20 miles into the mountains . . . . Keeper turns to invite you to walk with her. Abby way ahead of us. The ridge higher in the distance is a target for us for late Spring, before the bugs but when it gets a little warmer, or late fall. There's a little-travelled path that goes up there.



Dead end . . . . time to turn around . . .



But another way shows the trail going far ahead . . .



Rick C
www.goldentales.ca

Love seeing your pictures of Abby and Keeper. One little nagging question? Why are the dogs on leashes? They dont get excited and run away eh?

The short answer on leashes is that there are NO off-leash areas in Canadian national or provincial parks.

Dogs are to be leashed and under control at all times . . . . particularly in remote areas like this.

The longer answer . . .

Abby and Keeper, in the days when we roamed the non-park pasturelands near our home, have chased deer, have chased coyotes, have been charged by moose, have been charged by elk, have had coyotes try to lure them away . . . . our one bear encounter two summers ago in the forest had me, fortunately, with their leashes in hand.

In places like the pictures above, there are cougars, bears, wolves, coyotes, wolverines, lynx, etc, etc . . . . and its quite possible that a free-roaming dog will bring one of those bigger predators back to you as it runs for protection.

In practical terms, in a forest, I'll typically have Abby in hand and let Keeper trail her leash a few paces ahead. There are walks where Abby never leaves my hand.

In places where I have long visibility in all directions, like the pictures above, I'll let them run but try to keep them reasonably close with verbals.

Abby can be unresponsive though. Keeper is pretty good.

Anyway, the law is there for a good reason, for the protection of both the wild animals and your animals . . . and yourself. The pictures would look better without the leashes but . . . its not worth it.

These areas look like a great place to let them loose . . . but really, there's lots of things in these places that would hurt Abby and Keeper. Or me.

The local grizzlies . . .



The local moose a few days ago . . . being charged by one of these guys is a pretty awesome experience.



Rick C
www.goldentales.ca

Thanks for the response and I now understand why you keep them close. Hope Abby and Keeper keep there distance.

Ralph

A modest story on this . . . . one winter day some years ago, in the pasturelands around our home, Abby and Keeper were ahead of me when they took off after a pair of coyotes and were over the horizon in the blink of a eye . . . . I literally ran a mile in big boots, up a hill, and stood on a rise looking down on a forest where they'd disappeared.

I whistled and yelled for 15 minutes before they finally reappeared . . . . I still have no idea what they were doing in there all that time with those coyotes.

Even in places like the pictures in this thread, a hearty wind and vacuous spaces can quickly drown out any whistling or yelling you might do to verbally control them . . . . and they may not know where to return to if they're distracted and run off after a prize . . . . lost dogs washing up on acreages after a coyote chase aren't unusual in our area.

Abby and Keeper have a four acre back yard though, fenced so they spend most of their lives running around without leashes, digging for rodents in the tall grass or chasing deer along their side of the fence.

No leashes for Keeper in her yard . . . .



Rick C
www.goldentales.ca

Ah ... love those pics on a Monday morning.

Thanks. So beautiful!!

Beautiful beautiful pics. Thanks for sharing.

You and your golden's have the best adventures! I love to explore with mine but we don't have so much space to roam like you do.

Beautiful pictures.