Throughout his life Biggles has set himself some pretty ambitious goals. His success in achieving those goals has been a bit patchy. For example, he’s never caught living prey such as birds, squirrels or cats, but he has caught lots of socks and once laid claim to a dead cow on the beach. One thing that has eluded him consistently is to pee on Beanie’s head. I’ve never understood why that’s on his to-do list, but it must be important to him because he’s made so many attempts. Regardless, he pulled off something so remarkable a few days ago – something so not-even-in-your-dreams extreme that Beanie’s urine-free head no longer bothers him. He actually managed to poop on Poppy’s head.

In truth this noteworthy achievement owes as much to Poppy’s small stature and addiction to eating the brown stuff as it does to Biggles’ defecation skills, but still I’m sure it gives him a claim to fame that few other Beagles can match.

It happened just a few minutes in to a routine tea-time walk. Monkey had just laid down a challenge to Biggles by delivering an unfeasibly large collection of bottom sausages, and I’d fought off both Poppy and Monkey to get the better part of them into a bag. I’d just tied off the bag and had the nearest bin in my sights when Biggles decided to respond. He squatted and opened the bomb bay doors, but his initial serving paled into insignificance compared to Monkey’s offering. Biggles was far from finished however; even as Poppy, Monkey and my bag-covered hand moved in on that first instalment, Biggles shuffled forward like a golfer preparing for a putt and delivered part two. I managed to beat the pups to the first dollop, but now the race was on for the second one. Once more my hand got there first, but Poppy was getting very determined not to lose out again and Biggles still wasn’t finished.  He shuffled forward again to deliver part three. Unlike its predecessors, part three was getting a bit loose (isn’t it always the case that the sequels are never as good as the original?) and as I struggled to scoop it up, Biggles was already repositioning for part four, and Poppy was ready for it. She swooped in to pick it up, leaving her head directly below Biggles’ delivery chute. Out came part five, straight on to Poppy’s head. It had the consistency of Greek yoghurt, and formed a disk as it landed. Positioned fashionably off to the right side of Poppy’s bonce, it resembled a beret – a poo beret rather than the raspberry beret that Prince used to rave about. Poppy seemed completely oblivious to its presence, and for a moment I was so mesmerised by the sight of it that I couldn’t do anything but stand there motionless. When I finally stirred to action, I wasn’t sure how best to clean it up: use a bag, and risk smearing the beret all over Poppy’s head, or go in with a tissue to minimize the spread. I went for the tissue, and it worked out quite well save for a bit of bleed-through onto my fingers.

A few days later Poppy continued her pursuit of repulsive fashion items. We were on our way back from a beach run, and on the track ahead of us I spotted the remains of a rabbit. Our local beachpark is overrun by rabbits, so its not unusual to see the odd bunny carcass. This particular one had been thoroughly gutted, boned and bifurcated at the waist; what was left looked like pair of rabbit trousers, size: extra small. As soon as I saw it, I knew that at least one of our Beagles would be keen to get it, so I locked off the extender leads and took a wide detour. Biggles lunged for it but I pulled him clear, and breathed a sigh of relief that we’d dodged it. A few steps later I glanced to my left and saw Poppy bounding through the sand and over-grown grass with the rabbit pants flapping in her mouth. It wasn’t easy to get them off her, I can tell you.

The poo beret had been gross, the rabbit pants had been even more gross, but the award for most disgusting Beagle-related event that week was won by The Beanster. On the very next beach run, she spent some quality time with a dead seal that had been buried by the council some months ago and uncovered either by the tide, or by a very big dog with a talent for digging. I pulled her clear as soon as I could but she still stank out the house for hours after, and just as that stink was subsiding, she barfed on our rug. The smell wasn’t quite as bad as that old Beagle favourite “shitvom” (regurgitated, partially digested poop) but it has hung around for some days now, no matter how much we’ve scrubbed at the rug.

When it comes to disgusting smells..

.. Beanie is still top dog!