The garden flooding we experienced last month weakened a couple of posts in our rear fence, so one dry morning I set out to put a couple of fresh, concreted posts in there to firm everything up.

The thinking behind this was of course to prevent any loss of Beagle containment, so it’s ironic that this maintenance work gave rise to the very thing it was intended to avoid. I’m getting ahead of myself though.. I’d better start at the beginning.

I gave our team of four a good long early walk, fed them, and then put Monkey and Poppy into their crates. Beanie and Biggles remained uncrated as they go straight into deep nap mode after a walk, especially if the donut beds in the lounge have been stacked to clear some floor space.

Heaven is a double-decker donut with Biggles in the middle of it

So with two furries in their crates and two in donut comas, I figured I had a couple of hours of unhindered working time. I got off to a good start, cutting the new posts to the correct length and digging two good deep holes, but soon I felt the need for coffee break. You know how it is with coffee breaks – they always go on longer than intended – and when I resumed work it was time for the youngsters to be released back into the garden. Still, the hardest parts of the job had already been done and what remained was straightforward enough: pop the new posts into the holes, screw them roughly into position against the fence, then pour in water and some quick setting concrete stuff and clean up. Half an hour or so and everything should be done, right? No, wrong, because it never goes like that.

I called in Susan to help with the first bit. While I ‘went round to the other side of the fence to brace the first of the new posts in position (being careful to close the gate after me), Susan prepared to drive a screw in from the front to hold it. As soon as I got into position we hit a problem: the screwdriver bit was chewing up the screw. I went back round and swapped the screw out for a new one. We were ready to go again, but now the screw I’d grabbed required a different bit from the one currently fixed into the driver. Back round I went. At some point in the proceedings I failed to notice that I’d left the gate open. Monkey however did notice, and wandered through.

At the back of our garden there’s a narrow bank that separates us from a fast-flowing burn, while on either side are neighbouring gardens, separated from us by fences that don’t fully reach down to the undulating bank. Obviously my initial concern was that he might fall into the burn and be carried away downstream, so I went after him with some haste, and with even more haste, he dodged under the neighbour’s fence and into their garden.

Much of the time Monkey is suprisingly well behaved, but right at this moment he wasn’t the least bit interested in my attempts to recall him, so I just had to chase him down. As a humie I didn’t have the option of squeezing under the fence, so I had to run up and out of our garden and into the neighbour’s garden via their gate. As I finally closed in on him, he took off into the the next adjoining property, beyond which lay the outside world: countryside punctuated by busy roads. I hopped over the next (thankfully low) fence in pursuit, but this garden was somewhat overgrown with lots of brambles and other spiky foliage. I knew that if he took flight again I wouldn’t be able to stop him from escaping into world beyond. It was time for a cooler, more laid back approach that wouldn’t spook him. You know what they say: slowly, slowly catch Monkey. I don’t know about actual monkeys, but when it comes to Beagles called Monkey, that old adage seems to be bang on the money.

I calmed down and held off stalking him for a moment, and in return he stopped trying to evade me. He slowly ambled back towards our garden, and after a moment I began to follow, setting my pace so that little by little I was catching up to him. When I was close enough I made a grab for his shoulders. I missed those, but my hands landed on his big rear end and found a solid grip. One scoop action later he was in my arms, and seemingly happy enough that his latest unsanctioned adventure had come to an end. His little sister gave him a bit of a hard time on his return, but at least she didn’t hump him.

Despite a heavy downpour (not forecast) I finished the fence repair work and there were no further escapes, but I need to remember that even a secure fence is only secure if I remember to keep the blummin’ gate closed.

Monkey, our economy-sized little boy is now one year old. Nobody who meets him ever believes that he’s younger than Poppy, and even though he’s 12 months old he still seems to be growing. When we hug him (which we often do) he feels more like a Boxer dog than a Beagle, with a big muscle-packed frame, extra-short fur and a large jowly head. On occasion he even drools like Boxer, but he definitely behaves like a Beagle.

If he can stick his head through something, he will, and damn the consequences!

He’s enthralled by things he hasn’t seen before and is driven to investigate them…

..especially when his diminutive big sister advises caution

When asked how her boys differ from the girls, his breeder replied simply “the boys are more needy”. That’s certainly true of Monkey; he pours on the drama if he’s left alone or doesn’t get the chew or toy he wants, with wailing, whimpering and cries of “Ooo-wooo-wooo!” which is Beagle-speak for “Help! It’s Monkeycide I tell you!”.

He’s still at the mercy of his pendulous Spherical Ideas Department; those balls of his are always whispering unwise suggestions in his big floppy ears and just recently that led to the creation of his own line of fashionwear which I call “Distressed by Monkey”. His most successful piece to date is/was my favourite gardening jacket; I hung it from a post thinking it would be safely out of reach, but I didn’t count on Monkey’s impressive jumping ability.

I can still (mostly) wear the jacket, but it’s not as warming on a windy day as it used to be and the pockets are no longer useable.  He’s also made two pairs of shoes more trendy, but we’re very fortunate that he wasn’t listening to the SID when a package bearing the words “living organisms inside” dropped through our letterbox this morning. It contained 500g of wriggling tiger worms for our compost heaps; if he’d decided to rip open that package on the hall rug before we got it he’d have had a genuine reason to cry “Monkeycide!”

Our boy certainly is a cheeky monkey but he’s a cuddle-monkey too, and we wouldn’t change a thing about him – except maybe for the huge amount of food he gets through in a month; by contrast his little big sister Poppy could live on the fluff from a pocket for more than a week (though not the fluff from any of the pockets in my gardening jacket, because they’re distressed by Monkey as I noted earlier).

We’ve been describing The Beanster as 15 years old to other dog walkers for a couple of months now, but in reality she only had her 15th birthday a few days ago.

Most people who meet her have a hard time believing she’s that old, particularly now that – on the advice of a behaviorist (more on that in a moment) – we’ve been giving her a low dose daily painkiller. She’s become more frisky, more active and playful, and unfortunately, more of a stroppy, entitled little madam.

But let’s roll back to the behaviorist part. We called in professional help because Beanie is still having difficulty accepting the pups, especially the extra large one with the fully intact pocket billiards set.

They’re all great on walks, they’re fine in the garden and when we’re doing well established routines (pre-walk prep, mealtimes, tooth-brushing and such), but at other times – especially at night in the lounge – Beanie has been showing signs of being rather disgruntled.  She paces, she woofs and occasionally she grumps whenever Monkey is present. In many ways we can’t blame her; Monkey is a big active boy who could easily hurt an elderly lady by accident, and it’s understandable that she’d want to keep an eye on him and keep him in his place. That said, as we head into winter we really need the two of them to get on better, so we consulted a well-respected behaviorist to help us make that happen.

The first part of the session was just an exchange of information with all the Beaglets still tucked up in their crates. We told the behaviorist about all the steps we’d taken to keep Monkey and Poppy from being a pests to our older dogs, including giving Beanie exclusive access to our second lounge, complete with its own private decked balcony – a facility that became known during the summer as “Beanie’s Penthouse Suite”.

Yes Dad, this appears to be fitting for a pupplet of my standing

Is any of this stuff edible, and if not, why not?

Yes, a spoiled Beagle girl could get used to this…

The behaviorist seemed to approve of all that – especially the penthouse suite – and she nailed all of the reactions we’d been seeing from Beanie, and correctly predicted our reactions to those reactions, if you know what I mean. The advice she left us with was to keep Monkey separate from Beanie on evenings for a while longer and work on getting him to be calmer and less prone to excitement. She also picked up on the way Beanie was sitting and thought that she might be having low level discomfort due to her advancing years, which could be contributing to her irritability. A course of mild daily pain relief was suggested, and since we’ve been doing that and the other things, tension in the house has been steadily dropping. The painkillers have brought about the most noticeable change, seemingly restoring Beanie’s confidence for things like jumping onto the sofa, dancing at mealtimes and so on. It’s great to see her back on form, but with that restored confidence we’re also seeing more of the naughty, demanding little madam that was a feature of the younger Beanie.

We’re going to have our work cut out keeping that in check and getting her closer to accepting Monkey the way that Biggles has done.  Other than a bit of competitive pooing on walks, The Bigglet pretty much ignores the pups and they leave him alone (possibly because they think he’s a bit weird). One thing they can all agree on is that Beanie’s new birthday present is seriously comfy.

A big donut bed. Biggles likes it..

Poppy and Monkey like it..

..and Beanie loves it.