New Neighbours at the Allotment (Both Sides)




Cat people have moved onto the neglected allotment beside ours.  Boy have they got their work cut out – blackberry, stinging nettles, overhanging hawthorn, tall docks, long grass, fire ants, wasps nests, and rats.  I would have called them mad, but they are cat people (I can tell straight away), so I helped them out by supervising for most of Sunday afternoon.  It was much more interesting than what F was doing.

On the other side of us Mr Leeks has swapped his huge plot with Lee who has the small plot........and the dog.  So that loony dog has moved to right beside us.  It seems harmless enough, more interested in chasing around after a bag of something that gets thrown about by Lee than in chasing cats; but one can never be too careful.  It might be a master of subterfuge.  I don’t think dogs generally are masters of subterfuge, they are more blunt-instrument sort of animals, blundering about chasing things that humans throw, but like I say one can never be too careful.  The dog doesn’t supervise, or inspect, or go ratting, or even dig.  It just pants a lot, chases things that get thrown only to being them back and have them thrown again.  It can’t even get the message that the human is trying to throw that thing away, but it has to keep bringing it back.  Not the brightest things, dogs.

Having said all that, after my dog attack a few weeks ago, and my very sore back, I keep dogs at an even greater respectful distance than previously.  It isn’t difficult, the dog charges about in the heat and sunshine, and I go looking for secluded shady places.  That particular dog doesn’t even know how to lie down in the shade when the temperature soars.

F has started cutting the hedge.  I believe that means she has finally got all her plants in the garden and is looking for things to do.  That hedge is a job creation scheme all on its own.  Maybe having new neighbours on both sides has inspired her to tidy up our own rough edges.  She is going to have to shift the water butt too because I reckon there is a rat nest dug into the space under the thing it is standing on – now this is where a proper dog could be useful, but a squirrel ran directly past Lee’s dog’s nose on Sunday and the dog didn’t even react.  So I suspect it doesn’t go much on rats either.  I shall nonchalantly be sitting on the shed roof when I see F tackling that job; it could be interesting to witness and I’d hate to miss interesting.

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