Butterflies are the new Gulls ~ Miss Darcey Puffle Dog's latest obsession

Being as she's a Working Irish Cocker Spaniel it's in Miss Darcey Puffle Dog's nature to flush out birds, after all that's what her breed was bred for. Remember her obsession with gulls recorded here, well they're all flying high in the sky now

as are the other fledgling birds.

But she's discovered something else at eye level

something that flutters past her nose that she'd love to chase.

We did wonder what her new obsession would be, well now we know butterflies!

Oh and tractors, but not little vintage tractors like this one seen in the orchard, huge tractors roaring down the roads with trailers full of harvested produce, she'd like to chase those too!

Sandringham Sunday a Miss Darcey Puffle Dog Day Out

Miss Darcey Puffle Dog is off on an adventure, 

she wonders where she's going.

"Are we there yet?"

"Almost"

And she's arrived at Sandringham Country Park on Her Majesty the Queen's Norfolk estate. 

243 hectares to explore,

with so many interesting smells to sniff,

places to investigate

and look out points to observe from.

"Can you see the sea Darcey? It's over there"

All this exploring is thirsty work and Darcey manages to get herself quite wet at the conveniently situated dog water tap. She's also rather tired now so

snoozes all the way home.

Sandringham Country Park, part of Her Majesty the Queen's privately owned 8,000 hectare Sandringham Estate, is open to the public all year round with no entrance or parking fees. It's 6 miles North East of King's Lynn and can be found using satnav postcodes PE35 6AB (Visitors Centre) or PE35 6EH (Park House Hotel opposite the visitor centre).

The Sandringham Estate was originally purchased as a country residence for Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, the future Kind Edward VII, and his wife Princess Alexandra of Denmark. It has been the well loved Norfolk home of successive British monarchs since 1862.

"Dear old Sandringham, the place I love better than anywhere else in the world" 

King George V said that and we think that a lot of dogs, and their owners, would agree with him.

Cast of Characters

First off we have the eponymous heroine of Darcey's World little Miss Darcey Puffle, she came to live here in December 2017 when her families marriage faltered, she was around 7 months old.

Sadly Miss Puffle, she had a different name then, although well loved, had not been treated right. Her formative puppy months had been spent incarcerated in her crate due to both her owners working full time. She had no manners whatsoever and wasn't even house trained.

Darcey joined house cats Daphne and Lizzie.

Sisters, Daphne and Lizzie came to live with us when they were about 6 months old, yes around the time cats need spaying, their previous owners didn't feel they could offer the girls a good enough life living in a caravan as they did.

Two lovely tortoiseshells girls with very different personalities. Daphne and Liz hadn't previously had access to the outside world and as our road can get very busy and it's really not safe for wandering cats we decided to keep them as house cats.

We also have a few chickens living in the garden. The latest addition to our little flock of rescues, we've had ex-battery in the past, is Dolly, who was abandoned at Muddy Bottom, where we keep our horses. That's her pictured above in her travelling crate. Apparently she was caught eating eggs so her owner wanted rid of her, as it turns out she'd only just come into lay and since living with us we've seen no sign of egg eating.

Another bird abandoned at Muddy Bottom is Hansel the goose, dumped in the orchard by his owner to take his chance with the foxes. We herded him down to the horses thinking he could spend his nights safely in our old horse trailer but he's always refused to go in it. He lives with the horses and has a special bond with Madeline.

Madeline is a black thoroughbred mare who had previously been kept as a companion to an ex-eventer. When he died her owner didn't want to keep her so she came to live with Boo.

Boo is an ex-hurdler and point-to-pointer, an Irish bred thoroughbred he is our oldest resident at 20.

We have one other ex-racehorse, Tipper, purchased straight from the racing yard out of pity, he was in a poor way and looked to be heading straight to the pet food industry.

Then there are the ponies. 

When Darcey first joined us, we had three ponies.

Murphy who was saved from the meat man as a yearling by a lady who couldn't keep him so he came to live with us. We had great fun with him for 8 years before he was taken catastrophically ill and sadly had to be put to sleep.

Pip who was offered to my husband by a gypsy as a just weaned foal

and the rather famous Eggsy Pony (he has his own blog & Twitter)  who was abandoned by his owners when he was just a foal. 

Around the time that Eggsy was found abandoned Gingee turned up at Muddy Bottom. At first he didn't get on too well with long term orchard cat Charlie but eventually they learned to tolerate one another.

 Gingee is currently the only cat at Muddy Bottom as poor old Charlie got hit by a car last year and his luck finally ran out, Charlie had been involved in two previous road traffic accidents but there was nothing anyone could do to stop him crossing the road. 

Miss Darcey Puffle and the Herring Gulls

That's the Miss Darcey Puffle naughty face, the face that says, "Let me do what I want!". As you can see she's being restrained here and that's because she wants to chase a baby gull.

Darcey has an obsession with birds of all shapes and sizes, hardly surprising given her breeding, she's an Irish Working Cocker Spaniel, Cocker Spaniels were originally developed to flush out woodcocks. She wants to chase birds, not sure what she'd do if she caught one but I don't think it would end well for the bird.

Over the last few weeks, feels likes months, Herring Gulls have been fledging all around us driving Miss Darcey Puffle to hysteria, making our walks shall we say interesting!

 On occasion we've even had to rescue fledglings from the middle of a busy road, as you can probably imagine that drove her to conniptions!

Most of the fledglings are flying now so we're looking forward to more peaceful walks in the near future. Though I do wonder which bird will be the next object of obsession for our little Miss Darcey Puffle!

Aldi special buy stuff for dogs & cats

Lots of comfy looking pet beds in our local Aldi store at the moment, they're fully washable and and come in a variety of sizes, very reasonably priced too. 

Sadly although we'd love to get Miss Darcey Puffle one she really isn't ready for a "nice" bed yet. Darcey loves to dig at her blanket, shake it about and yes, I'm afraid she likes to rip big holes in them too. So to avoid stuffing everywhere she's going to have to wait until she's a bit more grown up before she gets a dog bed like this.

Our old boy Jake, who was not the sort to rip his bed up,  had a couple of Aldi dog beds and they proved to be good quality for the price so we'll definitely be looking out for them when Darcey is ready for one.  

As you probably already know you have to grab stuff like this when it comes in store as it tends to sell out quickly, these pet dishes sold out in a few days.

Hardly surprising really, a Cath Kidson inspired food bowl for your dog at less than £4.00!

There were also lots of toys and other accessories including shampoo in store, Darcey does get rather muddy at times so we thought we'd try some of the shampoo. We'll let you know what we think of it in a few days time.

Grass seeds and dogs ~ our experience with Miss Darcey Puffle Dog

Darcey's silky fur is like a magnet for seeds of all types so we always check her over after every walk to make sure that they are all removed.

Only we somehow managed to miss one stuck between her toes and it worked it's way inside and Darcey had to go to the vet to have it removed.

She ended up with a bandaged foot and a course of antibiotics and  the "lampshade" which needless to say didn't last long.

Less than 24 hours and she'd figured a way to get it off and render the thing useless by chewing it up! 

These were the culprits:

They're like tiny little arrow heads, very pointy and sharp and they actually work their way into the flesh.

Darcey was quite lucky as the one she picked up was easily retrievable, with tweezers, by the vet, through the entry hole. But, sometimes a seed can work it's way up through the foot making it very difficult to find. Grass seeds don't show up in x rays so if one does get lost inside the body it's difficult to find and could require surgery. 

The most common entry points, according to The Kennel Club, are feet and ears so be sure to check your dog carefully after they've been outside to prevent a painful and expensive trip to the vets.

Symptoms of grass seed "attack" are vigorous licking and in the case of one being embedded in the ear, head shaking. Don't delay in getting your dog to the vet, the longer you wait the more chance of the seed migrating within the body.