Keva was one NAW-TEE dog tonight! We (my mom with Syd and me with Nebo and Keva, Skya stayed home, she's too young for hiking) went for a hike tonight. We just went on one of our usual trails just a few minutes from my house. We didn't leave until after 6, by the time we were heading back it was close to 7:30.
We had passed two guys on horses close to when we started back, the horses were on their way down. I held the dogs and waited off to the side but the dogs really weren't freaking out or anything. Anyway I just mentioned that because that's the only reason I can think of for the trick Keva pulled. After we started back down Keva was really being a pain with pulling. She's never wonderful on leash but she's not usually that bad. The trail is really steep in parts and mostly covered in shale rocks and dirt, its slippery. It's hard to handle two big dogs going down especially when one is pulling like that.
We ended up switching dogs, Nebo and Syd were being good so I put them on the coupler together and my mom took Keva (she volunteered...and usually Keva isn't that bad when its just her). We got to an area that was really steep and my mom couldn't get down with Keva too so we did something that I guess now was really stupid but I've done it a lot when hiking and never had a problem.
The trail is narrow and there's a steep incline on one side and it slopes down on the other side with lots of bushes on both sides, so there's really only one way to go...down the trail. So I went to the bottom of the steep part (not that far, maybe 20 feet or something) with Nebo and Syd, my mom waited at the top with Keva until I was ready, then let her go so she could come to me. I've used this trick many many times and the dogs always just come right to me and I grab them, they've never tried to slip past.
Well I think you can guess what happened next.Keva came barreling down and I went to grab her and she just went right past me and kept on running. She is one fast dog too! I think she was on a mission to get another look at the horses or something...I don't know but she was just booking it down the mountain. I'm not sure how my mom and I made it running after her without killing ourselves...big drop off on one side, slippery rocks...running...not a good combination. The little sh*t stopped a couple of times and looked back to make sure I was still coming then bolted again.
I know chasing her is completely the wrong method to catch her but I had no choice, she wasn't stopping to give me a chance to entice her with something and if I hadn't of ran after her I couldn't have kept her in my sight. It was starting to get dark and there's lots of trees, easy to lose sight of a dog up there.
Poor Syd couldn't keep up and was getting dragged, she ended up pulling out of her harness...I didn't stop, but I knew my mom was on her way behind me and Syd is good so I wasn't too concerned. When my mom found Syd she thought I had tied her to a tree or something, she was just sitting there good as gold waiting for my mom to get her.
Ugh anyway, I'm of course screaming her name like an idiot, about ready to burst into tears...I had lost Syd at this point, and lost sight of Keva...went round a bend to this area in the pines that we have often stopped at for lunch. There's a stream that runs along the trail and its deeper in that area, the dogs like to stop there to wade around. There she was, standing in the water, getting a drink. I called her to me and she came right over, just like nothing had happened.
I think she's trying to get me to match her fur color...she thinks I need gray hair too, they'll be popping up soon if she keeps freaking me out like that! I know she's a good hunter but I don't think she'd make it as Keva of the Forest for long.
*Edit...great I just found a gash on her back leg, probably caught herself on something running down the trail.I'm keeping an eye on it, its not really bleeding but its rather nasty looking ...may end up at the vet tomorrow if it doesn't look better in the morning. :/
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Seriously though I am glad she came back to you and Sydney, too. 
I bet she's grounded now, huh? 
Originally Posted by wolf_Q
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