Pumpkin

Life has been a little crazy lately, more so then usual. Our precious little orange dog Pumpkin started a new hobby recently. Pumpkin who we lovingly call Demon, Agent Orange, Urchin, and Creature from the Orange Lagoon, Pumpinator, The Beast, seems to always find herself in trouble on a daily basis. We honestly don't know how she thinks up enough stuff to get herself into so much trouble. Maybe because she is half Beagle, very stubborn and a smarty paws. Pumpkins latest "hobby" or escapade involved her collecting eggs one by one and burying them, only to dig them up later and have a yummy snack.
Suddenly we noticed a dramatic drop in our egg production and found the chickens hiding what few eggs we could fine in odd places. For some orange reason they were afraid to lay in their nesting boxes. We found eggs all over the yard, upstairs in the barn, downstairs in the workshop, in a bucket, on a bail of open wood chips, everywhere. Not one egg was deposited in the nice nesting boxes we built for them. Then one morning Pumpkin went running up to me showing off the egg in her mouth. I tried to get her to drop it, no such luck, Pump ran off at high puppy speeds to bury her prize. Of course I followed, watched her bury the egg, and then retrieved it. This happened a few more times and then she broke an egg, discovering how yummy they are. That was it; the egg internment would only last a few hours then dug up for snack time. That short period of time in the ground must have added some special flavor.
It took us a week or so to figure out the tie between Pumpkin, the birds, the eggs disappearances and the daily egg hunts for hidden treasure. Pumpkin was stealing the eggs away while the birds were still laying them, terrifying the poor things, chasing them out of their nesting boxes. We decided to try an experiment, lock Pump in for the day and go to work. Don't worry grandma came up to let her little grand puppy outside for pee-pees.
That evening when I went out to pick eggs, there were actually a few more eggs, imagine that. Then pumpkin tried to steal an egg before I could collect it. I caught her red pawed, or should say saw her. The stinker ran off and ate her snack; after all she didn't have any eggs all day. Now we have only one choice, out came infamous "collar of shame".
Pumpkin is the sweetest dog on the planet. She charms kisses out of strangers, snuggles endlessly and has the saddest beagle face you have ever seen. But Pumpkin knows the collar of shame very well. In 25 years of having dogs I have never had to resort to the collar of shame. I hated doing this but it's either no eggs and a fat dog with egg breath or the collar of shame. She is just one stubborn girl.
Off I go to dig through my work kitchen drawes, find the collar and install it around the little orange demons neck. If looks could kill, I would have been dog food. Pump snorts, glares at me with narrowed eyes and goes off to pout in the kitchen. She is not a stupid dog, just stubborn and very smart.
The next morning, on goes the collar and we go off to do chores. I'm stepping out of the barn, guess who is trotting out of the chicken pen door, with an egg in her orange mouth. This time I've caught her red pawed! I give her the command to stop and drop the egg, no response. Then I use the warning beep on her collar, this does not faze or slow her down, she's walking off with the egg. So now I have to do it, a very low zap, she stops drops the egg and gives me the evil orange eye. We have a little chat over what she has been caught doing; she goes off to pout sitting outside the back door for the whole day.
Now realizing I have a huge problem of dog egg snatching. I hunt through the interned looking for a solution. That's when I come across a New Improved collar that responds to a transmitter. The transmitter is on the barn over the chicken door, the collar is on Pump, and hopefully this will work. She pouts then tries to go into the chicken coop, hears the beep and stops. Amazingly we have more eggs!