Letter to my Trainer, Oksana

by Terra, a Kerry Blue Terrier from Eagan, Minnesota,
owned by Charlene Dwyer

I am Terra, a nine year old Kerry Blue female. I live with my human and another Kerry Blue, Desmond, who is not interested in hunting, and if he has ever helped me, it is only by accident. Some of your training methods have inspired me! I, too, love to hunt the evil chitterbox, Mr. Squirrel. To capture the Enemy, I instruct my human to take me to the park where Mr. Squirrel lives with all his chattering relatives. My human sits on the bench near the biggest tree, so Mr. Squirrel is distracted. When one of the chitterboxes strays too far from the tree, I spring up and run for the tree. This makes the evil nut cruncher have to decide whether to try to leap over my head onto the tree, or to run towards my human. Through many hours of training, my human will jump up and wave her hands when I bark for her to do so. Mr. Squirrel is more afraid of a human and is confused. He will try to jump onto the tree, but I anticipate this and leap at the same time. I jump up the trunk of the tree as far as I can and grab the sassy one's tail. The look on his greedy, little face as I fling him around is breathtaking! I have only been able to capture two so far, so it is possible my technique needs practice. Kerry Blues are only fast for short distances, unlike your most elegant self. As you can see from my picture, I have hair over my eyes, and sometimes, I don't see as well as I need to, but this hair protects me from my other favorite prey Mr. Raccoon.

We live in a triplex and there are two most stupid neighbors upstairs. An Irish Setter boy and a Dalmatian girl. I am disappointed that the Irish boy is not smart, as I am Irish too. When Irish Boy sees an unworthy interloper in the yard, he lifts his foot and tail, and points at my prey, but he never tries to hunt it. Irish Boy also leaves food outside that Mr. Raccoon loves to dine on. I have chomped three raccoons for invading my yard, so far. My human is so well-trained, she had one of Mr. Raccoon's skins tanned, so I can roll on it whenever I want! To catch raccoons you have to be fast and to know how the invaders think. Many evenings Mr. Raccoon comes to our porch to munch some canine snacks. The sneaky one is gray and brown and has a long, striped tail. However, it is not nearly so lovely as the wonderful fluffer-nutter that you possess, Oksana! Since the interloper is not very fast on the ground, catching up to him is no problem. His beady-eyed face has a little black mask on it, showing him to be a thief. I only weigh 40 pounds and many raccoons can weigh that much, too. I believe this thief to possibly be related to Mr. Squirrel since he climbs trees when pursued.

My best method for catching raccoons in the yard is to conceal myself on our patio. I stalk the masked one as he leaves the deck and heads toward the shed, where my human has thoughtfully laid out a pan of bacon grease to cool. I wait until he is about halfway there and make my charge. Unfortunately, I usually forget myself and cry out in my loudest terrier yell. He waddles faster toward the biggest tree in the yard, but I cut him off. Mr. Raccoon can stand up on his legs and growl at me. Being a proficient hunter, I'm not intimidated. The offensive intruder tries to claw me and sometimes gets a little of my face hair in his claws. My human will shout for me to come inside, but I know what is best! I must dispatch the threat to my yard! Once a momentary argument with my human allowed Mr. Raccoon to escape into the raspberry bushes, where I lost more tufts of my fur pursuing him. I finally forced him into retreat and cornered him against the shed, where I displayed my courage and rid my yard of this menace. As part of her penance for distracting me, and out of her desire to please me, my human took Mr. Raccoon to a man who made the skin into a carpet, you can see in my picture.

My human prefers that I play with toys she has brought me from the store, but I prefer the wild things. She will not let me eat my prey, fearing it has disease. I have employed your royal training methods of foot stomping and teeth clacking, upon my human, with excellent results. As a last resort, I lay in my chair and just stare off into space. My human is not from royal breeding, as I am, so I was surprised that these subtle techniques work on her. But, I have learned to trust the Diva Oksana in these matters. I used to use my own methods of barking in her face and shaking her pant leg, but these didn't work and it usually ended with me in the crate. I have seen you reclining on your Oriental rug and have attempted to emulate you. My human thinks it's so cute that I get my favorite food, dog cookies, as a reward.

Desmond, used to go to dog shows where he saw many Borzoi boys and girls. He says there were none so clearly a diva as you.

Tally ho!,
Terra

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