Chasing Reptiles

My doggie Inu is a pretty good little athlete. He is sort of like a quarter horse, except that genetically he is a predator, not a prey animal. He can accelerate very rapidly, and for short distances his speed is remarkable.

One of his great passions is chasing tennis balls in the back yard. But even better is chasing small sentient beings like cotton tailed bunny rabbits and lizards. Being small and a good athlete, my doggie can zig and zag rapidly. So chasing live animals, which are utilizing all their strengths, talents, and intelligence in evasion, is a wonderful intellectual and physical challenge for him.

This morning we were getting a little exercise out walking in the Chihuahuan desert near El Paso, Texas. We were not on a dirt road, rather we were bush-wacking across the sand dunes. I was occasionally stopping to take photographs, and Inu was exploring. Out of the corner of my eye I saw him take off at full acceleration after a lizard. Except I immediately realized that this reptile was not a lizard, it was a snake. A fast snake.

Even in it’s S serpentine shape it was at least twice as long as my dog, and it was really moving along trying to avoid any sort of confrontation. But it was clear to me that my dog was right on the verge of making the capture.

Fortunately we have a good partnership, and he is normally well attuned to my verbal calls. I think he could probably sense the concern (actually it was more like horror or terror) in my voice when I called, and as soon as I hollered at him he immediately discontinued the chase. Whew!

Then a few minutes later Inu found a really fast, fat lizard and had a great little chase. Naturally the lizard won, but my dog got the early morning predator hormones worked out of his system.

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