So my sweet Golden, Jenny, kept coming in all slimy, having obviously rolled in ... SOMETHING. But we couldn't figure out what. It was all over her neck and shoulders, but it had no odor. Simetimes we wouldn't notice it right away and it would dry, stiff and spiky. I told my GC, this is almost like ... egg. Only, there's no yolk. What could it be? Well, then one day she saw Jenny sneaking out of the hen house with an egg in her mouth! Aha! She's carrying the egg off to the lawn, breaking it, eating the yolk, then taking a bath in the white! Too clever! Well! I know how to fix her, and I have everything I need.
So today I set up the Great American Egg Monster. It starts like this. I have a little pet-quality electric fencer, like this:
It doesn't have to be strong enough to knock the socks off a horse, or to fence around a hundred-acre pasture, because a dog's nose and tongue are VERY sensitive.
First I needed to connect one of the posts to a ground post. I used a little T-post. Like so.
You don't have to set up under a tree, by the way. It's just convenient for me. The best way for me to set this up after I plug it in is just to hang it from the electric cord like so.
It's not plugged in yet at this point as we're still setting up. The last thing we need to do is set up the bait. It can't be grounded, so we use a plastic basket. We set it on a couple of bricks to keep it off the ground. Then we run a wire from the Hot post on the fencer to the eggs. This was actually trickier than I expected it to be, as the wire was springy and had a mind of its own! We finally ran it through some holes in the basket and round the eggs in plain sight. Then we cracked an egg and poured it out over all the eggs, making them wet, gooey and enticing. And finally we dumped a bucket of water all over the ground around the whole setup, figuring it wouldn't hurt for the dogs to have wet feet when they touched the wire with their nose. Brutal, I know, but remember, it's a very small fencer.
Here's the baited egg basket:
And here's the whole setup:
Then we plugged it in and walked away. Went in the house, in fact. And trusted to Nature. I sat on the back porch and pretended to read. Jenny came and sniffed at me. Whatcha doing, Mom? I ignored her and she went outside and disappeared. Sure enough, less than a minute later, a little yelp and here she came, giving me just a passing glance as she went in the house to her usual spot behind the recliner. Later in the day the other dogs discovered the temptation and loudly announced their decision to never, ever get near enough an egg to sniff it, ever again.
Mission accomplished. All dogs' egg-aversion complete.
So today I set up the Great American Egg Monster. It starts like this. I have a little pet-quality electric fencer, like this:
It doesn't have to be strong enough to knock the socks off a horse, or to fence around a hundred-acre pasture, because a dog's nose and tongue are VERY sensitive.
First I needed to connect one of the posts to a ground post. I used a little T-post. Like so.
You don't have to set up under a tree, by the way. It's just convenient for me. The best way for me to set this up after I plug it in is just to hang it from the electric cord like so.
It's not plugged in yet at this point as we're still setting up. The last thing we need to do is set up the bait. It can't be grounded, so we use a plastic basket. We set it on a couple of bricks to keep it off the ground. Then we run a wire from the Hot post on the fencer to the eggs. This was actually trickier than I expected it to be, as the wire was springy and had a mind of its own! We finally ran it through some holes in the basket and round the eggs in plain sight. Then we cracked an egg and poured it out over all the eggs, making them wet, gooey and enticing. And finally we dumped a bucket of water all over the ground around the whole setup, figuring it wouldn't hurt for the dogs to have wet feet when they touched the wire with their nose. Brutal, I know, but remember, it's a very small fencer.
Here's the baited egg basket:
And here's the whole setup:
Then we plugged it in and walked away. Went in the house, in fact. And trusted to Nature. I sat on the back porch and pretended to read. Jenny came and sniffed at me. Whatcha doing, Mom? I ignored her and she went outside and disappeared. Sure enough, less than a minute later, a little yelp and here she came, giving me just a passing glance as she went in the house to her usual spot behind the recliner. Later in the day the other dogs discovered the temptation and loudly announced their decision to never, ever get near enough an egg to sniff it, ever again.
Mission accomplished. All dogs' egg-aversion complete.
That's what I get for doing stuff at midnight-thirty, lol. Oh well.
