Grounded.

Sometimes someone needs to lay down the law here at Struan Farm, and that someone is usually me.

I normally leave Clifford untied during the day. He stays by the house and more often than not naps in the sun. But a day or so ago he disappeared and I had to go off to find him. I thought he'd followed nephew Mike down to the Homestead where he's working on the new garden shed. Turns out Clifford was down at the Homestead, but not with Mike. He was running around in an agitated "hunt" mode, a state that I've come to recognise. He loses all awareness of his surroundings when he gets like this.  One could say he is "in the zone." The last time this happened was chasing turkeys, and he blew out a ligament in his back leg.

Suffice it to say he was lectured sternly about wandering off and brought back up to his coop. At the time I thought it was a one off thing. I also wasn't sure what he was hunting.

But no, it wasn't a one off. He slipped off again two days later.  I found him down at the Homestead again. This time he came crawling out from UNDER the Homestead. Now John and I know that rabbits nest pretty regularly under there, we see them run for cover when they're startled on the lawn. I'm sure Clifford was on the prowl for rabbits, something he views as his primary responsibility here at the farm. But the problem is that poison has been tossed under the Homestead, both rabbit and rat. So I can't have Clifford going under there much as he'd like to.

Time for tough love: he's grounded indefinitely.

 

Now no one jump to his defence, please! I definitely don't like tying Clifford up during the day, but really don't have a choice when he gets sneaky like this. It's for his own good. I don't want him eating poison and dying...We're also coming into lambing season, the time of the year when he's on a very short leash since we don't want him stressing the ewes and new lambs.