Beautiful, Brutal Nature

There’s a pond in front of the house I live in. Surrounding the pond are bushes, scrub, spindly trees, and grasses. When the bushes and trees bloom, there is privacy for geese to lay eggs and rabbits to lay bunnies. You can’t see the nests; they’re well-hidden.

My dog, Duke, knows they’re there, though. Several weeks ago, he pulled hard on his leash and dashed into the brush and ran down to the pond. I pulled him out, but it was too late. He immediately sat down on the grass. He then opened his mouth and slowly, slowly, a giant goose egg emerged. He dropped it on the grass and batted it around with his paws.

When Duke is eating or playing with something, it is unwise to try to take it from him. Instinctively, he will bite you. Hard. I know I should have had this trait trained out of him. I bought a shock collar to discourage his bad behavior. It’s still in the box. I can’t bring myself to inflict pain on him (I’m aware of the irony), so I just don’t take anything away from him. And I tell others not to, either.

But, back to the goose egg: Somehow, I was able to distract him and while he was looking away from the egg, I grabbed it and headed into the thicket. I located the nest, which appeared to have been constructed primarily out of dryer lint, quite easily since the two geese in the pond were nearby, screeching their heads off. I quickly placed the egg back into the nest and got out of there.

After that, the mother never left her nest. She sat there all day, every day, protecting her young. She must have left the nest at some point, but only when she was certain that Duke was not around. The eggs hatched last night or this morning, because I saw the eggs yesterday afternoon in the nest, and today I saw the mother and father geese swimming with their little goslings in the pond. I was happy they survived.

The same couldn’t be said for a nest of newly born baby bunnies, however.

Yesterday, on our walk around the pond, Duke pulled especially hard on his leash and dragged me back into the brush, a little further down from the goose nest. I pulled and pulled and finally got him out of the brush. As he emerged, I saw numerous tiny little newborn rabbits scramble away from him, racing in all directions across the lawn. He raced after them, pulling me with him. He scooped up two or three in his mouth and would not release them. I screamed and yelled and demanded that he drop them, to no avail. His jaw was clenched tightly. Little limbs hung from his mouth. Horrified doesn’t even come close to describing how I felt. There was nothing I could do as he swallowed them whole.

I was afraid of him for a while. This is the same dog I hug and snuggle with. He’s a 140-pound gentle giant … when he isn’t biting off your hand or eating live animals. It’s hard to reconcile his two natures.

My niece, who was visiting, asked how he could behave in such a vicious way. She noticed that he looked quite happy and normal right after eating the rabbits. I told her that it’s instinctive to him to capture prey.

“But, he’s a house dog!” she responded. Yes, he’s a house dog. But he’s also descended from wolves.

I’ll have to keep that in mind on our next walk around the pond.