Heart has 2 speeds: full-out-fast and dead asleep.  She and Shorty run constantly around the place.  Her abdominal muscles have tightened and hypertrophied to the point the umbilical hernia has now closed completely.  Whereas Friday used to sit majestically and watch Shorty heel the horses, Heart copies everything Shorty does and is heeling like the heeler mix does.  She bites at the horses legs but hasn’t been kicked yet.  I say “yet” because our horses are so used to dogs that they play and take turns chasing.  They will kick a dog if she gets too obnoxious, but usually it’s just a halfhearted blow to teach a lesson.  They will let the dogs chase them for awhile and then it’s their turn to chase the dogs.  The spotted horses in the new pictures are our two yearlings.  They are juveniles themselves and they like to play and run.  The dogs also have charge of three huge feral barn cats.  The cats keep the messy birds out of the barn and keep the rodents down.  Rodents =  rattlesnake meals.  No rodents/no snakes.  No rodents also mean less chance of exposure to the Hanta Virus which is endemic in NM and very dangerous to humans.  The dogs keep away the Coyotes who would eat the cats.  So we have a sort of a closed loop ecosystem.  Our old 110 lbs lab is not much of a threat to the Coyotes anymore.  Too slow and arthritic.  Shorty is too small to scare them away on her own.  But as a pair , Shorty and Heart are very aggressive and intimidating.  Heart is already a ferocious watchdog.  Karen is betting Heart will be small, maybe 40 to 45 lbs., but I am observing rapid maturation and I bet she will be well within the standard for bitches at 55 to 60.  She is about 30 lbs at 4.5 months.  We are especially vigilant about chasing cars (obvious reason) which these Canaans seem to enjoy.  But she is pretty obedient and so far we have been able to restrain her. 

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