Jasmine Saves Us From A Mosquito Disaster

When watching any of the disaster movies, it always drives me crazy how people don't take a cue from what the animals are doing. When you see the animals run, you should do the same! Instead, in every one of the movies, as all the birds suddenly take off or all the animals stanpede by - the hero is just standing there wondering what to do. It's time to get out of there, now!

Animals really seem to know so much more about these things while we remain oblivious. Is it because we are so out of touch with our instincts, or is it because we are so full of ourselves that we simply won't accept the possibility of something going wrong in our world? Probably a bit of both. I know one thing. If my dogs are running, I am running too!

Of course this isn't always true. Some dogs do suffer with fears and phobias, and react to things that are of no particular danger to anyone. But knowing your dogs and being able to tell whether you should worry also could prove very useful one day.

There is research into using dogs for early earthquake detection for example. People's lives have been saved by their dog detecting smoke or fire before it was too late.

This week we are enjoying time at Jasmine's Ranch, an 80 acre rural property in North Ontario which we are fixing up to become a dog retreat. Jasmine and J.D. truly love being up here and spending their days outside. It's been quite hot and Jasmine's is also appreciating her cooling vest - yes, it does come in handy.

Right now we are staying in a trailer. It does have some human creature comforts, and since we are up here to enjoy the nature and work this is good enough accommodation for us at this time.

Jasmine adores her place and to her this is a true home. She usually gets a bit pouty every time we return to the city. She cannot uderstand why did we go back to the city again, having such a great place picked out.

It is very quiet up here and there aren't many things to bark at or protect the place from, though we do have a bear den little further back on the property.

However this time Jasmine saved us from disaster the first day here (no, not from a bear, thankfully). At this time of the year, with the type of weather we're having, the moment the sun sets swarms of mosquitoes come out and surround our trailer. No one would survive unharmed without screened windows. There is no leaving the trailer at that time of the day!

After dinner, while we were sitting inside the trailer, the mosquitoes started buzzing at the screens. Jasmine, who was sleeping on the bed, suddenly got up and started pacing back and forth between us and our little kitchen area. She was quite agitated. I got up trying to figure out what was bothering her and to calm her, when I noticed  couple mosquitoes buzzing around her. I thought that some must have gotten in to the trailer when we were coming in. But there was another and another ... Something was wrong! There were too many here! The mosquitoes had found a way in somewhere!

We started looking and there it was. Last fall we cut a little whole in the screen to get the propane hose through for our heater. Then we forgot all about it. The mosquitoes found it very quickly and decided to launch an attack through there! Even though we reacted to Jasmine's warning fairly quickly there were already so many mosquitoes inside we spent quite a while killing them while getting chewed up. I believe that if she had not warned us, someone would have found our dried up carcasses and could write a vampire movie based on that!

Thanks to Jasmine who noticed the problem right away, I'm still around to write about it.

Our dogs are amazing creatures who know and understand things that to us, as smart and literate as we may be, are simply beyond our reach. I for one have a big respect for dogs' instincts and ability and I always take their reaction into consideration.

It might be a good idea for you to do so as well.

Jana