Baby Buck's Adventure

If you haven't met him, this is Buck, aka Baby Buck. He's four, about 112 pounds and the biggest lap dog around, or at least thinks he should be. That is UNTIL his protective instinct kicks in.


Buck is half Lab, half Great Pyrenees. The GPs are bred to live with and protect flocks of sheep in the mountains of Europe, mostly from wolves. Buck seems to have an instinctive hatred of anything "wolf-like", which means coyotes. In New Mexico he chased them totally off our 98 acres.

I am, of course, leading up to a Buck story. We have a dog door, a big one to accommodate this guy, and we close it at night to prevent who-knows-what entering. So, the other night about midnight, Buck comes up from a sound sleep barking like mad, growling, etc., dashes down the steps - - and OUT the dog door that had been closed for the night! Huh? All we can figure is that the door, which has a little latch when it's pushed all the way down, wasn't fully closed and he butted it with his nose, something he loves to do with anything, until he got it open and got out.

So, midnight and I'm outside in jammies calling for Buck, who also tends to take off and be gone for hours. Fortunately he came right back, acting quite proud of himself for having defended the home from some marauder. He got back to sleep much more quickly than did I. You can bet we make very certain the dog door is all the way down now.