The Cottage Smallholder

Berry and Basil (world renowned American gardening Min Pins) wrote a post on Sarah’s great blog Gardendogs and I have been inspired to answer from the perspective of our three UK Min Pins: Dr. Quito, The Contessa and The Lady Midnight Amber (Inca).

1. We love yapping and scaring the postman. We can hear his van driving up the road and can bark for a good five minutes before he hits us on the head with the mail through the letterbox on the front door. We also enjoy yapping at the bank manager next door when he is scratching about in his garden and gets too near our fence. This makes our mistress very angry and red and she roars with a much bigger bark than ours.
2. We are sun worshippers and, like Basil and Berry, we like a tan on our tummies. The best days in the summer are sunny ones. We don’t like rain. We are small enough to take cover under the rhubarb leaves if we get caught in an unexpected shower.
3. Bred as ratters, we are efficient killing machines, particularly when we hunt together. Our mistress loves us to catch moles, mice and rats but we were flummoxed when she was not pleased when we killed the baby ducklings that pottered into the garden this summer. We enjoy visiting the chicken run every morning and baying at the hens and guinea fowl from behind the wire. The chickens ignore our taunts but the guinea fowl have started shrieking when we thunder past. This sounds quite alarming coming from a creature with such a small head. Thank goodness they are contained in the run.
4. We feel the cold so like to sleep in furry igloos with lots of blankets. If we can creep upstairs into the human dog basket we sleep well under the duvet at the mistress’s feet. We would prefer to sleep there every night but have altruistically sacrificed this comfort as we have our security duties to consider.
5. We are great guard dogs although we are a bit short sighted. Sometimes we do not notice that our mistress has gone into the garden and we think that she is a stranger when she walks back to our cottage. It is a perfect excuse to let rip and have a jolly good bark.
6. We are curious (some would say nosey beings). We examine every box and bag that is brought into the cottage. Our mistress calls it the customs inspection. We like to examine what is happening in the garden too. Sometimes we creep upstairs and guard our territory from the comfort of a sunny windowsill.
7. We are independent. We are fond of our human pets and sadly feel that we have spoilt them by giving them a bit too much freedom. OK, they have to go out to work to earn the money for our food and private medical care but we are not the centre of their world. As they are the centre of ours.