On 6 August, GRACE comes back to Sidney:

GRACE apparently liked the c*t too much and spent two days barking at it, which drove the husband crazy.

She is happily back here with the gang . . . and now there are six! I'm beginning to feel like Rusty! ADOPTED!!

I'm exhausted . . .

. . . LESLIE is still being coy.

On 7 August, Sidney reports:

I spotted LESLIE twice tonight. Once as I drove up to the construction area where she has been spotted before, and where I left some boiled chicken and water last night, and once as I was leaving, trotting along the neighborhood street.

I took GRACE with me, hoping that perhaps sisterly love would bring LESLIE in, but her fear of humans was too great. It was heartbreaking. Grace and I tromped all over the area where we first spotted LESLIE to leave a good scent pad for her to return to. I couldn't resist waiting around for a couple of hours, hoping that she would come back to eat while I was there, but I finally gave up.

I talked to a man today whose business is trapping nuisance dogs. He said that my biggest weapon was patience. Because she is hanging around the same area, we are to stop trying to go out and catch her. It would be pure luck to trap her anywhere that we could catch her and we chance chasing her out of the relatively safe area she is now.

What I have to do is establish a place where she comes back each night to eat and drink. If I hadn't spotted LESLIE when I first drove up tonight, I would have had a lot less faith that this would work. There is no way to tell whether she is eating the food or whether it is the coyotes, but since she was right where I left the food and water last night, I am going to continue doing so. On his suggestion, I am using the stinkiest canned c*t food I can find. He says that wafts on the breeze for a long, long way and dogs love it.

I will do this for three nights and then take out a live trap. I will put the food in front of that for a couple of nights and gradually move it inside.

The food in the crate that Stephanie & Hap have right outside their front door was eaten last night. This is about a quarter mile away from where the neighborhood where I spotted LESLIE tonight, but she could easily be traveling that far in making her nightly rounds, so if that continues, we will try the live trap there first.

Keep little LESLIE in your thoughts tonight.

I was just about to write to the list about something I have observed. CHARLIE, GRACE & LESLIE don't seem to have very good vision. For instance, when all of the dogs are running around the yard and come to the raised pad of my house, the red dogs will misjudge the jump and stumble. CHARLIE was always running into my dogs, much to their aggravation. On the other hand, as they are running around the yard chasing each other, they are easily able to leap over and around flying dog bodies to avoid collisions. They have a very difficult time figuring out whether sliding glass doors are open or shut.

After observing LESLIE these last few nights, as well as the dogs I have had with me at night, I think I have figured out why.

I believe that they have spent their entire lives sleeping during the day and awake at night. Their senses of smell and hearing are very acute, but they use their eyes only to spot motion, and not for actually looking at things, if that makes sense.

I also think that the way LESLIE is surviving is exactly how the entire pack survived in northern Arizona. I don't think they were out hunting very much . . . I think they were lurking around town scavenging on garbage, dog food, etc. We can't really know what happened, of course, but it is interesting to try to figure it out from their behavior.

Some good news from Teresa about GINGER:

GINGER had her first obedience class tonight. We did pretty good. She also went to the local dog park on Sunday. We've decided that will be her Sunday treat. She also has her first grooming appointment on Saturday. We leave next Friday on a little four-day trip; it was hard to find motels that take larger dogs but we finally had success.