Dancing Dogs - Jon Katz
Do animals have souls? Have you wonder whether your pet, your farm animal, or even the wild animals can communicate among themselves or with you? keywords in this book: dogs, cats, cattle,farm dogs, bulls, and horses.
Jon Koko is an artist who currently lives and works in Malmö, Sweden. His square illustrations and paintings are carefully balanced scenes with mostly flat color surfaces...
I noticed while researching “Going Home” this curious thing about dogs and people. No matter how old or sick they are, their death always comes as a shock. It was to me, I suppose. Last year at this time, I had four dogs, and all of them were powerful presences in my life, in their […]
Flo is very happy in her flower pot, her new tanning salon and sun spot. She was trying to flirt with me when I pointed the camera at her, and she did get a belly rub, which she loves. Flo has several sun spots but this is her new one. The ingenuity of barn cats […]
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I want to share a wonderful experience I had this morning. Yesterday, I began a program of Tai Chi as part of my daily spiritual practice, I began receiving instruction from an experienced and committed teacher, Scott Carrino. This morning, I went out into the pasture by the apple tree to practice Tao Chi for […]
When the temperature falls below zero – it was – 10 this morning, the donkeys get ice whiskers, it is so cold that their warm breath freezes on the whiskers. The ice whiskers last until the sun comes up or the temperature rises, it is part of the real world of real animals. This winter […]
Simon has a loud, piercing bray that the neighbors hear a quarter-mile down the road. Lulu and Fanny have soft brays, when the three of them get together they make their own Donkey symphony, and they lure me to the cookie jar in the barn. Donkeys are intuitive, the read intentions, they know when I […]
It is not as cold as the weather forecasters said it would be, but it is bitterly cold. The animals handle cold in their own way, when the sun came out, they all came out of the pole barn and stood sideways, exposing as much of their skin and fur to the sun as possible. […]
As a writer, I am used to using words to tell my stories, as a photographer I am learning the hard and difficult lesson that sometimes images tell a story much better than my words. Hard for me to get that. This week, a new ritual has developed under the apple tree in the rear […]
Every day, we communicate with our animals, we learn something about them and they learn something about us. It used to be a challenge to move the donkeys and the sheep from one place to another. Now, more and more, we just ask them to follow us and they do. They have come to trust […]
This is where the sheep holed up in the Pole Barn, notice Liam, is front and center, Deb to his left, Pumpkin to his right. The ewes huddled behind the lambs and nobody moved. The secret to moving sheep is just to keep pressure on them, send the dog in closer and closer and have […]
Nearly two weeks ago, one of the donkeys – Simon, I am certain – bit and stomped Liam, one of our new lambs. He probably didn’t recognize him as a sheep and went after him to protect the flock. Donkeys are guard animals, they are very protective of sheep. Since then, we locked the donkeys […]
Every day one of us has a talk with the donkeys, most often it is Maria. Animals sense and smell emotions and hers are right on the surface. I often stand back with a camera, I love watching and listening to their conversations.
Since one of the donkeys bit and stomped Liam – we imagine it was Simon – the donkeys have been exiled to the side pasture, where they will remain until the lambs get bigger and stronger and faster. I believe Simon did not recognize the lamb as a sheep, he saw him as an unwanted […]
More than 90 per cent of Americans now live on one or the other coasts of our country. Economists have condemned rural life as inefficient in the global economy and more and more people are driven to cities to find work they don’t love to pay for health care they might need for wages that […]
Over time, we are touched by the sweetness of donkeys, by their gentleness, patience and intuition. Lulu is a guard animal, she is ever vigilant against intruders – deer, foxes, coyotes, stray dogs, new people. She is shy sometimes, wary of people trying to make her do things she doesn’t want to do. She has […]
