Bella and the butterfly

This has been the summer of butterflies.  Bella and I have released 10 Monarchs into our garden this summer.

This is one of the young men we released.  You can tell it's a male because of the fat spots on the lower wing veins. This one is of the generation which will travel to Mexico.

Bella and the butterfly.  We had a couple young ladies spend the night on our phlox.

One of the young ladies on Mommy's finger.  This one wasn't quite ready to take off.  When they are ready to go they are ready.  How they know how to make it cross-country and end up with their cousins in Mexico is a miracle.
How they transform from caterpillar to chrysalis to butterfly is a miracle!

Bella wants me to include a link to Monarch Watch.  Monarchs as a species are in dire need of human help.  Their habitat is endangered, the caterpillars' only food, the milkweed has been drastically reduced and nectar plants are rarer and harder for them to find on their way to overwinter in Mexico.
Find out more information here:http://www.monarchwatch.org/
Bella says "All you puppies out there, ask your people to help the Monarchs.
http://www.monarchwatch.org/waystations/

Goodbye Magpie

It is hard to believe it has been five months since we lost our Magpie.
We discovered she had elevated liver enzyme numbers.  We took her to the Specialty Clinic for more tests and discovered she had polyps in her spleen, her liver was enlarged and perhaps there was something going on with her adrenal.

It is difficult to know how far to pursue things with an older dog.  She had lived a good life (really should have bought it several times due to her poor life choices).  Surgery would be very invasive, life-threatening to an older dog and very expensive.  So we decided to give her a good end.  She was doing fine, enjoying her walks, sneaking out for visits to the neighbors almost to the end.

The second week in December she had a Vestibular incident where she couldn't walk and her eyes were tracking out of control. She recovered quickly but it's not too suprising she didn't last much longer.

Saturday, Dec 12th she was clearly going quickly and by Sunday she was not eating but was drinking in the morning.  Phil stayed with her and comforted her until we came home from church and then we all sat with her and gave her love.  She passed about 2:50PM CST.

Magpie puppy
She was a character from the beginning

Someone loved Christmas!
Nothing better than opening gifts.
Didn't matter if they weren't hers.

Such a tolerant dog.

I never knew an animal so motivated by food.

Goodbye Magpie!