When we first moved here, I wanted to "save" every bird and critter that needed help, and quickly learned no one else around here was as worried about the wild things as I was. Our first year, a big owl crashed THROUGH the fiberglass skylite panel on the roof of the chicken coop. He cut his head and hurt a wing. I called all over southern Oklahoma and no one (least of all the local Fish and Wildlife people) were interested in helping that owl. I was crushed. Finally, we moved him to an adjacent small guinea coop/pen and put the guineas in with the chickens. We left the door open, and he finally flew away on his own after several days. I refused to catch mice for him, so he had to live on canned cat food for those few days. I guess if you live in an area where wildlife is very abundant, people don't get as excited about one injured bird. If blue jays are engangered, you can't tell it here! We probably are overpopulated with birds, though, because we put out food for them and have a constant water source. I HAVE noticed that there are more birds than usual hanging out around the garden and eating bugs in the garden. Birds are a terrific method of pest control, so I encourage them in every way possible. We ALWAYS have a pair of owls who stay together all the time and hunt together. One is a really big barn owl, and we call him Hooty. The other is a little screech owl, obviously named Screechy. You never see one without the other, which is fascinating. They've been here as long as we have. I don't know if the current Hooty and Screechy pair are the actual same Hooty and Screechy pair that we first saw in 1999. I think it is an odd pairing. I feel sorry for them....the crows harass them relentlessly and try to run them off. Our owls are mostly out at night, but every now and then I see them out late in the morning. For all the birds we have coming to the feeders, predator birds do not come into the yard much. Maybe the cats and dogs help keep them away? Oh, and the Purple Martins also like to chase off other birds attempting to "hunt" in their territory too. Dawn

Sounds like you're doing great with him. As Cesar would say: "Dogs live in the moment." So what matters is now, not a slip when you were surprised and spoke louder than you meant to. "Dogs respond to a confident leader." When you walk him, stand tall, shoulders back, loose lead, in charge, ready to conquer anything that comes your way. "Don't encourage fearful behavior - ignore it." Go about your business as if there is nothing scary going on, just like balanced dogs would. If a dog acts scared and you scoop it up and comfort it, the message the dog gets is that there is a reason to be afraid and it is rewarded. So the next time that stimulus comes, she reacts the same way because you taught her she was right to be afraid of it. A rescue dog I got reacted slightly when there was thunder. I ignored it and then thought of a game that would make her happy. We played her favorite game, a game of her own I called growly bump. There it was thundering and I'm on my hands and knees, doing the let's play position and jumping around with her, bumping her hip, immitating her play growl. We made much happy noise and drowned out the storm. I did this a few other times with particularly bad storms, and she quickly forgot that storms were once scary to her. Hope that helps you.

So what if you go through the list, and are still having problems? Because our 3 year old cat was so playful, and we thought it would be nice for him to have a buddy, we adopted a 2 year old neutered, declawed male cat from an animal shelter. After their initial adjustment, they seemed to get along well. The new cat was never very affectionate with us (our first cat is), but I don't think that's all that unusual. All was well for a few months, then the new cat started pooping outside the litterbox. My vet said he had colitis, and gave him some prescription food to try, which worked well - I kept him on the prescription food, and he always pooped in the litterbox from then on. A few months later, though, he started occasionally peeing on our beds. Thinking it was another medical issue, I took him to the vet a couple more times. He didn't find any medical issues - said it was most likely behaviorial, and gave us some Feliaway and advice similar to the above article. We had two litterboxes, and both were in the laundry room (upstairs). I could imagine that the location and/or noise might be an issue, or maybe privacy (our bedrooms are all upstairs), so I bought two additional litterboxes - one for the main floor (covered), and one for the basement (uncovered). I scooped all litterboxes daily, changed litter, tried different brands, etc. He continued to pee on the beds, and then later started peeing on our leather furniture, and carpet. I ended up returning him to the animal shelter, but have always felt terrible about it. I know that being a good pet owner means that you are willing to spent a certain amount of time and money when necessary, but after paying for several trips to the vet, Feliaway, replacing mattress pads, carpet pad, sections of subfloor, pillows, and buying gallons and gallons of Nature's Miracle and Urine-Off, I just reached my limit. Thank goodness for our first cat, or my confidence as a cat owner would be completely gone. Still, I don't think I will ever get another cat - I feel horrible that our second cat's behavioral issues were just beyond my capacity. Every time I see an article like this, I read it and think, did I do all I could? One of the most frustrating experiences I have had.

"I loved the way the final votes were read but trying to figure out how and when that was planned." "A tie could happen anytime, it would only take 1 person to vote for the 3rd person to make a tie." Last season, in one of the Q & A sessions that Dalton Ross does with Jeff Probst, the subject of a tie came up and Jeff said that if there were a tie at the final tribal, then the person not involved in the tie would cast the final, deciding, vote. If you think about it, this is what they do in "regular" tribal councils when there is a tie vote to oust someone. The folks who are tied do not get to vote again, and everyone else votes again with votes only being cast for one or the other of the folks who are tied. Ok, now for "how and when it was planned." When everyone is done voting at a tribal council, Jeff always says, "I'll go tally the votes." Then he comes back and dramatically pulls them from the urn and reads them. If Jeff just grabbed the urn and brought it back to his post and started randomly pulling them out and reading them, it would not be nearly as dramatic as it has been. That's because when he goes off to "tally the votes," he actually looks at each one, and then they are arranged in the urn in a manner that will provide the most drama as they are being read. In last night's case, when Jeff previewed the votes and saw that there was a tie, he knew he HAD to read them out loud to the group right then and there, because he knew that Laurel would have to cast the deciding vote. No, he couldn't have waited and had Laurel cast the vote at the beginning of the reunion show, because it would have been a tainted vote. Think about it -- when they are on location, they have no idea what is going on. They only know what they see and hear. They don't know what another player is saying to the camera in the "confessional" interviews; they don't know what other players and saying to each other behind someone's back, etc. By the time the live shows rolls around, they've been home for several months, and they've watched every episode on tv, just like we have. That final vote needed to be cast in a manner that represented what Laurel felt at the time, uninfluenced by outside factors.