“A poacher to his eyelids, as all the lurcher clan, follows silent as a shadow, and clever as a man"

Found this quotation recently (it comes from a poem entitled 'The New Anubis' by Patrick R. Chalmers, written around 1915 I believe):

'All along the moorland road a caravan there comes
Where the piping curlew whistles and the jacksnipe drums;

And a long lean dog
At a sling jig-jog
A poacher to his eyelids as are all the lurcher clan,
Follows silent as a shadow and as clever as a man'

This quotation, combined with a conversation I had with someone who used to come along to my training classes when they needed help with their dog, made me recall that I once jokingly sent a picture of Nellie to Lesley with a request for my money back. My reason? I had asked for a border collie pup and seemed to have a black and white 'lurcher' instead!! At five months old she looked far more like a long legged lurcher-type (some kind of sighthound crossed with a collie) than a pure bred collie and, while she is definitely a collie obviously, this person I met in the week noted, without any prompting from me, that she had a turn of speed and a running style reminiscent of a lurcher.

She certainly has long legs, lean athleticism, beautiful balance, power and ease of motion when she moves on the ground or through the air. If she were a model I think she'd be a cross between Kate Moss (for her lightness) and Cindy Crawford (for her lean, strong athleticism) and

both for their legs, cheekbones (her beautiful head) and beauty. I have lost track of the number of people whose heads she has turned everywhere we go - from tops of mountains to urban streets - collie people, non-collie people and even non-doggy people. She has charisma - she draws people to her. Her litter name wasn't 'Miss World' for nothing :-)

Her hunting instincts compound the lurcher impression for me. Though I am glad to say the recall and focus training I built up with her all through her pup hood and adolescence means that all I have to do if she sees or chases after a hare, deer, cat, squirrel or any exciting situation ....is ask her to Sit, or Down or Leave at a distance or just Recall. If I let her follow her instincts as I do sometimes with the occasional rabbit, pheasant or woodcock (on public footpaths!), it is a meal soon enough....

How else? Well apparently some suggest the word 'lurcher' comes from an old word for 'thief' - hence 'poacher'. She is a thief that's for sure! She regularly takes cooking implements from the sink and licks them clean. Pop would take things too but her tastes were more typical - once she had two prime slices of wildcaught salmon I had carefully put ready to go into the oven for our supper. I put my head out the door that was barely four yards away to tell Iain I was about to put the salmon in the oven and that it would be ten minutes, only to turn back to find Pop smacking her lips together with much relish and the foil that had contained our salmon lying on the floor at her feet....I had to laugh, her expression said it all really. We had an omelette instead! Another time I was going past the fruit bowl that was on a very old gateleg table we have - so it is a bit lower than modern tables -and I noticed that a bite had been taken out of a pear on the top of the fruit pile....Clearly she had sampled it, found it not to her taste and left it for one of us. And yes, of course I ate it. These episodes are making me laugh about her again as I write. Nellie however will have any kind of food from the kitchen worktop if we don't push it right to the very back. And I really do mean anything. Raw mushrooms, my banana, walnut and carrot cake topped with marscapone cheese, almost any kind of fruit or veg, even a whole courgette I'd picked from the garden.....Her tastes are very inclusive! I'm afraid I just laugh at her too when I find she has done it. She has the leg length and the dexterity (damn all those proprioception tricks I have taught her over the last 4.5 years :-) )to get to quite out of the way places on even the

worktop so we do have to think about this for anything edible. Both she and Henry would nick fresh eggs from the eglus given a chance. Arch? Well he is quite happy to share any spoils Nellie allows him to have....

Another lurcher habit? Creature comforts. They like any big bed with comfortable duvets and quilts (*tick*) and sofas with plump cushions or even a sheepskin (*tick*) and will stretch out over the whole expanse quite luxuriously given the chance (*tick*). Hmm. Can't say she prefers sleeping to 'doing things' - in that she is all collie. But if one is going to sleep one might as well be as comfortable as possible!

So yes, a 'poacher to her eyelids' then, gloriously long legs and a liking for our bed, and she already knows she is as clever as me, cleverer probably :-). Somehow somewhen a colliexsighthound must have got into the mix, but I still don't really want my money back :-)