Friday, July 17, 2009

Horehounds… the Bane of a Country Corgi’s Existence!

Have you ever heard of “horehounds?” It is a type of herb that people make cough medicine from. Mom says it is supposed to “soothe” the throat. Well, I don’t know about THAT, but the plant itself is AWFUL!


When it flowers, it is always swarming with bees. It may smell ok, sort of like honey, but we keep our distance from it because we HATE the buzz of insects… flys, wasps, beetles, tarantula hawks, and BEES!


Not only do bees BUZZZZZZZ enough to drive a dog crazy, but if you snap at them, like you would at a fly, they will STING you like a wasp or tarantula hawk! Nasty things! Do NOT bite them… they BITE back!



Anyway, after the horehound bushes flower, they get clusters of sticker burrs all the way up and down each stem, and they have a hundred or more stems! When you walk by one of those nasty bushes, and just BARELY touch one of the stems, a BUNCH of the burrs JUMP on you and grab on, getting tangled in your hair!


The coarse, outer coat of a Corgi, is pretty good because most of them will come off fairly easily, but you sure don’t want to get them in your britches or belly hair! They are VERY uncomfortable to lay down on or sit on!


They tend to tangle up in soft undercoats or softer hair, and then when you pull them out, you pull out a bunch of hair with them, and that gets in your teeth… hath oo eber trieth to thpit ou a mouf full of ‘air wiff thtikerth in it? Nathty!!!


THEN, Mom will end up getting involved! The dog brush works pretty well, ooo, but, OUch, it ..... “WATCH IT, MOM!” tends to pull a lot, OUCH, too!




One of the main problems is that fuzzies like to dig their holes under the edges of the bushes… sneaky little rodents! It is our JOB to get them out of there! Mom yells at us for that, and she has been at war with the nasty plants for years…even had a lot of them knocked down, but then the head people in this area said our air was not good and made it so you can’t burn them out anymore. The past few years when Mom’s not been able to get around so well, they’ve grown back up in a lot of the places she had cleaned out. Most of the poison you put on plants to kill them doesn’t seem to work very well on them either.


Sadie is the one that REALLY has a problem with them. She tends to lead the hunts, and her coat is very soft and they snag and tangle horribly in it! She also HATES to be brushed, snicker… and would rather pull them out herself, but then she spits them on the rug or floor in the house, and she can't reach the ones on her head.




Mom says she doesn’t understand how come you can brush and pull and tug and have so much trouble getting them off of Sadie, but if Sadie walks within a FOOT of Mom or the furniture, a bunch of them will jump off of Sadie and onto Mom’s clothes or whatever else. (Snicker, snicker, snort…) “Poor, old Sadie…”



(OC’s Mom: OC, would you quit teasing Sadie, get out of her face, and LEAVE HER ALONE!)

Who, ME, Mom?

12 comments:

Martha said...

We confess we have never heard of Horehound! At first we thought we might be related - well what with it having a hound in!
It does sound nasty. We like to rummage through long grass etc like you guys and our mum reckons our coats must be pretty good protection as she has all sorts of stings from nettles and so on she gets sometimes trying to get us out!
Martha has been trying to snap at bees and wasps - we dont think she knows that they sting!
Oh well she never even used to know that water was wet so we guess she might find out the hard way.
Thanks for sharing that interesting information - we will look out and see if that grows over here in Scotland. We can tell you that heather is very prickly indeed on you belly!!!
love and kisses
Martha & Bailey xxxx

Gus, Louie and Callie said...

Those certainly sound like some nasty plants. Perhaps mom needs to put up a sign. "Corgi's beware"
Mom just had to stop by and say hi. We have a friend Imus that is a corgi and his mom is letting him learn to herd..
Have a great weekend...


Big Sloppy Kisses
Gus, Louie and Callie

ClassyChassy said...

Dreadful stuff - so hard on thick haircoats! OUCH!

The Adventures of the LLB Gang said...

Whoa...we will be on the look out for those..OUCHY! Being Llasa's bilbo and I get everything stuck in our furries....

We came here via Sasha and you all are so very cute AND informative! We will be following your adventures!

Smileys!
Dory

ClassyChassy said...

Thank you so much for the prize you sent me and my corgi girls!!! I just posted about it on my blog today! What a cute little story about Dott, and the girls thank you for their bedtime treat! They will enjoy it while they have the story read to them tonite!!! Have a great day!

NAK and The Residents of The Khottage Now With KhattleDog! said...

We had heard of it but really hadn't ever seen any in the wild...only in a bag fur khoughs!

Tank woo fur sharing!

Hugz&Khysses,
Khyra

Ziggy Stardust said...

Ouch, I am so sorry you got those sassy hounds all over you. My fur is also long and gets things stuck in it, so I will watch out for those. I hope you are all getting better and please stay away from those bad, bad hounds. They should at least bark and warn you first before they stick you.

licks and sniffs, Sasha

betty said...

never heard of horehounds; they sound dreadful for sure, especially for poor Sadie. interesting that a plant that could help soothe a cough/throat could cause so much discomfort for our furry friends

betty

Martha said...

Thanks for stopping by to follow Koda's vacation. We are having a great time! Thank you fo all the nice comments on my other entries too. Koda was too tired last night for a full post - we got home really late! But we did post one little teaser photo if you want to come see :-)

Taffy said...

I have heard of horehound but never seen it. I think it is strange that it is a plant but called a hound. What I do want to know about is a tarantula hawk.....never heard of that before. Thanks for sharing squirrel patrol with us. Good to know you guys are on the job!
Love and hugs,
Twix

Kritter Keeper at Farm Tails said...

there is candy with horehound flavoring...very old fashioned and probably good. poor puppies with those nasty burrs...we don't have horehound around here...kind of glad too! :>)

ocmist said...

Yes, the candy is supposed to sooth your throat. I buy is sometimes, and it is pretty good... a slightly, not quite bitter taste. I've also made it before from our bushes. You pull a bunch of the new leaves, clean and boil them in a couple of cups of water for 10 mins. or so then strain the leaves out. Continue boiling down another 30 mins. or so, then add a couple of cups of sugar, and oook down until hard crack candy stage. Remove from heat and pour on a buttered cookie sheet to cool. Break into pieces and then keep in a cool dry place.

You could probably google other recipes.