You would think....

by Mary
(Gaspe coast, PQ)

Today was another one of those 'huh?' days with our great hairy beast, a.k.a. Gabriel.
He asked to go out onto the deck and waited politely for me to open the big patio door. Usually, we open it just wide enough for him, and he steps out over the lintel.
This time I opened the door, he stopped in his tracks and stood there looking down at his feet. 'Go on, buddy'. Nope. He looked up at me and backed away. Well that was odd, so I looked to see was there anything scary or weird or dead by the door. (Tobi the cat sometimes leaves gifts for us). Nope.
So I walked out thru the door and invited Gabriel to do the same. He looks up at me from under his eyebrows and then makes an almighty high-jump leap out the door!
I laughed and gave him a hug and decided a closer inspection of the bottom of the door was the next step.
Amazing what I found, that he so strongly felt he had to be careful of. A spider egg case was in the process of hatching hundreds of teensy spiderlings. There was no discernible sound, but LOTS of action.
So, what was it that alerted our dog?
His sensitivity to everything is astounding and he never fails to amaze us.
And the baby spiders?....they fanned out and disappeared in about 5 seconds. Nature is a vast collection of miracles. We should all be as aware to this as is our lovely boy.