LODI'S DOG PARKS

Lodi's Vinewood Dog Park

Yesterday's heavy rains brought delta temperatures down to the cool side of comfortable, so Amber and I drove to Lodi to go to a dog park or two.  I had just finished reading Alexandra Horowitz's Inside of a Dog.  Her final chapters deal with how dogs communicate, with us and with each other.  Particularly fascinating are the movements that are their vocabulary of play.  Dogs all know this language, the greetings, introductions, invitations, agreements, refusals.  And animal behaviorists like Horowitz have studied the language in great detail using slow-motion video.

Reading about how dogs play reminded me of how much Amber enjoys a good chasing game, or a rough-and-tumble play battle, or tug of war, or keep away.  Chasing rabbits is a lot of fun, but can't entirely take the place of playing with other dogs.  And so we set out for Lodi, since Rio Vista, although its parks are quite dog friendly, and the surrounding fields rabbit heaven, has no dog park.

Lodi has two large, fenced dog parks with well-tended grass, shade trees, a few benches.  We had previously been to Beckman Park, and stopped there today but it was closed.  Yesterday's downpour had converted a former marshy area into a good sized pond.  We had not been to Vinewood Park before, and had a little difficulty finding it.  Once we did, it became an instant favorite.  Vinewood has at least two acres, probably more.  The address provided on the Internet is on West Tokay Street, but once there we found a notice on the gate forbidding entrance and directing dogs and persons to the gates on Virginia Street clear on the other side of the park.

To get to Vinewood Park from Kettleman Road, which is what Highway 12 through the delta becomes in Lodi, continue to Ham Lane (which is a major artery not at all a lane) and turn left.  Go several blocks to Tokay Street and turn left.  Instead of going all the way to the park, turn left on Virginia just before the Vine Elementary School, and it will curve around to the side of the park where entry is possible and legal.

Of course the most important feature of a good dog park is the dogs, and there were plenty of well mannered and thoroughly socialized new acquaintances for Amber, including some enthusiastic chasers.  The people were also well mannered and socialized, and cheerfully willing to allow the dogs to be dogs without heavy-handed supervision of their interactions.

To get to Beckman Park, which is also an excellent dog park and presumably will open when dry, you also go up Kettleman to Ham, but turn right.  Continue to the first stop light, about three or four blocks, to Century and turn right.  Beckman Park is on the left. 

MAIN STREET, RIO VISTA

 Looking down Main Street from Second Street

After the flood of 1862 had washed away the first attempt at establishing Rio Vista, a small group of determined survivors approached a wealthy landowner, Joseph Bruning, to solicit land on which to rebuild the town. About three miles downriver from the original settlement Bruning had purchased a sizable chunk of the Montezuma Hills, the high ground stretching from the Sacramento River to the southwest.  He was a remarkably charitable chap who not only donated land to rebuild Rio Vista, but continued to support the community.  Another wealthy landowner, whose ranch bordered Bruning’s on the south, T.J. McWorthy, also contributed land.  The surveyed border between the two properties became Rio Vista’s Main Street.

Walking down Main Street, we have, as the town’s name promises, a view of the river.  We also have the local businesses that in their idiosyncratic ways are quite sufficient for our ordinary needs: a pharmacy, a veterinarian, a travel agency, two local banks (I count the Bank of Stockton as such in addition to the Rio Vista Bank), real estate agencies, a book store, Hap’s Bait Shop, several restaurants (Italian, Chinese, Mexican, the Pizza Factory, and of course Foster’s Bighorn a local landmark) a bakery, a grocery and meat market, a pet store.  At the end of Main Street, by the river, is the City Hall.  In front of City Hall is a memorial stone honoring the wayward whale that brought Rio Vista to national prominence in 1985 for 15 minutes of fame.

 Official Rio Vista memorial for a visiting whale

Rio Vista’s Main Street evokes my memories of Springville, Iowa.  There is the same feel to a stroll here.  I was quite young during the months—I don’t know how many—that I actually lived in Springville with my mother, who had returned to my grandmother’s large Victorian house on the occasion of a separation from my father.  It was about 1937, the heart of the Great Depression, and while it was undoubtedly a difficult time for my parents, I remember it as a time of great adventure.

We had been living in Duluth, Minnesota, but were not prospering.  My father decided to return to the family farm near Winterset, Iowa to help his mother run the place, and so we did.  Briefly.  My grandmothers were both domineering women, as for that matter was my mother.  At any rate, my mother did not last long on the farm and decamped with me to her childhood home in Springville.  I suppose many children would have been upset by the emotional turmoil and moving about, but I have always had a great appetite for uproar, and particularly for travel.  My first word was recorded as being, “Bye bye.”

At three years old I had experienced the big city: apartment living, busy traffic, large brick buildings, anonymous strangers on buses and passing on the sidewalks.  And I had been on the farm and helped feed the chickens, watched the cows being milked and even got a squirt of milk directly into my mouth.  And then I was in Springville where the most exciting thing to do was walk uptown.  I don’t know why it was called “uptown” there instead of “downtown.” 

But Main Street (if that was its name) in Springville had the same feel to it that Main Street in Rio Vista has.  It is like a slow steady heart beat, the living center of a community.  There is no heavy traffic, no bustle and hurry, but it is alive.  The people greet each other as they pass, frequently stop for a word or two.  Amber is a great help in this regard as she provides us with a topic for brief conversations.  And Main Street in both towns is the gathering place during holiday festivities, the 4^th of July band concert, years and years ago in Springville, the Memorial Day Soapbox Derby Races this year in Rio Vista.  It is where the community celebrates itself as a community, a particular unique entity.  These small towns have much in common, but part of that is being entirely themselves and not a copy of somewhere else.

2011 Memorial Day Soapbox Derby, Main Street, Rio Vista

WATCHING THE 'HOOD

What Amber likes best about our house is the many windows, and that the windows are low so she can see out.  In the bedroom the sills are even  with the surface of the bed so she can curl up, or stretch out, lie down, sit, or stand, and still keep an eye on what goes on in our neighborhood. Frequently I join her. We each prefer to watch the activities of members of our own species, but both are interested in cats.  There are usually representatives of all three species moving about.  People with dogs on leashes pass by.  Children in swim suits with towels draped across their shoulders  walk to the swimming pool two blocks away.

Across the street live two black labs who come out on their deck to bark loud warnings to any dog passing by.  Alerted by them, Amber joins in to tell potential interlopers not to mess with us either.  Caddy-cornered across the street lives a very old golden lab who is free to wander loose but never goes further than the sidewalk surrounding his yard.  He suns himself at the foot of his porch steps and pays no attention to the ruckus.

Across the street in both directions live seemingly unemployed young men who are outside much of the time.
They attract more unemployed young men who come by to lean on their trucks and smoke and talk, or get a football and toss it back and forth in the street, or help each other carry things from the trucks to a garage.
Some of the young men are attended by small children who play in the yard. Amber and I watch what goes on. One of the children, a little girl about three years old, is playing with a garden hose and sprays the young men standing by the truck.  One of them chases her and takes the hose, spraying her with it as she laughs and runs.

Do Amber and I see the same thing as we look out our window at the ‘hood?  Not exactly.  Partly, of course, our interests govern what we notice.  But beyond that there are differences in our ability to see.  It is not true, although I have often heard, that dogs see only in black and white.  But it is true that their ability to distinguish colors is less than that of humans.  According to John Bradshaw, “they have only two types of color-sensitive receptor cells.”  However, “they can distinguish many different colors based on the relative strength of the signals coming from these two.”  He goes on to say that dogs cannot distinguish orange from red.  And that they see turquoise as gray, which I wish I had known before painting the bedroom walls bright turquoise.

So if it’s bright daylight when Amber and I look out the window, she probably does not see the bright primary colors of the children’s yard toys across the street as vividly as I do.  But if the daylight is fading in the evening, she has the advantage.  Her vision is much better than mine in dim lighting because while she has fewer color receptors, she has more light receptors, making her night vision more sensitive than mine.  According to Alexandra Horowitz, Amber also sees faster than I do; that is, she is better at seeing things in motion.  This no doubt comes in handy when chasing rabbits.  It also explains the almost miraculous-seeming ability many dogs have to catch a ball or a Frisbee  on the fly. 

THE NOSE KNOWS

The weather has cooled off.  What a very narrow range of temperature provides sufficient comfort for us to go about our daily activities. How peculiar it is that this little window of life sustaining coolness-to-warmth is generally available on our planet, at least when supplemented by technology.  Today was cool enough to go to the road by the ferry dock, but not to be without shade in other of our favorite places.

I am reading Alexandra Horowitz's Inside of a Dog.
She is a cognitive scientist examining how dogs experience the world.  Not only is it clear to the most casual observer that dogs have a more acute sense of smell than humans, but the degree of difference is staggering:

"Once a smell has been vacuumed in, it finds a receptive welcome from an extravagance of nasal tissue...The tissue of the inside of the nose is entirely blanketed with tiny receptor sites...Human noses have about six million of these sensory receptor sites; beagle noses over six hundred million."  I try to imagine what it would be like to be one hundred times more aware of odors.  Jonathan Swift was evidently much more sensitive to smells than most people, and this fueled his misanthropy.  How amazing it is that dogs like us in spite of how we smell.  Or maybe even because of it.

Horowitz makes the point that not only do dogs have an incredibly sensitive sense of smell, but that to them smelling is believing, the way seeing is believing for humans.  The primary way dogs accumulate experience and assign meanings is by smell.  I watch Amber as she makes all the necessary little decisions about which direction to take while we are walking along the road by the cherry orchard, and it is clearly her nose that is deciding what direction to take, while I make my choices by what I see.

 

THE BRIDGE TO ANTIOCH

The bridge is directly above the image of the camera taking a picture of the bridge.

Today I again drove the hundred years and 20 miles from Rio Vista to Antioch.  Since there was only one errand--picking up our portable air conditioner at Lowes--Amber went with me.  Lowes is customer and dog friendly and one of the few places where I am able to buy things.  The employees there are evidently trained to be helpful, to not only find what you are looking for but to explain about how things work or what the relative merits of different models might be or how to use whatever widget you need.  In the other places I had looked yesterday, Best Buy and Target, I had to search diligently to even find an employee, and then the most information I could pry out of them was, "Against the back wall," or "Aisle 14," or whatever.  I was then left to stare stupidly at a row of boxes on which were printed letters, "BTU," whatever that is.  British Thermal Units?  Whatever that is. 

At any rate, the experience at Lowes was sufficiently positive that I not only bought an air conditioner  from them, but bought an air conditioner that they didn't even have.  The other two places actually had portable air conditioners in stock, or at least boxes for me to look at.  I thought it rather strange that I would make an extra drive to Antioch simply because of a friendly conversation with two men who told me things about air conditioners even though they didn't have any.  But the expected shipment did come in this morning, so we got our air conditioner.

Getting the air conditioner has cooled off not only the house but all of Rio Vista.  We were not able to install it because it had to be transported on its side, and has to wait 24 hours to get its innards back in place or it won't work correctly.  However, simply having an air conditioner was sufficient to change the weather, although this did not happen until evening and Amber and I spent the afternoon in heat stupors that precluded any useful activities.

But it did cool off as the sun went down, and we went to our current favorite rabbit place, the end of Poppy House Road, where the rabbits were also evidently invigorated by the cool breeze.  They were leaping about in such profusion that Amber hardly knew which one to go after next, and ran until she could hardly stagger.

RIO VISTA BOAT DOCK

The twin towers of the Rio Vista Bridge spanning the Sacramento River are in the background.

Although long time residents refuse to admit that it's hot until the temperature hits triple digits, it is hot enough for me at 95 degrees and above.  And for the last two days it has been that warm inside. Amber is an even bigger sissy about the heat than I am. She finds a slightly cooler spot--next to the tub in the bathroom for instance--stretches out flat, and refuses to move.

Today, which promised to be even hotter than yesterday, I realized that some action beyond whining was called for, and made a foray into the 21st Century as represented by neighboring Antioch with its many big box stores selling portable air conditioners.  I had been warned not to wait until it got hot, but of course didn't listen.  I found a suitable model at Lowes, but was informed that none were in stock.  Supposedly some will arrive tomorrow and I will go back to get one.  At any rate, I managed to get several errands done and was back to Rio Vista by early afternoon.

The drive to and from Antioch affords some of the best views of the delta with all its sloughs and islands.  The view from the top of the great arch of the toll bridge on the outskirts of Antioch is spectacular, a sweeping 360 degree vista stretching to distant hazy horizons, translating the delta map into direct visual experience.

When Amber and I go out in the heat of the day, as we did yesterday and today, it is down to the little park by the boat dock and boat launch.  There is some shade from trees by the river (the cottonwood trees send their little puffs drifting by), and cool river water at the boat launch for Amber to swim in to retrieve sticks.

A sign on the public boat dock reminds us of the bass festival that will be held in October. I have not experienced this but understand it is quite a popular event.  Rio Vista has legitimate claim to being a
major mecca for fishermen after striped bass and sturgeon. There was evidently so much competition for the prizes awarded for the biggest fish--boats, large cash prizes, etc.--that people were keeping large fish alive in their bathtubs for weeks in order to claim that the fish had been caught on the day of the competition.  The festival organizers had to change the contest rules so that the winner would be the fisherman who brought in the bass closest to a secret length, which would be revealed only after the entries were all in.

Meanwhile the dock and boat launch are nearly deserted on hot weekday afternoons, so they are a good place to get a little walk and cool off at the same time.  For rabbit chasing we wait until the sun goes down about 8:30 to drive out to one of the open fields nearby.  Amber has a LED lighted collar so I can keep track of her in the dark visually as well as by her excited yelps as she pursues the jackrabbits.

Fish and bait leave tantalizing smells on the dock.

Cool river water is good for a splash on a hot afternoon.

RIO VISTA MUSEUM

The Rio Vista Museum is on Front Street between Main and Sacramento Streets.  The museum is open on Saturdays and Sundays between 1:30 and 4:30.  Today was warm (the local residents have assured me that it has not even begun to get HOT even though I have already begun whining) so after a brief romp near the boat launch and the public dock, Amber and I were glad to take refuge in the museum's cool interior and browse among the extensive collection of artifacts from earlier times. I had spoken with museum curator and local historian Philip Pezzaglia earlier in the week.  He emphasized that the museum changes exhibits often because they have so much material.  In fact while we were speaking a woman came in with a box of items to donate to the collection.
 

In the museum's kitchen exhibit Amber recognized the stove even though it was an earlier model than ours, and checked it out for edible spills.

But even though the old tools and implements and household items are charming, the real strength of the museum's collection is in the archives of photographs, letters, and newspapers.  Drawing on this collection, his own private collection, and other private collections, Pezzaglia wrote Rio Vista, a book in the "Images of America" series.  Many of the old photographs in this book show houses and other buildings constructed in the late Nineteenth Century that are still occupied and in excellent condition today.

ISLETON CAJUN FESTIVAL

To get to Isleton, a little river town that is a sister town to Rio Vista (sharing a school district and a newspaper and a lot of history), you cross the Rio Vista bridge and turn upriver on the levee road, which is highway 160.  This weekend Isleton is having their Cajun Festival, which was formerly called a Crayfish Festival, or maybe it was a Crawdad Festival.  At any rate, these little crustaceans are the thematic focus for Isleton's festival. I wanted to try some, but the quantities in which they were sold was daunting, so I settled on catfish and chips.  Maybe next year for the crawdads.
                                                                             

The festival business is not appealing to me.  In fact this was the first one I have been to. The notion of milling around with large masses of boisterous others is not my idea of a good time, and booths full of tacky tourist items are not appealing either.  Such was my notion of what festivals were like, and I still think most of them are.  They are evidently the way small to mid-sized communities try to bring in revenue.  In Oxnard there were several every year: the Strawberry Festival, the Salsa Festival, and I think there was a Chocolate Festival.  But I never attended any of them.

Nellie and Jacob and I drove over to Isleton in the late afternoon.  The weather was about perfect, warm
but with a cool breeze.  The main attractions were
three bands, each good and each drawing an appreciative audience of listeners and dancers.There
was blues, bluegrass, country swing, jazz, rock, soul-- the group that played bluegrass had a good fiddler. They also had a large tent covered dance floor. The third band was at the far end of the street and attracted some enthusiastic street dancers...








And Jacob and Nellie.

                                                   

WATER

WATER

Someone observed that “geography is history,” so it’s not surprising to learn that calamities in Rio Vista’s history have been related to water, primarily flooding.  In fact the first effort of establishing a town was completely washed away. The original settlement was started at the juncture of Cache Slough, Steamboat Slough, and the old river, about a mile from the town’s current location, in spite of warnings from an early navigator that there had been flooding there.  With the typical pig-headedness of humans, enterprising people began building a general store, butcher shop, post office, livery stable, drug store, hotel, cannery, and undoubtedly a saloon.  This was in 1858.  Three years later, in December of 1861 the rains started and continued until January of 1862.

According to Shine’s  Early Years to Golden Years in Rio Vista: “Every one of the forty-seven buildings in the town was washed away…All of the town’s population was saved when they swam to a high mound and were rescued by the crew of the steamer Antelope.”  It’s a good idea to be a strong swimmer here even today, as the spring run offs can combine with unusually heavy rains to set the river lapping into the nearest streets while residents talk bravely about how solid the levees are.

AMBER AT THE RIO VISTA CITY BOAT LAUNCH

Ironically the current difficulties with water in Rio Vista have to do with how much it costs.  A lot.  For one very small cottage, mine, the bill is nearly $150 per month.  This has caused a great deal of acrimony and dissent among the citizenry.  A special election was  just held to force the city to lower the rates, but failed. Why water costs so much when there is so much of it evidently has to do with poor planning of treatment facilities in the past and not-much-better planning in the present.

Meanwhile, the local waterways draw visitors who fish and sail and water ski and jet ski and wind surf or just pull their RVs around to campgrounds on the Delta Loop, which, during the summer, has a transient population which rivals Manhattan.

RIVERS AND SLOUGHS AND ISLANDS

RYER ISLAND FERRY CROSSES CACHE SLOUGH

My recently acquired map of the delta shows more than 20 islands and nearly as many "tracts."  How these tracts differ from islands is not clear since both appear to be areas of land surrounded by water.  The reason for so many areas surrounded by water is the large number of rivers and sloughs that cross and recross each other on their way to the sea.  A slough is an alternate channel of a river.  How anyone can tell which is a slough and which is a river is a mystery to me as yet.  

It is easy to get lost on the delta. Logic suggests that if you are driving next to what appears to be a river, and you drive across a bridge to the other side and continue driving in the same direction and later cross back on another bridge, that you should be on the same side of the same river that you started out on.  Usually, in my experience, that doesn't work out too well. Most of the time I end up somewhere else entirely than wherever it was I was trying to go.  And this is with land vehicles.  I suspect that there are boaters who have disappeared entirely, leaving nary a trace.

Bridges are not the only possibility for getting from island to island.  If you leave Rio Vista and drive north on the road along the Sacramento River, in a couple of miles you will come to an abrupt turn after which the road ends at the Ryer Island Ferry dock.  The ferry runs 24 hours a day on the days that it runs (not predictable).

According to the ferryman I spoke with, he makes about 80 crossings in a 12 hour shift.  If you take the ferry across, you find that the road, which is Highway 84, continues north on Ryer Island.  Oh, and if you thought the ferry had taken you across the Sacramento River, you were wrong.  It crosses Cache Slough.  On the other side of Ryer Island is Steamboat Slough.  I have no idea what happened to the Sacramento River.

AMBER COOLS OFF IN THE INLET NEXT TO THE FERRY DOCK

RULES FOR THE DOG

1. The dog is NOT allowed in the house.

2. Okay, the dog is allowed in the house, but only in certain rooms.

3. All right, the dog is allowed in all rooms, but has to stay off of the furniture.

4. Well, okay, the dog can get on the OLD furniture only.

5. Fine, the dog is allowed on all the furniture, but is not allowed to sleep on the bed.

6. Okay, the dog is allowed on the bed, but only by invitation.

7. The dog can sleep on the bed anytime, but not under the covers.

8. Okay, the dog can sleep under the covers, but by invitation only.

9. Fine, the dog can sleep under the covers every night.

10. Humans must ask permission to sleep under the covers with the dog.

I found the above list of rules for the dog in the examining room at the Rio Vista Veterinary Office. It is of course for fun. The following list, presented by John Bradshaw in his book Dog Sense, is a perfectly serious list of rules, or commandments, proposed by trainers who espouse the dominance method of teaching obedience:

1. Do not allow your dog to eat its meal until you (the top dog) have eaten first.
2. Do not allow your dog to leave the house (den) before you (the top dog) have passed through the doorway first.
3. Do not allow your dog to climb onto the sofa or bed (only top dogs are allowed to rest in the cosiest places).
4. Do not allow your dog to climb the stairs, or to peer at you from the top of the staircase.
5. Do not allow your dog to peer into your eyes.
6. Do not cuddle or stroke your dog.
7. Do not interact with your dog unless you are involved in some kind of training.
8. Do not greet your dog when you come home from work or from the shops, etc.
9. Do not greet your dog first thing in the morning; it should be the one to greet you (the top dog)
10. Do not allow your dog to keep the toy at the end of a game; it will interpret this as winning.

Bradshaw's reason for presenting the above list of horrors--which were seriously advised by a trainer committed to the dominance theory of dog behavior--is to demonstrate exactly why they are harmful.
Bradshaw observes, "It has become abundantly clear that the model upon which many people are training, managing, and simply interacting with their dogs is fundamentally wrong." His book details the scientific evidence that conclusively demonstrates that the dominance theory of dog behavior is a lot of hooey, and most competent and educated trainers now agree. Unfortunately, the dominance theory is the one which has the most entertainment value on television and other mass media because of the innate conflict it supposes. Shows like "The Dog Whisperer" are popular because Cesar Millan's weekly contests with problem dogs have a satisfying dramatic structure, not because they provide valid approaches to good relationships between humans and dogs.

Which brings me to the question of Amber being spoiled. What is assumed about the individual creature that is considered to be spoiled? I would contend that it is inferior status. Children are considered spoiled, husbands or wives are considered spoiled, animals are considered spoiled, if they are indulged by a more powerful parent, spouse, or owner. If we consider, in all the above instances, that the healthiest and most rewarding relationships exist between those who relate to each other as equal animals, we have a different way of viewing the way they interact.

If Amber behaves in ways that cause me distress--and she does, most particularly when she will not come with me when it is time to end a free roaming rabbit chasing session, or when there is some danger such as traffic or dangerous currents in the river and she will not come to me--then the distress is my problem to deal with. If I behave in ways that cause her distress--and I do, on those occasions when I have to leave her alone--then the distress is her problem to deal with. In other words I do not see our relationship as essentially different than any other kind of relationship. Language and an opposing thumb did not make me a more valuable sort of animal than she is. I do not consider that "teaching obedience" is a concept that has any validity in a relationship between equal creatures.

What does have validity for me is working towards solutions to those problems which cause either of us distress, or which cause distress to the others in our lives whose friendship and relationships we value. In this area I was quite amazed by how Amber behaved when we visited friends of mine whom she had not met before, and stayed the night in their home. She acted like some flawlessly trained obedience champion, sitting quietly at my feet while we had dinner, going to her bed (which I had brought with us and put in the room we were staying in) without being told, greeting my friends calmly with tail wagging but without excessive display. What to make of this? I don't know.