Each morning, just before breakfast, we take Minnie’s hood off, open the crate, she hobbles and hops around the sofa and lies down on the dog bed where Frieda lies. This morning, I decided it was time Frieda dealt with Minnie’s presence in the house, Frieda has enormous prey drive and often tries to chase the cats if she can. I have little doubt that she would kill them if she caught them. Frieda needs to know when something is part of the household, then she evolves and protects it rather than hunts it.

I let Frieda in and she came to Maria and I saw her trembling – she was aroused and excited at the presence of Minnie on her bed. She leaned up against Maria and instead of tension and pursuit, I saw a tableau of love. Frieda was seeking Maria’s reassurance, Minnie was calm and resting, Maria was signaling to both of them that this was all right, it was part of life now. We will do this once or twice a day under supervision until Minnie has healed and is back outside resuming her life as a barn cat.

Dogs evolve, dogs adapt, dogs permit us to guide them. We have to give Frieda a chance to succeed as well as fail, and she invariably does. In dog training, trainers learn quickly that most people give their dogs many chances to fail, few to succeed.