I guess I have a weakness for alert dogs. To me, they are a sign of intelligence and keen instinct. No dogs are as attentive as Terriers, except perhaps border collies near sheep. Those are two great breeds for me.

We have two wood stoves, and despite the netting we put up, birds occasionally get into one and fall to the bottom. Bud is the first to hear them.

Maria opens the doors, reaches in, takes hold of them, and brings them outside, where they fly away. Sometimes we open the door or a window, and they pass out.

I know he’d like to catch and kill or eat the bird, but it has never happened. The birds are way too fast for him. He is the first to hear a bird in the stove or an Amish cart on the road.

Bud alerts us to every sound, including many we can’t hear, like mice in the walls.

When he hears one,  his eyes widen, and his ears go up, as in the photo. He is transformed. He’s ready. That look is pure Bud, at heart a working dog through and through.