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Jack attack

Roughly (or should that be ruff-ly) 7kg of solid shouty muscle, with teeth, the Jack Russell is a small terrier with a furious 'someone-lit-my-touch-paper-and-I'm-about-to-explode' temper and a belligerent 'you-think-I'm-small!-Tell-that-to-my-face' attitude.

We share our home with two not very well behaved but loveable labradors. They are friendly, somewhat lacking in intelligence, funny and gentle. They lie at your feet; lie waiting at the foot of the stairs; lie in doorways; lie anywhere inconvenient and in the way to force some interaction from their human co-habitees; and they also 'lie' about whether or not they've been fed by one of the other human co-habitees. Perhaps, it is all this unexciting idleness that turns some people to the Jack Russell. Variously described as stubborn, energetic and aggressive, this is a working breed used to flush out foxes and definitely not prone to lying around.

But why would you want to welcome into your family an angry creature with boggly eyes that look like a bad case of exopthalmos, a jaw of shark-like dentition framed with thin, rubbery lips and legs just long enough to allow it to chase the postman and launch itself missile-like at your thigh? Why have one in your home?!! Are you afraid that the big bad wolf might come down the chimney? Maybe the Jack Russell could keep guard at the hearth ready to chase it back up the chimney. Wolf versus Jack Russell - no match! - that unfortunate wolf would pop out of the chimney stack faster than a wolf with a firework strapped to its bottom.

And if the teeth, temper combination isn't bad enough, the Jack Russell's bark is ferocity personified. A high pitched, spluttering, bared-lip-trembling, foaming at the nostril, "Wawawawawawawawawawawa!!!!!" Lovely? - I don't think so. Neither did Bertie Baggins and Four-legged-friend when we met one on a walk. Sorry ... on their walk. The walk that (they think) belongs to them. That no other four legged creature is permitted to cross without causing their heckles to rise, proprietorial-like. The garden belongs to them. Aren't the neighbouring fields just an extension of the garden? After all, Mum picks the brambles and surely she wouldn't pick anything that didn't belong to her?

Anyway, this Jack Russell, doing his furious shark impression about six inches from Bertie Baggins's nose, was apparently "Just being friendly." I've seen friendlier wasps! It's owner reluctantly put it back on its lead and dragged it away, while I clung desperately to my two.
"He just wanted to play" called the Jack Russell's owner, somewhat huffily.
What at? ... Chase the fox? ... Terrorise the labrador? Having ten minutes earlier, observed Four-Legged-Friend and Bertie Baggins perform a perfect pincer manoevre to catch a rabbit and demolish it, I was more concerned that their idea of playing with the mouthy midget might involve dinner. I think, or rather know, that they probably wouldn't have done anything braver than run away, but they were between me and the enemy - would they have attacked it to save me? Would it have been their fault if they had? I didn't want to find out. So I twisted my fists into their collars and held on tight. They got a lot of the biscuit gravel out of my pocket once the Jack Russell was safely away (still 'wawawawawa-ing,' but huffily, like its owner.)

I am sure there are some Jack Russell owners out there whom I have now seriously offended. Perhaps my opinion is skewed by the nastiness of every Jack Russell I have ever met. Perhaps, there are good-natured, placid, quiet Jack Russells. There is, after all, a lovejackrussels website for all things jackrusselly. They are ,agile and intelligent.' Apparently. And good at ball games and frisbee. But inclined to still have juice in the battery long after their poor owners are worn out. And 'inclined to boredom and destructive tendencies' if left on their own for too long - I once saw the shredded inside of a car, ceiling fabric hanging in torn ribbons - punishment perhaps for the owner who had left his Jack Russell in the car for "ten minutes." I wonder if the insurance paid out on that one?

While I'm prepared to accept that the Jack Russell of our walk may, when not confronted by two big beasts and an anxious stranger,  in fact,  be a friendly little beast, I do wonder if the Rev John Russell of Black Torrington in Devon was perhaps not too keen on his parishoners. "Meet my little dog," would have had them running for the door, long before they could get into the pernickity details of uncle Fred's funeral. And allow the good parson to get on with his main love, the important job of fox hunting.


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