Magzter Gold (Sitewide CA)

Magzter Gold (Sitewide CA)

Digital Delivery

All Creatures November 1st, 2021 Digital Back Issue Cover

All Creatures Nov/Dec 2021 (Digital)

(0)

Single Digital Issue

Nov/Dec 2021

$3.49

Powered By Zinio

Zinio

Satisfaction Guaranteed

Instant Start

Also available on ZINIO Unlimited logo

Get unlimited access to All Creatures (Digital) + Back Issues & 5000+ other magazines

1-month free trial

Renews at $8.99/month after trial.
Cancel anytime.

Get unlimited access to All Creatures (Digital) + Back Issues & 5000+ other magazines. Renews at just $8.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

Start Trial Learn more

16 Articles

Editor’s Note

HERE IT IS, I think as I pull the ornament from its special silk pouch. It’s the first one I look for every year when I open our container of Christmas decorations. The paw print-shaped ornament frames a photo of me holding Charlie as a puppy. My husband, Dave, and I had adopted him just two weeks before Christmas and my mother-in-law had given us this ornament for our first holiday as a family of three. Among a few others—a glittery ballerina, a handmade nutcracker and my kids’ first ornaments—this one is a favorite of mine. I’ll never forget that first Christmas with Charlie. He was 10 weeks old and curious about everything—including our tree. Dave and I love to decorate a real tree, but we didn’t expect our beagle puppy…

unexpected friends Diesel & George

Derward Mose of Sharpsburg, Maryland, saw a runt poult being picked on by bigger turkeys at a poultry swap meet and decided to take him home. It turned out George, a heritage turkey, wasn’t a fan of the other turkeys on the farm. Instead, he liked to hang out with Mose’s American Staffordshire terrier, Diesel. Folks who pass Mose’s home down a backcountry road can watch George, 5, and Diesel, 12, pal around. They love to chase each other, George often knocking Diesel to the ground—a game that goes on for a while. Sometimes they just relax together under a tree. “George is quite the character,” Mose says. “He only likes the chickens, Diesel and me.” Diesel is less active these days due to Lyme disease, but that hasn’t stopped…

unexpected friends Diesel & George

I’ll never forget you

CLYDE WAS SUPPOSED to be a temporary pet. A friend called one day to ask if I could foster a one-and-a-half-year-old wolf mix whose owner was diagnosed with cancer. I thought, We can help out, but we’re not keeping him. But when Clyde stood on his hind legs and hugged my six-foot-three son, James, that was it. We loaded him and his refrigerator-sized crate into our minivan and welcomed him into our family. A few years later, we adopted a Shiba Inu mix, Angel, and she and Clyde became best friends. They were rarely apart. The day cancer took Clyde from us at 14, Angel stayed by his side, lying with him under a table until he took his last breath. Angel suffered a stroke at 16 and joined her pal over…

I’ll never forget you

EVERY TIME Paul Johnston of Lehigh Acres, Florida, starts up his lawnmower, 16 of his rescue dogs come running. They know what the sound means: a ride through the neighborhood on an eight-car homemade barrel train. With one dog in each car, half the crew will have to wait for the next departure. Paul drives the lawnmower that pulls the train, and his wife, Alice, rides her bike behind the caboose to make sure that the dogs stay safe. Neighbors watch the train drive by, taking videos and bringing their own dogs outside to see the spectacle. During the holiday season, Paul and Alice decorate the train with Christmas lights, turning it into the Wonderland Express. But it’s the train’s year-round decorations that show the couple’s true motivation. Each car displays a…

SIX YEARS AGO, beneath the surface of the Caribbean Sea, Rodolfo “Rudy” Reyes’s life changed. The former Recon Marine went scuba diving in the Cayman Islands with friends and seasoned recreational divers Jim Ritterhoff and Keith Sahm. Reyes was a trained combat diver who served multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he’d never been diving just for fun. And because his underwater missions took place in the dark of night, he’d never even seen a fish up close. Reyes had struggled with post-traumatic stress disorder and depression since returning to civilian life. He discovered something he never expected on that dive trip: healing. The beauty of the underwater world brought him a sense of peace he hadn’t known was possible, and he wanted other veterans to experience what he had. In 2016,…

Creature Comforts

“HOP IN THE TRUCK!” Dad called to my brother, Gordon, and me. It was a Saturday morning in early December. Most eight-year-olds were probably still in their pajamas, but I grabbed my winter coat and rushed outside. Dad worked for a furniture company in Wausau, Wisconsin, and Gordon and I loved riding along on his deliveries. Dad was a quiet man who worked long hours, and this was the only time we got to spend with him. We pulled up to an old country house, where an elderly couple lived. Dad carried their new table and chairs into the house. Gordon and I stayed in the front yard, playing with the couple’s Boston terrier, Bobby. I hardly noticed the cold as the dog jumped into my lap and licked my face. I…

A Light From Within

Had I made the right decision getting these horses? I paced in our home near Norfolk, England, waiting for the horse whisperer to pull into the drive. I’d found his information in an equine magazine. He claimed to help people with difficult horses. I was desperate. My two horses ran from me or lashed out. What if I couldn’t make them feel settled? What if I failed with them as I had with so much in my life? My son, Richard, then 11 years old, had convinced me to adopt a small pony, Gus, several months earlier. Richard had a Saturday job tending horses for a neighbor. “Please, Mum, please! I’ll take such good care of him,” he pleaded. We had the land, and Gus had been abandoned. He needed a home.…

A Light From Within

Their Mysterious Ways

PING! MY PHONE CHIMED. I swiped open Letgo, an app for buying and selling used goods. Someone was interested in the car sunshade I’d posted. I coordinated a time and place to meet the buyer. Meanwhile my mind wandered to my father, Adolph—or Molly, as I used to call him. A mispronunciation of a German word for “chubby.” A hardworking, practical Austrian immigrant, Dad would’ve been proud I was trying to sell something I no longer needed. Dad died in 2016. He’d lived with me for the last nine years of his life. One of my favorite memories was our trip to New Mexico. That’s where Dad bought the pastel painting of parrots that hangs in my entryway. He liked to say it reminded him of the three of us—my late…

Their Mysterious Ways

The Joy of Alpacas

On a small farm in Stone Ridge, New York, the Quiet Moon Alpacas are happily grazing and greeting passersby. For more than a decade, Bob Trismen has been caring for these gentle creatures with his neighbor, who didn’t have space for them. “They’ve been an unexpected joy,” says Bob.“I wouldn’t change a thing.”…

The Joy of Alpacas

how I met my pet

“LOOK, ED! THERE HE IS!” I said, pointing to a cat walking slowly up the sidewalk in front of the motel. My husband and I were spending a week on Chincoteague Island, Virginia. I’d spotted the cat—a skinny white and brown creature—our first day there as we unloaded our luggage. The little guy looked hungry. All we had was some milk in the mini fridge, so I poured it into a dish and set it just outside our door. He trotted over, lapping up every drop before wandering off. The next morning, he was back. He was older—seven or eight was my guess—and in bad shape. One of his eyes looked infected. But his front paws had been declawed and he was neutered. You must have been somebody’s pet, I thought. We asked…

how I met my pet

Saving Wildlife Saved Me

Every time I hold a baby squirrel in my hands, I feel a sense of wonder and gratitude at what I’m being entrusted with, at what God is asking me to do. I’m 27 and I volunteer as the squirrel team leader for Tri-County Wildlife Care (TCWC), a nonprofit rescue that rehabilitates and cares for injured, orphaned or displaced squirrels, birds and other wildlife in northern California’s Amador, Calaveras and San Joaquin counties. During the past seven years, I’ve helped hundreds of “patients” heal and grow and, eventually, return to the wild. It’s emotionally demanding work. Some days are hard, made harder by the fact that I have chronic intractable migraine disease. I live with disabling headache pain. So why do I pour so much of myself into taking care of…

Saving Wildlife Saved Me

A Moment in the Barn

I was determined to make Christmas perfect. Our home, an old stucco farmhouse, looked like something out of a magazine—from the red-ribboned wreath on the front door to the row of hand-knit stockings hanging from the mantel and my best china on the table ready for a feast. I took a deep breath. Please, Lord, let this Christmas be everything it’s supposed to be, I begged. But could it, now that my husband and I had separated? Would Christmas ever be the same for me and my kids? The kids were upstairs working on last-minute secret projects and changing for church. I checked the ham in the oven and then washed my hands in the sink. The muscles in my neck and shoulders felt tight and achy. I was so tired…

A Moment in the Barn

Debbie and Jorge Garcia-Bengochea Gentle Carousel Miniature Therapy Horses

Who They Are It all started in Debbie and Jorge Garcia-Bengochea’s barn, where special-needs students stopped by to interact with two friendly miniature horses the couple had as pets. Debbie, a school principal at the time, invited a few students and their families to come meet Molly and Sugar. She noticed how the horses calmed the children. It inspired her to learn more about the human-animal bond, so she brought some of her smaller pets—a rabbit and hamster—into one of the classrooms at school. The positive interactions encouraged her to go further. Not long after that, Debbie and Jorge carefully led another miniature horse into a homebound neighbor’s house so the woman could get an up close experience. Debbie realized there were many people who couldn’t come outside to see the horses…

Debbie and Jorge Garcia-Bengochea Gentle Carousel Miniature Therapy Horses

Is This for Real?

Imagine being a child, unable to see well. Your eyes are tested, dilated, puffed with air or squirted with liquid, and now you’re told you’ll need to wear glasses. Or perhaps, an eye patch. It can all be very scary. Enter master optician Danielle Crull, who started her practice in Mechanics-burg, Pennsylvania, specifically for youth—infants through teens—who need glasses. In 2002, she opened A Child’s Eyes, the first independent optical shop of its kind in the United States, and now runs the practice with the help of her husband and their three children, who are all in their twenties and board-certified opticians. Wearing glasses as a kid prompted Danielle’s interest in the field and she jumped in with an apprenticeship right out of high school, before earning her national certifications. Her work…

Is This for Real?

’Tis the season to count our blessings—including our pets that provide companionship and improve our quality of life. Over the years I’ve had many different pets, including dogs, cats, rabbits, guinea pigs, gerbils, goldfish, turtles and a hermit crab. I’ve learned something wonderful from each one. We currently share our home with two golden retrievers—Ernest, 13, and Petey, 4. When it comes to reasons to be grateful, they are surely near the top of my list. Here’s why: 1 They’re the best welcoming committee. I love coming home to someone who’s so happy to see me. We have a large window in our front door, and from the moment my dogs hear my footsteps on the porch, they are waiting there, jumping and wagging their tails like it’s the best moment of…

I WATCH AS A RED-TAILED HAWK SWEEPS across the azure sky. Two dots follow its every move. It swoops. They swoop. It glides. They glide. Binoculars reveal the dots are its young. The hawk is teaching them the freedom of the sky. One dot veers away, then returns. The other does the same. This happens again and again, each veering wider and longer than its predecessor. At times, the little ones fly so far they disappear from my sight. The hawk doesn’t follow. Eventually, its young return. But someday soon, they’ll take to the open sky and not come back. Near our back woods, I see a mother pronghorn and its fawn. The baby’s legs are splayed, its walk tentative. Gradually, it gains confidence, repeatedly trots circles around its mom, does…

In This Issue

Description

Details

Reviews

Recent Digital Issues Browse all

Recent All Creatures Digital Issues Browse all back issues

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription May 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) May/June 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription March 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) March/April 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription January 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) January/February 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription November 1st, 2020 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) November/December 2020: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription May 1st, 2022 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) May/June 2022: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription March 1st, 2022 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Mar/Apr 2022: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription January 1st, 2022 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Jan/Feb 2022: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription November 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Nov/Dec 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription September 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Sept/Oct 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription July 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) July/Aug 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription May 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) May/June 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription March 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) March/April 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription January 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) January/February 2021: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription November 1st, 2020 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) November/December 2020: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription May 1st, 2022 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) May/June 2022: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription March 1st, 2022 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Mar/Apr 2022: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription January 1st, 2022 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Jan/Feb 2022: $3.49

All Creatures (Digital) Subscription November 1st, 2021 Issue

All Creatures (Digital) Nov/Dec 2021: $3.49

Reviews