Dog Days

On the 6th of July our family grew by one member. He’s affectionate, playful, a bit smelly and surprisingly hairy. No, I haven’t had DS cloned, we’ve adopted a dawgie 🙂

He’s called Dexter*, he’s between 8-10 months old, so still a pup, a Pointer cross with probably some Doberman in him judging by the colouring and he’s completely and utterly lovely 🙂

*he was called Usher, but that’s a silly name so we changed it.

After much stress, uncertainty and shenanigans over the adoption process (mostly over a gorgeous GSD pup at another rescue)* all of which coincided with the week from hell, we finally went down to Allsorts Rescue** near Brighton and met our boy. Oh my! What a fearful, cowering creature he was, refusing to come near us at first, tail firmly between his legs and looking for an opportunity to run away 🙁 The chap who brought him out of the kennels thrust the lead into my hand and said to take him for a walk. The dog showed little interest in us as we walked off, until we met his sister coming back the other way. A totally different character, she leapt on us gleefully in greeting, at which point, our dog obviously thought: Hang on, this lot are with me, I’ll have some of that. Before we knew it he was paws up on my chest and licking his hellos 🙂 DD got the same treatment though he was rather more reticent when it came to the boys, preferring to keep his distance if he could.

We headed back for the kennels and after a quick discussion to make sure everyone agreed, we decided to take a chance. He’d warmed to me and DD and it was likely that he’d relax once we got home and realised we were family. We didn’t want to stress him out unnecessarily by leaving and then coming back later to collect him so we took him there and then. We had a dog! Come to my arms, my beamish pup! O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!

*My heartfelt thanks to Lynn Byfield, the fantastic Hart Dog Warden, who came out very quickly to do the necessary home check.

** If you look at the Dogs Available link, you will want one. You have been warned 🙂

Yes, he does look rather apprehensive, doesn’t he. The picture above was taken a couple of hours after we first met and he wouldn’t sit close to us, but he did growl and face off a very large GSD who came too close to us and our picnic. We’d been adopted 🙂 By the time he’d spent a few hours with us and arrived at home, he was looking much much happier…

Grin

…though we were all much happier to be out of the hot car by then.

Once we’d got him into the house, (he was happy in the garden but apprehensive about coming indoors), he found his bed and retired to it fairly quickly. It had been a fairly tiring and stressful day for him. He wouldn’t eat or drink if any of us were in the same room but tucked in once we gave him space. He slept the night downstairs without an signs of distress whatsoever  and I was treated to a waggy tail and licks the following morning. By Monday, I risked letting him off the lead in a virtually empty park and he came bounding up when called (I’d been expecting to have him on lead for 2-3 weeks) and by Tuesday, he had mastered “Sit” (totally ignored the command at first) and now does so unbidden with little or no encouragement (as long as there are no scary things nearby) when we stop to cross the road. It took him a little longer to warm to the boys and, although he’s not quite as waggy with them (his whole back end wags for DD) he comes to them to be fussed over and is getting more playful by the day. He’s eager to please, responds quickly to training and although he’s still nervous of most strangers, particularly men, he’s mostly fine with children, dogs and their female carers. He’s even tolerant of the occasional man and generally a lot more relaxed…

Dogatonic

From fearful, cowering creature to playful, bouncy, happy pup (when not passed out) in a week 🙂

Yes, I know, I should have turned the phone around <sigh>

After only a couple of days, it felt like he’d been part of the family forever. I’m so glad we took a chance on this rescue dog – he’s absolutely delightful and I can’t imagine how he and his equally lovely sister ended up as strays. I couldn’t part with him. The dog days are here again 🙂