These last two weeks have just flown by. We’re happy to announce that our second foster sister got adopted the weekend before last, so now both Sky and Sage have joined their forever families.
After our week long road trip to Nashville for the BlogPaws conference, we met up with some friends and went for a Pack Walk at the San Pedro River. Miss Sage joined us too since she was now completely vetted and healed from her spay. The total number of dogs was 10 and there were 3 humans. It was a great outing for everyone to stretch their legs. A few of the dogs can be nervous and a little unsure around other dogs, so it’s a nice way for dogs to learn how to be around each other in a group setting and become more comfortable with other dogs while getting exercise. Bella and Terra are experienced group walkers-Kronos has only been on a few of these kinds of outings.
Mom was kept busy with helping prepare for a couple big marketing events that her financial adviser attended. The second week in June we headed up to Phoenix to visit family and catch up. We played some board games, went on walks in the desert, played on Fit Paws equipment, did trick training, swam at the lake, and the humans went to the see Jurassic World.
The main purpose of the visit though was for Bella and Terra to help socialize a young Bull Terrier pup. One of our auntie’s co-workers got the girl pup and it had no regard for space or social cues from other dogs and she asked that Bella and Terra come to help. The pup was also under exercised and under stimulated. We’d heard many a bad story of this mouthy, bitey, stubborn, and ill behaved dog.
Kronos is still working on his social cues and face-to-face interactions so he didn’t attend the training meet up. Bella and Terra are good about giving appropriate corrections, and though they are both loud when doing so, it’s generally all noise. One of our aunties wanted to play with Sage and do some training with her, so Sage also got to come to the meet up.
We went to the Pet Store where the person worked and she brought the Bull Terrier pup, Izzy, out from her crate in the back. She was a pistol from the get go-pulling her person to try to say hi to the other dogs, but at least she was too focused on them to display any of the jumping or biting we’d heard about. Mom’s first comment was “This dog needs a 2 hour run just to begin with.” She rushed Bella to greet her, and though Bella told her off once, Izzy was entirely clueless. She continued to get in Bella’s face and must have nipped her too, because Bella was soon trying to get away with her tail tucked and she was whining. She wasn’t sure what to do with the rude pup who was bigger than her and didn’t listen, and it’s wonderful that she’s not a fighter-if she gets told off, she turns tail and tries to get away instead of engaging. But Izzy was a bit too much for her to handle. Bella was taken out of Izzy’s reach and then Terra was brought to meet her.
Terra immediately yelled at Izzy, but again, Izzy did not get the hint. She had been around other dogs who had simply tried to move away or turn away instead of correcting her inappropriate rude puppy behavior when she persisted. And she was already around 35-40 lbs. Izzy kept trying to get into Terra’s face and under her feet-moving forward instead of away when Terra barked at her and told her off. After a few moments of Izzy not getting the hints, I decided it was time to walk to let Izzy get out some of her energy and to be given some direction. We began walking around the store. Initially, Izzy was dragging behind and kept trying to cross to get under Terra’s face. With short tugs and simply body blocks and patience she was walking decently. Next we went outside and Bella joined the group initially. We walked around the store complex a couple of times. Izzy soon fell behind the girls and followed nicely on the lead. After that, I asked my sisters to bring her dog and Sage for the next walk around the store-walking next to us or behind us, but not to really let them meet yet. Izzy had a ton of energy and she was too overexcited to focus on greeting appropriately (sniffing butts and exchanging canine handshakes) yet. After a couple more rounds around the outside of the store, Izzy was beginning to relax a little bit. She began sniffing butts, being sniffed, and exploring her environment. When we went back inside she actually laid down with everyone, chilled, and took treats with a feather-light mouth. She took treats from strangers very nicely and didn’t jump or mouth. The nice thing was that at no point was she so stressed that she didn’t eat.
Mom cannot accurately explain the feeling that she felt when holding Izzy’s leash. The best way she can try is to say that her energy was incredibly strong-pure, raw, bold, and regal, and that she’s never felt a dog’s energy like that. She doesn’t know if it was frustration or pent up energy, or what, but that it was like being on a continuous high. She said she would put Izzy’s energy and forwardness above both Bella and Terra, but that Izzy seemed to be just looking for someone to look to and provide her direction and she immediately fell into that role.
The owner was incredulous to see the difference compared to how she reportedly acts. We left with the parting note to increase the amount of exercise she receives and to include structured walks (having simple rules like while it’s fine to be out in front, it’s not ok to be pulled around, varying between simply walking and occasionally sniffing) in addition to continue to meet appropriate doggie role models for her to learn from and to have people give her treats like we had done. If Izzy’s mom sticks to it, Izzy will be a wonderfully behaved little girl in no time-she already has the confidence. We really wish she could have joined us on a group Pack Walk in the desert so she could get some of her energy out and learn to be around a variety of dogs, but maybe next time. It took mom a good half hour to return to her normal energy level after feeling that energy high, and we were all pretty wiped from the encounter and took naps in the car.
After the meet up, we loaded up in the car and went to Lake Pleasant and swam.
Kronos finally had some swimming lessons and learned to not swim on people or other dogs but to swim around. Terra even swam a bit too and sat in the water with us before spending the rest of the time sunbathing on the beach. Bella and Kronos were water ball fiends and had so much fun playing fetch and swimming after their respective toys. We’ll have to get Kronos a real water bumper-he loved playing and racing to retrieve his cousin’s toy who was nice enough to let him play with it.
We had a great day playing in the water and sun. The next day we photographed some fosters and Sage had her meet and greet where she met and went home with her new family.
The next week mom went to a sales training in Phoenix, stayed with a friend where she got to meet some new foster pups that just came into the rescue which was followed by a volunteer meeting for Arizona Cattle Dog Rescue. Our family came down from Phoenix to stay briefly, and the next day was spent with more family where we ate dinner, played board games, talked, caught up, and played with kittens. Terra wasn’t feeling very good so she stayed home and Kronos stayed home to keep her company so only Miss Bella came along for the day.
We are currently putting together a blog post highlighting some healthy dog treat options, so keep an eye out later this week for that. We’re also currently running a couple of giveaways on our blog-one for a car seat cover by Kurgo and one for a box of a variety of some healthy dog treats that we want to share with one of our wonderful readers. We’re also getting ready for a camping trip with some human and dog friends that we’ll be heading out for tomorrow, so we’ll check back in when we get back in on Sunday. Hope you have a great rest of your week!
