Lyon in Summer

Lyon is a good looking, youngish male. There is some disagreement over whether he's a pure bred shepherd or a mix. The confirmation of his head and body is all shepherd, but the red color is rather unusual. He's a good looking dog, regardless of what he is or isn't.

Lyon's only fault that I saw is his "neediness." That's hardly a rarity with shepherds and his wasn't as bad as some I've seen. He seemed to be best when he was with another dog or two and didn't have the possibility of demanding all of his handler's time and attention.

I took Lyon in from another foster home because Lyon was driving him crazy. Lyon arrived the day before I got home from Kansas and went into an outdoor kennel. When I arrived, I was a stranger and he was clearly scared of me. I couldn't get near him, he would run away and bark, trying to scare me off. He was fine with other dogs, but didn't learn to trust me even though they did. This went on for a couple of weeks without improvement. Clearly, the dog wasn't adoptable; I couldn't even touch him to get a leash on him so taking him to an adoption event wasn't possible.

I don't have a lot of patience with dogs who are scared of me for no reason. I get frustrated, which the dog can always sense, and it makes a bad situation worse. I finally told Clay that we had to get him on a leash and in the house. The two of us went out to his kennel, backed him into a corner, and I slipped a lead over his head. He didn't snap at me; he was obviously scared, but wasn't fear aggressive. As soon as the leash was on, he was a different dog. My status went from "suspicious stranger" to "trusted handler" almost immediately. He came indoors and ran upstairs like he had been here forever. He wasn't crazy about going into a crate, but he didn't fight it and settled down quickly once inside. He then settled right into the household routine.

I took him to an adoption outing last weekend and sent him home with a husband, wife, and their two sons. They had another dog, a female shepherd about the same age, crates for both dogs, and a 6 foot fence. It seemed like a great situation for the dog and he took to them and their other dog right away without fear.