Smokey's first walk

Yesterday I went out to mess with Smokey a little and managed to get a new collar and tags on him. He seems comfortable going in and out the window now and the big box full of straw was packed down inside so I know that he had been using it. The comforter in the dog house inside the shed also looked like it had been arranged and slept on. I took a bag of treats but he didn't know what they were and he dropped them after taking them. He probably went back and ate them later, but he doesn't appear to be particularly food motivated.

Today I went out with a slip leash, got it on him, and took him out of the shed/kennel habitat with the intention of taking him on a hike. We walked around the front yard for a bit at first and he seemed fine. I put him into the van, in a crate, but as soon as I closed the crate he went into his barking routine, scared and showing teeth. I brought Maya out and put her in the adjacent crate, hoping she would calm him down. He turned his barking to her, she turned her back to him and wanted nothing to do with him. I took Maya back into the house and then got Smokey out of the crate. Instead of going up to Pleasant Grove for a  hike on the trails, we just went for a walk around the perimeter of pasture, inside the fence. I  hoped that walking along the fence would guide him like walking on a trail so he wouldn't just run back and forth. It actually did have the intended effect and we had a pretty nice walk around the edge of the pasture, about a half mile. He didn't pull on the leash at all. Mostly he stayed a bit behind me and I occasionally felt his nose on the back of my legs, checking me out.

It was a positive experience for him and I'm hoping that by being associated with a positive experience he will begin to trust and even bond to me. I'm really not sure how to introduce him to other dogs. He seems very interested in them and seems to want canine companionship, and it would be great for him, but he completely lacks the social skills necessary to make friends. That's not surprising since he never developed them as a puppy and was probably sold out of his litter at the bare minimum of six weeks or less. I'm tempted to put him together with Theo and Max and let them sort him out, but I don't need the vet bills and besides, those two are not the greatest role models anyway.

I used to have a female rottweiler who excelled at discipline and settling young male shepherds. She would grab them by their scruff, flip them onto their backs, and just sit on them, keeping them pinned to ground until they settled down. They would yelp and scream at first, but she never left a scratch or a mark on them. Mad mama skills. That's what this boy needs.