VA Dog Rescue: Dogs helping dogs

Friday, August 4, 2023

Dogs helping dogs

I can't claim, and don't claim, to be a dog trainer, animal behaviorist, animal communicator, or expert in anything at all. I think that the best thing I do for any dog who passes through here is to provide a port in the storm, a safe place to land, and an opportunity to let nature take its course. The dogs who are permanent residents here do most of the real work in providing comfort, socialization, and what we call "training" to the foster dogs.

Some are particularly gifted with this ability. Our late Trooper could walk up to a new dog who was terrified and somehow calm them down and convince them that we were just here to help. He famously worked that magic on Maya, but I watched him do the same with many other dogs as well. In fact, our protocol for new dog introductions was always "Trooper first," especially for scared dogs, and after that everything would be easier.

We had a female foster rottie one time, I believe her name was Cheyenne. She was big and very imposing. We fostered a lot of German Shepherds back then, often young males who were quite high strung. Cheyenne would grab them, put them on their back, and sit on them to make them calm down. She did it so quickly that you never really saw how it happened, just suddenly Cheyenne was sitting on the shepherd. And she did it without a fight, and in fact she never put a scratch on any of them.

Our late Molly, a rottie mix herself, was given the title of Kennel Manager. We fostered a larger volume of dogs back then and had a number of outdoor kennels set up. Much like Trooper, Molly could go in with any new dog and seemed to calm them down. She reduced anxiety and taught them how things worked around here.

Our current set of dogs, both fosters and residents, are providing current examples of dogs helping other dogs. Sherlock was returned because he didn't get along with the other dog in the house. The two dogs hadn't met, which was obviously a mistake, but we were assured that the other dog liked dogs and loved to play. It was also a mistake how the situation was handled. When Sherlock was returned we had taken in Jericho, and intact male German Shepherd. The two boys barked and snarled through the fence, but after a 24 hour no-contact observation period I put them together and they were playing together within the first minute. They have barely stopped since then.

Millie also spent a lot of time playing with Sherlock, and with Della. Millie was very scared in the beginning and she still spooks easily, but she has definitely learned that at least some humans are trustworthy. Because she was so scared I kept her indoors around us and the resident dogs almost exclusively in the beginning so she could see them interact with me and learn that I wasn't going to hurt her.

That brings me to the situation of Starfish and Gina. Star has been in the house more than with her puppies for the past week. She has been gradually getting with the program, going into her crate and out to the a/c yard, and hanging out in the kitchen (she has not ventured upstairs). I've seen a number of instances of her interacting with the resident dogs as they pass through the kitchen on their way outside.

Gina came in right after she had been spayed and she was also very shy and scared so I put her in a kitchen crate adjacent to Star and they started following the same routine and got very well acquainted. Gina seemed to come out of her shell and was lively and playful, but when she had a visitor from a prospective adopter yesterday I realized how scared of strangers she is still. We sat with her for quite a while and she eventually calmed down and came around to accepting some petting, but what seemed to calm her the most was when Star came over and sat down beside her. Now I usually find the two girls sharing the one big crate during the day, although I still split them up into the two adjacent crates at night. Both girls still need a lot of socialization work, but I expect that if we take them out together it will be easier on both of them. They are each other's emotional support animal.