Blog

When I first saw the adolescent canine who was to become my darling dog Otto, in my local shelter in June 2008, his cage card warned Kills chicken" – an endearing typo that evidently meant he had either killed a chicken

Not long after my husband and I bought our house in 2006, we were introduced to another couple who, unbeknownst to us, shared our home address: a pair of skunks. They had a den under the house, and emerged shortly after dusk to wander through the neighborhood, foraging for fallen fruit from ornamental and backyard fruit trees, digging for grubs and worms in freshly watered lawns, and helping themselves to cat food on various porches where some people feed cats (feral and otherwise).

If I had to name my puppy's most annoying trait, I'd have to say it's "fooling around" with my older dog, Otto. What do I mean by this? A person who wasn't familiar with dog behavior would be likely to say that Woody is pestering my older dog. He jumps up into Otto's face, licking and flopping around, and generally acting like a fool. The more he does it, the more irritated Otto gets. Otto may start out with his tail wagging, standing in one place and turning his head away, trying to ignore the puppy's foolishness. Within a few seconds, though, he will start baring his teeth and growling at the puppy in a fearsome manner, until they are either interrupted (by me), or by Otto abruptly deciding enough is enough and flattening the puppy with a roar and a lot of snapping teeth.

A colleague sent me this link to a video of famed BASE jumper Dean Potter flying off a cliff wearing a wingsuit" with his dog

I'm a HUGE advocate of shopping in independent pet supply stores. They are generally run by people who really care and are knowledgeable about dogs (and other small pets). They tend to carry better-quality foods, treats, toys, training products, and just about everything else that the chain pet supply stores do. (But don't get me wrong: The giant pet supply chains are leagues better at identifying and carrying better-quality products than chain supermarkets and big box stores. I can't think of a single product I'd buy in the pet supply aisle at a Walmart, for example.)

This is what I'm grateful for this chilly, rainy morning: Three dogs who willingly and quickly go right outdoors and get to work. Not all at once, of course: there is a peeing order that is aligned with the pecking order. The puppy goes first. Tito, the older small dog, goes next. Otto, the benevolent leader of my little pack of three, checks to make sure it's really happening; Tito is so small it's hard to tell. Only after everyone else is done does Otto go back over both spots and mark them himself.

I'm a big fan of "puppy socials" - a classroom-type setting to which people bring their puppies for socializing with pups of a similar age. It's a powerful opportunity for the puppies, especially the ones who are being raised with no other dog at home to learn basic canine social skills from - or the ones who DO share their homes with another dog, but the dog is super grumpy about puppies.

For over three months, I had possession of a year-old American Black and Tan Coonhound or coonhound-mix whom I called Maebe. I absolutely loved that dog, and cried when I dropped her off for transport to her new home. AND I'm thrilled and tearful - in a good way - that she found a great new home. That's the bittersweet experience of fostering.

I want to congratulate WDJ's long-time contributor, dog trainer/writer Stephanie Colman, for winning a Maxwell award from the Dog Writers Association of America (DWAA), for her article, "Service, Please," which ran in WDJ's July 2015 issue. The award is named in honor of the late Maxwell Riddle, who co-founded the DWAA. The awards were announced on February 14, at the Pennsylvania Hotel in New York City at the DWAA's annual awards banquet, held prior to the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.

I've heard it from a dozen different people in the past few weeks: "Oh my goodness, Nancy, that puppy LOVES you!" In every case, the person who made the spontaneous exclamation was prompted to do so by witnessing the same phenomenon: Seeing my new puppy sit calmly and stare, making direct eye contact with me.

The puppy, Woody, may well love me - I certainly love and adore him! But what's the true explanation? Does he stare at me because he loves me, or has he developed affection for me as a result of all the reinforcement he's received for that eye contact?

None of you actually had any money riding on the question of whether I was going to keep him or not, did you? I hope not.

Yes, I am keeping the puppy, the one I fell in love with from the litter I fostered for my shelter. One of these days, I'm going to go back through all my files and do the math, but I think that if I added up all the dogs I've fostered for one shelter or rescue or another in the past 20 years, the total would come to more than 25, and this is the first one I've "failed" at fostering. At least, so far. I am still not discounting the idea that, if it turns out that this puppy turns out to be the ideal dog for an ideal family sometime down the road, I could, theoretically, still turn him over to a perfect life elsewhere. Who knows? Maybe he will turn out to be a great service dog or therapy dog, as some of you have suggested. He does have the calmest, most centered personality I've ever seen in such a young dog.

As you may know, I've been fostering a litter of nine puppies for about seven weeks. From day 1, there was one puppy who stood out to me as a potentially great dog. One of just two males in the litter, he was the first to learn to offer a sit" when I was getting their food or medicine ready