Learning, trusting & finding out

These first few weeks of owning a new dog, when not having had one for years,  have been all about getting into a routine, working out our limitations and gaining trust on both sides.

We've learnt that he is a very trusting dog and, whilst obviously a bit bewildered about his sudden change of surroundings,  is coping well.  Whilst he was part of a pack of 3 dogs, we believe ever since a puppy, it must seem strange to him that the other 2 aren't there anymore, although he does seem to be enjoying the quieter life with 2 humans giving him attention, love, walks and tennis balls!

So what else have we learnt so far?
- He is extremely well trained on most commands except 'find' which he can't work out for the life of him, we lost 2 tennis balls in one day, apparently i should have magically had them back in my hand ready for throwing again!
- He was really obstinate about getting in the car. Doing a bit of dog psychology i think this was possibly down to him arriving in a car to us and then that car leaving without him. However, we have done lots of 'good' car journeys where we have driven somewhere then got out for a nice walk. The one longer journey we did to the Peak District, we had him on the floor in the passenger footwell of the T4 camper (with a doggie harness on!) but it meant he could see us and be fussed.
- He really doesn't like other dogs. Unfortunately I found this out when i was walking him in Marbury country park, just after we had lost a tennis ball!  We met 2 large labradors, the female was fine but the male was really aggressive towards Leelu whilst Leelu  was trying to hide behind me and sink himself into the ground at the same time.  The next couple of dogs we met, he did a big loop around through the undergrowth and then waited on the path ahead until i caught up.  Fortunately since then we have met a couple of other placid dogs who haven't been interested in him sufficiently, just as well as he has been hiding behind our legs.  However, we have found that if he has the tennis ball, he is a bit braver as he can focus on that rather than the other dog.  Again a bit of doggie psychology and i reckon that he has never really been in an 'only dog' situation before as previously he would have been in a pack of 3 or with other dogs he knows so would have been / felt protected. Something to work on.
- Water. He really doesn't like it! He actively goes around puddles, if we are in the field he lies on the high ground. The twice he has fallen in the canal off the boat (fortunately at the mooring!) He was terrified and clung to me like  small child, although he can swim! Sarah did manage to entice him into the sea when we went to Red Rocks beach on  the Wirral - a fantastically huge flat beach with lots of room for running around - only because she too was paddling and was in charge of ball throwing!

The next blog will be about the experience of putting him in kennels.  Yes i feel really bad when he is so new to us!

A new dog

We have a 'new to us' dog! Its great and has been a wonderful first week with him.

My parents had dogs when I was growing up, including a succession of German Shepherd dogs from rescue homes.  My husband also used to have dogs and coincidentally, the last dog we both had was a collie cross shepherd. 

We have both wanted a dog of our own for a few years but working patterns and living on a boat wasn't really conducive to it.  However, now that J works more locally more of the time and has a lot of part time work, most of which is based from home, suddenly the conversation of getting a new dog came up again...  So we started looking at the dog rescue sites...what sort of dog did we want?? 

Not a small dog as we didn't want to trip over it or lose it amongst the rocks or tufts of grass that are found on mountains,  nor did we want to carry it home when its little legs got tired!

Not a large dog either.  We live on a NARROW boat!

So medium sized mountain loving dog....ooh look, a friend has reposted another friend's photo on good old Facebook.  A 7 year old male border collie that needed rehoming due to a change in circumstances of his owners. SOLD!!

So here he is, learning to be with us 2 crazies and completely putting us under his spell! 'Umlilo,' Zulu for 'Fire.'  His previous owners were South African.  So his name is Lilo but for the sake of getting the correct pronunciation we have changed the spelling to be more literal.

This is LEELU our lovely new border collie who is doing fantastically, is good as gold and loves the mountains - hooray!! Periodic adventures of our 'woolly dog' will be posted here. Enjoy.