I talk about my 3 girls, my cats, all the time on this site and I thought Sky needed some lovin' too. After all, it can't be easy being a canine baby brother to 3 cats.
Sky's Story
As I'm studying to be a dog trainer, meaning I've been studying positive reinforcement training methods as well as canine behavior and psychology in preparation for beginning training for my certification, I figured that I needed a dog of my own to work with. After all, what client would rely on a trainer who's never trained her own dog, right? After looking at various shelter websites I came across this picture from a no-kill shelter one town over and fell in love:
There was very little information about him available on the site--all I knew was that he was an 8-month-old male Australian Shepherd mix who was neutered and available for adoption. I'd always loved Australian Shepherds and wanted one, and I thought he was the perfect age to adopt--not a little puppy who'd get a home easy but still young, at that "teenage puppy" age that most potential adopters seem to shy away from. A few afternoons later, after stalking the website to make sure he wasn't snatched up before I got the chance, I went to go see him. This is what awaited me in the shelter's kennel room:
He had no bed or blanket, just a hard floor and a bowl of water. He'd had all his puppy shots and was microchipped, he had been just recently neutered and still had stitches and a cone, he was on pain medication that made him very tired, and he was obviously not doing well in the shelter environment, which was very, very crowded with dogs since it was springtime and therefore "puppy season". I sat outside his kennel while I waited for a staff member to help me (they were busy that day) and he stuck his nose under the gate as well as he could with the cone and whimpered until I got him out. I took him on a lead to an outdoor enclosure to get to know him.
He was very polite and a complete sweetheart. A staff member cleaning the enclosure next to the one we were in told me his story. At about 6 months old he'd been found running loose by the side of the road with part of a rope tied around his neck. Somebody who pulled over to pick him up took him to a shelter and they tracked him back to a trailer park, where he'd been tied up outside and abandoned with no food or water. He'd chewed his way free. They made every attempt to contact the owners of the property where he'd been left but they got nowhere. He'd been transferred to the shelter I found him at because nobody had any interest in meeting him. I couldn't imagine why, as he was such a beautiful dog and so sweet. Unfortunately something came up that day and I wasn't able to take him home--it actually looked like I wouldn't be able to take care of a dog at the moment, which crushed me after just having fallen in love with the perfect boy.
I followed him on the shelter's website for another few days, both hoping to see him adopted and worried that he would be, even though I felt guilty about the latter. He spent another four days sitting at the shelter before things turned around and I learned that I would be able to have a dog after all--and I rushed right down to the shelter and made a beeline for his kennel. He was still in a cone but no longer on medication and he jumped up the instant he saw me and started wagging his tail and barking. I knew he remembered me. As I was getting him on a lead to take him out front and fill out the paperwork a little boy there with his family looking at a puppy in the next kennel over asked me if he was my dog. I told him "Yeah, he's mine and he's finally coming home."
He stuck his head between the two front seats on the whole ride home and hit me in the face with his cone every time he turned to try to lick me. When we got home he sniffed all over the front yard, promptly peed on my cat Isy's favorite tree (Isy was, thankfully, inside and didn't witness this atrocity), and sat right next to me until we went inside.
He stayed in my bedroom for the rest of the day, where his kennel was set up with a brand-new blanket and toys (the cats were very offended at having to sleep in the living room that night. On the couch of all places. Oh, the horror). He got a frozen peanut butter kong for being so good and the poor guy couldn't eat it with the cone on. I had to help--after spending the appropriate amount of time laughing at him pushing it in circles, of course. It struck me then that his coloring looked kind of like a stormy, cloudy sky and his name finally came to me: Sky. He started responding to it almost flawlessly by the end of the evening.
Sky is now a year old and well on his way to being a perfect little gentleman--at least around everybody but his sisters. In proper baby brother fashion he terrorizes them in the most loving way possible and doesn't realize how much bigger he is than any of them. Even as a shrimpy Aussie (he clocks in at barely 35lbs full-grown, a good 15lbs lighter than the average male at least), he doesn't realize his size or strength. Maya isn't too keen on spending a lot of quality time with him but Zoey's more than happy to use his tail for hunting practice--though Sky hasn't quite gotten it through his skull that she doesn't find chase as fun of a game as he does. Isy believes she's above anything as loud and clumsy as a puppy and therefore doesn't associate Her Royal Highness with him except to glare from the highest spot in the room so as to better make him understand how superior she is. Keeping the peace isn't easy with multi-species siblings but it's an adventure, to say the least. I'm still waiting on the cute cat-and-dog-living-in-peace pictures but these'll do for now.
Sky's Story
As I'm studying to be a dog trainer, meaning I've been studying positive reinforcement training methods as well as canine behavior and psychology in preparation for beginning training for my certification, I figured that I needed a dog of my own to work with. After all, what client would rely on a trainer who's never trained her own dog, right? After looking at various shelter websites I came across this picture from a no-kill shelter one town over and fell in love:
There was very little information about him available on the site--all I knew was that he was an 8-month-old male Australian Shepherd mix who was neutered and available for adoption. I'd always loved Australian Shepherds and wanted one, and I thought he was the perfect age to adopt--not a little puppy who'd get a home easy but still young, at that "teenage puppy" age that most potential adopters seem to shy away from. A few afternoons later, after stalking the website to make sure he wasn't snatched up before I got the chance, I went to go see him. This is what awaited me in the shelter's kennel room:
He had no bed or blanket, just a hard floor and a bowl of water. He'd had all his puppy shots and was microchipped, he had been just recently neutered and still had stitches and a cone, he was on pain medication that made him very tired, and he was obviously not doing well in the shelter environment, which was very, very crowded with dogs since it was springtime and therefore "puppy season". I sat outside his kennel while I waited for a staff member to help me (they were busy that day) and he stuck his nose under the gate as well as he could with the cone and whimpered until I got him out. I took him on a lead to an outdoor enclosure to get to know him.
He was very polite and a complete sweetheart. A staff member cleaning the enclosure next to the one we were in told me his story. At about 6 months old he'd been found running loose by the side of the road with part of a rope tied around his neck. Somebody who pulled over to pick him up took him to a shelter and they tracked him back to a trailer park, where he'd been tied up outside and abandoned with no food or water. He'd chewed his way free. They made every attempt to contact the owners of the property where he'd been left but they got nowhere. He'd been transferred to the shelter I found him at because nobody had any interest in meeting him. I couldn't imagine why, as he was such a beautiful dog and so sweet. Unfortunately something came up that day and I wasn't able to take him home--it actually looked like I wouldn't be able to take care of a dog at the moment, which crushed me after just having fallen in love with the perfect boy.
I followed him on the shelter's website for another few days, both hoping to see him adopted and worried that he would be, even though I felt guilty about the latter. He spent another four days sitting at the shelter before things turned around and I learned that I would be able to have a dog after all--and I rushed right down to the shelter and made a beeline for his kennel. He was still in a cone but no longer on medication and he jumped up the instant he saw me and started wagging his tail and barking. I knew he remembered me. As I was getting him on a lead to take him out front and fill out the paperwork a little boy there with his family looking at a puppy in the next kennel over asked me if he was my dog. I told him "Yeah, he's mine and he's finally coming home."
He stuck his head between the two front seats on the whole ride home and hit me in the face with his cone every time he turned to try to lick me. When we got home he sniffed all over the front yard, promptly peed on my cat Isy's favorite tree (Isy was, thankfully, inside and didn't witness this atrocity), and sat right next to me until we went inside.
He stayed in my bedroom for the rest of the day, where his kennel was set up with a brand-new blanket and toys (the cats were very offended at having to sleep in the living room that night. On the couch of all places. Oh, the horror). He got a frozen peanut butter kong for being so good and the poor guy couldn't eat it with the cone on. I had to help--after spending the appropriate amount of time laughing at him pushing it in circles, of course. It struck me then that his coloring looked kind of like a stormy, cloudy sky and his name finally came to me: Sky. He started responding to it almost flawlessly by the end of the evening.
Sky is now a year old and well on his way to being a perfect little gentleman--at least around everybody but his sisters. In proper baby brother fashion he terrorizes them in the most loving way possible and doesn't realize how much bigger he is than any of them. Even as a shrimpy Aussie (he clocks in at barely 35lbs full-grown, a good 15lbs lighter than the average male at least), he doesn't realize his size or strength. Maya isn't too keen on spending a lot of quality time with him but Zoey's more than happy to use his tail for hunting practice--though Sky hasn't quite gotten it through his skull that she doesn't find chase as fun of a game as he does. Isy believes she's above anything as loud and clumsy as a puppy and therefore doesn't associate Her Royal Highness with him except to glare from the highest spot in the room so as to better make him understand how superior she is. Keeping the peace isn't easy with multi-species siblings but it's an adventure, to say the least. I'm still waiting on the cute cat-and-dog-living-in-peace pictures but these'll do for now.
Sky is such a wonderful addition to our family and I'm so glad I was able to adopt him. I felt so bad going home the first time without him, not only because he looked as crushed as I was when I put him back in his kennel but because the poor shelter staff were obviously so overworked and had seemed so happy to see me about to take him home! They were so crowded with both dogs and cats over this spring and summer they couldn't provide all of them with comfortable beds or blankets (like Sky) and it seemed that every time one got adopted two more came in. They were begging for more volunteers just so they could get all of the dogs outside once in a while and for new foster parents to take care of all the puppies and kittens that were coming in. It was heartbreaking to see all the animals there, especially young and high-energy ones like Sky who ended up having to spend all day cooped up in a kennel when they really needed the socialization and exercise.
