DOGGIE DOG BLOG

Written By:  Cindy Jacobs (Cyd)

You always wondered just how things would go bringing an older dog into a home.  I have always started with puppies, they always seemed to be more tolerated with existing older dogs.   Candy has now been in the family for 2 months.  She is doing excellent, I couldn’t ask for better now with fitting into the household.  There is still a peace in the house.

Candy was pretty skittish about everything at first, so you do need to allow a couple months to get more of an idea.  If I were to judge it from the first few weeks I had Candy, I would have said forget it and gone back to raising puppies.  Time and patience is a big key for allowing an older dog to fit in, something I am not always good at.  However, things happened right after her purchase that really forced me to slow down with Candy, a good thing according to my trainer David Harris.  He was glad these things happened to me, as I tend to want to rush into training, and he wanted Candy totally settled in and bonded before any real training began.  David knew more what I would be dealing with with Candy than I did really, as he went with me to evaluate her before I purchased her.  The things that happened delaying training were:

1.  Candy came into heat four days after I got her.

2.  I was ask to enter Candy in the Seiger (conformation show), less than 2 weeks after getting her.

These 2 items truly slowed me down from what I normally would have done, which would have been jumping into training with Candy, pointed out to me by David Harris, and to him this was the best thing to happen, anything to slow me down.  David was right, I see that now, and he also had evaluated Candy before I even purchased her, so he really knew more of what I would be dealing with.

Candy has fit in perfect, is totally house trained, not in a crate anymore even at night, and a pleasure to have in the house with the other dogs.

Candy and I will start training with David next week.  I am looking forward to David testing her just to see what we can get busy doing…  Bonding Time Is Over Starting Monday!  haha  I am looking forward to training again.  Ready or not Mr Harris: HERE WE COME!

Cindy