Rescue Dogs

Should I adopt a rescue dog? This is a good question. Our little Cocoa is laying next to me sleeping on the couch right now. She will get final approval of this writing. You see, it was about a year and a half ago that she came into our lives. After much soul searching and begging from my children, we finally decided that it was time to bring a little four legged darling into our home. After discussing what type of dog we wanted to get, a standard poodle, we began looking. My son began with an online search to find an appropriate breeder and I began calling the breeders I knew from Upstate New York, where I knew some breeders.

Meanwhile, we were introduced to Craig’s List and saw some of the listings for dogs available. One particularly shaggy little girl caught my eye. I showed her to my son and we agreed that we should call about her. Thus began our introduction to the world of rescue dogs. You see, this little cutie was rescued by the Pomeranian Rescue League of Baltimore. She isn’t a pom herself, but she was with a pom that was being rescued so she was rescued too.

A wonderful woman by the name of Lorelei answered my email. She told me a bit about this little girl and what had happened to her as well as how she was adjusting now that she was living in a foster home. Well, we met our little girl and fell in love with her almost from the first moment. It was a match between her and our family, but it wasn’t easy at first…

There are some things to consider when wondering whether a rescue dog would fit your family. First of all, get all of the facts you can about the particular dog. Some of the questions you should ask include items such as why was it rescued and what kind of environment was it in? What is the dog’s disposition? What is its level of socialization? Are its shots, including rabies and distemper, up to date? What is its level of training? For instance, is it housebroken, crate trained, does it obey simple commands such as “stay,” “come”, “sit” and the like? For us, one of the most important questions was, “Does the dog travel well? You see, you have to ask questions to determine if the dog will fit your family and your lifestyle. “Is she good with children?” is an important question to ask if you have young ones. These kinds of questions will help in your decision of whether to adopt this particular dog or not.

In our case, we have to make a long distance car trip about once a month. Obviously, if we had a dog who was nervous on car trips or got car sick, it would be very difficult for that animal to fit into our family and our routine. These are the kinds of things you need to think about. Also, if you live in a small apartment, you don’t want a dog that needs a lot of running space. These are important things to consider, not just how cute the dog is.

Adopting a rescue dog is a little different from getting a puppy and raising it from the time it is real little. When you have a puppy, you can train it the way you want it. With a rescue dog, you sometimes have to try to break habits that it formed while it was in an abusive or neglectful situation. This is what I meant about things weren’t all wonderful when we got our dog.

She is a bit on the finicky side so just any treat wouldn’t work for her. They always recommend you reward your dog with a treat while training it. We went through about ten different types of treats before we finally found one that she would eat. Once I found a treat she would eat, she responded well to commands and was actually quite easy to train. Fortunately, we have a friend whose dog will eat just about anything so he had an early Christmas that year.

We kept her on a harness and a long lead when we first got her. That way, she could run when she wanted and yet, when we needed her to be close to us, we could keep her on a short leash and get her to come back to us. This was useful in training her to respond to other commands as well when we were training her. Since we live in the country, after she was used to the property and knew where she could and could not go, we took her off her lead to see if she would remain where she was supposed to. She responded beautifully and has never left our property whether on or off her lead.

We were told that our dog was crate trained and would stay happily in a crate. Well, after two different types of crates and quite a bit of money spent on them, we found that our little dog was much better if we left her in the house without her being in the crate if we had to go out without her. Now, our dog is very well behaved. She has been a good dog as far as listening to commands and learning the routine of the house from the first week we had her.

However, we did everything you are supposed to do as far as getting the dog used to the crate, such as leaving the door to the crate open and putting her favorite treats in it or her favorite toys and then just letting the dog go explore the crate to get used to it. I even got into the crate with her for a while. She never would go into the crate voluntarily without a bit of resistance. Then, there was the first time we left her by herself in the crate. Well, we came back all of two hours later to find that she had completely, and I do mean completely, shredded the potty pad we had left in the bottom of the crate. It took quite a bit of time to get that mess cleaned up. We tried the crate twice more when we left her alone. She repeated the same behavior. The next time we went out, we left her to have the run of the kitchen and the hallway and closed the doors to the rooms that had carpets. She was an angel. She didn’t mess anything up or get into anything while we were gone. From that day forward, she never was in the crate again, but she never did anything to misbehave while we were gone either. This is why you have to learn your dog’s personality and his or her own peculiar behaviors and not expect the dog to conform to your preconceived notion of what it should do or not do. That is fine for a puppy who hasn’t had a bad living situation or even an abusive home that it is coming from, but you may have to work through those behaviors they have learned and be very patient about it.

The nice thing about rescue societies, in our case, the Pomeranian Rescue Society, is that they will help you through your crises with your dog. At first, our dog wouldn’t eat any of the recommended dog food that was on the list that was given us when we adopted her. Would this dog starve? No, our friend at the rescue society said. “When she is hungry, and she realizes that is the food she is going to get, she will eat.”

Each dog that is rescued has its own story of neglect or abuse. They have developed behaviors to cope with their individual situation. Each dog is different. The biggest thing they all need is a loving home that they can feel safe, and not threatened in. Find out, if you can, what your particular dog’s situation was. Was it neglect in a particular way or abuse in a particular way? Then, think about how you can avoid your dog even remotely getting near that situation again. For example, if a dog has been locked in a basement and neglected, don’t let that dog near your basement, if you can avoid it, until it is comfortable with you and in your home. Then, and only then, should you take the dog into the basement and stay with it for a few minutes just to let it investigate this new territory. Then, make sure you come back up from the basement together so the dog realizes it won’t be left in the basement and neglected again.

If you are patient and willing to deal with issues the dog has developed and work through them, you will be very rewarded with a grateful and loving animal who will think you and your family are just the best thing in the whole world! What could be better!