Before we even began looking for our next hound, we committed to watching the girls, Falcon and Clara, while their parents moved. Then we got Lizzie, and the first week made me a bit nervous that it wouldn’t be good to bring new pooches into the house. However, her rapid changes, and improvement in her comfort, play, and behavior led me to believe it was worth the risk.
I suspected that Lizzie would be fine. The reports form her foster parents were that Lizzie thrived with other dogs, while being reserved around people. But the real wild card was the greyhounds. Most of them are good with other dogs, but not all, and Falcon is very very strong.
They arrived at 8:30 ish, and within a half hour, they were getting comfortable around each other. Of course, we needed to feed the greyhounds, and like all dogs with a deep chest, they need to rest for a minimum of a half hour after eating. Fortunately I had one conference call at work that I couldn’t get out of, so that covered the restful time – barely.
Then the fun began. I kept the harness on Falcon, as that was my biggest worry, that she would turn on the little Lizzie. A good precaution, but it turned out to be totally, 100% unneeded. Lizzie, once she came out of her den was hopping and prancing like a deer.
She really wanted to play with Clara, but Clara, being one of the reserved greyhounds (not as uncommon as you might think) was quite good in setting boundaries. Lizzie kept testing those boundaries, but Clara was even better at consistency. Good for Clara.
Falcon, on the other hand, has met her match. Falcon is super high energy, food motivated, and amazingly strong. Lizzie kept playing and playing with her throughout the day, literally running circles around her. Finally, Falcon said no more, and just went to sleep.
In the process of the day, about 1:00PM, Lizzie went to the doggie door, and after a few pushes with her nose, she went out and did her piddles on the grass.
YESSSSSSSSSS
After dinner, about 5:00PM, while Falcon was pooping, lizzie again went out in the yard, all by herself, and unleashed her own stool.
WOO HOO
and a couple more times during the day she went out on her own. Heck, as we were watching some TV at about 8:00, she just went to the door, I opened the screen, and out she went.
Yes, I am super excited about this, because it was a major hassle to get her outdoors during daylight hours, and, to be frank, it gets tiring of cleaning up accidents in the house.
Along the way, her hesitancy around Barbara shrinked significantly, in fact there were plenty of puppy kisses and full body pets during the day.
As the girls were packed up at 9:00PM to head home, Lizzie finally settled into her “den” and was down for the count.
This morning, she slept in to 3:45 AM. Not great, but an improvement. Also, when she was done with her morning ablutions, she was fairly calm, not going nuts until after breakfast, and her usual house zoomies were intense but short.
In summary, the risky watching of the greyhounds turned out to be an enormous breakthrough. Lizzie really opened up, and wow, she is higher energy than a very active greyhound. (that is frightening in and among itself)