Meet Sam

As I mentioned recently, Sofie, our sweetheart rottweiler-hound mix, had to be put down several weeks ago. Well, we knew we couldn’t do without a dog in our home for long, and so many are in need of one. From Terhi’s experience at the Idaho Humane Society shelter in Boise we knew that three categories of dogs have the hardest time getting adopted: old dogs, black dogs, and handicapped dogs.

So Terhi went looking, and we found the un-adoptable dog trifecta: Sam.

It might be a little hard to tell from this picture, but Sam has only one eye. He lost the other to glaucoma when he was a puppy. He’s eight years old, and as you can see, he’s black. And big. Like 90 pounds big. He’s a black Labrador mix (we think the other part might be Newfoundland), surrendered when his family had to move to an apartment.

Let’s just say that when John O’Hurley states repeatedly each year during coverage of the National Dog Show on Thanksgiving that you should do your homework and make sure you understand the characteristics of the breed before you select a dog, he is not kidding!

One reason we chose an older dog is because they are calmer. That may be true, but Labradors are high-energy dogs. They love to play, and there is a reason they are called “retrievers.” So for the first couple of days we were caught off guard by the hurricane of energy called Sam–okay, we were overwhelmed.

But then my dear, sweet wife went to work, researching everything she could find on Labs and dog training, especially for old dogs. And we realized that we did pretty much everything wrong for poor Sam at first. Fortunately, things can be undone, and we’ve been working on it for a couple weeks now. And things are getting better.

But new dogs, young or otherwise, will require changes. We’ve had to change up our routine for both Sam’s and our sanity. He sleeps quite well at night, but when he wakes up his batteries are fully charged. We need to find ways to burn off that energy, and a walk just doesn’t cut it. Our morning routine is a bit chaotic at the moment, but we’re learning, and so is he. He also gets another big burst of energy in the late afternoon, but the kids are coming home from school then, and they’ve promised to take him outside and play with him when they get home. One more walk before bedtime seems to burn off his energy enough to sleep at night.

We’re pretty sure Sam was an outdoor dog. At first he required some work to make sure he did his business outside, but after a couple of days he seems to have it down now, and we’ve learned his signals that he needs to be let out. But we suspect he didn’t get as much attention as he would have liked before, and he is a real attention hound. It most often manifests whenever the whole family gathers in one place, such as dinner, family prayer, or watching TV. Suddenly he wants to play. If we don’t play with him he goes and finds our shoes. If that doesn’t work he finds the biggest, most destructive toy he has and starts to play with it in the most dangerous, destructive manner he can devise. Ever been whacked with a knotted 1-inch rope propelled by a 90-pound dog?

But he’s learning. We’re all making progress. The cats, currently barricaded safely upstairs behind a child gate, are slowly getting used to him. We’re discovering the power of Kongs, including the MOADT (mother of all dog-toys), the Kong with peanut butter inserts, frozen overnight. He’s learning our routine, and developing a little more patience. And he’s learning commands, which he mostly follows. (By the way, the covering on that dog toy at right was stripped off by Sam within the first few days.)

I don’t mean to imply that Sam is Marley incarnate. He certainly has his good traits. He’s very friendly, and gets along just fine with other dogs. We arranged a “play date” with one of our neighbors’ two-year-old husky the other day, and they got along great! He loves people, hardly ever barks, and will take all the petting and hugging you want to give him. He doesn’t have “doggy breath.”

And even though he’s full of energy, he’s still an older dog. He’ll play until his body hurts, and then insist on playing some more if we don’t stop him. He’s not as young as he used to be, but he remains in denial on that point.

He gets along just fine without his right eye. He does have his limitations, but he can play fetch just fine, often snagging the ball out of the air. He’s still getting used to where everything is in the house, though, and sometimes he’ll turn to his right and whack his head on something he couldn’t see. I don’t know if this results in a higher focus on movement, but that’s certainly the way for the cats to get his attention. The faster they move the more he wants to chase them. If they move slowly they can go right by him and he couldn’t care less.

Taking in a new dog is never something to be approached lightly. We knew that, or thought we did. We know now our previous two dogs spoiled us a little. That, and we’d forgotten how much adjustment they required at first. Six months to a year from now we’ll probably have forgotten those first trying few days before we figured things out. But we owed it to Sam to give him a chance, and we’re glad we did. We still have a way to go, but he’s already fitting in with our family and becoming part of our lives. We’re glad he’s got a home with us, and we think he is, too.