Zen and Now

I recently sent out a joyful announcement about our new dog "Zen". Unfortunately, he will not be staying in our home. Nothing tragic has happened, other than a mismatch that did not have to be, and a lot of sadness at this end. When we decided to rescue a dog, our criteria was that he would be a young adult (2-3 years or so, past the adolescent stage), be good with people and other dogs, and have a medium but definitely not high energy level. The rescue and I talked at great length about these things. Super high-energy dogs are wonderful, but are not a good fit in our particular home/lifestyle. Because the couple who were giving Zen (a 2-year-old German Shepherd mix) up elected to show him themselves rather than giving him back to the rescue and having them re-evaluate him and show him at adoption days (the rescue agreed to this), there were things about him the rescue was not aware of. Beyond the exuberant nippiness, he has definite resource guarding issues, and is also fear-reactive. Interestingly, when we saw him at the owner's home, his nipping (of my husband) displayed more like the exuberant mouthiness of an adolescent than typical fear-aggression—even the nips to the rear had been part of an overall jumping up and nipping display, rather than a typical dart-in-nip-from-behind budding aggression issue. This impression was strengthened by the fact that he ran right up to both of us when we met him with no hesitation, just affection. But then I took Zen to the vet yesterday to examine a dewclaw that had been torn before we got him. It's a good thing my vet has a sense of humor, because Zen bit him in the crotch. (This was not during an exam, but the moment the vet walked through the door.) He also took a couple of snaps at the vet tech (same scenario), and I had to do the restraint myself. Granted, the bite was a light, insecure, fear-reactive bite with no damage whatsoever, but...not good. And his reaction to strangers, even outside the vet’s office, has been one of caution. His easy-going reaction with us was probably due to our knowing how to use non-threatening body language. And okay, the invisible ink on our foreheads that spells out “sucker for dogs!” While it's true that I didn't want a "project" dog as far as behavior, I can understand why this dog is insecure, having been bounced around so much. I truly feel for him. And although I wasn’t happy about it, I would have been willing to work on the behavior issues; who better than a trainer, right? But I can't do anything about his super-high energy level. (When we saw him at the man's home he must have just come back from being run at at the park, because he was calm.) He's much younger than the rescue thought, and an hour at the park, 2 long walks, tossing toys in the house, and short clicker training sessions doesn't put a dent in his daily energy supply. He's constantly on the move in the house, hyper-vigilant (I've never seen a dog sleep so lightly, he's got one eye open so he can spring into action at the slightest creak of the sofa when someone gets up). It's wonderful to have that much energy (I wish I did!), but he needs a home that's a lot more active than this one. And all the behavior modification in the world won’t fix that. Zen is in no danger. He's going to get his dewclaw fixed and will then go back to the rescue, who now have a lot more information about his needs and behavior. The rescue, whose staff and volunteers I like and respect, have learned that having the former owner adopt him out without taking him back in first for re-evaluation is not a good practice. The truly scary thing is that the family who went to look at him right before we did had a 2 1/2 year old daughter, and they were taking a few days to think about whether to adopt him. The universe works in mysterious ways, and perhaps our adopting him and discovering these issues saved a little girl and her family some grief. Had Zen bitten that child, it wouldn’t have ended well for him, either. I feel terrible about this, and must take some responsibility for being head over heels for this dog to the extent that I probably did not listen/observe as objectively as I would have otherwise. Sure, there was no way to know about his high energy level, the resource guarding, or the extent of the fear-reactivity, but I did dismiss things I normally wouldn’t have if I were wearing my objective trainer’s hat. This is a painful admission, but I wanted to post it here so that perhaps others will not make the same mistake. Even trainers should probably take another objective trainer along for adoption evaluations! As for Zen, no harm done. The owner was about to turn him back into the rescue, so instead, he's had a great vacation for a few days, has been well-fed, exercised, and gotten tons of affection. He's a wonderful dog who just needs a lot of exercise and some behavior modification, and I fervently hope he will find the right home. As for me, this year had been an emotional roller-coaster already with four deaths (three of my dogs and a friend), ending with Mojo in late September and then Phantom three weeks later. I'm looking forward to a better 2009.