From: cwilbur@yogi.bowdoin.edu (Charlton Wilbur)
Newsgroups: rec.pets.dogs
Subject: A Sheltie: chewing & barking & such
Date: 9 Nov 1992 21:38:31 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

Hello all,

I just read the last 200 or so postings, and thought I'd remark on my dog and
how we dealt (or are dealing) with some of her foibles.

My dog, Spirit, is a six-year-old Shetland Sheepdog. We acquired her from a
relative who had been consistently neglecting her all summer long; she was
eight months old, in heat, and tied to a tree with no food and little water.
The relative decided that she was moving to an apartment and didn't want a
dog. We'd been feeding the poor thing all summer long and providing water. We
figured that we couldn't hurt things by taking in another (small but
voracious) mouth to feed.                   

So we acquired this dog. She was eight months old, only just fully grown, and
cute as a button. Unfortunately, she was completely unsocialized and
unhousebroken. She attached herself to me right away - I was the one who had
the greatest success housebreaking her. Mom and Dad could scold her and it
wouldn't seem to bother her. All I had to do was look at her and she would
react. So she was eventually housebroken.

Our first real problem with her was the fact that she had no idea what
linoleum was. She had spent her entire life until that point on a lawn and was
terrified to go into the kitchen because of it. (We have hardwood floors in
our dining room and living room, both with area rugs, and linoleum in our
kitchen, in between the dining and living rooms.) So what we did was, we
deposited her on the rug in the dining room and all went into the living room.
She didn't want to give up her newly found pack all that easily, so she
immediately attempted to walk on linoleum. On her first try, she slid right
into the dog food bowls and water. On her second, she made it into the living
room. She was pleased with herself, and linoleum hasn't bothered her since.
Probably because she needs to stand on it to eat.

Our next problem was the circular stairs. Our German shepherd has no problem
with the stairs. Spirit did. We used the same approach. We put her on the
stairs, two steps from the bottom, and all went into the next room. She had to
go down that step to come see us. So she did. After a few repeats, we put her
up two steps and did the same thing. After she was on the fifth step, she got
the point. We did something similar for up - one stair from the top, two
stairs from the top, etc. Now she's going up and down the stairs quite easily.

She's never really been a chewer. She demolished one pair of Mom's slippers,
and that was it. But she hides shoes. She has the run of the house during the
day, and if she's got some reason to be mad at Mom, she will take a couple of
pairs of shoes (yes, _pairs_ - she matches them!) and hide them in different
places all over the house. Usually she drags one by the front door, as if to
say, "Here's a scavenger hunt! Look for your shoes!" It's amusing and not
destructive, and she doesn't do it that often. Usually they're "hidden" in
places like the middle of the living room floor. Only once has she thrown them
down the stairs. 

She's rather intelligent, although I suspect she doesn't think that quickly.
We don't have her trained to the same extent that we do our shepherd. With her, it's more for our own convenience. She knows "Want some food?", "Want some
water?", "Want to go pee?", "Where's X" (where X is some member of the family,
including the other dog), "Go get X" (which usually results in the wrong X,
depending on who she finds first), "Go lie down," "Sit," her name (which she
responds to by barking), and "Here." 

She gets along wonderfully with our shepherd. She's nipped him right into
submission. ;) An amusing story: our shepherd, when bored, will wander around
the house to find out who's where before settling down for a nap. Somebody had
left our bathroom door, which opens outward, ajar. So our shepherd wandered in
to see if anyone was around. I came onto the scene just in time to watch
Spirit close the door behind him. I went and got the family, and when we
finally let the poor dog out (about five minutes later), he emerged with a
severely wounded dignity. 'course, he tried to look as if he _wanted_ to be in
a closed bathroom. But it didn't succeed. 

I miss these dogs incredibly since I went off to college. It's been over a
year now (I'm a first-semester sophomore), but I still miss them. 

Charlton Wilbur
cwilbur@polar.bowdoin.edu