From: diannes@stein.u.washington.edu (Dianne Schoenberg)
Subject: Re: Rescue Groups & favorite rescue story
Keywords: rescue list
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Fri, 6 Nov 1992 21:20:54 GMT


Well, since no one else seems interested in a rescue mailing list, but some
people ARE interested in hearing rescue stories, I thought I'd share my
latest (I warn you it's going to be long; press n to skip).

It's been a bad week for Briard Rescue of Seattle.  I hadn't gotten a single
dog in all of 1992, and now in the past week I've had two.

By way of background: Briards ranked I think 109th in AKC popularity in
1991 (out of 134 breeds) with, I think, around 260 registrations nationwide. 
Most Briards are concentrated in a few geographical regions in this
country: i.e. upper Midwest, California, upstate NY, Maryland--NOT the
Pacific Northwest.  Here in Washington we have (to my knowledge) one 
"show" breeder (who has bred three litters in the last six years) and one
"backyard" breeder who has bred at least two litters.  There used to 
be a breeder in Oregon, who is no longer active in dogs, but there are
still a number of dogs of her breeding out there.  About once a year all 
us Briard folks around here agree to bring our dogs to the same show, which
is just enough to give us a major; most shows, there aren't any Briards
entered, and most of the remainder there's only one.  In short, Briards are
RARE around here.

Seattle is fortunate to have a large and well-established all-breed rescue
group, Seattle Purebred Dog Rescue.  After adopting an OES through SPDR
two years ago, I was told that they didn't have a volunteer to handle
Briards.  I became the SPDR breed representative (i.e. volunteer breed
expert) in May 1991.  I have also provided a temporary foster home for 
five dogs of various other breeds for SPDR since that time.

In 1991 I dealt with four rescue Briards.  Two came from my friendly
neighborhood puppy mill, and I could not determine the breeders of the
other two.  One was placed through SPDR, one was placed by the shelter, 
one was redeemed from the shelter by the owners, and one was kept by her
owners.  I suspect that there are others that are falling through the
cracks; identification is a real problem in this breed.  I have in fact
heard later about two that ended up in shelters in this area and weren't
identified as Briards until later.

So it wasn't a complete surprise to find the ad in last week's newspaper:
"Briard, 2 year old neutered male, free to good home.  Beautiful."  

BTW: for those that aren't familiar with them, Briards are an old French
herding/guarding dog.  They look vaguely like Old English Sheepdogs, but
have a temperament much closer to a German Shepherd or Rottweiler.  They
are large, very intelligent and very strong-willed & can easily dominate
an owner less strong-willed and/or less intelligent than they are.  They
require socialization as puppies, exercise, grooming and obedience training,
and they are not recommeded as a breed for the novice dog owner.  I had often 
heard that there are hereditary temperment problems in the breed, and had
been told that there are Briards with severe aggression problems, but I had 
never seen this for myself until I met Alex.
 
I called the phone number in the classified ad, and the story I was told was 
a sad one.  They had bought the puppy as show-quality, sight unseen, from a
breeder in Maryland for $800.  At the age of 3-4 months, he was already being
aggressive toward humans.  They enrolled him in a handling class, but his
conformation was poor and there was no question of earning a championship
with him, so they had had him neutered.  He had had no formal training other
than the handling class.  At the age of six months, the family became so
uncomfortable with his behavior that he was banished to the yard.  Since he
could easily scale their four-foot wooden fence, he was kept chained inside
the yard.  The owner told me that they were careful to keep him away from
their own children and the neighborhood children.  They had previously
tried to return the dog to the breeder when he was a year old for his
aggressive behavior, but the breeder had refused to take him back at that
time.

Their reason for wanting to place him was that he had bitten one of their
children twice.  This child had a history of teasing the dog, and the
first bite occurred when the child shut a door on the dog.  The second
bite appeared to have been unprovoked.  The dog had also done a lot of
nipping but I was told that he had only drawn blood on those two occasions.

I agreed to come out and see the dog a few days later.  In the meantime I
did some research on the breeder and the litter of puppies from which this
dog had come.  The breeding had been a linebreeding on a dog with a known
aggresssion problem.  At least one and possibly as many as three puppies
from this same litter had already been returned for aggressive behavior.  
The breeder was a clinical psychologist and believed in allowing the mother
dog to raise the puppies without human interference; thus, the puppies had
had no handling or human contact until they were weaned.  It turned out
that a friend of mine had seen the dog a number of times throughout his
puppyhood.  I called her to ask what she thought of him and she told me,
"I've been telling them to put that dog down since he was six months old,
because it was just a matter of time until he bit somebody."

So it was without a lot of hope that I went up to see this dog, who lived
a two-hour drive away from me.  The reality was as bad as I had been led to
believe.  The wife told me that the dog was in the garage.  Her son (the
child that the dog had previously bitten) was near the door of the garage and
she asked her husband to move the child away.  She told me that she would
get some food and distract the dog so I could come in.  A minute after she
went into the garage with the food she called for me to come in.

Alex was tied inside the garage on a six-foot lead and a training collar. 
The coat on his neck was entirely worn away, telling me that the training
collar was on him constantly.  As soon as he realized I was there, he
bounded over to me purposefully.  I made the mistake of leaning over and
stroking him on the shoulders (a dominant gesture in dog language) and he
began growling.  He growled continuously the entire 5 minutes or so I was
there.  Next he jumped up and bit at my face.  His owner waved the food at
him and shrieked, "Alex, sit down, sit down!"  He sat but continued
growling.  "No!  No!  No speak!" she said.  He then barked once and
then continued growling.  The husband then came into the garage.  Alex
jumped at him and bit at his face.  The husband put his hand on Alex's
shoulders and physically held him down so that he couldn't jump up.  At
this point I realized that any further attempt at evaluation would probably 
be pointless and stepped back outside the radius allowed him by the
six-foot leash.

This dog made me very sad.  It is entirely possible that with appropriate
training he could become trustworthy enough to at least be allowed out in
public: but it would take a great deal of training by an experienced dog
person to accomplish this.  In my mind, one or two household obedience
classes is a very minimal amount of training for a dog, yet most potential
owners balk at doing even this much.  What Alex needed was far more
extensive: at least 6 months to 1 year of intensive obedience work and
training specific to his aggression problem, which would have to
be done under the guidance of somebody with considerable experience with
aggressive dogs.  Furthermore, with the questions about the possible
genetic contribution to his aggression problem and his faulty early
socialization, there was a considerable question in my mind as to how
trustworthy he could ever be considered to be.  Certainly the handling he
had received from this family was the major cause of his problems but it 
also seemed to me that he had had several major strikes against him even
before he was placed in this home.

Rescue work is a minefield of potential legal problems.  I knew that I would 
be unable to help place this dog because if he bit somebody in his new home, 
both Seattle Purebred Dog Rescue and I personally could be held liable
for the injury.  I also told Alex's owner that if she placed the dog into a
new home herself, her family could be sued later, even if she had informed 
the new owners of his past history.  She had not previously thought of this
and was very upset by the possibility.

She and I talked about her possible courses of action.  She told me, "I
had been thinking that maybe I could place him with an older couple who
wanted a guard dog."  I told her that guard dogs have to be unusually
well-trained and trustworthy in order to be able to discriminate between
situations where biting is appropriate and when it is not.  I told her
that if Alex were placed into a home where he was not guaranteed to get
appropriate training that he would not be a guard dog but would just bite
indiscriminately.  I told her that probably her best course of action would
be to return the dog to the breeder, and the second best choice would be
euthanasia.  I told her that if she decided that the dog should be
euthanized but was unable to bring herself to do it, I would come back 
and pick Alex up and take him to the vet for her.

This story has a happy ending, of sorts.  I called his owner last night
and she told me that Alex will be flying back to his breeder in Maryland
on Sunday.  The breeder has begun investigating possible homes for this
dog but has warned the owner that euthanasia might be necessary if a
suitable home cannot be found.  The owner is comfortable with this since
it relieves her of the responsibility of making the decision herself.  
Also, the breeder will bear legal responsibility if Alex should cause
any problems if he is placed in a new home.

The lessons for breeders are clear: 1) Consider temperament when breeding!
2) Socialize your puppies!  3) Place them carefully in homes that are
prepared to meet the dog's needs!

The lessons for potential puppy buyers are less clear but equally important:
1) Research your breed carefully & don't get more dog than you can handle!
2) Research the temperament in the bloodline you're considering buying--
don't assume it's good just because the breeder has "show dogs."  3) Get
help early on if the dog seems to be having problems--don't just exile him
to the garage; you're going to end up with worse problems than you can
imagine.  Myself, I believe that formal obedience training is a must with 
any intelligent, strong-willed breed.  It's a pity that these people
hadn't done any with this obviously very bright dog...

So it had been a bad week already when I received a phone call from SPDR's
shelter coordinator yesterday morning.  "There's a Briard down at King
County Animal Control." she said.  "The message I got said 'This time it
really IS one!'"  She and I both laughed; I have several times responded
to shelter calls only to find Beardie mixes, a Poodle cross, and once even 
a purebred and very handsome Bouvier (who fortunately was rescued by our
local Bouvier club).

I took off work early so that I would have plenty of time for the 50 mile
round trip.  The dog in Kennel 35 cocked his ears and wagged his tail when
I came up to the run.  I stuck a hand through the bars and scratched his
head; he wiggled and stuck his nose through the wire mesh to give me a kiss.
"Hello, buddy!"  I told him.  If nothing else he certainly didn't have any
aggression problems.

I took him out of the kennel run and took a good look at him.  The shelter
vet had guessed him to be about a year old; he hasn't quite as much coat
as I'd like to see on a Briard pup of that age, though once the mats are
groomed out it could well turn out to be that he has more than he seems to
have now.  He doesn't have the distinctive double-dewclaws on the hind feet
that are characteristic of the well-bred Briard, but those may be missing
congenitally or else they may have been removed.  I would feel more
comfortable if I recognized which bloodline he came out of, but boy,
stand back and take a look at him and damned if he isn't a tawny Briard
with cropped ears.  Should his new owners want to show him in obedience,
tracking or herding they will easily be able to get an ILP number on him
as a Briard, which is the standard SPDR uses to judge whether a shelter
dog is purebred or not.

So Joey will be coming home with me on Tuesday, assuming that his owners 
don't reclaim him in the next couple of days.  (He had already been in
24 hours when I saw him, so I'm not holding out much hope of this.)  First,
he'll visit the vet to have a little minor surgery done, then once I get
him home I'll get the pleasure of brushing out & bathing his yucky coat.  I
want to give him a little TLC before trying to place him; he was very timid
about walking on the slick floor of the shelter, and shrunk down to the
floor when a leash was put on him.  But these seem to be minor problems: he
was so clearly attracted to both me and to the shelter worker who let him
out, and he was nosing up to the dogs in the other kennels so I'm assuming
he'll get along well with my own two dogs (as for them, they're used to me
bringing strange dogs home!)  His kennel run wasn't dirtied, and that gives
me some hope that he's already housebroken (I can deal with it if he's not,
but it means more work).  He did bark in protest when I left his kennel
after paying attention to him, but this is pretty normal for a dog in the
shelter--I'm hoping that this will extinguish itself once he's out of
there, but am prepared to deal with it if it doesn't.

So I plan to let him have a little R&R before trying to place him; my
usual technique has been to do no more training than is necessary to 
preserve household order for the first week or so, then start basic
obedience.  Joey will also get the opportunity to go herding with my dogs
(I'm looking forward to seeing his reaction to sheep!) and I have some dog
shows coming up that will be useful for socializing purposes.  Once he gets
a little more relaxed and learns to walk appropriately on a leash, we'll 
think about finding a permanent home for him.  I plan to list him with the
Briard Club of America rescue program but will try to place him within the
Seattle area if it's possible.

Don't get me wrong: having a third dog is not going to be all skittles 
and beer for me.  I live in a tiny basement apartment & have a tiny fenced
yard.  I work full-time, am going to school, am actively training two dogs,
(showing & trialing one of them) and have a number of volunteer commitments. 
But I think that Joey is a dog I can save.  I know that Alex wasn't.  

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Dianne & her kids:                                   diannes@u.washington.edu
            K.C.: U-CD Nightwind's Elan, HC HCT CGC (Briard)
             Chloe: Found a Four-Leaf Clover, HT CGC (OES)
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