Weds 13th Feb: Paying the price for human failure

Today was more about planning for the coming few days rather than anything else, as I have a number of dogs moving from Lamma to Tai Po arranged for Thursday, while two poodles will be surrendered in the morning.  Also two Ap Lei Chau residents have already had their first successful adoption interview so we hope to be seeing them leave by the end of the week.  As usual, no names before the adoption forms are signed, or at least the foster agreement.

As I'm sure you know, many adult dogs that come to us have been abandoned or surrendered due to behaviour problems caused by poor or no training, as well as a lack of understanding about the nature of dogs and their basic needs.  Apart from the obvious food and water to keep them alive, companionship and the desire to be part of a family are also important, as dogs are by nature social animals that naturally live in family groups, or packs.  I'm very aware that many dog owners are at work during the day and that means their dogs are left alone for as much as twelve hours, resulting in a very unhappy and solitary life.   Even worse is when it's a puppy that is left on its own, because this is the time of life when socialisation, play and training is most important, vital in fact.

The "Red Dogs" (not the black or large dog here) are fine with volunteers they know

Our "Red Dogs" are those who have behaviour issues as a result of their past, and sadly it's only the smaller ones that can be saved if they have such problems.  Large dogs that have developed a mistrust of humans due to old-fashioned training (punishment and dominance), or lack of early socialisation, are too dangerous to keep at our Homing Centres.  In the end it is always the dogs that pay the price for human failings.

Gumbo is still a puppy so he  has a good chance of finding a home

Caught at an early age most behaviour problems can be dealt with, or at least modified to the point where they're manageable.  The shiba inu puppy, Gumbo, that I took from AFCD on Monday is already doing really well with the help of our trainer Cactus, and his food guarding has been downgraded from red to amber.  Whether it can be completely eradicated isn't clear at this point and we would not home Gumbo to a family with young children, but with the ongoing use of very simple training methods I think it's fair to expect that Gumbo will forget that he needed to protect his food.