Sat 6th July: A dog's instinctive behaviour

Sahara is so sweet and gentle she stayed with the baby pups

A group of puppies were at Concordia Pet Care in Happy Valley today, all hoping to be the lucky ones chosen to go home with their new families, like Sahara who was one of three I took from AFCD recently.  The other two, Smithy and Joseph, are staying at our Tai Po Homing Centre and like all dogs and puppies from the barracks, they are also lovely.

Sweet Smithy at Tai Po

Webster was adopted from our Ap Lei Chau Homing Centre.  He's one that came from the same place as many others that are small sized mixed breeds, and all very good-natured.  If you are looking for a young adult and don't mind that they aren't any particular breed, please come and meet those that are still available.  They are all such lovely dogs that they are adopted quite quickly.

Webster is one of the many small mixed breeds we have homed

I had a good reminder today, as if I needed one, of how a dog's instinctive behaviour is always just below the surface and how quickly the survival mode kicks in when needed.  The runaway terrier Tina is also a perfect example of this, because Tina knows that she must hide during the day and only come out at night when there are few people around, and that she must run when approached.  In the mind of a wild animal, danger is everywhere and all senses must be on high alert.

Madonna back home and quite normal again

It was one of my Lamma dogs though that I was referring to, and ten year-old Madonna has been with me since she was a puppy.  She is one of the group that comes for the morning walk every day, and like all of the others she just follows the track and never strays from the regular path or more than a couple of yards from me.  Today for some reason she either jumped down into the storm drain that runs alongside the track, or fell, but they're not too deep and easy for a larger dog to get out of so I didn't really pay much attention.  It was only when I was on the way home that I noticed Madonna wasn't with us, so I back-tracked but couldn't see her.  Hoping she'd gone home I did the same, but when she wasn't there I went back and walked the whole length of the drain looking for her, again without success.  I needed to feed the other dogs and have a rest myself, after which I went back out again, and this time I found Madonna, unhurt and still in the drain, but instead of being happy to see me she reacted in the opposite way and ran off down the drain away from me.  It took some time of her running back and forth in each direction for me to finally be able to get her to a spot she couldn't escape from, loop a leash round her neck and pull her out.  Once I'd done that she was willing to walk home with me, but during the time she was in the drain she behaved as though I was a stranger and she needed to hide from me.  It was really quite bizarre.

Violet (l) was very scared at AFCD while Icy was happy regardless

I see this kind of self-defensive bahviour many times in the dogs at AFCD and I'm happy that at least at the Pokfulam kennels I'm able to understand that they're not aggressive, only scared.   Even the new Stanley Barracks dogs were like that when they found themselves suddenly locked up separately in a strange and unwelcoming situation (except for Icy who was super-friendly even then), but as soon as they were out they changed to being sweet and happy again.