My wife and I have always wanted to have a dog and out of an interesting turn of events, we have the opportunity to adopt a 2 year old dog that a family friend cannot take care of anymore (they developed an illness that radically saps their energy).
Super excited but a little worried about making sure the doggo is taken care of properly. We’ll have to drive him back in our car for 3h30 and we have an old overly-affectionate cat.
What do people think? Any tips? Relevant stories? Give me your thoughts and have an awesome day!🙂
You’ve had some lovely advise already which I agree with. Treat the dog kindly, train them with positive reinforcement and love.
But something I think so many new dog owners neglect is to research the breed. Dogs were selectively bred and some traits like energy level, play style, etc are baked in. For example cocker spaniels are retrievers, they were bred to retrieve game, so they want to have something in their mouth, and a lot of new owners will take away everything they try to take (shoes, socks, human toys) and not give them anything they CAN hold (dog toys) so they start aggressively guarding their prizes from owners and suddenly you have a dangerous dog.
If you understand the breed then you’ll know what the dogs instincts are telling them and it gives you a head start on making them happy.
The second thing is, a tired dog is a good dog. If you’re all having a bad day and the dog isn’t listening, then a good long walk followed by a nice sleep will normally sort it out.
Though I will say, retrievers, you can sometimes give them a literal chest full of toys, and really all they want are your napkins and mail.
I let them shred apart toilet paper tubes though.
Oh yes, absolutely
Solid advice. Little dude is enamoured by bog rolls.
Right on about needing to have lots of toys available. Our second day of having him we went out and bought lots of different toys for him.
Good dog ownership, you saw what he needed and sorted it. You’re starting strong.