On Jul 22, 2:47*pm, "Paul E. Schoen" wrote:

I agree, and your experiences and observations are similar to mine. It took
a long time before I was able (or willing) to allow Muttley to spend most
of the time in the house, so for about six months he was tethered outside
while I was gone, and also much of the time while I was here, as he was
aggressive toward my cat, and he would mess in the house.

Now that I have more experience, and have learned from reading and
interacting with people here and elsewhere, I can see where I made some
mistakes, so I can relate both negative and positive experiences, unlike
those who seem to think they have never made a mistake, and always know the
"one true way" of dealing with any dog-related situation. Yet many of the
posts from these "regulars" continue to be problems. I usually post about
good experiences, and they get quickly drifted to criticism and negativity.

But, my point is that, eventually, Muttley and I learned to communicate
with each other, and eventually he actually "told" me that he did not want
to be banished to an outside tether. I trusted him, allowed him
increasingly long periods of free run of the house, and he proved that he
was worthy of that trust.

My second "rescue dog", Lucky, adapted more quickly, but she was a
different sort of dog who was not running wild, but instead (AIUI) had been
confined in a small fenced area and neglected and had been picked up by AC
to be euthanized. When we got her released, she had an almost mangy coat of
fur with about a dozen ticks, and she was very frightened and skittish. But
she warmed up to us, and rode very nicely on my lap as Helene drove her to
a friend's place. But she reacted aggressively to her dogs, and we had to
find other arrangements for her. Some mistakes were made during that
adventure as well, but I always had her best interests at heart, and she
became a very sweet dog. On the last night before I surrendered her, I had
Muttley in a crate, and she spent the night quietly in bed with me, and
finally seemed to accept my touching her without the flinching that she
usually expressed previously. I almost canceled my appointment at the
rescue on Monday, but the overall situation with her and Muttley was not
good for any of us, and she was adopted within a week. I visited her on
Friday, at which time she was wearing her "adopted" jersey, and she was
very happy to see me. This is a shelter with very strict adoption standards
that even I would probably not meet, so I'm sure she is now in a good
forever home.

Paul and Muttley

I'm trying not to be outright rude here, but do you really think that
a rescue finding you to be an inappropriate home is a level of
excellence that sets it above other rescues? I know of good rescues
in my area, and I know of bad ones and I don't know of one that would
adopt out a dog to you. I can't tell if you actually care about
Muttley. Sometimes you seem to, but then you just do the most
horribly stupid, potentially dangerous things. Things that I would
have never thought someone who seems to care about their dog would
do. And then to top it all off you come here and try and give people
advice on how to resolve potentially serious issues and cite your
mistakes as experience. The wheat to chaff ratio needs to be quite
higher before you can start offering advice responsibly.

My apologies to the OP for drifting off topic from their dog, but I'm
quite fed up with Paul trying to assert himself as someone worth
getting advice from. I do not have the experience to help you, if I
did I would offer advice. Paul does not have the experience to help
either, yet he continues to offer advice.

Nick