Gusto (Sir Robin) New Foster Home

Gus has joined my family as a foster in March 2011, after spending nine months with Kristy recuperating from Lyme & Rocky Mountain SF. At Kristy's home he learned incredible house manners!

Gus is a perfect gentleman in the house. He is 100% housetrained. Totally non-destructive -- unless you are one of the yummy bones that he enjoys chewing! He does no "garbage diving" or counter cruising. He eats alongside my other dogs without fighting. And he takes biscuits as gently as a lamb. I leave him loose in the house with my other dogs when I go out to run chores, and he gets into zero mischief. He crates well, but really we only do that occasionally to keep up the crate training. And he enjoys going in his crate on his own just to sleep. He will bark an alarm if someone comes to the door or approaches the fence, but he does not bark with without reason (ie, he is not a nuisance barker).

He gets along incredibly well with my dogs-- even my cranky old dog (who grumbles at everyone) play-bowed to him the first time they met. He just has that kind of personality. And he and my 2-year-old intact GSP play well and sleep next to each other. I have introduced him to play sessions with at least a dozen other dogs (from a tiny maltese to huge bloodhound, Rhodesian ridgeback and shepherd dogs) and he has been totally non-aggressive. I have trained him to interact with my alpacas, who are loose in the same yard that my dogs play in.

His only issue is his people shyness. And we've been working on that. He is very wary of new people, especially men. But once he gets to know you he is just the sweetest dog imaginable. A sudden/unexpected noise in the house may startle him momentarily. But I am working on desensitisizing him to that. Surprisingly, he is not scared of thunder.

The good news is that the fear is totally non-agressive-- he just wants to keep his distance. I take him out whenever I can to work on building his confidence, and he has come a long way in just a few short weeks. We go to Petsmart a lot and have even started obedience classes with him. He's nervous in new environments for sure, but totally under control. And he's getting some nice on-leash manners.

At my Search Dog trainings, all the other handlers (men and women) greet him and give him treats. Some even walk him. By the fourth visit with them, he was jumping out of my truck wagging his tail and taking treats from both the women AND the men. He is learning so fast!

The perfect home will have at least one dog-- preferably a young dog who craves a best buddy. It should be a relatively quiet household that doesn't have a constant influx of new visitors (ie, a single person, or a couple with grown children or no children). He will certainly accept women before men; so the primary caretaker should probably be a woman. The man of the household should be prepared for a longer period of time before he trusts them. My uncle just came back from snow-birding in Florida to live in my downstairs in-law apartment, so Gus will have to get used to a man in the house and this will be good training for him. I'll let you know how this goes.


If you have not worked with a people-fearful dog, I can get you started. Basically you don't coddle or hug him when he is scared. Instead you let him know that you are not scared, and ignore his fear. As the leader, he is looking to you for direction (and comforting him is actually telling him that he is right to be scared). Simple obedience (he has a great sit and shake!) focuses him on you and not the "scary thing". And don't force new people on him. There is no need for a visitor to have to pet or feed him. Just have the visitor ignore him, and gradually he will warm up. Since he loves to play fetch, one of the best ways to bond with him is in the yard, tossing the ball. The trick is to try to keep any new fearful stimulation to the point where he can still concentrate enough to do obedience (or at least not try and take flight), and before it reaches panic. Surprisingly, he does better on leash than off-- perhaps because we can communicate leadership ("I'm not scared, so you shouldn't be") through the leash.

We're working on his recall in the yard, and he is joyfully bounding over when called. But I do not think he is a dog that will ever have full off-lead control outside of a fence-- simply because of his propensity for flight if he were to get extremely scared. So this rules him out completely as a hunting prospect. Though it is fun to watch him lock up into point on the birds in my yard!

I'm tempted to keep him, but my next working dog will be arriving soon, and four dogs is too many for me to handle logistically. But it will be very hard to part with such a sweet boy.

Hey! anyone in there?
Hello? I'm looking for you.

I wear my heart on the outside so everyone knows, that I will love you unconditionally.


Robin is a very skittish fellow. He is scared of just about everything new....any change in his little world. He does not walk well on leash. He is scared of the outside world. It took a few days for him to trust me and he is really scared of men. Eric, his former foster home, complained that he did this to him, too. He is such a sweet and playful boy when he trusts you. He is good with my other dogs and loves to play fetch in the yard. He brings the ball right back to you for more!

I think a nice single woman, who hasn't got a lot of men in her life, would be perfect for him. I don't know how he is with kids yet. I also think he would do better if he had another dog in the house to romp with. He is good with my cats and he is not birdy in the least.

To see more of Gus, visit his Facebook album by clicking on his name.

Ok, so this weekend we had what Eric called a 'Photo Op'. It involved a bunch of 'sitting' and 'staying', but it came with a lot of praise and some treats later. I love being outside, being that I'm a birddog, so it wasn't much of a sacrifice. I still need some reminding to sit when commanded, but I know all the right stuff.

I'm really birdy, too. I get all twitchy when those abominable barn swallows go swooping around, and I try really hard to run after anything with wings. As soon as I can graduate from 'sit', 'stay' and 'come', my first Big lesson is going to be 'woah doggy'. That means something with birds, but I'm not sure what yet.

Mostly I'm happy to still be home and crated by the air conditioning vent. I have a thing called Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, that comes from ticks, and Eric says I'm like hugging a hot water bottle. I get pills every day for it, but I'm getting pretty handy at finding them in the peanut butter and spitting them onto the floor. Eric has to keep inventing new ways to get me to take my pills. I also have a thing called Lyme disease which is also from ticks. I'm not sure, but it sounds like ticks are bad. I wish I didn't like playing in the tall grass so much.

Well, here's some pictures of me from this weekend. I sure like the sun on my face and playing in the grass. We go walking up and down on the grass, and then because it's been so hot, we all get to splash around in the kiddy pool.

Getting Used to Foster Life

Ahh, I've got it easy now!

Hi Everybody, Gus here. Just wanted to drop a quick note to say that I got my Blog set up (thanks to Aunt Pat) and now I can brag about how nice it is on this farm in Wisconsin!

My foster dad & mom, Eric & Stacy, picked me up on an IBR transport from a shelter in Peoria a couple of weeks ago and after being showed the back yard, I got a little confused about the rules and bailed over the fence to go look for birds. Eric's still not sure how I got over a 5' fence, but I showed him.

I was gone for a whole big long week! Eric saw me a few times down in the marsh and kept calling me, but I didn't know yet that he's one of the good guys so I kept running away from him. He sure was waving his arms around his head a lot and yelling something about the black flies. I have to give him that one, they were almost as hungry down in that bog as I was.

Some of the neighbors called Eric to say they'd seen me, and finally one called to say that I was actually trying to jump the fence back into the back yard. So Eric set a live trap right there and I ended up deciding that kibble was a better deal than skunky marsh grass for supper, and allowed myself to get caught. Besides that, I was wandering around where there's coyotes, and just last week a property owner a mile away saw a bear. Crap! You have no idea how creepy it is out there by yourself at night.

Other than smelling pretty foul and having some cuts & scratches, I came out ok but geeez it's good to be safely crated now and have food every day. I have two Cheesehead foster sisters, Cheddar and Brie, who have been really welcoming here at Greener Pastures. Brie gets a little snotty when I poke my nose into her crate, but I don't care because I'm really easygoing and she doesn't scare me. I was just a rack of bones when Eric finally caught me (Eric thinks he's a good trapper, but I allowed myself to get caught), and already I gained 10 pounds. The vet thinks I'm perfect at this weight, but I'm always jonesin' for another handful of kibble.

Eric doesn't dare turn me loose in the back yard yet, but he did make a nice steel cable clothesline thing with his airplane tools that I can clip my leash onto--now I can run around in the back yard without being tempted to go adventuring again. There's a pool at one end of my run, and some awesome shade at the other. All in all, this isn't a bad deal.

For the near future, we're going to start working on housebreaking, learning boundaries and earning privileges. Eric keeps trying to explain that he was really worried about me while I was gone, so now except for food, water and shelter I'm not guaranteed anything--I'm going have to earn all the perks those two Cheesehead girls have. I'm good for it though. You'll see.

I have to run! Eric's filling the pool and I need to go splash around and drink up before Cheddar pees in it.

Gus