Say "Cheese"

Roxy & Ranger WERE sitting nicely, smiling for their photo until foster dad crinkled the CHEESE bag. LOL. Its so funny how they can actually differentiate between the sound of plastic wrapper with food vs plastic wrapper with no food!

Ranger has been with us for just over two weeks already and I think its pretty safe to say he's settled in and has fully adjusted to our routine. He continues to be a big cuddle-bug and will nudge my hand with his nose and crawl close to me if I stop petting him! He loves his walks, he loves to do zoomies in the backyard with Roxy and he will have occasional play-spurts in the house (which are never long-lived). While he is a moderately active pooch....he is also a VERY talented couch potato and when he's properly exercised, does spend most of the day napping.

Many people have asked me what they can expect of Ranger during the transition period when he ends up in his forever home. You can probably expect him to attempt to mark, particularly if it's a household with another male dog. Ranger needs to be safely secured at all times and at present time he is NOT a candidate for off leash dog parks (well, he can go, but he has to stay on a leash!) this is because he has a poor recall and loves to explore. He has a bit of "stranger-danger" with newcomers to the house which consists of tucking his tail between his legs and grunting with intial uncertainty while trying to determine "friend or foe". We encourage all of our visitors to first avoid making eye contact with him, avoid touching him, or talking to him and his stranger-danger disappears within 5 minutes (and then he's jumping up and trying to make friends with everyone!).

While he is crate trained, he has exhibited crying and whining when he can tell we're about to leave. We have therefore started leaving him out of his crate on our main floor (we're up to 3-4 hours now!) and he is wonderful. I really think the crate was the source of the problem, although he has no problem sleeping in it at night.

Overall we think this boy is quite a catch and we will no doubt miss him dearly when he leaves.