The only time I ever saw Sam zoom like that was when he got sprayed by a skunk.

Day 6.

I'm thinking Raffi has some dachshund in him, with maybe border collie or sheltie mixed in. His face reminds me of the dachshunds I grew up with (one standard short hair and two mini long haired).

Definitely has the temperament of those breeds. He's very stubborn and definitely nippy when he doesn't like something. Gonna take some patience working with him, and time for him to relax and feel comfortable and confident in his new home. We're taking it slowly, one step at a time.

All in all, I'd say he's doing pretty well. He seems to be settling in and getting used to our routine. The first few days he was here he avoided looking at us at all and just seemed like he was in his own little world. Now he's much more engaged with his surroundings and with us. Mr wtg is really good with him.

Raffi's loving his home cooked food. So are we; he poops about a quarter of the volume he did when he was on kibble.


I thought about doing one of those doggie DNA tests to see if my guess about what breeds he might be is right, but I don't want to spend the money to find out.

So what do our WTF dog experts think? What is he?

Three weeks and we continue to make progress. Have to say that working with a rescue is a whole different set of challenges than raising a puppy.

An adult dog, especially a senior like this one, is set in its ways. You have no idea what his previous owners did and didn't teach him, and he has no idea who you are and what you might do to him. I got bitten once when I ran a small towel across the side of his body to get to his tummy so I could wipe him dry when we came in from the rain. He just whipped around and let me have it. That was pretty early on, and Mr wtg has been working with him and can now dry all four paws and give a swipe or two across the tummy. He's getting much less reactive.

Using food for training has been good news/bad news. He's exceptionally food motivated, but kept grabbing the treats out of my hand. Plus he would get hyper-excited and we couldn't get him to focus on anything else. I read about holding a treat in the palm of my hand with my fingers curled around it, only opening up the hand to let him have a treat when he was gently nuzzling rather than grabbing or getting toothy. Took him less than a day to figure it out.

Also started to feed him after we are done eating. Low dog in the pack pecking order eats last.

It's pretty certain that he can't hear much of anything, so voice commands seemed to be out. With one exception....

He was getting barky and jumping on cabinets when I was fixing his food one day. I whirled around and bellowed "OFF!" at him and he got this totally surprised look on his face, then sort of slunk away and just stayed there quietly until I put his food down. That was totally unexpected since he had pretty much been challenging us in lots of ways.

Since that episode he seems to have decided that I'm the leader of the pack and that he's my best bud. Follows me around everywhere.

I'm not confident at this point that we can leave him alone in the house; we still don't have a good feel for what he might do when we're gone.

I've started working with him on crate training. He must have been in one before because he'll walk in and out of it, but he barks if you leave him in it with the door closed. I've turned the crate into the Magic Treat Dispenser. When he's not looking, I toss a treat in. He comes strolling by and smells it, walks in and gets the treat, and then walks out. He checks it pretty regularly now.

Thought it might be a good idea to feed him in the crate so that it becomes his special place. He got his lunch in there for the first time today and look where he is for his afternoon nap.



No treats required to get him in there. He just walked in and went to sleep.

I still want a golden puppy.

Yep. He looks sweet, but definitely needs both of you to let him know his place in the pack. Rock bottom. I suspect once you get there he'll be great.

Going to take him to obedience?

Probably no obedience classes; I think they might overwhelm him, physically and emotionally.

He's a little old man (he's 14) with a slow gimpy gait. I was taking him for walks but almost got stranded a couple of times when he came up lame. He gets to socialize a bit with some of the neighborhood dogs but he's shown little interest in playing. Even Finley, whom he greeted so enthusiastically the first time, gets a "meh" when they meet at the fence or on walks.

I haven't been to any training classes since the 1990s; we went with the first three or four puppies but then just kind of developed our own in-house methodology that has worked well.

I'm a reasonably experienced dog owner but was accustomed to raising puppies that were breeds that are pretty easy to train, so a reactive old deaf dog with arthritis was a bit of a wake-up call.

I was a little discouraged with Raffi at first, but I think he just needed time to decompress and to learn to trust us. He definitely has challenged us to find creative ways to train him. I have a friend who has a fair bit of experience with difficult rescue dogs and she's given me some great suggestions.

He looks like he's pretty comfortable with us; we hope he thinks of our home as his soft place to land in his old age. Following our rules, of course....

Got my eye on a pup... Aussie-Basset mix supposedly

Beautiful pup.

Aussie/Basset sounds like fun!

WTG, bless you for what you do.

I can’t imagine sharing space with a dog that bites.

Sweet looking doggy, Mik! Has the eyes of an old soul.

Keep us posted on your search.

I like the look of that pup, Mik.

I'd love to get a new puppy, but I prefer my wife, and I'm pretty sure I can't have both.

So wonderful that you are doing this. Seems like a good dog.

Cute puppy Mik. Are you going to get it?

Don't know yet. I had already filled out an app for this particular organization but have not contacted them again yet.

New to this story, but it IS heartwarming.

A great, compassionate thing to do, wtg.

Every dog deserves such a retirement home. Wish they could all land in one in their (usually not so) golden years.

BTW I think he's very good looking too.
(But I say you've earned the right to your golden puppy one of these days!)

Beautiful pup, Mik. Has those basset eyes but the rest is unique. I like floppy eared dogs with a bit of fur on them.
(Also ~ 30 lbs or so is perfect.)

She has an adoption pending. dang.