Thanks to Mary Shannon Johnstone's Facebook page
Landfill Dogs, Quinn has suddenly gotten a surge of interest. I'm seeing a lot of the same questions, though, so I figure I can answer some of them here.
How is he with other dogs?
I've only seen him at length with three dogs: Honey, Baxter and Sienna. He's totally fine with Honey, who is a slightly dominant female from his pack. They're about the same size and his play drive is higher than hers and he plays a bit rough for her, but he's just a puppy at heart.
With Baxter and Sienna, two boxers, intros went well and play was fine until someone got up on the furniture, then Quinn became very possessive of the furniture and snarled at the other dogs when they got close. That was not at home. Here, he is not allowed on the furniture for that reason.
I suspect he would not do well with unaltered animals.
How is he with cats?
I didn't realize how stupid our 6 month old kittens were until they ran up to a strange dog with no introduction. He sniffed them and wagged, but didn't initiate play, didn't lick them, didn't chase them. Since he's been here, he has followed cats into corners and gotten slapped, but no major confrontations and he's just fine letting them be.
Is he good with kids?I don't know. He hasn't been around kids, to my knowledge. If kids are anything like kittens,
yes.
Is he trained?
He is house trained and crate trained. He has not pooped in the house, but he did pee in the kitchen for some unknown reason. It's the same exact spot his sister peed a week or so ago, so maybe he smelled it. He also peed on the porch a couple times; I suspect the neighbor dogs come onto our back porch when we're not looking and pee on our planters. He was just letting them know that we don't appreciate that.
When he's not playing, he needs to be in his crate, otherwise he can't relax and he just wanders around looking for something to do. He does not mind getting in the crate. We're working on transitioning from "crate" to "blanket", and there's already been improvement. He paced a lot his first night but slept soundly on his blanket the second night.
He hasn't had much in the way of obedience training, but we're working on "Come here", "Sit" and "Down". He very quickly learned to sit at meal time (like his sister) and lay down when he goes in the crate for a cookie. Otherwise, he's eager to please but not too bright.
Will you transport?
No. If an approved rescue pulls him, that's fine. Adopters can apply to the rescue and go that route. Otherwise, I will speak with potential adopters directly and do what screening I can on my own. Anyone not comfortable with lots of questions should not inquire.
Other fun things:
- He understands and pays attention to mirrors more than any other animal we've had. He will watch you in the mirror if he can't see you directly. It's not creepy at all.
- He went off-leash at his photo shoot and did just fine. He recall isn't great, but he eventually gets the idea. He likes to chase a ball but his endurance isn't great because he's been kenneled so long. His sister was the same way when she came out of the kennels, but now she runs like a champ.
- Being from a family of dogs I'm very familiar with, he gets more leeway than a new foster dog would normally get. Some of the family traits are: Good with dogs, good with cats, good with kids, good off leash, rare barking, rare jumping, not mouthy, friendly kissers, eager to please. So I assumed he would be house trained fast and assumed that he would be fine with the cats. I can't make those assumptions most of the time but he has not let me down.
