Gracie (Harmony 19-111)
Profile
Harmony came to RAGOM after retiring from the breeding life. She arrived with some skin issues but is quickly becoming quite social for a dog from her background. Because she can be fearful of noise and sudden movement, children must be age 10+. Harmony must have a confident dog companion to provide comfort and guidance. A physical fence is required to keep her safe. Harmony loves her walks and is looking for a home in which she has time and guidance to develop into the sweetest house dog you can imagine.
At a Glance #19-111
| Golden Retriever | Born: April 2014 |
| Female | 66 lbs |
Status: Adopted
Profile
Harmony came to RAGOM after retiring from the breeding life. She arrived with some skin issues but is quickly becoming quite social for a dog from her background. Because she can be fearful of noise and sudden movement, children must be age 10+. Harmony must have a confident dog companion to provide comfort and guidance. A physical fence is required to keep her safe. Harmony loves her walks and is looking for a home in which she has time and guidance to develop into the sweetest house dog you can imagine.
Updates
Foster dogs always take a piece of your heart when they are adopted, but Sadie took a chunk. She will now be called Gracie and that name fits her to a T. For a variety of reasons, her Foster Mom and Dad feel this is a perfect fit and thank the S family for being that perfect forever home!
Sweet Sadie (Harmony) is doing wonderfully. In case you are counting, that is new name number four, after Sadie Bell, Sadie Baby, Thumper, and now Sweet Sadie. I think she will answer to anything as long as you do it in a perky voice. She has fit in here flawlessly, is very loving, and really is an easy house guest.
She and Jake coexist beautifully. Jake is more independent and tends to not be very Velcro, whereas Sandy is extremely Velcro and wants to be by her people all the time. She does continue to look to him in times of uncertainty, which really is not often.
She is at an ideal weight of 59-60 pounds and she is well toned and healthy looking now that she is getting so much exercise. Initially, she would run about three steps and stop (most likely due to living in a cage).
But once she realized that when we visit the neighbor's fenced yard and she can actually run around, she loves going there. The first time she actually ran was pretty hilarious to watch, as she was less than coordinated. Now she runs like a champ!
We continue to work with our youngest grandson to be a bit quieter around her and she just removes herself from his presence when he bothers her. We find her sitting in the living room looking out the window. We ask her to join us and she does, but often she goes back to the living room when he is around.
She also removes herself from the activities when too many people are here. I do think it will improve, but as long as someone is watching for her signs of anxiousness and shows her to her safe space, she should be okay.
Other than her not being a huge fan of car rides (she drools a lot), I can't think of any real issues we have with her. She is as sweet as they come!
Sadie Bell (Harmony) has some exciting news to share! After spending three nights with another RAGOM foster, it is official...
Sadie can live with cats!
It has been a week of many celebrations at this foster home and Sadie Bell (Harmony) is ready for adoption!
She was spayed yesterday and is recovering nicely. She also got a quick weight check when she checked in and was down to 61 pounds. The vet felt that she was close to being a perfect weight so we will keep working on it, but she is winning that battle. She spent the night at the vet and is home again, exhausted, but reestablishing herself in our home.
I have not been able to cat test her, but do not think it would be good for the cat. She does have a healthy prey drive on walks, so I fear a cat would be at risk.
She recently spent the night with the 5- and 10-year-old grandkids. She did pretty well with the older one, but although she really wanted to warm up to the little one, she struggled no matter how much he tried. In all fairness to the boys, they were on their best behavior, but when the little one enters a room, you know he is there.
She did remove herself from the family room a couple times and I found her in the front room looking out the window, so she does understand that she can go to her safe spot. Having a safe spot for her and not forcing her to interact when she is nervous will be important, as will having a good eye on her to make sure she is comfortable with kids and new people.
Last week we had another first: she jumped up on the outside couch to hang out with foster dad and Jake. We think the temptation was too great or maybe she was just thinking she was missing out on some pets. Either way, she did finally lie down, but she still wasn’t sure she should be up there. I’m sure if you like a couch dog, she will acclimate over time.
She is doing great in her crate these days and has earned a new nickname of "Thumper." When you come home or get her out of the crate, she happily thumps her tail on the crate and we just have to laugh and call her Thumper. She is also called Thumper when she knows she will be fed, as that is one of her favorite times of the day and she shows us with her exuberant tail wags.
Sadie Bell is a sweet, sweet girl. We will be sad to see her go and think that Jake will miss her a lot, but I know that finding her a perfect new home will allow us to continue fostering down the road.
Sadie Bell (Harmony) is doing great!
We take between 2 and 4 walks per day and they are typically .5 mile to 2.5 miles. Sadie will walk as long as you will walk her and we often have to take resident Jake home about halfway through. She also gets in more miles than her humans, as she still weaves back and forth a lot.
Good food and daily brushings have caused her to "blow" her coat. Between Sadie Bell and Jake, there have been a lot of tumbleweeds blowing in the wind and collecting in the corners of our home. We are looking forward to seeing the new Sadie in her new healthy coat.
Normal things that bother breeder dogs don’t seem to bother her. She is fine with the vacuum, loud cars/trucks and other things I would have expected to make her nervous.
On the other hand, the crazy neighbor lady who talks with her hands waving around and foster mom getting out of the shower with a towel wrapped around her head (in all fairness, that would scare anyone) make her nervous.
She continues to try hard to get Jake to play, with zero success. He does really like her and sleeps right next to her kennel at night. They have gotten along wonderfully and she has not met another dog that she didn’t do well with.
She does bark, not much and mostly when Jake starts it, but she will let you know when she sees something that you need to know about. They do share a desire to rid the world of rabbits and squirrels and will both stand at the back door barking when the squirrels are walking the fence, taunting them.
She is starting to enjoy hanging around outside...
And will relax enough to catch up on her beauty sleep.
She does counter surf, but luckily she is small enough that she can’t really get to things, but she does try hard. Feeding time is her favorite. She spins, runs around the kitchen/family room and joyously celebrates those two times a day.
I’m hoping she can meet the grandkids, get her spay scheduled, and be available for adoption very soon!
Sadie Bell (Harmony) has been in the house for two weeks and I thought I'd send out a quick update on her. She has been an amazing addition to our home, and Foster Mom is so happy that she took the step to foster a retired breeder!
Sadie continues to amaze us with her joyful little self. She has improved greatly on the crating and the car rides with the help of our resident, Jake. A carrot is the key to get her into the crate, and she waits quietly to be let out.
She is sleeping in the crate at night now, because we learned that she will get up and wander at night. Apparently, we sleep harder than we thought. She has a thing for terry cloth, so one of our towels took a hit overnight and crating seems a safer option at this point.
We did learn a lesson with her... no fatty meat! We had been using some left over T-bone to get her in the crate, but it caused a bout of diarrhea. A day of pumpkin and rice and we are back to normal. Of course, it happened during a day of rain, so it was a hard lesson to learn for her humans.
Car rides are now spent tethered in the backseat next to Jake (to restrict movements between the backseat and the cargo area) or flat on the floorboard. She will actually sit like Jake and look out the window.
She has also learned the fine art of begging at a drive-through. We don't ride with the windows down, so Jake barks at the bank ladies to make sure they know he is in the back seat, which works like a charm for him, and now for Sadie as well. An adopter will need to know she has learned to beg, thanks to Jake.
Sadie is currently on Apoquel for some skin issues. Her areas of hair loss are now growing tiny golden hairs and her coat should be full and beautiful soon.
There is a good chance that her skin issues and hair loss were caused by poor nutrition, and most likely once she has been on good food for a while, we will try to see if we can take her off the Apoquel.
We have no pictures this time, as I can't get to the camera to catch her doing something cute without her following me. She really is a Velcro dog.
I want to get a shot of her play bowing at her reflection in the mirror. She does it all the time and has yet to figure out that she is trying to get herself to play, and I never have my phone with me when I need it.
More updates to come for this wonderful little girl!
I’d like to introduce the sweetest little retired breeding dog, Harmony (we call her Sadie Bell or Sadie Baby), to the RAGOM family. She is an amazingly sweet little thing who is far more social than foster mom expected. Of course, she is fearful of new things, but wants nothing more than to be right by your side and soaking up any attention you can give her and she is very open to new things.
She entered foster care at the end of April, spent some time with a temporary foster and moved to northeastern Iowa about a week ago. She is a petite little lady, slightly overweight at 66 pounds, with a goal of around 55 pounds.
She just LOVES going on walks and gets more excited than the resident dog when she knows a walk is in her future. She is either right next to me when she is fearful of something, or out front with her tail held high when she is feeling safe and confident. She recently had puppies, so the walks are helping her get back in shape. She will be spayed soon.
She and Jake, our resident dog, get along very well. He can be cranky with dogs that invade his space, but we have only seen one instance where he growled at her. We were eating and Jake was begging and she got too close to him. After the growl, she looked at him like “What did I do?”, turned and walked away. It is safe to say that she reads dogs very well.
She is extremely playful even though our resident dog doesn’t know how to play. She is forced to find a ball and just play with it by herself—quite cute really! She tosses it around, chases it and pounces on it like a puppy might.
She is not a fan of car rides, but has not been in a car with the aid of another dog to act as her role model. Today we will start going on short, easy rides with Jake showing her what perfect car behavior entails—at least we can hope Jake will do this.
Crates are another work in progress. She needs help getting in (an understatement, as a major push is needed), but once in and with Jake confined in the same room where she can see him, she settles in after her initial complaints.
She has free reign at night confined to our bedroom and only is crated when I leave home, but the ability to crate is important, so we will keep working on it. I do think she would be okay baby gated in a safe room with another dog.
Sadie Bell’s requirements in her forever home are:
- Another confident/well adjusted dog: All breeder dogs require this. They look to the other dog as a role model. The other dog shows them that people are good and things that scare them, are very doable. Although she is more social than I expected, she looks to Jake for confirmation on people and situations. If Jake is okay with something, she shows great bravery. So far, he has taught her that eating peanut butter off mom’s finger is good and going out doorways is the best way to get outside to go on a walk. This role modeling is very important for her future well being.
- Physical Fence: She could never be trusted off leash in an unfenced yard. With all of her confidence, she still gets fearful and is a flight risk when she is fearful. She will remain this way for a long time. She also has no recall, so if she were to get into that state of mind, it would be impossible to get her attention and keep her safe. We don’t have a fence and I think she would LOVE the opportunity to just go where she wants, at the speed she wants to go, so a physical fence is required.
- Kids over 10: All retired breeder dogs require kids over 10 and some require more strict requirements. Most breeder dogs have never been around young children and the noises that come with young children, as well as the unpredictable movements which can cause fear and anxiety in a retired breeder. With Sadie being so social, I do think she would be fine with grandkids or occasional visits from children, as long as the adopter is aware of her comfort level and can provide a safe space for her to get away if needed. She will meet the grandkids soon and I’ll update this at that time.
She won’t be available for adoption for a bit, but there is no reason we can’t start talking to interested applicants and find her forever home. She really is a sweet girl that will love you to the moon and back!