May 27, 2013

Isabell joined our household just a bit over a week ago and has blossomed into a delightful girl. Isabell is a five year old spayed golden retriever female who was picked up as a stray and has been in Ragom roughly two weeks. She has exceptionally good household manners – we’ve had no accidents, nothing destroyed (well, ok there was one small notepad that must have looked evil to her) and she gets along famously with our resident dogs. Actually, the first few days she relied heavily on the resident dogs to help her figure out the routines and to find all the good places to sniff in the back yard. As she’s become accustomed to our household and routines, she has opened up and relaxed and her playful personality is shining through.

Since we don’t know much of Izzy’s history, here’s what I can tell you from the time she’s spent with us. She seems to be a very quiet girl – we haven’t heard her bark yet but that doesn’t mean that she hasn’t been busy looking out the front window and watching the birds and squirrels in the tree. She’s watched the neighborhood dogs going by on their daily walks and hasn’t made a fuss, a trait we really value! She follows my husband around room to room and when he doesn’t offer any fun, she seeks me out to see what I might be doing of interest. She loves the basket of dog toys that we have in the living room and over the course of an hour will take out each toy, enjoying them all. She particularly enjoys throwing one of the indestructible toys in the air and playing with it. A chew on the large Nylabone appears to be a blissful experience for her – she closes her eyes and wags her tail and seems to really enjoy herself. We’ve noticed that tennis balls also seem to be an Izzy favorite. She isn’t a particularly active dog and right now is content to wander our fenced yard to check out every scent. With all the rain, we haven’t taken Izzy out for walks but the few times we’ve had her on a leash it appears that she is a very strong puller so we’ll be working with her on that.

Izzy isn’t at all protective about her toys or her food and she takes treats gently if you tell her to sit. She quickly learned to sit and take turns as all the dogs get their treats – she is very comfortable with our dogs, both males and females. She is *not* friendly with cats however – not at all. Besides ‘sit’ Izzy also knows ‘shake’ which she will do over and over, particularly if she wants your attention. She hasn’t shown any interest in jumping on the furniture although she has surprised us once or twice by jumping up on the bed – something that seems to be a huge delight to her.

When we come home – whether we’ve been gone ten minutes or several hours she is *very* excited to see us. She has a nice bouncy welcome with very soft sounds to let you know she’s glad you’re back. So lovely to come home to! She also gives (sparingly) gentle little kisses. Izzy has been to the vet and is in the process of getting current on her shots. She goes back to the vet this week to be microchipped and get one last booster shot. She’s also enjoyed an outing to the local pet store where she helped select some treats and new dog food; she handled the experience and meeting the new people very well. We haven’t had a chance to see how Izzy does with children so we’ll report on that soon. She definitely likes to ride in the car and be part of whatever is going on. We have not crated her at this time, she seems to do fine in the house particularly with her companion dog buddies.

Izzy isn’t a huge girl – she’s medium size with a medium gold soft coat. She has expressive eyes that are rimmed in black and the softest fur on her head – possibly from all the petting she gets! Izzy will do best in a household with another dog with no cats. She’ll be ready to meet possible families in another week after we’ve had a chance to see how she does with children and how she walks on a leash.