Rocky Piper

ROCKY FOLLOWED IN WILLOW’S PAWSTEPS

Rocky followed in the pawsteps of fellow Scottish foster girl, Willow, and made the long journey down to Devon where he joined her on the farm. What could have been better?

HISTORY

Rocky is a rather gorgeous 9yr old castrated male Golden Retriever who came from Northern Ireland and is now in foster with Lynn in Scotland.

PERSONALITY

She says “Not a lot has changed since Rocky’s first assessment. He is, basically, a 9 year old puppy who has had very little training and does not know right from wrong.

He is confident, alert and inquisitive, playful and very happy, boisterous and energetic. It’s hard to be serious with him a lot of the time as he is just a lovely smiley happy cuddly polar bear!!

He is an amazing character with a massive personality and he is really, really funny. He is very affectionate and is very easy to love (too easy)”.

HEALTH

Rocky is lean under his big coat but his health on the whole seems good with no signs of any arthritis. He loves being brushed which is just as well as he is full of matts.

SOCIAL LEARNING

He needs to learn boundaries and manners but he is listening. It is like having a 9 year old puppy. He is exploring everything, putting things in his mouth, spitting them out, sometimes eating them! Everything is at 100 miles an hour! He is excitable, nosey and very high energy and does jump up at the moment but he is a big softee and I’m sure he won’t take long to train.

TRAVEL:  He pants initially then settles and is happy and content travelling in a vehicle.

HOUSETRAINING: He has been an outside dog for many years but he is adapting to the house environment very well. He is not yet fully house trained but he is improving daily.

BASIC TRAINING: He is extremely high energyand it’s exhausting just watching him. He will require a lot of time and patience with training. He does zoomies across the living room from sofa to sofa using them as trampolines. He comes up on the sofa and stands all over the dog already lying there in order to get to you. He is a thief and steals lots of things mainly food based.

He loves toys and happily pulls them apart.

He barks and makes himself heard when wanting in/out or anything in general but, for all that, he is an absolute delight.

LEADWALKING:  On the lead he pulls, but not too hard, for the first 5 mins and then settles. He can be walked on a slip lead, halti, or equivalent or a body harness.

In a secure area, he is super off the lead on his walks and leaps and bounds over the tall grasses with the excitement of being able to run possibly for the first time in his life.

RESOURCE GUARDING: Rocky shows no evidence of resource guarding. He is non confrontational with other dogs and surrenders his toys to them.

SEPARATION ANXIETY:  He is always delighted to see you even if I’ve only been gone 10 minutes and likes to know where you are at all times.

He looks for you when he comes in and is happy once he knows where you are. He is still quite stressy in the environment as everything is still very new.

I have only left him once on his own for 20 mins and he showed no sign of anxiety.

ADULTS: Rocky is very friendly,  affectionate and sociable with people.

CHILDREN:  He has not been tested with children but he would be far too energetic for younger ones

DOGS: He is friendly and good with dogs although is still learning about them. His body language says he’s not sure how he should act sometimes.

Rocky has shown no signs of aggression with my dogs although he does chase one of the German Shepherds at daycare.

He is beginning to play with the other dogs but is not yet sure how contact sports work.

CATS: He has not been tested with cats

ROCKY’S DREAM HOME

Ideally, Rocky needs someone who spends a lot of time at home. He will require a lot of time and patience with his continued positive training but his new owner will have great fun doing it. Wherever he goes, someone will have a gem of a dog in the making once that energy is channelled in the right direction.

He will need another dog for company as he does have mild separation issues and a well behaved dog would help him to learn what is acceptable behaviour and what is not.

He would be best suited to a home where there are no small children as he would knock them over. The same applies to anyone older or who may be unsteady on their feet.

THE BEST HOME POSSIBLE (SEPTEMBER 2018)

Rocky went to live in his Forever Home on a farm in Devon with Mary and her husband.