jetcitywoman

Hi Selena, I work with Scooby North America and as it sounds, we adopt galgos from Scooby Medina to the North American continent. Actually we recently limited our geographical scope to the eastern half of North America because it was too hard to accept returns from the entire continent, and we stand by our dogs. Since you're in Ontario, you're in our area, and actually one of our founding members lives there also, so she (or Robin, who we also love and trust) could do your home visit when you're ready to adopt. Our policies are modelled after policies common to greyhound adoption, since we all originated in that world. You submit an application telling us about your home and family, and you can specify either the exact dog you want or the type of dog and let us pick. We'll do a phone interview just to make sure you have educated yourself about galgos and know what owning one entails. Then we do a home visit, just to take the conversation one step further, answer any questions and just check for glaring bad stuff (screen out hoarders or abusers, you know, really egregious stuff). During that process we will begin the logistics of transporting the dog, but we won't actually "pull the trigger" on the transport until you're approved. That's it in a nutshell. As I mentioned, our priority is the well being of the dogs, so if an adopter ever has problems, we are reachable by phone or email to support them. If the dog has to be returned, we want it back. Our adoption contract states that our dogs must be returned to us, never an animal shelter or other rescue group, so that we can verify it's health and find another good home for it. When we bring dogs over for an adopter, it's certified healthy in it's passport that allows it to be transported over national borders, and up to date on all shots. We may need to work with the adopter to follow up on things they don't check for in Spain, like heartworm, but that's easy. For us it can be sometimes a long process because the logistics of transporting the dogs here are challenging. We don't fly the dogs cargo, we fly them as pets to ensure their safety, which means that they must be escorted by a human on the same flight. The airlines we commonly use (American Airlines and Iberia) sometimes have date restrictions to prevent live animals from being left on the hot or frozen tarmac during the loading process, so it's generally faster to get a dog in the spring or fall. The timing can also be affected by how soon we can get a volunteer to escort the dogs. We have partnered with other galgo groups (SAGE, SHUG, GRIN and a few greyhound groups) so that if we can't organize a transport quickly and they have one ready with space available they'll bring our Scooby dog over for us. You can find our adoption prices on our website (see my sig below). I'm not entirely clear if we pass the variable costs on to the adopter, but I am working on my "coworkers" to get that clarified because I think the wording on the website is confusing. You'll definitely have to pay for the dog's air travel and adoption fee, just not sure about the rest. If you haven't already, I very much recommend you educate yourself about galgos, because they are a bit different from racing greyhounds. There is info about them on all of the rescue groups websites, and you can also search here for posts from Galgomum. That's Petra (SAGE) and she writes very eloquently and accurately about the differences between the breeds. And of course, I'm happy to answer any further questions you have, especially about Scooby!

Agreed. My greyhounds are retired. My foster galgo child is rescued. It's a very clear distinction that I think we should start teaching the general public.

Very true, Robin. I was just adding a possibility that nobody had mentioned, since the OP asked to be educated. If she decides that greyhounds aren't right for her but feels that's very disappointing, galgos might be a way to have a different kind of greyhound that fits better. Since I've moved from greyhound adoption to galgo adoption - without cutting all ties to my greyhound adoption group - I've been analyzing ways to champion adoption for both breeds without a conflict. In general, I think potential adopters who have a more athletic and outdoor lifestyle may be better with a galgo and adopters who are less athletic may be better with a greyhound. No hard rules either way, of course. And yes, individual variation means that really any dog might be fine in any home. I agree with you also about the personality of the galgo... my foster also would be a poor choice for someone like the OP. She would need a more confident, less skittish dog.

I got interrupted and lost my edit ability so have to just write another post. I want to add a bit about off-leash running. You do run the risk of losing a galgo just like a greyhound if you let it off leash in an unfenced area. However, galgos are used to that kind of "lifestyle" in Spain so being loose like that won't be as scary for them as it would be for a pampered and closely supervised racing greyhound. If you adopted from us, I would insist that you teach the dog a solid recall, however. I'm pretty sure (just my opinion) that many of the abandoned dogs in Spain are actually dogs that have run too far from their hunter and gotten lost. We don't want that to happen here. Also galgos are great in multi-dog homes. They live in packs in Spain, and in the rescue shelters they're kenneled in packs. They're generally good with small dogs but are best with dogs of all breeds that are approximately the same size as them so that they can play together fairly. On warning, though: they are avid hunters, so if you don't want him bringing home a steady stream of critters, then a galgo isn't a good choice!

I tend to agree with those who said a greyhound may not be the "perfect" fit for you, however I'm surprised that nobody (even ROBIN!) suggested a galgo. I think your home/lifestyle sounds perfect for a galgo. Very much like a greyhound except they are bred for endurance running (think 5 miles at a shot) over rough terrain. Health is very similar to greyhounds except their teeth are better and they're not prone to osteosarcoma. They're better problem solvers than greyhounds (in general) so can be pretty good about jumping over baby gates or fences and climbing over obstacles. There are many of us here who represent various galgo rescue groups. For more info, you can google: Scooby North America, Save a Galgo Espanol, Sighthound Underground. Or PM me.

Honestly it was just a lot of patience, and being gentle with her. At the very beginning we respected her bed space like everybody says to. When she started getting on the couch, we taught her that couch was a privilege that got revoked if she was snarky, while her bed always was her space irrevocably. When she was on the couch I would gently pet her until she fell asleep. So then just more and more of that until she became very familiar being touched by us when she was asleep.

It comes up here a lot, so I wanted to post my success story. Our first grey Capri came to us with sleep startle. If you have patience, it can be trained out over the course of a couple years, depending on the dog. It's a matter of her learning to be 100% safe in your home and that she can 100% trust that you'll never deliberately hurt her. Last night I slept on the couch to keep the dogs (and our new Galgo visitor) downstairs and quiet, and Capri chose to sleep on the couch with me. Correction: she slept ON ME. Lol! I had to get her up and adjust a few times when I cramped up, and once I accidentally squashed her leg or something because she yelped. I apologized and we went back to sleep. So yes, they can change from defensive aggressive to snuggle bunnies! When Dh got us up this morning, she was sprawled between my legs with her head on my tummy, nose sticking out of the blanket to breath, lol!

The followup vet visit showed that his hip area pain is actually worse than last week, even though he plays as normal and no longer has trouble getting up and down from the floor. So that explains things a bit. We thought it may be the case because he won't do anything that requires a step up, like even getting on the couch. The vet referred us to an orthopedist. I'm also still going to make an appointment with the behaviorist because he's so touchy I really think we need to learn how to get him over his mental blocks/fear once the pain is under control. But for now, he sleeps on the ground floor. We do have a bed there for him, but he still cries heartbreakingly when we leave him alone there. We let him cry for a while when we first go to bed and then one of us goes down to sleep on the couch to keep him company. I'm leaving for a week on Wednesday, though, and DH has to deal with this all by his lonesome. I think I'm going to buy some rescue remedy type stuff at Petco today - just something to sooth him so that he can get comfortable sleeping alone. Poor baby's really caught in a catch-22: can't go upstairs, hates being alone downstairs.

We're having Drama Time here, apparently. I much prefer boring old routine. Anyway, something just happened with Capri that really illustrates the difference between the two dogs and highlights Ajax's mentality. I'm home for lunch and while I was making sandwiches, she was in the kitchen sniffing around. She started screaming and I turned around and her back legs were spread sideways on the kitchen floor like a split and she was trying to push herself back up. As I tried to get my hands under her tummy her front legs slipped also sideway, so she was doing a four-way split. OUCH! Poor angel! I managed to pull her back up to her feet, and then gave her a gentle hug, and then went about my business. After a minute of recovery, she did too, none the worse for wear. If that happened to Ajax, he'd have an instant fear of the floor. Yep, time to add another rug or two in the kitchen. She's slipped into back leg splits before on floors but never a four way split. It looked horrible! Does anybody sell bubble wrap sewn into doggy body suits?

Well, we're just taking five steps backwards and none forward, so we're taking him for a followup vet appt tomorrow followed by an evaluation by a certified behaviorist. I think after we resolve the pain issue, we'll need to actually do behavior mod in conjunction with either Rescue Remedy or doggy prozac. Yes, he's THAT bad. Anything that's remotely close to forcing him to do what he doesn't want sends him into a tizzy, so things like using a harness with a handle won't work. As of last night, DH can no longer pick him up without causing a panic attack and GSOD. What a fun night we had: Ready for bed, DH picked him up at the bottom of the stairs and I don't know if he squirmed or what but DH had to set him down again a couple of steps up. Ajax did NOT like that and backed down to the landing. DH started to pick him up again and got the panic attack/GSOD. So we left him alone at that point. He whined and cried, so I went down to sleep on the couch. Or rather, "sleep". Ajax was quietly laying on the floor but occasionally got up to poke me gently as he does when he wants something. I'm pretty sure he wanted on the couch with me but I think there's still some pain because he wouldn't step up onto it. Around midnight, Capri apparently realized I wasn't in the bedroom so she came downstairs and hopped up on the couch and snuggled on my legs. My sweet little snuggly momma's girl. I couldn't sleep like that, so I took her back up stairs and shut the bedroom door. I slept for a couple hours until DH and Capri came downstairs. He thought she wanted out, but she hopped back up on my legs. I had him take her back upstairs. After that, Ajax was fussy. He clearly wanted a softer, warmer bed than the carpeted floor, but wouldn't come up on the couch with me. I ignored him for a few hours and listened to him and Capri doing a stereophonic whining on two floors of the house, and then figured nobody was getting any sleep so I may as well go up to bed. Dh and I were able to sleep fitfully after that, in between bouts of both dogs continuing their whining duet because they could hear each other. I'm soooo tired....

Yeah, he's fussy with his feeding station so moving it may also freak him out. I'm curious about the shaping idea: why toss the treats AWAY from the area instead of just at his feet? You're right about luring, I think. I've noticed that he KNOWS when we're luring him. At lunch today even though I wasn't planning to get him up the stairs, I just wanted him to take a treat off the third step (about his eye level) and he wouldn't have any part of it. The treat was a bully stick, too! I set it down and went into another room and it was still there. There's some stubbornness in there along with everything else. LOL!

Rimadyl is an anti-inflammatory and the tramadol is a pain killer, so it's not really double-dosing. But both are temporary, on the theory that he hurt himself. We're also giving him Dasuquin on the theory that it's arthritis. We got one xray of a thigh and it looked good so we don't think it's the Big O, but if he's not much improved by Saturday we'll take him in for a fuller set of xrays. He is already a little better, but not all the way there. But while the problem started because of pain, I think now it's primarily mental. He gets SO upset and when he's like that even efforts to calm him down are useless. For example, while I can gently but firmly guide him to the bottom of the stairs and hold him there just gently standing still, he will refuse treats no matter how yummy. He has to go back to a "safe area" then he'll accept treats. I do agree I think we'll have to gradually extend his "safe area". I do like the idea of feeding him at the bottom of the stairs and otherwise leaving him alone. One thing I thought of was when DH carries him upstairs at night, to set him down on the second-from-the top step, so that he can easily step up. After a couple days of doing that, then put him down one step lower. And etc until he gains confidence that the stairs won't hurt him. It also occurs to me that maybe we shouldn't be carrying him up, either, and just leave him on the ground floor. He usually sleeps in our room, so if left alone he may eventually come up on his own, then we can throw him a party.

It's entirely possible that the primary answer to my issue is going to be "just be more patient". But let me throw this out to you all anyway. We accidentally "broke" Ajax again and have to "fix" him. This time we got him afraid of the stairs. Let me elaborate: In general, he's a rather anxious personality. Not a spooky dog, but more like Woody Allen neurotic. He HATES being physically helped and luring with food is really the best or only way to train him. From past experience, if we try to physically manipulate him, like putting one paw on the step for him or body blocking so he can't bail out, he will get very upset. His "upsetness" snowballs quickly and he loses trust quickly; he's not a "get over it" kind of dog. For example, last night DH tried to get him up our carpeted, closed, indoor stairs by running him up on leash, and Ajax had a full blown panic attack with a GSOD and everything. So along with luring, he also requires eensy teensy baby steps. He used to do stairs just fine, although always had to run up them. Over the last few years, I've been occasionally "playing on the stairs" by tossing treats up (or down) and letting the dogs go get them. This has turned Capri into a little mountain goat and she has no problem slowly climbing up or down, standing still and even turning around mid-flight. But Ajax has never gained that much confidence, he can't stop mid flight and he can't do them slowly. A week ago he developed severe pain in his back hips. We took him to the vet and are treating him with Tramadol and Rimadyl, and he's getting better. We know he's not 100% yet, so we don't expect fully normal. It hurts him to go up stairs, although he can go down just fine. We've been compensating by DH carrying him up stairs each night. (Our bedroom is upstairs.) As the medications get his pain resolved, we'd like to slowly work on his fear of the stairs so that DH doesn't get a hernia. Obviously trying to run him up the other night was a major mistake, so we're not going to do that again. But now he won't come near the bottom of the stairs, even when we lure him with high value treats. He wants to come up and be with us, but he's afraid it will hurt, and he's also afraid of us when we try to lure him there. He also isn't really fond of being picked up and carried. So, how do you regain the trust and build confidence in a fearful dog? Just continue luring with high value treats and tiny baby steps?

I've actually thought that someone could make money by renting out greyhounds as temporary companions for people recovering from surgeries, because if you need someone to just lay around with you for hours on end, for days, a greyhound is top choice. I've had many lazy days with my crew, especially Capri who is happy laying by me on the couch non stop. Ajax does need to get out for a walk once a day and starts squirming and air-snapping when he loses patience waiting for me to get off my keester. But Capri, she will lay there with me until the end of time, I think. As your pup settles in and starts to really feel like he's home, he is bound to get more playful and show more personality. But he will always be a calm, patient lazybutt. It's in the genes.

That's good advice, well put, jbbuzby. I don't think all greyhounds do this - Ajax never did - but Capri went through a few "phases" where she tested her boundaries with us. One time she decided she didn't need to pee before bedtime. A couple of other things, that I forget. Right now she's discovered she can jump on our high bed, so is testing our rule about no dogs in our bed. LOL! So that may happen, depending on the intelligence and personality of the OP's dog.

Nobody's mentioned this, so I will: this is the reason we call them "potato chip dogs". I.e. like the Lay's potato chip commercial says, you can't have just one. Which really is just a joke that means these hounds can be so mindblowingly easy and wonderful that they convince you to get another one.... and sometimes one more.... and another.... etc. There are some strong people here who only have two. (Me only because DH enforces the rules and threatens to divorce me if I bring home more dogs! LOL! I would totally have a house full if not for him.) And yes... it's really easy to get a perfect dog. When we adopted Capri, she was perfect and we were afraid she'd ruined us for any other dogs. A year later we adopted Ajax and.... darn it all but he's perfect also! They are night and day different, but both perfect in their own rights. (And yes... I could be blinded by love...)

Okay, if that's where he's used to sleeping, it's good. Then I'm inclined to agree with the others that he may be cold. Or is it possible he is hearing noises outside your house and trying to go to you for comfort?

Has he always slept downstairs? It's hard to tell because you say nothing's changed, but then also say you're encouraging him to stay down stairs more.... It sounds to me like he's lonely. You can't have him in your room?

Sounds like a pretty successful racer, and in that case, yes her bones got a lot of pounding. Capri raced for three years at a year-round track (Daytona), over 130 races total and she has what may be called osteoarthritis. More of the sports injury kind rather than the flare up reumatoid arthritis kind. We give her Dasuquin daily and it really helps her a lot. Without it she is very stiff, climbing stairs like an old lady and yelps when she gets up from naps. When she's on it, she's spry and agile as a young dog. I recommend you take your pup to the vet for an official diagnosis, though. You can just put him on Dasuquin (it's not prescription) but it's better to rule out other things, too.

It sounds like your boyfriend doesn't understand how to train dogs. It's really not that hard once someone shows you, but it is very frustrating to try it on your own without understanding how dogs think. Very much recommend getting a positive-reinforcement trainer in to show you guys (mostly him) how to teach Sophia how to "wait", leash manners and other basic obedience. Also very much recommend Patricia McConnell's books, especially The Other End of the Leash and For the Love of a Dog. Those titles aren't really dog training so much as dog behavior. They're VERY readable and educational.

Greysmom put it very nicely. Especially this part: "you won't break your dog". Let me share a couple of times when I "broke my dog" and how we recovered, just to prove to you that they are more adaptable than you may realize. Shortly after we adopted Ajax, I gave them each a bone and put them in the back yard because I didn't want a mess in the house. I stupidly didn't supervise them, so was embarrassed and horrified at myself when I discovered they'd had a little tiff and Capri was bleeding. Other than her wound, they acted like nothing had happened. Oh and one other thing: she had a sudden new fear of the back deck. She would go out just fine, but couldn't come back because the deck was now scary. I knew it was up to me to fix it. I went out and sat on the deck steps and sweetly called her over. She would come close but stop at a certain spot and wouldn't come any closer. So I sat out there calmly as if I did it every day and looked at the sky and looked at her, and talked to her calmly. She eventually came over to me and I petted her for a little while. Then I said "well, it's time to go back inside", got up and told her to come with me as I did every day. She hesitated and then came inside with me. The deck was never again scary for her. The other episode was harder to fix. I didn't want to pick Ajax up to put him in my car because he's a big 80 pounder, so I wanted to teach him to climb into the car on his own. I opened the side back door and put the seat up. (I usually keep the seats down to make a nice platform for them to lay on.) I had him on leash and pulled and coaxed him to the door. He was afraid and didn't know what I was asking, so he'd put down roots and refuse to budge. I tried to pick up his front feet and he'd go into a mild panic and back out. I pulled him back up to the door and block him with my legs so he couldn't back out, and tried to push him in. "No flipping way" he told me. Ajax is the kind of dog who does NOT like to be physically coerced into things, no matter how gently. I stopped and tried again the next day. He remembered, though, and wouldn't even get close to the car door if I was near it. Ouch, that hurt my feelings. It took me about two weeks but I eventually did teach him to climb into the car by luring him with treats, one tiny step at a time. The first day he put a front foot in the car and backed out but I counted that as progress. The following day, two feet, progress. A few days later, three feet and backed out, still progress. Baby steps and much patience. So I was able to "fix" him and also regain his trust. So.... as everybody else said... be patient and calm and don't freak out at the little things. Your dog will learn a lot from you, so teach him that you are a calm, confident leader.

I just want to add a couple thoughts: Re: name training I think this is the easiest thing in the world to teach a dog and IMO the first thing one should teach a new dog. You start out as Giselle described: name/treat, name/treat. After a few repetitions you can add a short delay between name and treat. A little longer again and you'll notice that if the dog is looking away when you say his name, he will look at you so treat that. Then you deliberately wait for him to look away, say his name and treat him when he looks at you. From that you can move on to recall training or other things if you like to use name/command combos. Re: looking in the eye I'm not a dog trainer but just know my relationship and bonding "path" with my dogs, so this is my opinion, but eye contact is very different with a strange dog versus a dog you have a bond with. A dog that loves you will gaze into your eyes with a prolonged stare. I don't know what it means yet, but I do feel it's some method of communication. So when you do "look at me" training whether you target your eyes or your chest may depend on how bonded you already are with the dog.

AJax is a hand-kisser, but I don't think it's weird (like the poll option says). It strikes me more as chivalrous! Capri just this past year (after having her for 4 years) started doing face kisses, and the last few weeks we've been doing mutual face kissing. When I sit on the window seat, she jumps up behind me. If I make kissy noises at her, she will reach over my shoulder and lick my nose/cheek. Lately I've been finding it a fun challenge to try to smooch the side of her nose (without holding her head with my hands - that's cheating!)

Clicker training but also: First step: work on impulse control by teaching "wait" I can empathize, though. Capri is also extremely food motivated and if it's something she really, REALLY wants, she will flip through her repertoire of tricks at racing greyhound speed and all I can do is fall down laughing. I swear I can hear the circus calliope music when she does that. It's very challenging to reward a sit when she popped out of the sit and into a down then a rollover before I can say "good girl". Clicker really does help with that. Oh, also try using food treats that are closer to the boring side, and tiny so that he doesn't get quite so excited.

It's one of the most personal decisions ever. A couple weeks ago we had to say goodbye to our kitty. She had been declining for about a year; we were maintaining her on kidney diet and thyroid medicine but she was 18 and things were failing due to age. In December she had a seizure so we knew the time was close. However, aside from the seizure episode she was happy and affectionate so we felt her quality of life was acceptable. But the day I came home from work and saw that she'd had a stroke: one eye dialated, holding her head sideways, walking along the walls instead of freely into the room and turning in clockwise circles... it was time. She had no quality of life in that state, and at her age it wouldn't get better. We did get the vet's opinion first just to be sure, and the vet said we could wait a couple days. It would have been two more days of disoriented misery for her, so we said goodbye. As you mourn, take comfort in the fact that you deliver her gently into the arms of the Lord, or if you're atheist you deliver her gently to her end. It's a very loving, respectful thing to do.