The dogs of Davidson

Although I didn’t spend a ton of time with dogs this week, here’s what I learned from the two dogs I saw during my weekend with my family:

DUBLIN

Dublin is a three-year-old chocolate lab mix who belongs to our dear friends and neighbors, a family with two young girls. Dublin was adopted her as a puppy from an adoption drive in our home town. My father, who loves dogs like I do, has adopted Dubs as his own dog most of the time. She adores him, too, which I think is quite evident from the photo above.

She’s very smart and great with the girls, Ally and Kate, who are 9 and 7. Dad plays Frisbee with her almost daily and has taught her to retrieve the disc by name and to get into different formations with a command (telling her “cross” means that she’ll run into the other yard and wait for the disc to be thrown over the fence). She’s excellent with the Frisbee and hardly ever misses a catch. Like most retrievers, she could play all day long. Dad has also recently taken to bringing her canoeing with him on Lake Norman, an activity that she reportedly loves.

Our best guess is that Dublin is mostly a lab, but we think she may also have some pit bull in her lineage, due to her stockiness and the shape of her muzzle. Dublin was a very excitable puppy, but now that she is three, she has the ability to calm down considerably and temper her activity level to those around her.

I saw her display this ability when I took her on a walk on Saturday afternoon with her young charges, Ally and Kate. The girls were especially keen to walk her on the leash and I decided that Dublin seemed calm enough to be handled by them. I was a little nervous about it–since I’d walked her before and she’d been like a firecracker–but Dublin walked sweetly and calmly by these little girls and was generally perfect the whole time. The only exception was when she saw squirrels darting around campus. I told the girls to just drop the leash if she started charging after a squirrel. This happened a few times and was an infinitely preferable situation than having the girls get their faces skinned up by being dragged along the sidewalk by this strong, stocky dog.

Overall, Dublin taught me that:

Lab mixes can excel at Frisbee.
High-energy dogs can reach a state of calmness–eventually.
A three-year-old dog is very different, energy-wise, than a one-year-old dog.
The mark of a great family dog is a dog, who even though young, can temper her activity level to her child companions.

DALLY

A golden retriever puppy. Not Dally, but they look pretty identical! Source: Daily Puppy

This is not Dally, but this fluffy puppy looks nearly identical to her. Our neighbors across the street, who have three young children, bought Dally as an 8-week-old puppy from a breeder in Oak Ridge (I think from this kennel). She’s now probably 11 or 12 weeks old and just as fuzzy and adorable as ever. Naturally, I had to go over and meet her–along with the rest of my family.

The family’s gorgeous backyard is partially fenced, but they don’t worry about sweet Dally, who was patiently waiting for her humans to return on the brick stoop outside. She bounded up to us, rolled over, kissed our legs, and playfully mouthed our hands. I was surprised at how gentle she was at mouthing; most retriever puppies I’ve met love to chomp their needle-sharp teeth into soft human hands, but Dally seemed somehow aware that gentleness was required. I wondered if this was something her doting family had already taught her.

Like all good goldens, Dally was extremely attentive and sweet toward all types of people and displayed no signs of fear when met with men, women, and children of all sizes (our family fairly swarmed their backyard). She also seemed very smart; I was impressed that she immediately obeyed the command “sit” from the family’s energetic 7-year-old daughter.

What I learned from Dally:

A golden retriever puppy is one of God’s greatest and most adorable gifts to humankind.
Families with young children should just get golden retrievers. Don’t even look at a terrier. Or any toy breed. Just get a golden. There’s a reason why they’re so popular with families with kids; their temperaments seem ideally suited to the hectic lifestyle of a young, busy family.