It’s been just over a year since we adopted our little Princess Maya! AKA – ‘The Little Cowbag Princess’, or Mable, or Mabes!, and she’s come a long way. She’s a real character who’s eager to please…herself!!! 🙂 She’s a thief of sausages, and a murderer of chickens! But we loves her!!!
When we first got her she was great with other dogs, and still is, but terrible with people. She’d do this fear aggression thing where she’d bark at people with her hackles up looking really aggressive, but always staying just out of reach. It’s not easy finding volunteer strangers so Carla would set off on a walk with Mabes, I’d dress in disguise, and ambush them! We spent ages trying all sorts of things. We’d take her out for a long walk so that she wasn’t so fresh, then take her where there’d be lots of people. We give her treats for stying calm when someone came nearby. Slowly she’s made progress, and she’s got to the point now where for the most part strangers are OK.
She’s has a number of doggie friends….
Here’s Lulu! She came to stay for a week. They had a great time. Synchronised behaviours with a couple of days. Good and bad. It was such fun having Lulu staying we toyed with the idea of two dogs!!!
Here’s Anetta! He pops around every once in a while. He’s a Berger Suisse also, but he has long fur.
Here’s Gotham! When these two get togther they go completely crazy. It’s not safe to be in the garden with these two! Gotham came to stay for a weekend recently. What a white knuckle ride that was! We were all exhausted by Sunday night. But we’d had a lot of fun.
We took Mabes to her first MTB race yesterday. She was great. Lots of strangers coming up to her, and she was kewl. Plus for the first time, we saw her engage in play with someone she’d only just met. We were so pleased with her. We wanted a dog that we could take anywhere, and she’s getting there.