Tuesday, June 1, 2010

Getting nervous. . .

I've been thinking of how we're going to go about introducing Joey to his new home and his new "siblings."  Hmm.  In addition to the two small dog yards that we use for their potty breaks, we used to have a huge (2-acre) yard that they got turned out in just to play.  But we haven't had the fencing around the giant yard for some time now -- since we began the re-grading the year before last.  Of course once the guy comes to finish the grading next Saturday we will finally be able to put it back up very quickly.  But that isn't going to help on Saturday when Joey arrives.  Right now, all the fenced areas are probably considered their "territory" by our present dogs -- especially Niki.  So I'm a little concerned about having to turn them out together in such small spaces that the present dogs consider theirs.  We haven't used the dog yard on the garage side for months now, though, so I guess that one might be better than the one off the bedroom that they use all the time now.  Still . . .  it's only about 35 X 35 -- not room enough for anyone to run from anyone.  And REALLY small for FOUR dogs to play at the same time!

Cesar Millan says the first thing you should do when a new dog arrives is to take the new dog on a long walk with the present dogs -- like an HOUR!  Good grief!  (I think he thinks that if everyone is exhausted they'll be too tired to fight.)  But even if I were willing to do that, who on earth would I get to help me??  I couldn't take all four of them by myself as big as they are.

Well, maybe his foster mom will have some suggestions.  I think she's fostered a lot of dogs with her own 5 dogs, so I'll definitely give serious consideration to whatever she suggests. 

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