Arlo's Big Day

It seems like ages since Arlo's vaccination and he could meet and greet, but it hasn't really, 2 weekends. His experience of other dogs has mainly been the working dogs around here barking at him to which he could only respond by barking back and retreating.

But today he got a chance to meet some dogs that didn't really give too woofs whether he was there or not. He had a break-in session with Barley in the bottom first and spent half of it barking, yelping and cowering, confused about how to react and whether he'd get barked at. But Barley was not fussed and put up with it and we got to a point where he was comfortable, and more importantly, not barking. It was a bit stressful as we tried different approaches.

But he had a date to meet Tess (top) for a walk and we were apprehensive how that would go to say the least. However, Tess was even less fussed by him and we were soon on our walk, and even let him off to run around with Tess. It was nice walk in the sun, and what a relief.

Then it was back to Barley for a few hours and after they got re-acquainted, they both took turns playing fetch and he got braver, working out where he fitted in. We hadn't expected him to react like that, you could see his excitement to meet them combined with the fear of what might happen, but it had to be done, the sooner the better. I wonder whether the only other animal he gets close to, Jess the cat, had made him wary of approaching them, i.e. get a slap. I am sure he might have some wobbles in the future but get over them quicker so we'll keep at it. Thanks to Barley and Tess for putting up with the whippersnapper, they were just what he needed! He's puggled now though!