Thanks to our volunteer tranporter, we were able to transport Apollo-Chase from Modesto, CA to Fremont, CA. We were told that during transport Apollo-Chase was a good boy and enjoyed the treats he was getting the whole 1.5-hr ride.
As soon as our Foster Coordinator and Foster met Chase, we could see his ribs, which tells us that he had been underfed at the shelter! Immediately the first thing in the plan was to get him back to his normal weight…after he was groomed!
Normally we would not recommend a dog that just got out of the shelter be taken anywhere where he/she does not know the people. However, Chase was an exception. He was friendly to our volunteer transporter who picked him up at the shelter in Modesto, CA and transported him to Fremont, CA. When our foster coordinator met him, he immediately went to her for pets- He did the same as soon as he met our foster. Chase is such a people-friendly dog. He was shedding a TON and some of his fur was matted, and as he was a friendly dog, when our Foster asked whether he could take Chase to the groomer at PetFood Express, we said ok.
Apollo-Chase is such a good boy that does not react to another dog snapping at him, which our foster’s resident 4-year-old Taiwanese Mountain Dog did everytime Chase walked too close to her (he just wanted to say hi!). When the foster has a personal dog, we usually do a pack walk between our foster dog and their personal dog as an initial introduction. A pack walk is when 1 person walks one of the dogs and the other person walks the other dog in parallel to the other person & dog, with a few feet in between. Although we had strongly recommended the foster to do this between Chase and his dog, he insisted they would be fine without it. It is not that surprising when we were told that his resident pet was snapping at Chase a couple of times for getting too close to her during the walks. Despite that, we also know that how the two dogs react to each other does not guarantee they will stay that way once they live together.
The key is to slowly introducing them to each other. Our favorite method to slowly introduce two dogs to each other that will be living together is the “Crate & Rotate” method. This is when you put one dog in the crate while the other dog is out and vice versa. We also usually recommend that you feed the two dogs indifferent rooms if you’re feeding them together OR feed them at separate times. This is to prevent them from fighting over food. We also recommend to NEVER giving treats to both dogs at the same time.
Anyway, stay tuned for our next update on Apollo-Chase’s foster care journey!