My new friend, Tater the GSP. She belongs to my mom's friend and has never been outside of her little backyard except to go to the vet for her vaccines and spay and a short board-and-train with a heavily e-collar focused trainer. Tater clearly needs more physical activity and variety in her life, so I'm taking her out a couple times a week to run around. Eventually I'll introduce Keeso to her and I'll take them on hikes together if they get along. I expect they will.
Tater is just fabulous. We had met once before and she accepted me gearing her up and loading her in my car today without issue. She was a little bewildered once we hit the trail but was quickly sooooo so so so happy to run and sniff and swim in the lake. She'll be relegated to a long line for a while until I can figure out how, exactly, her previous trainer conditioned her to the e-collar. If it seems fair enough, I have an e-collar I can use to get her off leash ASAP. I think it'll change her life.
It just goes to show how important temperament is -- even more so than socialization, I think. Her resilience strikes me as mostly genetic. (She does have bad un-managed allergies and idk how typical she is of the breed but, still. She's a good dog.)
