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About the Author: Heart of a Dog

38 Comments

  1. Our dogs have all been rescues of one sort or another. Each of them seem to be fully aware they have been rescued, and they have been beloved companions. I wish we could have had more time with each of them.

  2. everybody loves a puppy until they require nonstop command and discipline a GSD is going to need more than a once a day one block walk. the walk is the foundation of a good dog

  3. What happened is Ace found a job, his role, his duty in the house — babysitter. It’s that simple. German Shepherds are bred to be working dogs. They need something to do or they will become unhappy, anxious, and destructive.

  4. The dog is answering an instinct as , being a pack or ''social'' animal '' it needs to find it's place in the pack. Dogs see infants and toddlers as the most vulnerable members of the pack and need to be protected so that is what the dog is doing. Showing alpha male(dad) and alpha female(mom) "Me good doggie me protect pups''. If anyone other than a family member or ''den mate'' tried to even get near that child that dog would rip them apart.
    This symbiotic relationship between man and canines is some 15, to 20,000 years old. Dogs aren't just man's best friend; dogs were mans first friend.

  5. People that get dogs they can't handle infuriate me!! Do your damn research!!!! One of my very best dogs ever was a German Sheppard puppy I found wandering in a construction zone, very dangerous. I took him in and made some posters. A person finally called and said it was theirs, but they couldn't handle him, too much energy and he was already too big (4 mo old puppy, although he ended up at 135 lbs!!!). Gator was part of my family for 17 yrs, and I miss him every day. He was so much like Ace, broke my heart and made me smile at the same time.

  6. it's so dumb to have such a large dog in such close proximity. if it ever bit her, for whatever reason, she could be seriously injured or die. it's a dog, you can't know how it will behave. scary

  7. Our first German shepherd, Doc, loved kids and babies. And he was the smartest dog I ever saw, which is saying something with so many smart dogs in the world.

  8. Pets are usually pack animals – they want a pack. And to be a pack member, they seem to instinctively know they must be worthy. Of the pack. Dogs seem to be more quickly adaptive to pack 'requirements' or 'wants' – and more quickly display "worthy/belonging" behaviors. I think dogs display something far deeper than doing a job – they seem to be acknowledging THEIR OWN desire to be a worthy, deserving pack member.

    (In fact, I think this is far more common behavior than not. I've had dogs that SEEM to display pack-worthiness behaviors but after longer observations, I now think they simply reject some Pack-Worthy behaviors as wastes of the energy/time, and then find those Ultra-Worthy Behaviors, sometimes like violent protectionism.

  9. I am 53 years old, but I still remember the German Shepherd we had when I was three and four years old. I remember stories of how this dog was so mean spirited to everyone, but would always curl up with me in the doghouse and take naps. ❤

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