I just had to email you to give you an update!! Sorry I have not been in touch since our conversation but the shelter has been looking at a number of solutions to help my lovely boy Huey.
Well, I am so excited to tell you Huey has not been euthanized! Although I was constantly being told that the adoptees were very knowledgeable and experienced when it comes to having dogs I just had a gut feeling all was not what it seemed! I knew deep down that this dog would not attack "out of the blue, without being provoked" and the more I kept asking questions the more the answers were changing, little differences to their story here & there made me think there was more to it than what we were being told.
It transpires that the adoptee would try to be dominant with him and taking the whole Cesar Milan approach well out of context and got it all so horribly wrong. I hear she would pin the dog down on his side, stare at him in the eye (why I don’t know because he's not aggressive in any way shape or form. ) I know he has some dominant body language signals but I think he is more insecure and afraid than showing dominant / aggression. He was also sprayed with water.....why I do not know. You were so right regarding the water bottle!!! As soon as you mentioned that to me, I kept asking questions around it.....how would someone have a water bottle around to hand, and the story / response would change, this set off alarm bells in my head and I kept asking the shelter to find out more about this story of what had happened, I was relentless. The clock was ticking and my boy was on death row.
Thankfully, a neighbor had come forward after hearing Huey was going to be euthanized and told the shelter everything that had been going on. She had seen the adoptee, pinning down the poor dog in the back yard. She would also be very dominant towards the neighbor’s dogs and they absolutely hated her, the dogs would end up becoming aggressive when this adoptee was around. All in all, I think she terrorized poor Huey, trying to be some dominant pack leader........and he simply had had enough. Whilst I love Cesar Milan, I do think a lot of people misinterpret his meaning of pack leader........and this ends up in a lot of people becoming like the adoptee in this case!
He has been back at the shelter now for some time. I have continued walking and working with him and have never seen any aggression. A volunteer went to take him for a walk one morning and Huey was so excited he kept jumping up in his kennel. The volunteer said it had ended up in a bit of a wrestling match for him to get the lead on but not once did the dog show any aggression towards the volunteer struggling to put on his lead. (If he had simply asked Huey to sit and wait he would have and he would have been able to put the lead on in a calm controlled manner)
So, today we have a pit rescue training centre from MA coming to assess Huey. I hope they will take him and work with him. I would love the opportunity of showing them what he really is like, a sweet loyal chap who needs to learn to trust again and not have to fear or be afraid anymore. I've enjoyed my cuddles and time with him whilst he has been back and I think today is going to be a teary day for me when he leaves.
Thank you once again for the time you spent talking with me, it was very much appreciated.
Michelle