Freeway

Freeway,  age 2

AVAILABLE

Update 10/25/12:

Freeway's foster home reporting a nice update on him:

Freeway is off the charts in making progress in such a short period of time!  Over the weekend, we hiked around Town Lake and he wanted to greet every approaching dog.  He's mastered the term "leave it" when needed.  

Freeway went kayaking and was great!  He's tried paddle-boarding, and was quiet and quite balanced. 

He loves hanging out at Mozart's on Lake Austin and loves the attention he gets even more, and gets frequent mentions on how calm he is. What's the secret?  Love and exercise!

Update 10/15/12:

Message from our Hotline volunteer, Sept. 18:

“Hi team, I have a call from someone who saw a Golden at a shelter outside of San Antonio. Seems he turned up stray about three weeks ago trailing a broken chain. They’re short on space at the shelter, so as you can see from the pix she forwarded he’s been spending a lot of time in a crate that’s barely big enough to hold him. You can see he’s got a lot of spots on his tongue but he looks purebred otherwise.”

It was another week after that by the time we got Freeway (aptly named, since he’s been doing a lot of traveling and he DOES like to move fast!) into care. After a stay at the vet for neuter surgery, he headed off to his foster home:

When I picked up Freeway the day after his neuter, he was scared, nervous, and out of control. The drive home was frankly miserable (even getting him into the car was a challenge, to say the least) and arriving home wasn’t much better! What I had on my hands was a young, active dog who had had zero exercise for almost a month—he was like a helicopter on a leash, not housebroken, and hyper. He was likely a yard dog who’d had zero training. Unfortunately, he had some complications from his surgery, so he had to do yet more crate time so he’d stay quiet and heal.  

Fast forward to today: Freeway has made incredible progress! He has settled down enough that he’s allowed to sleep loose in my bedroom at night. My own Golden has had a calming effect on him, and they get along very well. He has learned to walk on a leash, and he responds to my voice commands and as I pull back on the leash and then release; he now rides nicely in the car;  he appears to be housebroken; and he doesn’t destroy anything in the house. He loves toys. I suspect that he has not had them before. He collects them at night and brings them into my room and puts them on his dog bed; then, during the day, he brings them all back out to the living area. He sleeps quietly through the night and doesn’t attempt to wake me. 

Yesterday, I took him hiking on a nature trail with my dog and he was in heaven. Very well-behaved,  friendly to all dogs and people that we encountered, and very responsive to me. Afterwards, thinking I was probably pushing my luck, I took both dogs to an outdoor restaurant. Now, my dog goes everywhere with me and all of this was old hat to him—but Freeway? Surprise—he was great! Quiet, friendly, and probably very tired. We went hiking again today. 

Although he is at my feet as I write this, and appears to be very happy just to “chill,” he is young and energetic. He really needs owners who will give him a lot of stimulus and exercise. Like most Goldens, he just wants to please you. He really wants to learn and is very teachable. I am amazed at the progress he has made just in the few weeks I have been fostering him. He’s really a nice dog.

Adoption Procedures