Lola (Kinetic Flyer) Part 4 - Getting Used to Homelife.

Is it just me or do you break into song every time you say Lola as well?

Here's another update on the gorgeous hound Lola (Kinetic Flyer) and her journey to becoming an assistance dog, from her foster Mum Becs.

It was Lola's birthday on the 5th of June, she has just turned three years old and is still full of beans. She is settling into home life well and has most of the house rules down. The one she is struggling with a bit is 'no dogs in the kitchen'. She never goes in when we are about but a couple of mornings I have got up after her and found her sneaking out. I have yet to catch her sneaking in!

With the pics of Lola you have probably noticed her grey spotted coat and dark spotted ears. She is just gorgeous. Lola and I were walking down the street and one of our neighbours was coming up the road towards us. She stopped me and said, when she saw us, her first thought was  "what was her husband (??) doing walking their dog at this time?". They have a dalmation!! She quickly realised it was not her husband and had a cuddle with Lola. It was really quite funny. Dalmations and greyhounds do have a similar body shape, though thankfully different needs in the exercise department! Since then we have been asked several times, usually by children, if Lola is a dalmation!

To start with Lola was quite scared with scooters and bikes if they were too close. I nearly lost her one day when a boy on a scooter came towards us on the footpath. I was very lucky as the boy stopped to talk to me about greyhounds and let Lola approach him in her own time. She is much better now, but it's quite interesting how each greyhound has their own 'pet life' things to get used to.

Lola also had an aversion to manhole covers and any changes in the footpath. We regularly go past pedestrian crossings that have the yellow grippy tiles on the footpath. The first time she had no way of going around them so she jumped the tiles. They are not that big, only taking up a foot of the footpath, but she jumped those tiles like they were a steeplechase fence! However she has got used to them now and is now even managing to walk on the silver manholes with no problems.

Lola is scared of cats. If they are off in the distance she is interested in them but if they are too close she does not like it. When we are out walking and come across a cat, our two hounds are very keen on getting a closer look but Lola prefers to increase the distance between her and said cat. If she is between the cat and me she pushes against me to try and move away which is quite amusing. Catherine and Chris' hounds, Bernie and Piper, kindly offered Lola a play date at their place to meet their cats - namely Peanuts, the boss in the household of feline and canine. Lola made sure she kept her distance and was more interested in meeting the donkeys and having a run round with Bernie!

Lola came to the Wairarapa Supermarket Challenge and spent a few hours at New World. She loved meeting new people and hounds and was a big hit!

We had a Wairarapa GAP run on Saturday so off I went with Blondie and Lola. I was looking forward to seeing how Lola would behave at the run and she didn't disappoint. She was brilliantly behaved and had a great time running and playing with the other (16!) hounds. She loved smooching with the humans and it was a good chance to practice some recall with distractions around. We were there for ages and I didn't see her lay down once! Not surprisingly she slept very well Saturday night and we managed a bit of a sleep in on Sunday too.

The three girls are getting on very well together and Lola is still amazing at not getting on the bed or couch. She has also graduated to eating with the door open. This happened quite by accident as I didn't shut the door properly to Lola's eating spot and Blondie (the guts) managed to push it open once she'd finished. I was summoned by barking and Blondie had snuck through the door and was laying down beside Lola's bowl and staring at her. This is something Blondie does all the time to Priceless, it's like she's saying 'hurry up' or 'can you share with me?'. Anyway Lola was just standing at her bowl barking at Blondie. I called Blondie away and Lola carried on eating and they have been fine since.

Lola's training is coming along well for Canine Good Citizen. We have some work to do on loose lead walking, though she is great most of the time. Sometimes that super smelly patch of ground gets the better of her but she is only canine :-) !! Plus we need a bit more tie up practice but we'll get there soon I'm sure.

Right off to practice

Becs and Lola