Dog Packs - A Dogs natural state, plus how to chose a dog sitter

Recently Roxane and I went to Texas for Christmas tp spend time with her family. This meant hiring a dog sitter, as our favorite kennel filled up. Remember book your kennel space early over the holidays. Our trainer was able to recommend a high quality dog sitter. Hiring a dig sitter is somewhat different than hiring a trainer as this person will need to quickly introduced into the dogs. Ruthie our dog sitter, visited the dogs three seperate times. For us this is quite important as we have a Tibetan Mastiff; a large powerful dog which is naturally suscipious of outsiders and is highly protective of our home. By the third visit Bodhi had accepted her as a new family member. The initial visits are important and are something you should look for in selecting a dog sitter. Does the sitter allow the dog to approach? Does she have experience with your breed of dog? Any good dog sitter should want to spend some time beforehand to feeding your dogs, giving them treats and making sure the experience is a pleasant one for the dogs. It's always a good idea to check references. With Ruthie she came with the best reference possible, our own trainer with whom we have worked some time. It's generally a good idea to follow up with the dog sitter to make sure they are available during the time they are supposed to be there.

When we returned, the dogs were simply over excited and quite surprised to see us. They had already settled routine without us and the their pack dynamic had changed significantly. Watching them over the next few days was quite interesting as they had clearly continued their development as a pack. While excited to see us, they also played together more, and when it became time to settle down and sleep, they went their own beds and went to sleep. I found it simply amazing that they went about their dog pack business while we spoke with the dog sitter every day, making sure that they were all right, deeply concerned about our dogs emotional state. In the pack they are seemed fine and I think they came out of our trip better than we did! They are playing together all the time, are less focused on us and more focused on each other. We are a welcome distraction but we are not the primary show any more.