The Dogs have gone Crazy!

Jackson is having the time of his life this week, because his sister, or aunt perhaps? Is in town to visit. My mom has come to visit and help me out while Andrew is away and brought her just 1-year old Ridgeback, Niki.

While I've tried socializing Jackson a little bit with a few other dogs on leashes, I am also somewhat afraid that he will get snapped at or injured.  He was, after all, the smallest of his litter and the one who ate last!  Worse than physical injury would be emotional injury, as he is so innocent and just wants dogs to love him (or maybe the emotional injury would be more to me than to him!).  My readings do say however that between 8-12 weeks puppies absorb the most from their experiences.

So I saw this as a great opportunity - since Niki is still a puppy despite her (extra large) size, they could play and Jackson could get in some great socialization.

Well, Niki arrived and the playing began - I thought she was going to bulldoze and steamroll little Jax into the ground and scare him silly.  We kept trying to settle them down, and wondered if the next four days might have just gotten a LOT longer for us.  We eventually found a compromise using our legs as barriers between couch and coffee tables, so that Niki had to crouch down and Jackson fit underneath us.  That leveled the playing field a little.  Well, they wrestled with mouths and teeth for what seemed like hours.  But that was the segway into what has become a beautiful friendship, and more endless hours of wrestling, chasing, playing, and following.

The funniest part is while we were worried about protecting Jackson from Niki since she is bigger, he came right out of his shell right away and held his own.  In fact, we've had to simmer him down a few times.  When they play tug of war, he often wins the toy through his determination.   And then when they play chasing games and he sometimes gets rolled in the dirt by accident, he gets up gamely and carries on the chase.  He is still smart enough to duck under a chair if he hears her thundering up behind him.

So while I was worried before about him being too submissive or afraid, now I am wondering if he is getting too cocky!  All in all though, I think this has been a fantastic experience for him with respect to figuring out boundaries and how to play.  It also got us out to the dog park these past few days where Jackson has watched Niki wrestle with the big boys, and met several nice dogs that live nearby.