Life After Leaderdog

This is from Jeffrey about his Leaderdog “Gunner”,  a drop-out from the program and Jeffrey quickly snatched him up. Gunner is from the Leaderdog breeding out of their female Duhda bred to Gavin.

We’ve had Gunner for about 8 months now and I could tell stories for days. He is full of personality and energy and very, very smart. A very loving dog but also very protective. He is an incredible dog by the way and was raised by a women who lives across the street from us. As soon as I met him I told here I wanted him if he didn’t make it through training.

Our other dog is an 11 year old hunting-line Golden Retriever. He is a titled Hunting Retrieve, un-neutered (he can be tough when he wants to be) and they get along great. They played a lot when Gunner was a puppy so I’m sure that helped a ton.

To give you an idea of what he is like; we had a week-long vacation booked at a cottage on a lake in northern MI three weeks after we got him. We were worried he might be out of control and be a headache because we really didn’t know him well but felt strongly about taking him with us. Especially since he had been moved around so much in the last month. Amazingly, he was off-leash the entire time with our other dog, had a great time and never caused one problem. He listened and always wanted to stay with us, even on walks in the woods. Keeping him out of the water was our biggest problem, he swims like a fish. Him and Drake, our Golden, would chase ducks in the water sometimes hundreds of yards. One time I had to take a boat and steer them back to the cottage (it was safe, small lake, no fast boats or jet skis). He also dives. He would completely submerge himself to fetch toys on the bottom in a couple feet of water.

Being raised as a Leader Dog was a great advantage for us. He has been to so many places, stores, restaurants, etc. he is just very well behaved when he is out. It’s hard to explain his personality, he can be an idiot sometimes causing minor trouble horsing around but he is funny doing it. He is very vocal and talks, grunts and groans all the time. He will push his head into you being affectionate and grunts and growls, he loves to lay with people. If there is a stranger outside the house his hair from his ears to his butt stands straight up and he barks like he weighs 300 pounds. My wife and kids feel very safe with him, me too.

He was raised by a very nice family with two young kids and another dog. He was out all the time, we had him at Boy Scouts a couple times, in the car, out for walks, playing at our house, etc. He LOVES kids. He was great at Leader Dogs for a while and his training progress was excellent, he had already been leading people around. The problem was the isolation in the kennel. He resented having to go back into the kennel environment after his training sessions, he wanted to stay out with people. It got to a point where he was getting mouthy when he knew he was going back and was showing a lot of anxiety being locked up by himself in a loud room. They knew he would not be able to make it thru happy and stable. He is crate trained and likes the crate at the house, no problems with anxiety or anything, he is just happy all the time.

Two last things I would like to mention; he is very, very athletic and very biddable. He trains FAST, two or three repetitions and he has it, and he remembers. His favorite “toy” is the play-scapes  at a school near our house. Ladders, slides, etc., he loves it all. My daughter does this with him in the evening when no one is around.

I attached a cell phone pictures from when we just got him. I have a lot of better ones, I will pick out a couple and send them to you. He has since filled out some and just got more handsome. My daughter is with him in the one picture, she just adores him.