~Review by Pamela S. Hogle

For a relatively compact book (under 200 pages), Do Over Dogs: Giving Your Dog a Second Chance for a First Class Life packs in a wealth of information. Renowned positive trainer and author Pat Miller targets a broad audience of dog parents — and manages to hit the target dead on.

A Do Over Dog is any dog who has had “issues.” This can be a dog adopted from a shelter, whether the dog was surrendered due to behavior issues or turned in by a family facing financial hardship or by an owner who was relocating and “unable” to take the dog along (Miller points out that many of these owners choose not to take the dog because of a behavior problem). A Do Over Dog can also be a puppy mill rescue or a puppy bred in a puppy mill or elsewhere and simply not socialized adequately. The do-over can even be the dog you have lovingly raised from puppyhood but who has developed a problem behavior.

In short, since there are no perfect dogs (or owners) out there, whatever your dog’s background and behavior issue — and no matter how much or how little dog experience you have — you are sure to find valuable hints and advice in this book.

Miller does not promise quick or easy solutions to problems. Her emphasis on managing problems while working on resolving them, as well as her sober admission that some problems require lifelong management are strong indicators of her knowledge, experience — and commitment to the dogs. After all, if all she wanted to do was convince readers to adopt dogs, she’d make it all sound easy.

Instead, Miller emphasizes the need for consistency and points out many situations where the only way to address a problem is for the humans to change their behavior. She recommends enlisting a positive trainer for assistance with difficult issues and for some problems, suggests consulting with a behaviorist.

Miller provides clear explanations and training instructions for addressing several common problem behaviors, such as digging and property destruction, offers advice on reducing stress (the dog’s!) and anxiety, and offers her thoughts on medicating dogs to modify their behavior. She effectively explains why positive training methods, besides being the humane choice, are more effective in the long run in teaching dogs the behaviors we want and discouraging the ones we do not want. She presents the science behind different approaches to dog training in easy-to-understand language with examples all readers will relate to. Despite being jam-packed with information and advice, the book is not overwhelming, nor does it drown readers in jargon.

Do Over Dogs succeeds at what many dog books attempt —  presenting advice and information that is helpful and relevant to humans while respecting and explaining the dogs’ viewpoint.  

Published by Dogwise Publishing, Wenatchee, Wash., 2010

A "Do Over Dog" Story

The malnourished husky cross, infested with mites and other parasites, was not only pregnant, she was nursing her second or third litter of pups when the breakdown of an old school bus gave her a second chance at a first-class life. It took several months, including a long detour, for this do-over dog, Sasha Seibert, to become the regal creature she is today.

Sasha was one of about 96 adult dogs and 36 puppies rescued from the filthy, broken-down bus near Butte, Montana on October 5, 2008.  The dogs’ owner, Phillip Brode, claimed that he used the dogs, mostly huskies and husky crosses, as sled dogs. Their poor condition and the large number of pregnant bitches and nursing pups made animal services skeptical of this claim. Brode had been on his way from Colorado to Alaska when the bus  broke down. He was charged with animal cruelty and eventually received a 14-month suspended sentence and a fine of $1,000. He was allowed to choose six dogs to take home with him when he returned to Colorado, according to the Montana Standard newspaper. The other dogs were placed for adoption.

Animal services personnel set up a makeshift camp, dubbed Camp Husky, for the dogs. By early December 2008, the population had grown to about 200, as several of the bitches whelped litters. Overwhelmed, Butte’s shelters and animal services organizations called for help. Shelters in Missoula, Bozeman, Hamilton and Helena answered the call, taking many of the puppies and placing them for adoption.

In late December, Sasha, along with her puppies, found herself at the Humane Society of Western Montana in Missoula.  She was extremely shy, but her health was improving, thanks to good nutrition and veterinary treatment. The shelter estimated her age at about 3 or 4 years old. In April, they featured her in the local newspaper as their “pet of the week,” hoping to find the “special owner” who could offer Sasha a forever home.

Here, Maer and Paul Seibert enter the picture. Maer, a fitness trainer and therapeutic yoga instructor, was glancing through the classifieds, looking for additional part-time work. Sasha’s photo stopped her in her tracks. The Seiberts had three dogs. They had two sons. A busy, full family life. Another dog was not in the plans. A dog who needed tremendous amounts of attention and rehab was definitely not in the plans.

Maer went to the shelter to meet Sasha. It wasn’t visiting hours, but the staff let her watch as the dogs came in from playing. The dogs filed by. “The only one that stopped and looked at me was Sasha,”  Maer recalls. She lost her heart. And called her husband.

They pause in telling the story, interrupting themselves to recall a similar story. When we got Luna, we also had three, very elderly, dogs, Maer begins. Luna is their 6-year-old husky, a big sister who played a starring role in Sasha’s rehab.

One day, six years ago, Maer had taken the boys, who were very interested in animals, to the pet store to look at hedgehogs. There was an adorable Husky puppy, a phone call to Paul … and somehow, the Seiberts went home with a husky puppy. In the intervening three years, one of the older dogs had died, the boys had were on the verge of becoming teenagers, and Luna had become Paul’s best buddy.

On that fateful day in April 2009, when Maer called, Paul says, I simply said, “I’ll meet you down there.”

Paul and Luna met Maer back at the shelter during visiting hours. “I just couldn’t get her off my mind,” Maer said. “There was just a connection there that I can’t explain.”

Luna and Sasha met, played, and the newly enlarged family went home.

When Sasha arrived home, she immediately staked her claim to a bed in the living room. She could watch the family’s goings-on from there as well as keep an eye on anyone approaching the front door. For several months, she hardly left her perch. She never approached people but she would greet dogs they met on walks. She loves puppies, is very sociable with other dogs, and still avoids unfamiliar people. She’s strongly bonded with Maer now, and follows her around. She’ll  go upstairs but has still never gone into the basement and will not enter strange buildings. It took months before she’d greet the family at the door or even enter the kitchen, Maer remembers.

“They told me I’d never be able to walk her off leash, that she’d just take off,” Maer recalls. She and Paul walked her in places where they’d be unlikely to meet other people. Luna in the lead, the dogs would wander, but Luna always came back and Sasha always followed Luna.

They never did formal training, just showered Sasha with love, patience, and acceptance. “We let her be who she was, didn’t force her to be social.” They never yelled at her and, on the rare occasions that she’d chew something, they corrected her with a gentle “no” and took the item back. She learned manners quickly.

Sasha seemed to be doing so well that Maer decided to take her along on a camping trip in the August 2009. I thought it would be good for our bonding, Maer explains, but, in hindsight, I know that it was way too soon. Sure enough, disaster struck.

On an early morning walk, Sasha was startled by a man approaching them and took off. Simply disappeared.

For a few months, the family looked for the dog, returning to the area where she’d disappeared. Sightings of the dog were reported occasionally to the animal services department, and it seemed that Sasha had a “route” she covered. She was eating from dumpsters at a Pizza Hut and a winery and some people had spotted her more than once. They thought that she had decided to become feral.

Finally, during Thanksgiving week, more than a year after her initial rescue, Sasha got her second chance at a do-over life. A woman named Marge (she and Paul are still friends) had seen Sasha several times on her property. Casey, an animal services officer, placed a live trap at the site, and Paul and son Brad, aged 12 at the time, went to try to bring Sasha home. They checked the trap every couple of hours for several  nights in a row.  Then, at 6 a.m. the morning after Thanksgiving, Paul and Luna saw Sasha. Marge spotted her too, and was about to call Paul when she saw him approaching.

Paul let Luna out of the van and the dog trotted off. Sasha and Luna took off together. Paul waited. Sang Sasha’s special song, “Small Town Girl” by Journey. Sat outside the van and waited.

After about 15 minutes, Luna returned. Alone. She jumped into the van.

Then Sasha approached.

“She was so close,” Paul said. He debated reaching for her. But he knew that she could disappear again in a fraction of a second. Still singing to Sasha, Paul got into the van. He left the door open and positioned himself as far from it as he could. And waited.

Sasha approached. Put a paw up. Another paw. Jumped in. Paul closed the door. Sasha had come in from the wild.

Now? Two years later, she’s a very happy girl. She’s filled out, taken on a more adult look. Maer believes that Sasha might have only been about 2 years old, not 3 or 4, when they adopted her. Sasha has many food allergies and is on a special diet. And she has one mildly annoying habit, but she only does it when she’s feeling relaxed, so the family doesn’t mind, Maer says. What is it?

“She bites her nails.”

Sasha is not the only Camp Husky dog happily settled in Missoula; the family has met two of her puppies on walks. As always, Sasha was happy to greet the dogs but avoided the humans.

She will probably always be shy, but she’s definitely enjoying her first-class “do-over” life.

 “She loves to be with her family,” Maer says. “She loves to snuggle and get massaged. We feel so lucky to have her.”

Pictures of the school bus removal and the shelter scene courtesy of mtstandard.com