From puppies to police dogs – (first week in civilian home)

Isla is settling in very well in her new home and here we can see her working out how to flaunt the hose pipe ban

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Following the final instalment of the puppies to police dogs diary entries last week, we have an update on one of the puppies that was selected for placement in a civilian home, from her new owner. 

She’s been getting on great, getting more confident day by day and pushing her boundaries.

When we came to collect her we had a few ideas for names however nothing that we was all dead certain on. It was only on the way back home that we decided to name her Isla.

Upon meeting Isla we thought we’d had been blessed with a slightly docile dog, however, this seemed to be a misconception. We expected to be up a few times a night, where she would be crying for attention. Apart from this, we thought it would be quite simple, just a case of feed, play, lots of attention and sleep.

We’ve tried to tell Isla many things, like stones aren’t digestible, your water bowl is for drinking from and not for paddling in, it’s not advisable to try to jump in the dishwasher or washing machine, the hose pipe isn’t a shower and that socks are for humans to wear, not for dogs to play with (this includes mum’s slippers that are now Isla’s).

Although she didn’t listen to the above, she has proven quite handy whilst trying to work in the garden. Whilst daddy takes the spades and rakes from the shed to the end of the garden, Isla merrily grabs the broom, and copies what daddy does. She’s also quite handy when trying to pile up a load of old gravel, although she did only dug in one spot leaving a massive hole in the ground.

We never thought that Isla would be so well behaved already. She’s learnt to sit when we tell her to, she’s also starting to learn what ‘stay’ means....this is usually when we tell her to sit at the bottom of the stairs. She’s now house trained and is really good in the mornings. Instead of running around like a mad thing for ages she’ll instantly go to the toilet. Isla’s definitely learning her boundaries, but still pushing them!

We’re so pleased that we’ve got a pup with such a good temperament; for example, within the first few days we had a BBQ and ate it outside, the whole time Isla just lie on the grass looking at what was going on and playing with her toys in the garden.

Surprisingly Isla is brilliant on a lead (she’s still not out of the stage of running around with her lead in her mouth). She’s been for a few walks around the block which she’s been really confident with, feeling the need to investigate anything in her path.

We took Isla to the vet to have her second jab after talking the dates through with the vet. We were wondering how she would be in the waiting room, thinking she would be yapping all the time and just generally playing up. We carried Isla into the vet and got the ‘isn’t that a cute pup’ look from everyone in there. We sat down and Isla just sat on the floor, looking to explore. She didn’t flap, bark or do any of the other things that we expected her to do, although she did try eating the vet’s cotton wool balls, stethoscope, towel, keyboard, mouse and his apron.

Isla’s now been fully vaccinated, microchipped and insured. We’re yet to have the messy joys of worming. She’s brilliant with her grooming and apart from maybe only a couple of occasions, she’s been good as gold. We’ve also moved her onto Oirjen large breed puppy dry food which she loves.