Well what can I say about Ollie? He really is quite a character!
Let's start at the beginning....
Let's start at the beginning....
After losing Moss, our first Border Collie, we were devastated.
We had decided that we didn't want another dog. Having Jake, our other dog (a Utonagan) was enough. Besides we could never replace Moss.
But Jake grieved as much as we did...he lost his usual smiling face and would just sit around looking sad, so after some debate, we decided to get another brother for him...and yes, it HAD to be a Border Collie!
After phoning round several animal rescue centres only to be told that there were no Border Collies available for re-homing, we started to trawl the internet. Once we had made our mind up it was like..."WE need a Border Collie and we need one NOW!"
We saw a photograph of a gorgeous, tiny, fluffy, tri-coloured, most adorable looking Border Collie puppy up for sale! Like a little ball of fur with eyes and ears!
And we immediately thought...
"He's the one! We must have him!"
On arriving at the house we were greeted by a mother Border Collie followed by 2 puppies...a pretty female called Dorca, who the owner had decided to keep, and an odd looking scrawny thing, with a very long face, long gangly legs, short fur and an extremely long thin black tail, which was that far under his legs that it almost touched his chin!
THIS WAS NOT THE CUTE LITTLE FUR BALL WE HAD SEEN IN THE PICTURE!!
We were told by his owner that he had never been socialised, had lived outside and that he had never even stroked him, in fear of bonding with him! (Stupid man!) So at almost 5 months old this poor little pup hadn't had any human contact....huge, huge, HUGE mistake! (Which we were to find out to our cost in the coming months) Fido, as he was then called, was the last of a litter of 5 that were up for re-homing.
The guy told us he had always known that he would keep one of the female pups, so of course Dorca was friendly as she had been stroked and loved.
He said a couple of people had already been to see this funny looking male pup, but had decided that he wasn't the dog for them.....I'm guessing that this was because, not only was he NOT the puppy advertised online, but he also ticked every box on the list of "Reasons why NOT to choose this puppy"
Whilst chatting with the guy, who was rather odd to say the least, this scrawny looking creature hid from us trembling. He peed every time we looked at him...
What a pitiful animal he was....
So yes! We brought him home with us and changed his name to Ollie.
(There was no possible way we could leave him there!)
And even though, unlike all our other dogs, he wasn't a typical 'Rescue' dog....we really did feel like we were rescuing him!
Ollie's first day with us.
And so began a life of chaos!!
Looking back I have no idea how we managed!
I lost count of the number of times we held our head in our hands saying.....
"What on earth have we gotten ourselves into?"
He completely destroyed our home! He chewed great big holes in the walls, right through to the brick! He chewed the banister rail from top to bottom, went through countless cushions, a very expensive rug, 7 pairs of shoes, a remote control, several battery chargers for both my laptop and my phone and smashed and totally destroyed my brand new lap top!
He would steal food from the kitchen worktops, eat the contents of the cat's litter tray like it was the tastiest treat ever and...well! You get the picture! (You will find out later why it was impossible to keep him shut in a room out of harms way or to keep things out of his reach!)
House training him was a nightmare!...The first 'break through' with this little problem was when he poo-ed in a large plant pot I had in the house! Now you might not see this as a break through, but it was! because following this I put the plant pot in the garden and he would then go out and use it as an outside loo! lol.
You have to give him some credit! His aim was amazing!
Eventually we moved the pot and he would then do his business in the place it had been in the garden :)
And so the list of problems with him goes on...and on....
You have to give him some credit! His aim was amazing!
Eventually we moved the pot and he would then do his business in the place it had been in the garden :)
And so the list of problems with him goes on...and on....
He was petrified of visitors...in fact he was petrified of everything!
He suffered Separation anxiety and had phobias of just about everything!
He would completely go to pieces every time I left the house and go into 'destruction mode'
We started off not leaving him for any longer than half an hour and then slowly built it up to 4 hours, even now we won't leave either of our dogs home alone for longer than 4 hours. We used to leave the radio on for him when we weren't there, until he chewed through the electric cable and then peed on it! We then decided it was wise to make sure all electrical appliances were left un-plugged when we weren't around!
OLLIE THE ESCAPE ARTIST
We did try crate training him, for our home's safety, as well as his! But he broke free time after time! He was perfectly happy in there whilst we were home with him and would go in there himself to play and sleep...But it seemed he just didn't like being left alone in an empty house in there. We even tried padlocks but he still broke free and cut his poor little nose quite badly in the process, so we gave up on that.
We did try crate training him, for our home's safety, as well as his! But he broke free time after time! He was perfectly happy in there whilst we were home with him and would go in there himself to play and sleep...But it seemed he just didn't like being left alone in an empty house in there. We even tried padlocks but he still broke free and cut his poor little nose quite badly in the process, so we gave up on that.
To this day he is still a bit of an escape artist. You can't shut him in or out of a room because he jumps up, pulls the handle down and opens the door.(He even does this in the caravan when he wants to go out for a wee!) We have to make sure that we always lock our front door, because he went through a phase of letting himself and our other dog, Jake, out whenever he pleased! Plus if anybody rang our doorbell they would get the fright of their life when the door came flying open and they were greeted by 2 over enthusiastic dogs!
So basically we had no other choice but to leave him with full access to every room in the house. It was impossible to keep him in or out of a room. I very much doubt that even locks on our interior doors would have stopped him....He had proved to us that he could quite easily chew through wood!
(I was told that I could have got a stronger crate to keep him in and prevent him from escaping, but to be honest, as he clearly wasn't happy in there, I'm pretty sure he would have injured himself trying to get out no matter how strong the crate was....So I have no regrets in my final decision not to crate him)
I'm a great believer in positive reinforcement training...ie ignore the bad behaviour and praise the good....Trust me! This wasn't always easy! Many of his antics were very difficult to ignore!! But I'm pretty sure he picked up on our disappointment through our body language alone....It was very difficult not to sigh and mutter "Oh Ollie!" underneath our breath, after walking in the house and finding bits of furniture or pieces of plaster and wallpaper chewed up and spread all around the house lol.
(I was told that I could have got a stronger crate to keep him in and prevent him from escaping, but to be honest, as he clearly wasn't happy in there, I'm pretty sure he would have injured himself trying to get out no matter how strong the crate was....So I have no regrets in my final decision not to crate him)
I'm a great believer in positive reinforcement training...ie ignore the bad behaviour and praise the good....Trust me! This wasn't always easy! Many of his antics were very difficult to ignore!! But I'm pretty sure he picked up on our disappointment through our body language alone....It was very difficult not to sigh and mutter "Oh Ollie!" underneath our breath, after walking in the house and finding bits of furniture or pieces of plaster and wallpaper chewed up and spread all around the house lol.
It wasn't just the bad behaviour we ignored, if we returned home or got up in the morning to find he had chewed something then we ignored HIM too, we ignored those big brown eyes, little wet nose and waggy tail. And oh! how he hated being ignored!!
Good behaviour, obviously, resulted in lots of praise, cuddles and treats!! Which, of course, he loved! Even through the most difficult times, the one thing that Ollie always wanted to do was to please us and make us happy.
Eventually it seemed to 'click' with him that when he was ignored it was always following behaviour that we found unacceptable and when he was good, we were happy and he got treats and extra attention.
Eventually it seemed to 'click' with him that when he was ignored it was always following behaviour that we found unacceptable and when he was good, we were happy and he got treats and extra attention.
Initially, whilst he bonded with us immediately, he would cower in the corner hiding, shaking and peeing every time we had a visitor. Slowly his behaviour started to change, but not for the better! he would growl at anyone that went anywhere near him and hide behind me or my husband for protection.
By the age of 10 months old we had managed to build his confidence up, but unfortunately we hadn't eliminated the fear....He would charge, growling and snapping, at any strangers that we came across, either in our home or out on walks. It was only a matter of time before he bit someone.
'Fear aggression' was now added to his list of emotional problems!
And so 4 months of Intensive Confidence building, Socialising and muzzle training began....
We told strangers to just ignore him, this included visitors to the house or people we met out on walks....Everybody's instinct when they see a dog or walk into a home where a dog lives seems to be to want to stroke and fuss the dog, this just made Ollie worse.
When somebody came to the house I would tell Ollie to sit down and reward him once he did and then get the visitor to sit down too (although they didn't get a treat!) I would make sure they continued to ignore him, until he felt ready to approach them.
It was during this time that we decided to get a caravan.
Whilst our girls were at home, we never had any problem getting someone to mind our dogs when we went away, but once they grew up and flew the nest, with houses and pets of their own to look after, it was impossible for us to find someone suitable to mind our dogs. We couldn't possibly kennel them! All our dogs have been rescue dogs and we didn't want to put them through feeling as though they had been abandoned. So we had no other option but to take them with us!!
It was one of the best decisions we ever made!! I love our little caravan! And so does Ollie!
It proved to be a valuable part of his training.
On our first few visits he was very jumpy and his muzzle was essential. All these strangers!! Kids running round, appearing from nowhere! It was his worst nightmare!
He would charge at them growling and snapping! (of course his muzzle meant that he couldn't actually bite them)
Because we knew that his muzzle made it impossible for him to bite anyone, we were calmer and that calmness was past on to Ollie.
I was aware that many people thought I was crazy, because if he started to show any signs of aggression I would first tell him to 'Sit', then stroke him, make a fuss of him and even give him a treat. People thought that I was rewarding him for his bad behaviour. In fact, rather than treating aggression with aggression by shouting at him and confirming to him that aggressive behaviour was acceptable, I was teaching him that seeing strangers was a positive thing, before long whenever he saw a stranger approaching, his initial reaction would be to sit down and look up at me for a treat....
Eventually he become more relaxed when out and about. He learned that strangers weren't a threat to him, in fact he got a treat when he saw them, so how could they be a bad thing?
Of course the added bonus of camping was lots of fields to run around and beaches to visit!!
Strangers were no longer an issue.
And this is where we discovered his love of water!
He is an amazing swimmer!
From the very first moment that I held this skinny trembling creature in my arms, during the car journey from his previous home to ours, I loved him. That love just grew and grew every day and still does.
There was no possible way that I was ever going to give up on him.
When he was good, he was amazing and even at his worst, I only had to look into his eyes and my heart melted.
And now, several nervous breakdowns later (on our part!), HEAPS of love and even more patience! He has grown into a marvelous family member. His fur has grown, he now has a splendid tail! And is now quite handsome.
He is intelligent, incredibly well behaved (well! Most of the time!!) extremely loving and loyal and every day he does something that makes me smile. He is my baby.
We are getting there!! And are very proud (and grateful!) for what we have achieved with him so far. He still gets a few things wrong....like peeing on the cat for instance, because she hisses at him every time he looks at her!
He still has a few anxiety issues, is still a nervous dog, but is much happier around strangers now and no longer needs to be muzzled....he will go up to them wagging his tail and sniff them, but won't allow them to stroke him.....No growling or cowering though, he just moves his head out of the way.
And he now LOVES kids!! They are the BEST fetch players ever!!
And he now LOVES kids!! They are the BEST fetch players ever!!
Amongst his most endearing characteristics is his politeness...Like most dogs he has a habit of lying in the most ridiculous places, like blocking a doorway, in the middle of the room or on the stairs, but unlike any other dog I have known, as soon as he sees that you want to get past him, he sits up immediately ensuring that there is enough room for you to pass easily. If he is lying on the furniture and sees that you want to sit down too, he will move right up so that there is room for you to sit. This isn't something we have trained him to do...he just does it automatically, without us having to utter a word.
Another one is the way he smiles at me when I have been out or have just got up...and I mean a proper smile, showing all his teeth lol.
Update
Just back from the Vets, took Ollie for his booster jab. I was really proud of him...he greeted everyone that came in and wagged his tail, no growling or snapping at everyone! He saw a Vet, that was also an animal behaviourist, that he had never seen before and the first thing she said to him was "What a lovely sociable dog you are" Which really made me smile. When she read his records she said that we should be really proud of what we have achieved, because most people would have just given up on him and had him put to sleep or sent to a rescue centre. It saddened me to learn that many healthy Border Collies are put to sleep because of their destructive behaviour alone.The previous animal behaviourist I had spoken to several months earlier had said that he needed either 6 months of regular intensive training at £90 a session (which we just couldn't afford!) or should be put to sleep, she said there was no way we would be able to get the aggression out of him on our own and that his behaviour would only get worse.
Don't you just love proving people wrong!
This dog has great potential!
I keep watching all these Border Collie videos of them doing amazing tricks! Sometimes I wish I had time to train Ollie up like that...I know he is clever enough....He already does a few self taught 'tricks'...Like nudging things along the coffee table with his nose until they fall on the floor, rearranging ornaments on the fireplace, taking the lid off the bin in the bathroom and then tipping it up, just for the hell of it, opening doors, nudging the door stop away from the door and then watching in amazement as the door closes (This one never gets old!) he's an expert herder and he herds me down stairs every morning (I swear one day I will trip up over him and break my neck!) and he herds Kaya, his new sister, (Sadly we lost Jake a couple of years ago) on a regular basis, biting her feet in the process! He once lept over a wall with a 30 foot drop and survived!......(Click here to read the story behind that)
Oh yeah! And how many dogs can pee on a cat and poo inside a shoe?!
I might add that we are working on him channelling these 'talents' elsewhere! He loves puzzles, so as soon as the furniture re-arranging starts we get out puzzle games for him to do! (And he has now learned that tipping bins up isn't acceptable behaviour! lol)
OLLIE NOW HAS HIS VERY OWN FACEBOOK PAGE - CLICK HERE TO JOIN!
