Falco

"Age: 15/4/2005

History: this dog doesn't stay in the animal shelter, but with his owner until a new home is found for him. Reason for rehoming: Falco has bitten one of the children and now they are afraid this is going to happen again.
Features: can be placed with other dogs and cats. Is a good guarding dog.

Falco was adopted as a puppy from our shelter. He is a nice dog, but he misses a dog owner who can show him in a positive though consistent way what the rules are, what can and what can't, an owner who is a leader. Also he was a bit spoiled, and when one of the children told him to get of the couch, the biting incident happened.
Falco has been socialised well though, visitors are greeted with joy and can approach and pet him, even when he doesn't know them. He has no problems with other dogs, and he lives in peace with the cat of the current owners. Before the incident there have never been problems with the children also.

In the meanwhile, Falco is listed in our shelter nevertheless, and all info can be requested here. The trust was gone and the children didn't dare taking him for a walk anymore."

This was the add we read on the internet when we were looking for a second dog to keep our border collie Jessie company. We had been looking in an other shelter and found a beautiful Old-GSD, but he couldn't live with other dogs so we sadly had to leave him. So when we found this add and saw Falco's face, we were already in love with him. But we had to go and have a look first. We already decided to get a sheepdog because they are easier to train, although my son would have loved a sleddog...

So I packed the kids and Jessie in the car and off we went, and an hour later the shelter invited us in to have a look at the dogs. There were so many lovely dogs, we would have taken 5 if we could, but you can imagine my husband wouldn't be to pleased if we arrived home with such a lot of dogs! So we went to see Falco and he was a lot bigger than I thought, being a cross breed Border Collie - Groenendaeler (they are the black variation of the Tervueren Sheepdog). Falco was very friendly towards the kids and Jessie, so we deciced to take a walk to test him and his behaviour outside with just us. The contact between the 2 dogs was very good from the start, so after our walk we decided to take him on trial and did the paperwork and we drove home with one dog more in the car than we came with.

First day at home:

 

The 1st of July was the first day Falco came to live with us, and it was clear that first day that he wasn't very fit. When Jessie began to play with him in the garden he was exhausted after 2 minutes running around. He was panting so hard he even got us worried, it was clear he wasn't used to much exercise. But every morning Jessie took him through the chasing ritual in the garden, and he improved a lot and even looked athletic after a while. Falco also loves going for a walk and sniffing around a lot and is the first one ready to go walking along the river of in the woods.

Falco's Collie walk:

 

Something else he couldn't do was to play. If you throwed a ball or toy at him, he just watched it intently until it fell on the ground and looked at you with a question in his eyes: what am I supposed to do now? Since we took him to dog training, it was a bit difficult he couldn't play because we always rewarded our dogs with a game tug-of-war. He wasn't interested in that and just started to snif around after an exercise. By acting very enthusiastic and him watching Jessie play, he eventually started to play too and now he can even play some tug-of-war, as long as it doesn't take too long.

Halloween 2008:

A few months later, in december, we suddenly got a phone call from his previous owners to ask how he was doing. We learnt that he destroyed a lot in his previous home, chewing on cell phones and mp3 players and what not. Fortunately he never did something like that here, he just didn't get bored enough to do that! Falco just loves guarding the house and the garden, and watches everything that's going on outside. When we get visitors, he's always friendly and children often get surprised with a wet tongue on their face (adults too, for that matter). When he sees a dog outside his territory, he tries to bark them away. When he is walking he is curious to meet other dogs, very gentle with little dogs and playful with others.

Watching everything!

 

Falco became a lovely and active dog here, he enjoyes life here. Sadly, after a year he started to get seizures. After a blood test it became clear he had epilepsy, and we started him on medication. He gained weight from this medication, and he sleeps more than before. But he can still be very active for a short while, and he never gives up his guarding job.