Zoey 15-037

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Happy Spring to such a pretty girl who was also very brave toda  Happy Spring to such a pretty girl who was also very brave today! Janell

 

In addition to LOVE this dog has the following requirements:
Entered Foster Care Fence Kid Friendly Another Dog Cat Friendly
2/12/2015   Required Ages 10+ Required Not Tested 
This is the most recent information available; however, it may change as we learn more about the dog.

I'm so pleased to introduce Zoey, an absolutely lovely 3 1/2-year-old purebred Golden Retriever. Zoey is such a sweetie, we feel fortunate to get to foster her and help her find the family that will love her and provide her with a great home. Honest, she is just a beautiful girl with a thick, dark gold coat with reddish highlights, and she's very brave on top of being so pretty. She's gone through so much change this last week or so -- she gave birth to a litter maybe eight or nine weeks ago, at which point her owners surrendered her to RAGOM. Zoey was transported from South Dakota to her foster home, spending time in the car with a series of five different drivers, and each one commented on what a lovely girl she was! The start of the RAGOM Zoey Fan Club!

Zoey has been very cautious in learning about living in our home. We think much of all of this is new to her, but she watches what our resident dogs do and then carefully follows their lead. So far, she's learned to love exploring the fenced backyard - and she seems to really enjoy rolling in the snow no matter how cold it is. She's explored each room of the house and even mastered the stairs to the guest room, much to our surprise. I'm not sure how much experience she had with stairs, but if the other dogs were going upstairs, so was she!

Zoey claimed our sun porch as her safe spot while she settles in -- it's a heated room right off the kitchen where she can watch what's happening outside at the same time she's close to the action in the kitchen. We made a nice bed for her and she sleeps through the night easily, waking up when the rest of the dogs greet her in the morning. She has surprised us with her manners -- she has not had a single accident in the house, hasn't chewed on anything inappropriate, and shares her toys without any complaints. She takes her time eating, and sometimes we have to remind her to finish her meal. She has quickly bonded with my husband, but comes to both of us easily to be petted and for special attention and treats.

Zoey has been to the vet to catch up on her shots and is scheduled to be spayed on March 27th. She had her nails trimmed and the vet said she's in great health. We think she could stand to lose a few pounds - right now, she's 85 pounds and still has puppy tummy. The vet gave us some ointment to soothe her eyes and she doesn't mind at all when we apply this twice a day.

Zoey is going to require a fenced yard and a confident companion dog in her future home. We haven't had a chance to test her with cats or with children, but will try to make that happen in the next few weeks while we wait for her spay surgery.

We'll post updates to let you know how she's doing. Right now, we're going to work on confidence building with Zoey and helping her learn more about how to enjoy this new stage in her life.

At a Glance #15-037

Golden Retriever Born: July 2011
Female 75 lbs

Status: Adopted

Profile

 

Happy Spring to such a pretty girl who was also very brave toda  Happy Spring to such a pretty girl who was also very brave today! Janell

 

In addition to LOVE this dog has the following requirements:
Entered Foster Care Fence Kid Friendly Another Dog Cat Friendly
2/12/2015   Required Ages 10+ Required Not Tested 
This is the most recent information available; however, it may change as we learn more about the dog.

I'm so pleased to introduce Zoey, an absolutely lovely 3 1/2-year-old purebred Golden Retriever. Zoey is such a sweetie, we feel fortunate to get to foster her and help her find the family that will love her and provide her with a great home. Honest, she is just a beautiful girl with a thick, dark gold coat with reddish highlights, and she's very brave on top of being so pretty. She's gone through so much change this last week or so -- she gave birth to a litter maybe eight or nine weeks ago, at which point her owners surrendered her to RAGOM. Zoey was transported from South Dakota to her foster home, spending time in the car with a series of five different drivers, and each one commented on what a lovely girl she was! The start of the RAGOM Zoey Fan Club!

Zoey has been very cautious in learning about living in our home. We think much of all of this is new to her, but she watches what our resident dogs do and then carefully follows their lead. So far, she's learned to love exploring the fenced backyard - and she seems to really enjoy rolling in the snow no matter how cold it is. She's explored each room of the house and even mastered the stairs to the guest room, much to our surprise. I'm not sure how much experience she had with stairs, but if the other dogs were going upstairs, so was she!

Zoey claimed our sun porch as her safe spot while she settles in -- it's a heated room right off the kitchen where she can watch what's happening outside at the same time she's close to the action in the kitchen. We made a nice bed for her and she sleeps through the night easily, waking up when the rest of the dogs greet her in the morning. She has surprised us with her manners -- she has not had a single accident in the house, hasn't chewed on anything inappropriate, and shares her toys without any complaints. She takes her time eating, and sometimes we have to remind her to finish her meal. She has quickly bonded with my husband, but comes to both of us easily to be petted and for special attention and treats.

Zoey has been to the vet to catch up on her shots and is scheduled to be spayed on March 27th. She had her nails trimmed and the vet said she's in great health. We think she could stand to lose a few pounds - right now, she's 85 pounds and still has puppy tummy. The vet gave us some ointment to soothe her eyes and she doesn't mind at all when we apply this twice a day.

Zoey is going to require a fenced yard and a confident companion dog in her future home. We haven't had a chance to test her with cats or with children, but will try to make that happen in the next few weeks while we wait for her spay surgery.

We'll post updates to let you know how she's doing. Right now, we're going to work on confidence building with Zoey and helping her learn more about how to enjoy this new stage in her life.

Updates

Monday, March 23, 2015

Zoey had a terrific week again -- full of big steps for this lovely girl. Zoey practiced riding in the car every day this week - sometimes with her buddy dog, sometimes alone with FM and FD. Zoey seems to prefer riding on the floor of the back seat, but sometimes she rides on the seat. All in all, she's really improved and now will get in the car on her own most of the time with encouragement.

Zoey also had play dates with other RAGOM dogs in the area and with other RAGOM volunteers. She seemed most interested in hanging close to Foster Dad, but then, he typically has treats in his pockets and that's hard to compete with! Zoey also went to the groomer this week and she looks fabulous! She did pretty well, considering this was most likely her very first time at a groomer's. They took extra time to make sure she was comfortable and the only part of the process she wasn't fond of was the dryers that made a *lot* of noise. Turns out Zoey's coat is just gorgeous -- she's a rich medium to dark gold with reddish highlights. Very pretty.

  

Zoey also was a trouper at the Meet-and-Greet in Marion on Saturday. We were worried that it would be overwhelming for her since we knew there would be a lot of people and a lot of dogs. If necessary, we were prepared to take her home early as we didn't want her to have a bad experience. Turns out she enjoyed all the petting she received, although she did have her tail tucked most of the time. She wasn't necessarily relaxed, but we think she did very well.

Zoey is going in on Monday to be spayed, microchipped, and to have her teeth cleaned. We know that ZoZo has a fan club; we'll keep you posted on how she does!

  

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

Zoey is really enjoying this lovely spring weather. Today, she was out in the yard, exploring every corner and enjoying the smells, finding the toys that spent the winter hidden in the snow. She also managed to talk two of our dogs into playing with her -- she is just very anxious for a dog to play and romp with her, to chase her around and have some fun. Two of our dogs took her up on the offer and I wished I had my camera to catch it for you.

Zoey is going to be at the Meet and Greet in Marion, Iowa, this next weekend, so we're going to get her bathed and ready for the big day. She's not at all thrilled with getting in the car, so we're going to practice every day so she's more comfortable. She rides beautifully in the car; she just doesn't want to get in at this point. We've watched how she conquers all the things that have frightened her or worried her, and it's usually by learning from her buddy dogs. So, our plan is to have her practice getting in the car with one of her buddy dogs. We'll take it slow and report back on our success next week!

Zoey has learned some new things that I just love. The first is that she now gets up on the couch and snuggles next to me and rests her head in my lap. Until this week, she was not at all comfortable with the idea, although she tested it out several times, but now, she has decided that a snuggle is a really good thing. She's also very excited about getting on the bed in the morning. She has even managed to jump up on the bed on her own several times, which seems like a big accomplishment. My guess is that she's never done anything even remotely like that before, but she's a fast learner and loves that special time in the morning. The other thing she's learned is to sleep in the bedroom with us. She just wasn't sure until this last week -- we had moved a bed into the room so she'd have a special spot, but it wasn't until this week that she decided to actually join us. Now she joins us nightly and follows the pack to bed like a pro.

Zoey is such a sweetie - we're really enjoying having her with us. She is a gentle spirit and learning more about the world every day. Zoey needs a family that will help her continue to grow, but this isn't hard work; it just takes a bit of patience and then you're rewarded with her great smile and the knowledge that you're helping a very deserving girl reach her potential!

Zoey goes in to be spayed later this month and once she has recovered, she'll be ready to meet families who might be interested in her. We think the vet is going to be pleased -- she's lost a little weight and she looks good!

Monday, March 2, 2015

Zoey had a great week and we're getting to see more of her personality each day. She's full onboard with the household routine and knows exactly when she thinks she should be fed and where. She does a great breakfast dance and a great dance for dinner too! She takes her treats very gently and is practicing how to take turns with the rest of the dogs.

We've learned that Zoey absolutely loves to be groomed - she will stand still for the longest time to let you comb her coat. It's almost a zen experience for her; she closes her eyes and you can tell she is enjoying every second of the experience. She has found her favorite toys and really enjoys the soft toys the most. The bad side of that is she likes to destroy and then eat those soft toys, so we're moving her to some hard chew toys so we don't have to worry about her.

Zoey is learning to come to her name - it's not a matter of knowing the concept; we think she just doesn't fully trust us yet. Life is still full of noises and actions that she's unfamiliar with, so she is cautious and looks to our resident dogs to decide what to do and whom to trust. She absolutely loves my husband and she decided that very quickly. She is just a few days away from crawling up in his lap, I think. You can watch her test out the concept when she sees the other dogs do it. She's also expressing interest in climbing up on the bed but I think that's going to take a very long time to conquer.

Zoey seems to really be enjoying the snow we've had and she runs with the other dogs to explore the yard and then runs back in to warm up. She's learned the word "outside" and never turns down the opportunity to play outside. We tried Zoey on a leash this week and the entire concept of walking on a leash is something that's going to take a while for her to consider. Because she won't go to the bathroom on a leash and because she startles and darts away easily, we feel this strong girl needs a fenced yard to keep her safe. Zoey has started to use her paws to interact with us and with the dogs. While we're going to work on this behavior, we can see that she would not be a good playmate for young children, and for this reason, we feel she will do best in a household with children ten years or older. She's a sweet girl who is very playful and very strong!

This last week, we had some extremely cold nights so we decided to move Zoey's bed to a part of the house that would be warmer and close off the area she had claimed as her safe zone. Although we did this in stages, she was not at all excited about the change and it took her two days to decide that she could sleep on her bed in the living room instead of the sun porch. We've tried to entice her to sleep in the bedroom with us and although she gets excited about the idea, she's not ready to take the leap.

Zoey has people and dog company coming for dinner tonight - we'll update you on how she handles it all! In the meantime, here are some new pictures of this lovely girl!