please find below the latest escapades of Oscar, one of our rehomed springers featured in Rescue Tails.

“The Boy Is Back!
Last time I updated this blog I told you that my human mum was waiting to hear from the behavioural vet who would help me not be so frightened about going on walks.

Well, it took nearly three months to hear from her and my mum got fed up with waiting so decided to start doing some work with me herself.

She read up a lot about learning to deal with the fears that humans have and came up with a plan that she thought might work with a dog too. Every day we did lots of games at home where I had to learn to trust her more and more, like her blowing noisy kisses on my face (which I didn’t use to like) and she learnt to trust me not to use my teeth at her.

We did loads of tricks like this, over and over again, until in the end I didn’t really get bothered by them as I knew she wouldn’t hurt me. But we also started to doing walks on paths (where there was no grass) and then built up to going onto paths in a park, then walking a little bit on the grass in a field, and then across a field but by the wall. All of this was on-lead so I knew she was still looking after me.

After a while, I really wanted to begin to explore outside a bit more with the other dogs so she would let go of the lead. I know it sounds a bit daft but it made me still feel safe if I could at least feel like I had a bit of her with me, even if I ran around a lot.

The best thing was that she always made sure that we did walks where there was water for me to have a swim in because that really is my favourite thing to do.

She would never, ever force me to do a walk. If I got a bit nervous and sat down she would just stop and stand beside me. She wouldn’t pay me any attention though so I started to realise that there was no real benefit in keep stopping because it didn’t really get me any extra attention.

When I started to walk again she would always tell me what a good boy I was and that made me happy.Each walk has made me happier and happier and now I can run around loads without my lead on! I think she still gets a bit worried though – but this time because I run off to explore and she can’t see me, apparently we now have to work on something called my “recall”.

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that after a couple of wobbly months I’m back to my old self again – running around the fells, sniffing out a gazillion interesting things, splashing in any mud or water I can find, being a Springer!

Here’s a photo of me having fun in the stream recently – boy, it’s good to be back to me again.

Oh and the special vet phoned my human mum last week to say she was ready to see me now but it would cost over £700. Apparently, I don’t need to see her now, and that has to be priceless.“

please find below the latest escapades of Oscar, one of our rehomed springers featured in Rescue Tails.

“I have to say that learning to leave sheep alone has had a few unwanted side effects, but I’m so grateful to my human mum and dad who are being really understanding about how I’m thinking at the moment.

As you know, I spent some time in a field with lovely sheep in and every time I ran over to play with them, a lady threw a very noisy plastic bottle towards me and shouted loudly that I should leave them. It only took a couple of times of this before I decided that it wasn’t worth the fun of chasing them over the fells anymore. I know my new human family were really pleased with me about this as it meant that going out for walks on the hills was much more fun for them.

Unfortunately, over the following weeks, I seemed to get a bit more upset every time we went out – for some reason, I seem to have become frightened not of just sheep but also grass and fields and open spaces. A couple of months ago they realised that I wasn’t just being lazy when I protested about going out, I was actually terrified and it just seemed to get worse each time we went out.

My new family are wonderful and don’t force me to go out at all – sometimes they take the other two dogs out and leave me at home for an hour or so, which is fine with me although when they come home I have a good sniff of them because they smell of outside and part of me really misses the fun they have.

Last month they took me to the vet, who checked me over and said I was clearly very anxious and has referred me to another vet who apparently specialises in dogs like me who have behavioural issues. Whilst we are waiting to see her, my mum takes me out on very short walks along paths that don’t really have much grass on them or aren’t open spaces, and I’ve started to really enjoy them. I think she knows this because my tail is now wagging loads rather than tucked firmly down between my hind legs! And she always makes sure we go somewhere that has water so I can have a bit of a swim at the end, which is one of my favourite things to do!

Everyone seems very patient with me, which I love. My human family say that this is all the fun of adopting a rescue dog because they get the chance to really make a difference. And I know that it won’t be too long before I’m happy enough to go exploring in fields again.”

please find below the latest escapades of Oscar, one of our rehomed springers.

A couple of weekends ago we were up at the cottage in the Lake District – one of my favourite places! – and my human mum took me and the other Springer out in the car. I was really excited when we stopped by the side of a field and I looked out of the window and saw that there were loads of sheep in the field – woo hoo!!!! This was going to be a brilliant morning full of chasing and games and mum shouting my name!

Anyway, it didn’t turn out quite like I’d planned. I had to wait in the car for a while because they took just the other Springer into the field and when she came back a bit later she looked very tired, so I was super excited to go and do the running and chasing of sheep that I thought she had been doing. There was another lady with my mum and she clipped my lead onto a very long lead so I was pretty sure I would still be able to chase the sheep a lot.

Boy, was I wrong! I saw this lovely little cluster of sheep in the corner of the field and so I started making a dash to go and play with them, but before I could get up to maximum sprint speed there was this HUGE noise right next to me. I was absolutely shocked and immediately rolled over onto my back while I tried to figure out what the heck had just happened! Next to me on the grass was one of those plastic squash bottles that seemed to have a few pebbles or something in it but but let me tell you, it had made a huge noise and really frightened me. At the same time, the lady was shouting “leave!” at me.

Well that was all a bit confusing but I got up and shook myself down and then started to have a walk a bit more around the field. The sheep started to move again when I walked towards them and I thought this meant they wanted to play so I started running towards them and then again – whoosh! This loud noise as the plastic bottle landed next to me and was told to “leave” again.

Now I’m not stupid and I started to realise that clearly whenever I went to play with the sheep this loud, noisy thing happened that I really didn’t like! So after a few minutes of walking nicely next to the lady I stopped and just had a really good look at the sheep. I sort of sniffed the air and gave them a good old stare, which the lady said to my mum was what she called “mint sauce eyes” and so she said “leave” very loudly and sort of showed me the scary bottle. Well, that was enough for me – message received and understood – so for the next 20 minutes or so we walked all around the field and let me tell you, I kept well away from those pesky sheep. At one point the lady even tried to make them run towards me but I quickly kept my head down and went in another direction!

I heard the lady say to mum that a farmer owns these sheep and is happy for her to do the training with them in that field, and that mum should use the same technique when she’s out on the fells with us. I could understand why the other Springer was so tired – it’s hard work to keep thinking all the time!

We weren’t back up in the Lakes for a couple of weeks and lots of fun things had happened and I’d forgotten all about this until last weekend when we went back to the cottage – which meant great excitement as we would be running on the fells again. We leapt out of the car and off we went, enjoying the fun and freedom until after a short while both the Springer and I spotted some sheep nearby. Unfortunately, our mum had spotted them too and no sooner had we started to run over to them and – BANG! – one of those rattly plastic bottles landed at our side and we were on our backs again! She told us to “leave” and we didn’t need telling again. It was a very different kind of walk after that – great fun and we spent hours sniffing and exploring and rolling in mud and splashing in water but whenever we came near to some sheep we both kept our heads down. If we looked at them for a few seconds – just to see if they wanted to play with us – mum shook the bottle to remind us how scary it was and we walked away.

Still, there’s lots of other exciting things to do this summer out there!

please find below the latest escapades of Oscar, one of our rehomed springers.