Birthday Daycare

"Are we almost there?"

Ahri already looks a lot different from when I last posted photos!  She has fully recovered (as far as can be detected) from her parasites, and thankfully just in time.  Arik had required meetings this week, causing his hours to be far too long for a growing pup.  He was able to stop for lunch at home for the greyhounds, but as anyone with greyhounds knows, they are far easier to tire out in short time periods than any other dog and don't tend to do much during the day besides sleep anyway. But as Ahri is still young and needs to be crated during the day (the greyhounds are free roam downstairs with muzzles), we thought it best that she go to daycare during his meeting days.

So today is her third day in a row of daycare, with the staff constantly commenting on how grateful they are to see her.  She is described as "the best player we've ever had" because she will play with any dog, any size, any age, any play-style.  She is also tireless, and will literally play all day, while most dogs go full speed and are done in a few hours, if that. But Ahri's energy level is interesting to me; she is perpetually a 3-4 out of 10 on the energy scale. She is never insane or "hyper" and is very mellow in temperament.  But while she remains low key, she has the endurance of a husky.  Whether she runs ten miles or none at all, there won't be much difference in her general demeanor.  I'll notice her being more "busy", but the speed in which she does anything is still the same. I think this ties back to the "Livestock Guardian" breed though, as they must be very even tempered to not startle their flock, but also must travel many miles in a day's work as they roam the fields.

In any case, she impresses me that she can tire out the daycare's most active dogs, but is also compliant and mellow enough to get along swimmingly with my lazy older greyhounds!  She does have a sense of charm about her in that every dog likes her.  Ferguson, who is often so grumpy and impatient with younger dogs, actively invites her to play with him, lets her lick his ears, and genuinely seems to enjoy having her around.  I think he plays with her 3x more than Winry does!

It is true that daycare does tire Ahri, but I suspect she is not as good at monitoring her energy levels as an adult dog.  She will often seem restless when she comes home in that she still wants to be a part of everything and follow everyone around to see what they're up to.  In the evenings we've had to ask her to kennel-up (which she can do from across the house, by the way...such a smart pup!), to convince her to hang out in one place, and within 5 minutes she's dead asleep.  But without this prompting, she'll keep going like the energizer bunny...unbelievable.

For my birthday this evening, my parents are flying in from out of town and we're headed to dinner with friends, so I will appreciate Ahri being a living stuffed animal for majority of the evening. By morning though, she'll be up and ready for our 1-2 mile long walk with the greyhounds...;).