Is your dog a cat burglar or a stomp the yard type?
You would expect a big dog to move through your house like a bull in a china shop. I've been around noisy, gregarious Labradors who thunder from the kitchen to the yard, back through the sliding glass door until crashing onto a couch. Why? Because someone they knew drove up the driveway.
On the flip side, I grew up with Dobermans who could be light on their feet, if they wanted to. As a teenager I played a few games of hide and seek with Zorro, and lost not to his incredible sniffer but his stealth. He actually snuck around the couch from the opposite side before I heard or saw him.
After reading a new Scientific American post, "Who's Better at Sneaking Around: Dogs or Teenagers?" by Julie Hecht (@Dogspies), I got to thinking about my big Shepherd Husky girl.
Over the course of our life together, her physical presence was always large than life, but could also be quite silent. At young adult, our return home was greeted by her racing up to poke us in the stomach, followed by her jetting down the hallway to jump on our bed so hard the mattress and bedding slid two feet. She'd proceed to gallop back to the living room until her body hit the couch hard enough for it to slam into the windowsill.
She did this particular greeting for about three years, long enough that we were shocked when she ever so quietly took a piece of cheese off a plate. In front of us.
Until that moment I didn't think our dog knew the word subtle.
Our 85 lb. Shepherd Husky pawed, poked, bumped and jumped her way through the day. That afternoon when she flowed smoothly by the coffee table with the cheese and crackers on it, nipped the cheddar slice, and tiptoed her way into another room like a jewel thief, I was shocked!
I also couldn't stop laughing, at myself. Boy, did she just show me what it means to "assume" wrongly about a dog. Later that night, we added another nickname for her, kitten feet.
~ Sharon Castellanos
Is your dog a cat burglar or a stomp the yard type?