Sunday, March 8, 2009

Our newest member of the family.

For some time now Ruthie has been looking to get another dog for our family. She has repeatedly reminded me of Ryan's love of dogs and that every little boy needs a dog. She was even kind enough to send me the following video:



She started looking into dogs that have been trained through the
Colorado Correctional Industries Prison K9 Training Program. Because everyone knows it's better to have a dog that already knows how to drive the getaway car. ;)

Seriously though, the dogs that go through the Prison Trained K-9 Companion Program (PTKCP), have been saved from other shelters or rescues. Here is a brief description of the program:


All dogs which are rescued by the PTKCP receive appropriate veterinary care. This includes spay or neuter, multiple vaccine, rabies vaccine, heart worm test, heart worm preventative and worming. Some dogs come to our program suffering from neglect, lack of proper nourishment, abuse and require what would be extraordinary veterinary care. No dog owned by the PTKCP, will leave the program intact (meaning not spayed or neutered) regardless of breed, registered or unregistered.

The training each dog receives covers many aspects. First, the program is an intensive socialization program. The dog learns to be around and greet many people. They live with many other dogs. Basic manners training includes sit to greet a person, sit to go through a door, crate training and house training. Basic obedience includes: sit, sit-stay, down, down-stay, come when called, basic heeling on lead and we deal with any problem behaviors the dog has. Many dogs will go on to learn hand signals, or other tricks. We also feature confidence building with agility equipment training at some facilities.

The PTKCP is not tax supported.



Anyway, a few weeks ago, we saw Adam on the Colorado Correctional Industries website, along with a couple other dogs we thought we'd be interested in. We called and made an appointment to see these dogs on last Saturday, March 7. We took a beautiful Colorado road trip to Canon City.

We had an opportunity to visit with each dog that we had hoped to see. We even debated the possibility of getting two of them, because it was not an easy decision. In the end, we settled on Adam (his name for now).


Adam is a 6 - 8 month old puppy. Adam was donated to the PTKCP as a Great Pyrenees. Shortly after his arrival the trainers judged that he was not a Great Pyrenees. They think that he is quite the mix of Labrador, Collie, Australian Shepard and who-really-knows-what.

Here is a video of our time together meeting Adam:



We adopted him that day, but he still had a few more weeks to complete his training program. So we had to leave him behind but this has given us the chance to get more ready for his arrival. A few days later we received the call that we would be able to take him home on March 19. We will have to attend a two-hour adoption class so we learn the commands that he has learned.

So look forward to seeing Adam in upcoming posts/videos.

1 comment:

  1. Ah, two more days and you can take home your new arrival! Hope he's a good match for your family. :)

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