Rolling Dog Farm Blog

We have another happy adoption to report!  Our wonderful, long-time volunteer Laura W. from Helena has adopted blind Levi.  This sweet boy is a cross between a black Lab and something large with a big fluffy, curly tail (Akita?  Husky?).  You can read his original story here.

Because he was beaten blind — his eyes had blood in them when he first arrived — dear Levi was quick to submissively urinate, usually with men.  He has become much better about this in recent years.  His biggest problem was actually his desire to jump on people, something we have worked with him on for a long time.  With that training he now knows he’s not supposed to jump, but sometimes the urge can just be too tempting to ignore!  But a firm "Off!" usually does the trick.  He so eagerly wants to please that he will try to do anything you ask.  And oh, how he adores people … despite what someone did to him.

Levi was one of our dogs who we always thought would definitely do better in a single-family home.  That’s because he could get over-stimulated in our environment, with lots of other dogs and activity.  He’d feed off the other energy, and get excited and barky and wound-up.  He was never aggressive — not for a moment, he’s absolutely the gentlest thing you can imagine — but when he got excited he’d become a bit too much.  Yet whenever we’d let him hang out by himself in Widget’s House, while one of us was in there cleaning or doing laundry, he’d settle down right away.  After a minute of exuberantly greeting his person, he’d go quietly lie on a dog bed and happily chew on a toy.  Thus we knew in a quieter environment he’d be a calmer, different dog.

We had him listed for adoption for over a year, in fact, but we only had a couple of calls on him.  One of those potential adopters asked us to see how he does with cats.  So we took him over to our welcome center and introduced him to our barn cat Spark … who promptly hissed and whacked him on the nose.  Levi had a very hurt look on his face — "Wait, I didn’t do anything!" — but then proceeded to ignore Spark.  No worries there.

Laura saw the "inner Levi" in this big handsome boy and decided to take him home for a test drive.  He became what we predicted — a much more mellow, quiet guy.  Levi got along really well with Laura’s small dog, April, and he even tries to get her cats to roughhouse with him by doing play-bows.  These are a couple of photos Laura sent us of Levi at her house.

The test drive went so well — as you can see! — that Laura emailed and said, "He definitely is a keeper!"  This past Saturday Laura dropped off Levi for daycare and overnight boarding at Camp Rolling Dog (as we call it for our adoptees who come back for a visit) while she was out of town, and then she came back Sunday afternoon to pick him up.  That’s when we made it "official" and I took the photo at the top of Levi with his new Mom.

Thank you, Laura!