Heroic military dog to be honoured with 'Victoria Cross'

Heroic military dog to be honoured with 'Victoria Cross'
| Mail Online

We normally post about our own successes with foster labs, but here is an example of a badly behaved black lab turned national hero due to good training and example by his handlers:

An Army search dog that has saved the lives of scores of British soldiers in Afghanistan is to receive the canine equivalent of the Victoria Cross.

Treo, an eight-year-old black labrador, has spent the past five years sniffing out bombs and weapons hidden by the Taliban.

Yet as a puppy he was a badly behaved rebel in danger of being put down until intensive Army training turned him into the gutsy canine described by his handler, Sergeant Dave Heyhoe, as the best military dog he has served alongside.

Read the whole article, I think a lot of love and discipline was involved.  Rules, Boundaries and Limitations are a Lab's best friend.

Peace and Quiet When the Foster Dogs Leave

Gator 2009

Gator came to us with a lot of challenges. He suffers seizures and requires daily medication. He had also been kept as an outdoor dog and was pretty high strung. Then he suffered complications when he was fixed.

He took a lot of work to rehabilitate. It took a while to learn to walk on a leash. How to swim. And generally how to become a nice indoor dog. It was guaranteed he would show up with a tennis ball at family dinner time. More than once a spit tennis ball landed on a diner plate. His all time classic was when he shot a tennis ball from about 3 feet away and it swished right into Betsy's full wine glass.

He was a real character.

Piper, Gator & Hoover

Sleeping Dogs

Maggie #27

Crazy, lovable Maggie arrived January 2009. She was pretty sick and made of mess of the house, but eventually got better (and housetrained.)

She was way too skinny, but she sure could run fast and pull on a leash.

We had lots of fun during her stay. She spent a lot of time in the pool, going for walks, going on car trips, and chasing squirrels.

Kramer #26

Kramer came to us in November 2008.

Sorry 'bout that bunk bed stunt we pulled on him...

Labs at Work

Hoover, Tucker & Dillon at play.

4 Boys in Black

From Unwanted to Center of Attention

It's hard to believe these dogs were not wanted.

Here are some nice family portraits of

Pal

Shane

Rhett

and Jewel

Success Stories

People often ask if it is hard to give up a foster after inviting it into your house and making it a (temporary) part of your family. Some are hard to say goodbye to, but we keep reminding ourselvest that we do it for the dogs, not for us.

The best part is when we hear back from the dogs new homes and get to see some great pictures of their happy pets. All these great dogs got a second chance thanks to Mid-Florida Retriver Rescue and we are happy to do our small part.

The dog on top is now named Oliver. We will forever remember him as Scooter the puppy with extra personality.

The happy dog in the boat is Dudley.
The Beautiful white dog is Tonto. And the happy dog in the pool is Skipper. All enjoying their new forever homes.

#25 Tucker

Tucker came to foster as a very damaged dog. He was hand shy, meaning if you reached your hand out he thought you were going to hit him. If he was startled he would bite. He didn't trust any people or other dogs.

In a word, he was a wreck.

He came into our home the middle of August, and was succesfully adopted out on January 1. During that time he became a much more balanced dog and we grew to love him. Between his daily walks, good food, and a nice home he became more comfortable.As he settled in, we learned he had many talents.

He is one of the smartest dogs we have ever met. If you told him which toy to bring he would go find the right toy and bring it to play. He invented the game "Goalie Dog" for our family, where he would bring a big fluffy ball and drop it at your feet, then go into a doorway and play goalie while you tried to kick it by him.

We gave him a song "Goalie Dog" based on the Simpson's movie "Spider Pig."

Goalie Dog, Goalie Dog
Does whatever a Goalie Dog does.
Can he swing from a vine?
No he can't he's a dog.

O.k. it was silly, but all you had to do was sing the song and Tucker would show up with his goalie dog ball looking forward to playing.

Camp Hoover was very good therapy for Tucker. We gave him a long time, but he came out much better than when he showed up. Along the way we briefly grew to three dogs and he learned how to get along as part of a pack.

None of it was easy, but Tucker is truly one of our most rewarding foster rehabilitations.

Dillon Revisited

Poor Dillon. He went to his foster home with promises of walks and going fishing on the weekend. Unfortunately, his new owner became sick shortly after taking him and couldn't do anything with him.

Dillon returned to us on November 11. He left us in July at 85 pounds and came back at 104 pounds. He struggled to make it through the morning walk, and really couldn't keep up with Hoover and Tucker at all. All in all he was pretty unhappy, and had a bad case of halitosis to boot.

Breakfast and Dinner at Camp Hoover was pretty unfair to poor Dillon. The smallest dog, Tucker, got two cups of food to help fill out his skinny puppy frame. The medium dog, Hoover got 1.5 cups. And Dillon the huge dog got a mere cup. When he was adopted back out to a nice family on December 16 he was down to a more manageable 95 pounds.

Dillon has a beautiful face, and was very popular at the Petco meet and greets. Like Bentley before him, he talked quite a bit whenever someone came home. Probably asking where they've been.

After a month he was looking like a healthy lab again. He could manage the morning long walk and enjoyed playing with his two buddies Hoover and Tucker. We were never quite sure how to describe the three of them. Pack seemed too obvious. Gang didn't cut it either. We settled on "a convention of labradors." Thought that had the proper ring of a harmless group of black labs.