Nice dog, poss K9 prospect on death row allentown, PA - Page 5

IMO any dog evaluator who labels a a dog as aggressive due to it's behavior inside a kennel run (or crate) needs to go back to school. That's about the worst way to judge dog's temperament. Walk through almost any boarding kennel and most of the dogs are the hitting fence barking. Where do these shelter people get their dog behavior training or don't they get any?

Charles, I'm sure most here are indebted to you for taking a look at this dog and making a correct assessment of his temperament. I'd sure hate to think any dog is deemed dangerous and destroyed based on it's behavior while being confined inside a kennel. Some of the nicest dogs I've owned have been the ones who acted the most aggessive indside their runs. Take them out and they were different dogs. Thanks for helping with Max.

Charles does indeed have a good eye for a working dog and for temperament. Max is fortunately indeed to have caught his eye and won his, and my hearts. The entire Wallace family was to my house on Saturday, his son doing a fine job of handling the GS in the protection testing, first time ever. Max has brought a lot of people together this Christmas Holiday with his winning ways. I know we will all remain friends in future. I personally can't think of many better ways to celebrate the birth of Jesus than the way we have this year. I will post more pix of Max on the Males for Sale page when I get a chance, as the upload photo feature is down on the message board at this time. Merry Xmas all, and god Bless the MANY people who rose to the occasion to save Max. Great job all! (except Patches/Ben, of course, but we all ignored his negative remarks anyway ;) SS

More pix I took of of Maximus: http://www.pedigreedatabase.com/gsd/classifieds/49958.html I misspelled his name in the header, but he's still the same dog! :-D SS

Yes, that's Charles Max is nuzelling, and for GOOD reason! SS

Good job Charles & Shelley (and Molly too!) I have been following along on this thread. Max is very lucky to have someone qualified to evaluate him on a basic level. Charles undoubtedly could have eyebrows raised on his end by not immediately euthanizing a dog that appears to be aggressive to the layman. The only thing you can do with a dog that shows any potential for aggression is get the dog into a professional situation (where the liability is then on the new organization) or euthanize the dog. You cannot easily release the dog into a private situation without the liability being still on the rescue. Considering the state of most government run facilities, it would have been much easier for him to put him down and go on about his day :) Charles has the thankless job of cleaning up other people's messes. I would wage a guess that he has saved more lives than 80% of those of us on this board, and on government pay! That deserves a huge thank you any day of the week and regardless of the breed... Kudos to all that have participated in Max's prison break! Blitzen- I think that is may be more about marketing that proper evaluation. A shelter evalutor can read a dog beautifully- but if your random person looking to adopt is scared of one dog, they will leave and all the dogs suffer. Most of our shelters put down everything that barks and looks scary.... I seldom see decent GSD prospects in city shelters locally, the ones that are labeled "Adoptable" are cream puffs who don't get off the couch. Shannon :)

LCSH is not even government funded. It is funded by donation, bequests, fund-raisers, and adoption fees. They are not chartered to do animal control, but provide this service on a contractual basis. Max was picked up by animal control, then transferred to the shelter. Charles is one of those specially gifted people who can approach nearly any animal, regardless of circumstances, and handle it without force when other people dare not go near it. His confidence in a stressful situation seems to travel to animals via osmosis, calming everyone and every thing around him. He's like a human tranquilizer. LOL I look forward to the day when I can pull the occasional working GSD from shelters myself. I don't know what I have to do as far as paperwork, am limited by township ordinances, property use restrictions (read: forget a kennel license) but perhaps I can obtain some "official" certifications we seem a bit "fuzzy" in that regard. Chances are there could be some loop-holes once a working relationship is established with a shelter or two. Rescue work is addicting I think. ;) I have only rescued a few dogs, but I found the endeavor infinitely satisfying on each occasion, especially the pix from the forever homes that arrive after the dogs are placed. Its amazing how far a tank of gas, a few hundred cell-phone minutes, some time online networking can go! My New Year's resolution is to look into what I might be able to do to help in future (red tape) and get further involved once I have the space. As a breeder myself, I think its part of my responsibility to help good dogs produced by less ethical breeders than myself that find themselves in unhappy circumstances. I can't wait to take pix of Max in front of the shelter Xmas tree tomorrow, and walking out the front door of the shelter with Molly to start a better life! I am going to try to get the local paper to publish his story, "feel good" piece/photos, even on short notice. E-mailing editors today. SS

What a gorgeous dog Max is! Someone is going to be very lucky that you, Charles, & Molly were pulling for this guy, Shelley! Good work--nice save! Merry Christmas! jh

I'll hopefully be meeting Charles and Max, and taking Max home with me tomorrow. Only one more day for him in the pound, then hopefully many more happy days for him. molly

Special thanks to and God Bless flygirl55, who generously donated the money we need to pull Max from the shelter! We couldn't do it without her! The power of the GSD lovers on this board is amazing. SS