Name: Gandolf
Age: 5 years
Breed: Golden Retriever/ Samoyed
Personality: Orange
Price: 100 dollars
Status: Adopted
Through the last couple years at the Larimer Humane Society I have seen a general trend where adoptable dogs only stay for at most 2 weeks while cats tend to stay for days upon months at the shelter before being adopted. Along with this trend is the pattern where there always is more cats available than dogs available for adoption. However, this week was different. For the first time in almost 6 months the shelter was at capacity for dogs including one puppy. With fewer number of cats at the shelter and many of the ones present there for less than a week, I decided to find a dog who deserved a great home. Upon going through the profiles I came upon Gandolf as beautiful golden/samoyed dog with a gentle nature and calm manners. In the kennel this dog sat patiently and stoically without barking and almost majestic. His personality is a combination of the best traits from both goldens and samoyeds: intelligent, social, playful, and loyal.
Categorized as an orange dog (normal energy and normal maitenance) Gandolf has a great temperment while still being very playful in nature. In the first test, the greeting test, Gandolf became very excited and jumped all around the evaluator but not on the evaluator indicating both love of humans, higher energy level, but also lower maitenance as he has undergone some training. In the next test where dogs are left in a pseudoroom, Gandolf after looking around laid down within 2 minutes and was calm. This result means that he probably can be trusted in a house by himself again leading to a lower maintenance level. The third test evaluated his play level to which he was play motivated liking to play with plush toys more than anything else. This means not only is Gandolf well behaved but he is also a playful dog who is motivated by play which could be used as a training tool. He also scored high on the food motivated test and we found he knew sit, down, come, shake, and roll over. Obviously, this dog was well trained by the previous owners who surrendered him. The only flaw to this dog is he is a fence jumper and the previous owners lost him several times because of this behavior. When watched he would not jump, but left on his own devices he tended to fly the coop. Gandolf is a beautiful, well mannered dog who would be perfect for both family homes with children or for individuals looking for a dog. The only precaution is to make sure you watch the dog when outside or own a fence that is taller than 6 feet if this dog is going to be by itself in a yard with a lower fence.
