Well after the previous hearing dog we had to stay who was very calm and quiet, Mabel the whirlwind arrived on 3rd September. She was a large 5 month old golden Labrador who certainly made her presence known as soon as she bounded in the front door. Like all the puppies she came complete with crate, toys, food etc etc and took over our house immediately. She was very very excited and was only here for about 10- minutes when she decided to christen the carpet, fall through the mesh of our small fish pond and race around the garden as fast as she could. She continued her crazy manic behaviour for a good few hours, just stopping for her tea, and didn’t really quieten down until she went to bed. After protesting for a few minutes she eventually went quiet and we didn’t hear a peep from her until 8.00 a.m the following morning – not surprising really, she must have been exhausted.
As soon as I opened her crate door in the morning, I was greeted with a very waggy tail and her whole body shook with excitement as she was so pleased to see me. Today was the morning that she would meet Henry, our neighbours golden retriever who I walk twice a week. He is an elderly, well behaved dog and very placid dog (he had to be with Mabel). It was love at first sight, with the feeling obviously being mutual, although Mabel terrorised poor old Henry who is used to a very sedate walk without a young puppy biting his ear and jumping on him at every opportunity – although he seemed to love it. I did however for his own wellbeing have to take him back to his house after a long play after the walk in the garden for a rest and some peace and quiet.
It was very warm whilst she was with us, and she appeared to love water so I decided to fill up a plastic boat that we had lying around so she could keep cool. She absolutely loved it and would go in in and paw the sides as if she was digging in a sand pit. We emptied it out every night, but Mabel even liked it empty and would sit in it and look pretty!!!! Below is a video of Steve filling the boat (with a hosepipe!!) whilst Henry is looking on desperate to join in, but Mabel is adamant she is not going to share her paddling pool.
Along with keeping up her basic training which I have to say Mable definitely had a will of her own and her concentration span was rather short, but when she was fully focussed on the job in hand she was very good, as long as you always had a treat in your hand. But her favourite treat of all where I could get her to do almost anything was wait for it – blackberries. She absolutely loved them, which was really handy as it was the blackberry season so they were in abundance. She loved them so much that she would even suck, yes suck them off the brambles as we walked past any low ones that were just at nose height as she seemed to know that they could be prickly.
We have a super place to walk dogs from our house where you have to go up a farm track which then leads on to an open moorland area called Henlake Down where the blackberries were. Going up the farm track Mabel was fascinated with the calves that were in the field and every time we passed the gate we had to stop for Mabel to say “hello” to them, and was quite put out when they were too far away for her to rub noses with them.
She did have a few trips out in the car which included a walk on Wembury beach followed by a pub lunch!!! A walk around a local garden centre where she was accosted by two female sales assistants who once they had found out that Mabel like licking feet, took their shoes off to experience Mabels tongue, whilst customers stood and looked on. We also took her for a walk at Burrator Reservoir stopping off at a river bank to have a picnic whilst Mabel played in the water.
She stayed with us for 12 days and we grew very fond of her, although I have to say that she did prefer Steve to me, I have no idea why as I was quite put out by this, as I was the one who fed her and pampered to her every whim, but she showered all her affection on him from the moment she bounced through the door when she arrived to the day she left.
Mabel went back to her socialiser on the 15th September and we did miss her even though she was only with us for a short while and the house seemed very empty. We wish her luck in her future training and whoever ends up with Mabel will have a super dog.
Hearing Dog Puppy Mabel The Golden Labrador Comes To Stay
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