Cheyenne, Not the Mountain!

Today I crossed off another thing on my list, and added to my family!
80. Adopt a dog from the animal shelter.

I officially adopted my 5 month old, Golden Retriever/Australian Shepherd(?) foster puppy.  Her name is Cheyenne.


Honestly, out of all the foster dogs I've tried to convince my parents to let me adopt (there have been probably five or six by now), she is the most perfect.  She has medium-length fur, but it doesn't seem to mat or get dirty too fast, and while she is probably going to be a little smaller than I wanted for my thru-hiking partner her intelligence and agility makes up for her lack of size.  I've been taking her hiking pretty much everyday, and she's a wonderful hiking partner.  She walks well on leash (for a 5 month old puppy it's better than "well"!), she enjoys walking through the woods, likes jumping over things, or crawling under them, and it's pretty easy to regain her attention after she sees a squirrel or chipmunk!

I have a long plan for her training.  It starts now, with daily hikes, very basic obedience (sit, stay, down, her name, etc), socializing her with other dogs and people, and - as soon as I get my tent - sleeping outdoors.  That's all we'll be working on for the next month at least.  She isn't going to need a ton of training.  My beagle required a lot of training sessions just to be able to "sit" on command, and he still rarely does without getting a treat for it! Cheyenne already will sit for no treat, and I don't need to work with her on "heel" because she already does, without being told.

This is a picture of my puppy on her first hike!