Holly's Evolution As A Watch Dog, continued...

[Richard Crowe]

Holly is now a bit over 21 months old and weighs about 60-pounds which, although not on the big side for a Doodle, is still a pretty big dog. We had tree trimmers on our property today and last Saturday, thinning the deadwood out of our oak trees and spraying and fertilizing the trees.

Holly was absolutely fierce looking barking at the trimmers through the sliding glass door. However when I brought her out and introduced her to the trimmers; she calmed down and accepted that they were O.K..

One of the trimmers remarked, "I can't believe this is the same dog! She seemed like she wanted to bite our heads off before she came out with you!"

In my opinion, that is just the behavior I want from Holly. Fierce looking at first and then friendly after being introduced!

She really seems pretty intimidating and I don't think that I would want to enter a house that had a big dog like that barking - add our four Maltese barking to the chorus and the result is pretty formidable.

[Lindsey, Lee, Whopper and Simba]

It's always slightly amusing when a doodle starts using their intimidation tactics. We never considered Whopper to be much of a guard dog but a couple weeks ago we went to sleep with our bedroom door open. My sister and her boyfriend came in at 6:15 and Whopper went charging out of the bedroom, down the stairs and was barking and growling. She knows my sister so once she said Whopper, it's just me, she settled down but it was comforting to know that in the event someone who's not supposed to shows up, Whopper would at least cause a scare (and wake us up too).