Poor little sweetheart . Pooch is such a wonderful dog and he deserves a loving home as soon as possible to help him recover. Please come forward for this gorgeous boy!

We are the very lucky trio who were able to give Pooch a short term holiday from kennels over the Christmas break. Sadly, we were unable to keep him as he really needs more time and company than we are able to give (and unfortunately our girl wasn't sure she wanted his excited attentions all day) but I want to share with you the wonderful character of this lovely little fellow. We are all hoping that there is a perfect home for him out there somewhere and that he will find it very soon.

I collected Pooch the weekend before Christmas and he was very, very excited to be getting into a car (as you would expect) and for his own good had to tie him into the back seat to prevent him trying to drive us home himself. He was very vocal on this trip but we have since taken many short trips in the car and he has been quiet and desperate to be as close to us as possible, and loves watching the world zoom by. Even by the time we had been for our first walk back home Pooch had started to respond really well to "sit" and is obviously a very intelligent dog, but unfortunately seemed to have been given very little (if any) training before. He was very excitable when we got him home and insisted on constantly sniffing our existing dog over several days which resulted in a few scraps (again, as often expected) but this settled down fairly well once our dog affirmed that she really was going to be "top dog" here (in fact it was more her that was the difficulty here!).

Pooch is a very, very fast learner and after only 2 weeks out of kennels had already learnt to "sit", "stay", "leave" (providing the command is repeated), "bed", "come" (most of the time - see below re walks) and knew that he had to sit before crossing a road often with only a reminder of mentioning his name (especially as he meant he got some fuss for it!) Sometimes he would forget these commands but only when he was very over-excited and he would eventually respond when the commands were repeated, Given he had only just been taught them we were really impressed with the speed in which he picked them up. He even learnt to give me his paw with the request "paw" which was very handy when wiping them clean and when wanting to give him a little hug!

Pooch is full of energy and loved getting out to chase the ball (when chasing the ball or a stick his recall is pretty good, and again was improving at the end of our time with him, but less so if he has nothing to focus his energy on) and played really well with our dog, either chasing his or her toys and often chasing each other so they could end up in a game of tug toy which he always let our dog win! Usually he would deliberately get the toy first then run round as a cheeky way of encouraging our dog to join in the fun! Round the house he is full of energy too, especially immediately after a walk, but more than anything always wants to be close to you (leading to him often following us around the house) and he calms down very quickly when he curls up on the sofa with you or on your lap (preferably somewhere he can have a hug and some fuss) and we've had many hours spent with a very tired, sleepy Pooch curling up with us. He does dearly love his hugs! His need to be close seems as if he will need a home where he can be with his new owners for much of the day. He was fine at ours to be left for 4-5 hours at times but was not able to hold himself for much more than this (except overnight when generally it was good) and showed signs of separation anxiety after a relative of ours tried to keep him for 2/3 days with a view to fostering him for a longer period. He just needs the right home with owners that can spend lots of time and lavish lots of affection on him! He really deserves a wonderful loving home (possibly with another dog, I would not recommend a home for him with small furries or cats though after our experience!)

At meal times he learnt fast that if he waited for us to feed our dog first he would still get food and responded very well so that we no longer had to hold him back and he would patiently go to "his side" of the kitchen, sit and wait for his dinner. Watch for anything within reach though - we did catch him attempting one day to pull a bowl off the work top, very patiently and slowly, with only one claw! Bless him!

Pooch spent Christmas Day and Boxing Day with us at our families and was generally pretty good despite being understandably over-excited. He did rather a lot of humping initially with all the ladies when very excited but again a gentle hand on the scruff of his neck to remove him was all that was needed to remind him that it was not appropriate behaviour! He loved the adult men in the family - just loved curling up on their laps and promptly going off to sleep!! Just as excited by everyone but figured out who would give fuss (no children there so cannot say how he would respond but would suggest he may be too excitable to be homed with young children).

We let both dogs sleep in their beds in our bedroom and shut them in with us with a bowl of water overnight. Pooch initially tried the whole "yeh, human bed" thing but with repeated firm commands quickly got into a routine of only trying it on once before heading to bed. Having said that he did somehow manage to end up on our bed by morning so best for someone who is more than happy to share their bed space with their newfound friend. And what a friend! We spent some lovely hours all curled up on the bed - none more so than Christmas morning when both dogs and our sacks from Santa took up almost as much space as us!

How to sum Pooch up? A lovely cheeky chappie who learns fast and who loves to be loved and made a fuss of - a real character of a dog. We really loved him and were so sad to have to return him to the kennels (I'll admit that I shed a tear or two to have to let him go) but we hope that the time spent with us will mean that he can now quickly find his forever home with people who can lavish the time and affection on him that he truly deserves.