friends of the hound is a greyhound adoption group committed to the rehabilitation& rescue of Greyhounds in NSW

Abby and her new life!

We had been looking to adopt a dog for quite some time when my niece introduced me to their greyhound Ernie. I fell in love with him instantly for his affable & happy go lucky nature and wondered if a greyhound would work for us. We live on quite a large property and have an elderly cat so my boyfriend Mike was less excited about the idea then me but he was willing to give it a try. After contacting Lisa she decided she had the perfect dog for us, ‘Babe' (as Abby was then called), as she was deemed to have ‘no chase’.

When we first got her we were a bit dubious about how to introduce her to our cat Mickey and in the end had a less than ideal first attempt. We had neglected to clip Abby on her lead and Mickey took one look at her and bolted. Naturally Abby ran after him, (I defy any dog not to chase a running cat!) and as we’d changed her name, she did not respond when we tried to call her off. Anyway, there was no harm done and Mickey was fine and as we now know how fast Abby is, we also know if she had wanted to hurt him it would have been then. She was in fact just loping along behind him trying to work out what he was. It took only a month for them to be completely at home with one another, quite often sleeping together on the same bed. Over the past 3 years we’ve learned she has the most gentle soul when it comes to other animals.  We have regular visits from koalas, wallabies, echidnas, sugar gliders, and various birds and lizards. She just cocks her head to the side in wonder and occassionally will try to sniff them but then quickly moves on to the next thing to take her fancy. Even when our pet turtle comes out of the pond for food, she is careful to step back out of his way.

We were amazed at the fact that we had to teach her to do most ordinary things that other dogs just take for granted such as walking up and down stairs and wagging her tail, but as we have also discovered she is incredibly smart and usually needs only to be shown once before she learns something. She has such a sincere countenance with her beautiful brown eyes and regal long nose, so much so that at first we wondered if 'the lights were on but nobody's home'. This is definately not the case and we know she very quickly learned how to 'milk the room' of cuddles and affection by standing in front of and staring at you, willing you to make use of those lazy hands by patting her. When you tire of this, she simply moves on to the next chair and so on until she has cleverly got a pat from everyone, some not even realising they have done so. We affectionately call her 'our little love sponge'.

She is smart, obedient, loving and absolutely devoted to us and us to her. We regularly take her for walks on the beach which is her favourite thing because she gets to show off and run very fast. People are amazed when we put her on the 'stay' command and then walk 100m away from her before calling her to us and she comes like a bullet. When we get home she does her second favourite thing and goes to sleep for the rest of the day! :-) Kids just love her and she them. Abby has received many compliments from our friends and visitors over the years, (some from people who do not like, or are afraid of dogs) saying how gentle, loving and elegant she is, how lovely and soft she is to touch and how naturally clean she feels and smells. I couldn't think of life without her now and tell anyone who will listen what such beautiful dogs greyhounds are.

Alyssa & Mike