Here's another thing I wrote on him, but I never got any replies.
(on another forum)
"Okay, I've always wondered a bit about one of my dogs and was wondering if anyone had any experience with these types of behaviors. This is going to be long, and I'm sorry in advance. xD
The dog in question is named Trey and is an 10 1/2 year old neutered male Shetland sheepdog. He spent his first year of life with his breeder who at the time had 11 shelties (including him) and a cat. All the other shelties were female. She was contemplating keeping him for herding and agility as he was small enough to be in the smaller agility class and he had a lot of talent. She was also waiting to see if he'd indeed be show quality. However, he matured and stayed smaller than she expected along with some other faults, so she decided he would be better off as a pet. A family she knew was interested in adopting him, so they began babysitting him for some time on the weekends when she was gone to show. They wouldn't decide if they truly wanted a dog, so when she found out my father was looking to get another sheltie she explained to him she had a near one year old male that she thought would be wonderful with us. So we babysat him two days to see how well he got on with Nikki and they immediately hit it off. So we ended up with him. He was neutered a bit after his first birthday. That should be a bit of background…
Now, he's the sweetest dog, it's just… he's very strange. It sounds bad, but he is. He is very submissive, first of all. He hates strangers- which is a trait of shelties to begin with. He hides if a new person comes in our house and won't come to see them for quite some time. This has been getting better in the past few years. I've had two friends come in and to my astonishment he took right to them and within 20 minutes was asleep with his head in their lap. He also hates strange dogs. He loves attention, however if you call him, he runs up to you with his tail wagging, but as soon as he gets within a foot of you, he sits, looks straight down at the ground and holds out his paw for you to shake it. I don't know if he thinks that if you shake, it's a sign of friendship? If you are petting another dog, however, he will come right up to you and demand attention also. (Typical sibling rivalry) He is also very dominant when you let him outside. He runs out the door, usually first, though sometimes I will make him sit and stay before he can go, then he runs around the yard barking with his tail in the air and his fur bristled. He is brilliant with commands, and picks up on them very fast. He also has a habit of running into doors, and missing any treats that you toss to him. At first I thought his eyesight was going, but both vets say it's fine… Another oddity is it took forever for him to show affection. He also used to not tolerate being held. He'd freeze up and lock his legs and squirm- you could not hold him. Now he's better and really quite a lap dog. It's taken ages, though, and it's only been in the past 4 years or so. He used to never lick anyone, but he will sometimes, and he will only lick my hand, no one else's. He also does not understand the concept of playing. As a one year old, he did not pay any attention to toys at the same age when Nikki was very playful. If you throw a toy for him to catch or fetch he just looks at it. Also, if the other dogs are playing, he follows them around wagging his tail and growling. He never joins in and freezes up if they try to play with him. He is by far a follower and waits until Nikki eats before he eats, even though they have their own bowls. We've tried splitting them up to eat, but he still won't eat unless she's in the room. He won't do anything without her there, they're really close, and she's basically a bully. J If you crate him and feed him, which we do at the relative's to keep the kids from bugging them, he will step on his food dish and spill the food all over, then use his muzzle to push it into a pile with the dish on top. Is he trying to hide his food? If Beau is doing something, trey is copying it. He's picked up a lot of Beau's mannerisms, including lying on the back of the couch since we got him. Overall, he's very devoid of any kind of expression...
The most important thing, though, is that he is terrified of cars and the vets. Ever since he got neutered, he went way downhill with this. A few months later, we were taking him to the vet's. He was on a leash with one of the techs and he pulled out of his leash and ran down a 4 lane highways right in the middle of the lane. Luckily, with the entire vet staff and my family chasing him and a nice woman following him in a car slowly to make sure he didn't get hit, he was rescued without incident. Ever since then, he's hated the vet's. He shakes terribly there and frequently has accidents. He also puts up a huge fight if you are trying to get him into the car. This has gotten much worse with age. As far as cars, if he sees one while we're walking, he stops and sits and won't move. He also will not walk past a certain spot in our neighborhood. We thought he was missing Nikki for a while, so we tried walking him with her, and it makes no difference. He stops and sits and will not move if he gets too far from the house. You can get him to go a ways by coaxing him and petting and comforting him, but he stops after a few feet again. He's fine, though, if you turn around and go towards the house.
So my questions are: Why is he like this? Does it have anything to do with him being through three homes? Or is he just a very submissive dog? How would you work on the car/leash issues? Any ideas would be appreciated.
Like I said, I love this dog so much and have developed a really close bond with him. It's been hard, but well worth it. We've made a lot of great improvements, but it's been slow. I've just never been around a dog like him and have had no problems training the others and dealing with their issues. Healthwise, he's been great other than a couple of small benign tumors on his behind... The vets both don't think anything medically is wrong, but they both agree he's not your average dog.
And if you've read all that, you deserve a cookie! "