Adoption fee fully sponsored by Kristy Pace.
First joining us late in April, Meeka's origin story is heartbreaking - acquired and raised as a young puppy, Meeka's first owner soon found herself unable to care for her due to stage IV cancer - just a few months before she passed away, she made sure to find Meeka a place in our facility. Because of her struggles with her illness, Meeka's care was understandably pushed to the back burner, which for any dog is detrimental but especially a young, high-energy German Shepherd/Husky mix like Meeka! Meeka's first owner was aware of what Meeka needed, but due to the advanced progression of her cancer was unable to give it to her.
It took five months, but Meeka was finally chosen to go home! Her new parents fell in love with her and did several meet-and-greets with all dogs in the household and important family members to make sure that she would stick. However, after two months of trying really hard, it turned out that Meeka, more than likely due to her emotional neglect as a puppy, was not fitting in well. Although she loves other dogs and plays well with them, she unfortunately struggles with resource guarding surrounding food, and some households are just not set up to be able to care for a dog who struggles with that behavior. For the sake of the dogs that they already had, and for Meeka's sake as well, her adopters reluctantly and tearfully relinquished her back to our care in hopes that we would be able to find a safer placement for Meeka.
Even though we are so sad to have Meeka back at the shelter, we are thankful to have lots of information about how Meeka is in a home environment!
Although she still remained a high energy dog, with a routine and proper outlet, her energy levels are more than manageable. She's not destructive when she's out and free roaming, and she is both housebroken and crate trained. Her excitement and getting to go out on a walk makes her come out HOT on a leash, but her adopters said that with the daily walks and runs, she began responding easily to light leash pressure that reminded her to chill out with the pulling, even at her "craziest."
Meeka did well with meeting dogs outside of the home - showed lots of manners and was very polite on her walks in passing and while getting to play with new dogs.
She also spent a lot of time with her adopters' 3 year old nephew, and as active and spunky as she is with adults, always showed incredible restraint and gentleness when interacting with him. When faced with large groups of children at the park, she chose hiding behind her people's legs instead of barking or pulling!
Meeka seems to do best with dogs that are her size or larger. Huskies and Shepherds both have high prey drives, and although (without the presence of food as a trigger) she never showed any truly aggressive behavior to dogs smaller than her, she does seem to have a difficult time being respectful towards smaller dogs that don't want to wrestle and roll around with her. She wants to play, but her eagerness and energy level causes her to ignore small dogs who request space. With larger dogs, she seems to be instinctively more respectful, and there's not much she can do to harass them if they don't want to continue her games!
Meeka was one of the trial dogs for our new "Doggy Day Out" program - she got to spend about 6 hours out of the shelter with one of our amazing volunteers and her young daughter. A direct quote: "A great girl with no real hiccups. Does great on stairs, plays, aware of her surroundings but is still going to do her own thing. Loves water, popcorn chicken, and pup cups." We were told that at the river, Meeka shoved her entire head underwater which tracks for her, a known hose fiend. She had a great time making new friends with an energetic goldendoodle and found a kindred spirit in her child companion - their play styles matched each other perfectly.
When she spends time as office dog, Meeka does a great job of self-managing her own energy levels, immediately making good choices to retire to a dog bed with her toys while also not being destructive. She is always happy and excited to receive attention and affection, to learn new things, and to go out on long-line walks or join her doggy friends for playgroups. She knows sit, down, shake, and other commands, and she could easily learn a new command a day - she'd be such an easy candidate to earn AKC trick titles!
Meeka's ideal placement would be a single dog household or someone who has experience or knowledge about how to work with dog-to-dog resource guarding. Email adopt.ffaa@gmail.com or call the shelter at (417) 592-2512 to learn more about Meeka or to discuss the intricacies of her singular behavior concern. We are also open to longterm foster or foster-to-adopt placements for Meeka as she does struggle to cope well in a shelter environment (but is a dream to have at home).
