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Satanica

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A German Shepherd who was abandoned at an animal shelter by his family because they were having a baby became a nervous wreck and cowered inside his kennel before being given a new lease on life.

Rocco, 3, was left at the Dallas Animal Services and Adoption Center in Texas after his owners discovered they would be having a baby.

While visiting the shelter, a woman noticed Rocco who was underweight, hunched over and looking frightened inside his kennel.

The woman decided to take a short video of the timid dog and share it in hope of finding Rocco a new family as quickly as possible.

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Luckily, Preethi Pillaipakkam stumbled upon the video and took an interest in Rocco.

Pillaipakkam fosters dogs through DFW German Shepherd Rescue, a volunteer rescue organization that takes in stranded German Shepherds across Texas.

At first, Pillaipakkam was shocked Rocco was given up because of a new baby.

'But once I saw how underfed he was, it did not surprise me. It is probably a combination of change in family situation, plus not [being] the best owners in the first place,' she told The Dodo.

Pillaipakkam told The Dodo that Rocco should weigh around 85 or 90 pounds, but only weighed in at 60.

Pillaipakkam said, 'The shelter is certainly not the environment for a dog like Rocco. He was very timid and scared to get into the car. He even hid beneath the seat in the car. He was pacing a bit and seemed very stressed.'
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[....]
The Center for Shelter Dogs says dogs become stressed in shelters because of the sudden change in environment.

Dog's typically will become separated from their families, be confined within kennels and will experience more noise due to being so close to many other dogs.

During his first days in his new home, Rocco was nervous and walked around his new surroundings in a confused daze.

With the help of Pillaipakkam and her other German Shepherd, Katja, Rocco began to perk up by the first weekend.

'He slowly started exploring the house,' Pillaipakkam said. 'He loves the couches and his doggy beds, and he really likes squeaky toys and tennis balls. He is a really good fetcher.'

Rocco became more outgoing with each passing day and has even taking to following his 'mom' around.

'He was a bit aloof in the beginning,' Pillaipakkam explained, 'but now he follows me around like a shadow.'
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Since the viral video, Rocco has received dozens of adoption applications and his Instagram page has garnered over 6,000 followers.

Large dogs, like German Shepherds, are put into animal shelters more often and Pillaipakkam wants Rocco's story to inspire people to adopt big dogs

'The top reasons for large dogs to be given away typically include a change in the family situation, so this could be a move, a kid, a marriage, a divorce or any such factors," she said.

German Shep also face breed discrimination and it is becoming increasingly hard to find safe homes for them.


 
Why? Holy christ GSD are the best things for kids. They adopt the baby as pack. I had an all white GSD when I was 4-5 (Well actually the parents), but that damn dog would not let anyone he didn't know near me or my mom. Quite literally would knock me over and stand over me.
 
Having a baby is just a lame excuse to be rid of what they think of as a burden. I hope they never have another pet because they are LAME pet owners. And it doesn't bode well for what kind of parents they will make if they quiver and run at the first sign of something that might require some effort on their part. Lazy stupid jerks.
 
Rocco is such a beautiful boy, and he'll be stunning when he gets back up to weight.

Fuck those people for abandoning him. He was family too.
And he wasn't even given a chance to meet the new baby. German Shepards are usually good around babies and kids.
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Why? Holy christ GSD are the best things for kids. They adopt the baby as pack. I had an all white GSD when I was 4-5 (Well actually the parents), but that damn dog would not let anyone he didn't know near me or my mom. Quite literally would knock me over and stand over me.
I babysat 2 g.sheps while their owner was away for a business trip.

Those dogs had met us but didn't really know us.
The white one Bear jumped up to say hi to me and accidentally got his front paw caught in my long curly hair. It scared him so he started to Yelp. I was hanging onto my hair yelling bear bear just as I was getting his paw untangled from my hair, his sister came over and started attacking him keeping him from me. She rolled him all over the yard. Not really hurting him but correcting him firmly. Bear felt bad about the whole thing. I felt bad for him but pretty stoked that she stood up for me.
 
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Unless your kid turns out to be special needs and you simply don't have enough time to give your dog any more, or your dog is known to be vicious, having a baby is no excuse for giving up on them. If you're not sure how they're going to get on, it's not that hard to supervise them and keep them apart if necessary. Dogs are not just placeholders until something better comes along.
 
I dont get how this is news or why anyone who isnt a fucking idiot would find fault with it.

Kraut sheppards are not only ugly, but they can be dangerous(like any large breed, like nearly every dog actually). Perfectly reasonable and normal for people to get rid of even a beloved pet out of caution for a child.
 
Waaaait a minute here! Some things to understand -

These days, some German Shepherd breeders are breeding horrible pieces of shit that have fearful, worthless personalities. Those dogs are expensive garbage and are not anywhere near the 'lines' that are used for police dog work and similar. This dog's behavior could be a case of that, especially if the behavior does not become close to normal in a relatively short time.

These owners taking the dog to a shelter was probably the exactly-correct option. (Also, sensationalist media calling it abandonment should be lawsuit material. It's not abandonment when it's a shelter).

It was probably the right thing for the owners to do because dogs sometimes kill new babies, and it takes a focused and determined owner to ensure that the baby will be safe. There is training that owners can do to try to help, but it requires the owner to be on top of shit. See: http://leerburg.com/dogs-babies.htm . If the owners did not feel that they were competent to do this, then there you go. These parents may have saved the life of their baby by rehoming the dog (not abandoning it. It was a shelter. Period).

Admittedly, the dog being underweight wasn't great.

I feel like some news outlets will write just about anything if they can get a reaction out of a viewer, even with something that isn't news and should not be treated like news but can be pretended to be news. Like this.
 
This definitely isn't news worthy. Why shit on people doing the responsible thing? I'm not even going to judge on the weight issue

Nowhere in the article does it say how long he's been in the shelter or in what shape he came in. They dont even have interviews from the shelter staff. Just from the lady who's now fostering him and other unassociated shelters getting their 15 minutes of fame.

For all we know he came in perfectly healthy and he stopped eating at the shelter. Something that extremely common even in dogs without anxiety..which this dog clearly has. Shelters don't feed the animals even mid tier food, its cheap bottom of the line shit that can actually give them health problems like crystallizing their urine or stuff donated by the public. I don't know how many of you have ever actually visited a shelter, but a majority of shelter animals are under weight and under cared for.
 

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