2022, animals, pets, Uncategorized, work

A Member of the Pack

38 Comments

I have been reading up on Cesky Terriers, the breed of puppy we are getting in May. They are considered temperamentally different than the majority of terriers due to their comfort in being part of a pack. Your basic terrier is an independent thinker, bred to work alone and make its own decisions on how to deal with vermin and prey. Cesky’s are more reserved and standoffish, but very dedicated to their people.

The Cesky was developed by a guy in the Czech Republic who wanted smaller terriers he could take in a group to hunt prey on river banks. He started out with Scotties, but they fought with one another more than they hunted. He decided to come up with a new breed, and interbred Scotties with Sealyhams, a Welsh breed known for its calmness and lack of territoriality . The new breed he came up with was very good at working with other dogs, yet really good at flushing vermin and working as part of a team. I hear from Cesky breeders that they are not door darters like our Welsh Terriers were, dogs who wanted nothing more than to rush out any open door so they could explore the countryside and make their own fun. Cesky’s want to stay with their people at all costs.

It is important at my work to be able to work as part of a team. I guess I am more like a Cesky than I am a Scottie or a Welshie. It doesn’t pay to be a lone wolf in my line of work. I know that isn’t the case for everyone, though.

Are you a Scottie or a Sealyham? How well do you work as part of a team. What is your favorite breed of dog, and why?

38 thoughts on “A Member of the Pack”

  1. I guess I’m a mixed breed:
    I like to think of myself as a great team player, but I have my limits. It was pointed out when I worked with that consulting group, that I have a “run away” tendency when things get really difficult – would threaten a future resignation, etc.

    But that door darter thing also sounds familiar – I love to “rush out any open door [to] explore the countryside and make [my] own fun.”

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    1. Not sure I have a favorite breed. I’m not a dog lover, or even a dog tolerator (childhood trauma). I think Huskies are gorgeous (also the Owatonna HS mascot!). Golden retrievers seem like good dogs, and beautiful too. If i had to have a dog, I’d want a smaller one that was well behaved and didn’t bark at everything that moved. Maybe a beagle or a mixed breed.

      I’m pretty much a loner. I’ll be a team player if I don’t have to be in charge. But 99% of the time, I’d rather do it myself.

      Chris in Owatonna

      **BSP** Tomorrow I’m at Fair Trade Books in Red WIng from 11 am to 1 pm. Any of you “river livers” or “river lovers” who feel like a road trip on a cold sunny day, come on down (or up) to Fair Trade. It’s a great indie bookstore and perhaps their best salesman is the owners’ dog Reveler! (what a coincidence).

      https://www.fairtradebooksrw.com/

      **end BSP**

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  3. german shepard is the king of all dogs
    zeke my shepard wolf dog was a great dog but my shepard lab (suspected mix ) vinny is a great one too

    i am a team motivated player but an independent worker
    leave me alone and don’t make me work with your perimeters

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  4. I think I am a Scottie who has learned to compromise. I would love to have an Airdale, but Husband wants a dog he can easily pick up and who can’t steal food off the kitchen counter. There is just something about terriers that I can’t resist.

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  5. Rise and Shine Baboons,

    I am truly a dog lover. I have always been around them because we had dogs when I was a child, and the extended family had farm dogs who worked—they guarded, shepherded, and hunted mice and rats. All the farm dogs were named Rex or Tippy. They were often mixed breed shepherd/collies. I do not like dogs that slobber on me.

    Our late Rat Terrier, Coco, a rescue dog, was a master escapee. Any door that was open was her door to freedom. That is, until I took her to a dog park. Then she was terrified and stuck to my side. Go figure. She also shed prolifically. I brushed her outside then let the fur float on the wind. We found her fur woven into the local birds’ nests when they fell from trees.

    Bootsy is our 13 year old Corgi or Corgi mix, also a rescued dog. I enjoy the Corgi breed so much. Bootsy is a master at vermin control. I saw her dig a mole from the back yard and kill it in a split second. We still have moles, but they live at the edges of the yard outside her reach. She is reaching the end of her life span. I would like to find a small, short coated Corgi that we can transport on an airplane. We will soon be abandoning our 3 day trip to AZ, bring a car here to use, then fly the distance rather than drive it, but our next dog must be small enough to fly with us. I just can’t put a dog in the cargo hold.

    I am a pretty good team member, but often I emerge as Leader of the Pack because I have good executive skills. People often follow me whether I want them to or not. That responsibility gets old. I suspect in the pack wars in which the leaders fight to the death, that sometimes the leader just says, OK, just take over. I am done. I am getting ready to retire in 16 months, and somebody else can lead.

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  7. I was entertained by the characterization of Scotties: “they fought more than they hunted”. Do dogs take on national traits? When my daughter was a Scottish Highland dancer, we often met with a group of parents and supporters, many of whom were native Scots or first generation Americans. The meetings were characterized by perpetual discord. I used to observe to Robin, “Whenever you have two or more Scots together, it seems, you have factions.”

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    1. That must be the source of the well-defined clans. Don’t you dare wear my tartan! My mother’s family was defined by discord, but the side that instigated the conflict was far more German than anything else. They were gifted “grudge-nuturers.” The maternal side was Scots-Irish (the Stewarts, McGills, and Newells), but they got along better. But my great grandfather was famous for saying things about politics to the German side, then they would start fighting, and he would watch and laugh from the sidelines.

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  8. I can be a good team player as long as it’s a good team. The quickest way to kill anything is to make it a committee you know. Or let me pick the team members; that works too! Otherwise, just let me do it!
    Mom says my personal phrase was “Do it myself!”

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      1. My mother said that when I was little, she would get me dressed, and I would take off the clothes and put them back on because I wanted to “do it myself”.

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  9. It’s funny. I sat in on a parent/teacher conference once when I was in 1st grade. Mrs. McCall told my folks that I should never, ever, work for anyone. I distinctly remember her saying, “He has a different way of looking at and solving problems. If I break the class into groups and assign them a task, he assigns everyone else in his group a part of the task. If you were to look at any single component of what they’re doing, it doesn’t make any sense. But -he- sees how it will all fit together when it’s done. His methods are totally unorthodox but his results are usually better than the prescribed way of doing things.” So, naturally, I’ve spent my life working for other people and being a frustrated square peg.

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    1. I heard third hand that I was characterized as “someone who does a good job but he never does it the way you tell him to.” That sounds about right. Tell me your objective and I’ll get there but don’t try to tell me how to proceed.

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      1. No one likes to be micro managed, I don’t think, yet some people need a lot more detailed instructions than others. I once supervised a high school senior who had been assigned to sweep the back stairwell of the school. I took it for granted that he’d start at the top, but that turned out to be a mistake. Fortunately, I discovered this when I checked to see what he was up. He had started at the bottom, and was working his way to the first floor when I interceded.

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        2. To be fair, I don’t think this kid had that kind of ambition. Upon graduation he went into telemarketing. Is that a field? Professional telemarketer?

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  10. I think I’m basically feral. I’m pretty much a loner and I tend to be overly independent, sometimes to a fault. I prefer my own solutions (good ones or not) and I accomplish things best on my own. That said, I get great performance reviews at work and I’ve been described as an excellent team player. I think that’s because I don’t like to leave anything unfinished and if someone else can’t or won’t finish it, I will. I’m also willing to take on minor leadership roles such as being the person-centered thinking group coach. (I struggle to understand the concept of person-centered thinking – not the concept itself, but why it’s even a “thing.” Shouldn’t people who work in my field naturally put their clients first? Shouldn’t we already know that they will be happier and better adjusted individuals if we let them define themselves and their own needs and wants? So I struggle with why there is a need for person-centered thinking while being considered a good role model for the implementation.)

    I think being a good team player in my career has been learned over the many years and didn’t really come naturally. As I drift farther from my work life, I notice my natural independence sneaking back in. My patience with some team members isn’t what it once was and I find myself looking at the door more often than not.

    My favorite dog is a Cavalier King Charles spaniel or a mix with Cavalier in it. I think a wonderful, loving mix would be a Cavalier crossed with a golden retriever. There would be a lot of shedding but I think it would make a beautiful, loyal dog that would be very attuned to its human. I’m grateful I had my Bailey, even for a short time. He was a wonderful dog who loved me. He was like a Sealyham. Pippin is more Scottie. He wants to scrap with other dogs and I think he’d love to run and chase squirrels off leash for hours. He is also loyal to me and quite nervous about where I am though, so he’s not totally independent.

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    1. I don’t have any quibble with the validity of any of the words in today’s Quordle, I’m familiar with all of them. Just a hard time coming up with them in the allotted number of guesses.

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  13. All of my work life is on various teams and if we’re going with sports metaphors, I’m the quarterback. I’m good at it, so I guess that makes me a Sealy. But outside of my job, I’m not all that great on teams. So I guess I’m a Scottie?

    And not to start a firestorm but Irish Setters are the best.

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    1. Well, if you want to really start something, then bring up the toilet paper dilemma. Do you load it on the holder with the end going over the top, or around the back? Which is the RIGHT way?

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