Introducing Bruce
I have a dog named Bruce. Bruce thinks he is a tiny baby. A sweet baby that needs constant protection provided to him by his humans. Bruce happens to be a 99 pound (45 kilos) Estrela Mountain Dog. Estrelas, the sweet and majestic, and awfully cute cousin of the Caucasian Shepherd, the Leonberger, and the Balkan Sarplaninacs are native to Portugal. A long time ago, I lived in Sofia, Bulgaria, and for a time, we fostered one of the very few Leonbergers in the country. Later, we found the guy a home at the house of a butcher, who, with utmost seriousness, asked me and my wife if it was ok for him to feed him (the Leonberger) fresh meat daily. We solemnly nodded, and thus my Leonberger experience came to an end.
Years later, while walking on the streets of Lisbon, I saw a dog that I thought reminded me of the Leonberger. I had never recovered from letting go of my Leonberger friend, and must confess, I am a total sucker for mastiff dogs, and so I ran to the lady who was walking what turned out to be an Estrella Mountain Dog. Estrelas (or Portuguese Shepherds) are a sweet offshoot of the molosser tree. Brought to Portugal by the Roman legions and housed in the remote Estrela mountain range, they are the smaller, sweeter cousins of the fearsome Caucasian Shepherds.
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I won’t go into the deep dive of my physique, but let’s just say, I am built like a Viking. Broad shouldered, flat footed, like Gimli, I am very dangerous over short distances. So imagine the scare I gave the poor Portuguese lady, simply walking her dog, when she saw a big, burly guy, running full steam at her, while slightly gasping for air. As I got closer and saw her terrified face, I stopped, and at which point I asked her for her dog’s breed. “Estrella”, she meekly replied. From that day on, Bruce the Estrela’s fate was sealed, he would be part of the Dobrovitsky household.
A few years after the Estrela episode, we got Bruce. Bruce arrived to us doe eyed, sweet, and wiry-tailed. Despite being almost as big as a pony, from day one, he made sure we understood that he was just a baby, and it was in fact, our job to protect him. In spite of this, while once driving through Serbia at night, our van was approached by some unsavoury characters. My wife and I got nervous. All of a sudden from the back of the van we heard what sounded like a mixture of a bear and a wolf growling. It was the kind of growl that seemed to suggest that the God of the Old Testament will punish whoever that growl was directed towards. We turned around, and we saw our sweet, doe-eyed Bruce, still a one-year-old puppy, looking back at us, as if saying, “What? I may be afraid of the dark, but those bad people encroached on my personal comfort”. At once, the people approaching the van backed off, and went on their merry way.
Over the next few years it became apparent that Bruce willfully resists the concept of being trained. Estrelas are a sheep guardian and herder breed. They were bred to be smart, independent, and to function like sentinels protecting the sheep from wolves. Practically, this means that the Estrella will have an opinion on virtually everything. This includes, as an example, which direction to go while walking on leash. Many times I’ll be walking Bruce, wanting to turn right, only to feel him pull left as if to tell me, “No, no dad, you don’t understand, left is a much better direction, much better smells there”. At one point living in Albania we decided to hire a dog trainer who would come to the house daily to train Bruce. We had high hopes, as he was considered one of the best trainers in the country. Within a month he came to us with practically tears in his eyes telling us, “your dog is not trainable. He is like the Sarplaninancs, they will take a bullet but they cannot listen!”
Sarplaninacs, the Balkan cousins of the Estrelas, are fearsome. The difference is that the Sars tend to be quite aggressive and scary, whereas the Estrelas are generally sweet, if stubborn and opinionated. Thus, having received this verdict from the dog trainer, me and my wife decided that we will find a way to work with Bruce, even if this required a special language.
With time, we found a way to coax our mountain friend into listening. Much of the discipline actually comes from the owner, as I later discovered. Bruce, like any guardian, is deeply tuned to the emotions of his people. Are you scared when another dog approaches? Bruce will react. Are you not sure what to do? Bruce will react, and so learning how to communicate with him has been largely an exercise in understanding my own internal state. What the experience ultimately has taught me is that the problem never truly lies with the dog. The problem is always with the owner. The dog is just a baby, and we are their emotional support humans, and if they get upset, we need to do a better job protecting them.
