Bear is a 4 and a half-year old, 70 pound, neutered male. Bear is currently with a foster family in Ohio making great progress with him and have seen positive changes with time, training and exercise.  Very good natured, he loves to play with people and toys, but is quiet and likes to lay near his people while having a fan blow on him in the evenings.  He has met people of all sizes and ages, and seems to love them all. 

Since he has been with his foster parents, he no longer counter surfs, but he will beg for a bite of something you have that looks good.  He is totally house broken, doesn’t need a crate either for overnight or when his people leave. He can be left in the house on his own without issues (he does like a Kong with peanut butter and kibble to keep him occupied).  He will steal a tissue from bath trash cans.  At night he sometimes sleeps on the bedroom floor of his people, but often stays downstairs on his bed and cool blanket.

Bear is very affectionate, likes to have his belly rubbed, and loves his humans.  He knows all the basic obedience commands, on or off the leash, spoken or signed, loves his morning walk, chasing Frisbee (he’s getting much better at catching it, but has always brought it back), and to play tug of war.  He has the typical Airedale zoomies in the yard when he plays with his ball (we play soccer), but settles down once he has a couple minutes of crazy time!

He has excellent manners on leash, stops and sits at intersections, moves to the side when walking on country roads and cars come from either direction.  When walking on bike path, he is calm around other walkers (loves to say Hi), stays out of the way of bicycles, and really enjoys all the different smells.

On morning walks, Bear will bark if a dog inside a fence (especially Invisible) barks at him, but if they don't bark (or bark from inside a house), he ignores them.  Meeting another dog on a leash is still a problem with barking and jumping; but training is set up to address that.  When Bear is in his fenced yard and the dog across the street barks at him, he totally ignores it.  Bear had a playdate with a female Airedale to gauge how he is with other dogs. They first met through a fence and Bear barked a little bit but once the female was inside Bear's fence, they were introduced on leash and then eventually got to romp off leash. He did great, and they both had a good time. Bear would probably do well in a home with a more submissive similar sized dog, but a meet and greet would be required so we can make sure all goes well before placing him.  He does not like cats, so that is probably a no go.

He is doing great with at home grooming with his foster parents. He is still not a huge fan of having his feet touched, but he will now give each foot to be dried off with a towel.  We recently discovered that when trying to trim the hair under and around his feet, the biggest problem was that he seems to be scared of the scissors, so we are now working to get him totally accustomed to those when around his feet (we can trim his ears, eyebrows, chin and around the mouth without issue, so feet will just take some work).

 He is not a big fan of fireworks, but he wasn't overly upset with them either. He just wanted to be by his humans and was all good once they ended!  He does have exceptional hearing and being curious about everything, he looks around to find the source of any strange sound.

If you are interested in being Bear’s forever home, please contact Jenna Pecenka at 630-347-0343or [email protected]