Days With My Danes: A House Becomes A Home For Raiden

It's been a week since Raiden unknowingly chose us as his people, and he is settling in nicely. Joel and I have had Paige since she was 9 weeks old. She was 6 months when we decided we wanted to get another Dane. We participate in the Columbus Great Dane Meetups on a monthly basis. When we took Paige to a meetup in July a few of the Dane owners had puppies, and I suddenly got the itch to have another Dane. It's contagious I think. Danes are so lovable and precious! That evening I went home and started looking for people who had adoptable Danes. I didn't want just any Dane though. I knew something about it had to be pretty special for me to take on another giant! ....And then there he was....

We got Raiden through a breeder, but not because we wanted to prettiest, biggest, most solid Dane. We got him because we knew that if we didn't.... they would probably "get rid" of him. Raiden was deaf. He was a product of backyard breeding. This particular family were breeding different Danes just to see what colors they could produce. They had no respect for the breed,and no respect for the well being of the puppies. We knew that they wanted to get rid of him and we wanted to be sure he had the life he deserved!

Raiden's adoption post picture

We contacted the breeder right away, and while we did not agree with their breeding techniques we bought Raiden from them and figured if we didn't pay for him... who would? We waited over a week to pick him up because I wanted to research all I could on raising a deaf dog (Great Dane for that matter!) I read up on training techniques, inquired with deaf rescues in our area about what to expect and got tips from my trainer who helped up with Paige.

We've had Raiden now for a little over a week and we are learning as much about him as he is about us!

We know the following about Raiden:

Raiden sleeps through the night! YAY!
Even though he can't hear a darn thing, he sure knows how to use is vocal chords!
Raiden will protest when he wants something until he gets it!
At 12 weeks he already knows to sit before being fed!
He's a thief, and if you aren't watching he'll take anything! (last night he took Joel's HUGE flash light and drug it to the bedroom!)

What Raiden Knows About Us:

We are NOT OK with him terrorizing our cats
We have a feeding schedule, unlike the breeders he lived with
Mommy is the trainer, daddy is the spoiler.
Our noses are not for nibbling on.
The litter box is not a sandbox
When the dishwasher opens.... it's OK to prewash

Prewashing the dishes

Today we took Raiden and Paige to the local dog park. Raiden did very well. He tends to stay close by, but did venture off a few times to play with other doggies his size! We tried to get him in the water, but just like Paige..... he was having none of it! We stayed for about an hour and he was fast asleep before we even left the parking lot! I love a happy puppy!