Benz and Apollo playing in the leaves last fall. Benz is jumping.
Benz last summer with his hot weather hair cut. (he gets shaved in the summer)
"Bad dog!!!! Off the couch!!!!'
Ok, so here's Benzi's long story (Benzi is my term of endearment for him).
Before having kids, our dog (black lab named Sadie) was our baby. One night, a buddy of my husbands asked him if he would come over to his farm and help him move some machinary around. So I tagged along because the guy had horses, and I hadn't had a horse fix in a while. So I was grooming a horse, and my hub and the friend were doing their thing. Well, they came into the barn and the friend, John, said. "I need to run down to the end of the lane (like a 1/2 mile long) because someone just pulled in, and stopped for a few minutes, then backed out and left." So he drove his gator to the end of the lane, and came back and said "there is a wolf tied up under one of my trees. I think I'm going to have to shoot it!" Naturally, I pitched a fit, and walked down to the end of the lane. Wolf my ass. Tied by a skinny chain to the base of a pine tree was a cowering, very scared, big black dog. I talked to him for a few minutes, slowly got close. He was very fearful. I untied the chain, and as soon as I did, his personality changed. He started wagging his tail, walking around, sniffing... normal dog stuff. So I walked him back up to the barn where I could see him in the light.
We came inside and John said "I know that dog!" John used to have a boarder at the barn, and he had seen this dog with her once. Her chased the horses though, so John told her not to bring him back. She had removed her horse from his barn the month before this though, and he hadn't seen nor heard from her since. So, he called her to find out what was going on. Apparently, this lady was labled an irresponsible pet owner in our county. At one point, she had pitbulls, and they killed a neighbors small dog. The pits were destroyed, and the cops/court told her she could no longer have large breed dogs (she had an old blind schnauzer in the house they allowed her to keep.) Well apparently, she got ahold of this beautiful black german shepherd, and eventually, her neighbors found out and called the authorities. They were on their way to her house to arrest her and take the dog to be destroyed. She couldn't let that happen, so she took the black GS to John's farm. She asked John to keep him for "just a few days, until the heat dies down." She claimed that she would come out and give him food and water. John said, "And what if he gets off the chain? What if it rains? If he chases my horses, I'm going to shoot him."
So at this point, I gave my husband that LOOK, and I said "I'm keeping this dog." John told the lady on the phone "I have friends here now, and they're taking the dog. Don't ever come back here, and don't try to find the dog." I was happy as a clam. I took him to the car, and walked him around some so he would go potty before getting in the car. Damn dog hiked his leg and peed right on my boot. He's been mine ever since.
Keeping him wasn't our first intention though. I tried to find GSD rescues, and no one could take him, no one had room. I was afraid he and Sadie wouldn't get along, but they did. So he became ours, and we named him Benz (Sadie's real name was Mercedes. My husband is a car guy). He needed very little training. He was well behaved from the start. He's been a protector more times than I can count. He is a true working dog in that he does not play with my kids. He's playful with me and with other dogs sometimes, but when the kids are around, he's strictly business and he just stands guard and observes. He's very intimidating in person, because of his size and color, people think he's a wolf. He's the dog who comes out front with me when I have Craigslist people come to our house. Our vet, who was a GSD breeder in his younger days, says it looks like he's purebred, and told us to breed him before we got him neutered. His good disposition, good conformation (good hips), and unusual color would create some great puppies. We've even had people stop at our house and ask if we would breed him to their GSD bitch, but when we said he doesnt have papers, they would change their mind. Had to get him fixed eventually due to the increased risk of prostate cancer. He also had heartworm when we first adopted him, so we had to deal with that whole treatment process as well.
That's his story.
Apollo has kind of a cute story too, but it's really just crazy.
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