Visiting the Great Outdoors

Wylie doesn’t get to spend much time outside. He was a stray at the age of six months which is how my brother happened to find him at the pound and that pattern continued over the eight years that Wylie lived with Steve. Pretty much anytime he was left in the backyard, Wylie would take off in a flash, almost as though in his world, fences were a figment of someone else’s imagination. Sometimes he’d be gone for days at a time; on one adventure he was gone for two weeks and just as Steve and his wife were about to give up hope, Wylie approached a police officer and “turned himself in.”
Several months after Wylie joined me in Maryland, I stepped outside to talk to a contractor. We stepped around to the side of the house and a few moments later, Wylie pushed the screen door open and bounded past us with a huge smile on his face. (Dogs may not be able to smile, but Wylie managed it anyhow.) Since then, I’ve been afraid he’d run off and get hurt, and have tried not to let him go anywhere near the door without a leash on.
The problem is, even though I’m doing this for his own good, and I’m pretty sure ol’ Wylie knows I care, I still end up feeling badly that he doesn’t get to spend a lot of out time outside doing all the usual “dog things.” No rolling around in the grass, no chasing the squirrels (and the squirrels around my house are getting cocky, they need some chasing), and no digging up the garden. (OK, I’d probably be annoyed if he dug up the garden, but I’m sure he’d like to try it anyhow.)
That’s not to say that Wylie doesn’t get to go outside, I usually take him out when I’m doing yard work (except for mowing the grass, I don’t want him sniffing the mower). But when I’m doing yard work, he’s still on a leash. Oh sure, it’s long enough that he can go and lay down in the garden (he seems to prefer that to lying under the tree), but he can’t wander around at will and do anywhere near as much sniffing as he’d like.
So this evening we tried an experiment.
From time to time over the past year, when Wylie and I were coming in from the backyard and he was walking along next to me, I’ve taken the leash off for the last 10 to 20 feet. He tends to stay close to me and by the time I’m heading in, he’s ready to go in too. So far, it hasn’t been a problem.
So tonight we went out to the backyard without a leash. Wylie immediately headed out into the yard, but when I called for him, he trotted back right away and sat next to me while I made a phone call and checked my email (hooray for wireless technology).
After about 10 or 15 minutes I got up and closed both gates on the theory that if Wylie did decide to bolt, perhaps I could grab him before he got under the fence. Wylie spent some time wandering around the yard, sniffing some of the bushes and just generally exploring, as dogs like to do.
After perhaps half an hour in the yard, I decided to head in. I whistled twice for Wylie and he followed me back inside. He never even thought about wandering off.
I think we might do this again soon.