socializing my hseltie

Question
Hi Charlotte.  My name is Amy and I just brought home a 1 year old sheltie.  She was bought from a flea market and from what i understand, he was raised in a dog mill.  He is very timid, almost like he was beaten.  He wont come to you when you call him and he runs away from you if you come near him.  My in-laws got him at 6 months and he was a little better with them.  Can you give me any advice on what I need to do to get him to be socialized?

Answer
Hi Amy;
In those terrible puppy mills they are treated so badly. They have NO petting, or love of any kind shown to them, and the conditions they are raised in are terrible.
I am a Humane Society member, and we have good cooperation from law officials in helping us get these disgraceful places closed down whenever we can find them.
If you know where these people are operating, you can call your humane society chapter, and they will work to get it closed down, and the owners prosecuted.
I know what you mean about the dog's behavior.
My husband took a one and a half year old sheltie that a man he works with wanted me to find a home for. i work with animal rescues to find homes for dogs, and he was just tired of having pets.
Beautiful little angel that was so afraid of children, he would run when a child came near him.
I was baby sitting my 3 year old grandson while his mom worked, and he is such an animal crazy little person, like his granny.LOL
He wanted that dog to let him pet it like our others did.
I told him to just sit and talk to the dog gently, and wait for it to come to him.
That baby would sit almost the whole day, talking to Laddie, and coaxing.
It took him three months to completely change that dog, so that he would let children pet him.
It took several weks before the dog would come to him, but would run if a child came toward him. By the end of the three months, the dog was greeting other children, just like our other dogs do.
Laddie is almost 5 years old now, and he has no shyness left at all.
It was obvious the children of this man were abusine to the dog, because it was only children he was afraid of, and if  child had anything like a stick in their hand ( even a pencil) Laddie would run and hide under the beds.
    Just sit and talk to him. don't approach him, let him feel he is not going to have to run from you.
It will take time, but just gently talking to him, and coaxing him will eventually pay off.
when you go towards him, he is excited, because he may have been talked to, and then chained up, or hit.
In that puppy mill, he saw no kindness, only abuse and treachery.
When he eats, sit across the room from him and talk to him. He will come to see that you are not threatening his food, or him, and will gradually let you get closer and closer without running from you.
don't be afriad to stoop to bribery.
a piece of meat ( not pork, of course) that he can smell from across the room, and will want. Start by putting the treat closer to him, and them move away, to let him have room to go and get it, without fearing he can be caught.
I suspect he is afriad of being cought and locked up.
Gradually move the treat closer and closer to you. Prety soon he will notice he is closer to you, and you are not trying to trap him or harm him. Your in-laws were probably the first people he was ever around that were not cruel to him. He has little experience with humans.
When he is comfortable enough to really sense you, he will feel the love you have for him.
He can sense what is in your heart, but right now, he is more on his guard to protect himself, that his senses of you are overshadowed by his fears.
Just be patient and give him time to relax and come to you on his own.
I know it gets frustrating at times. It sometimes seems like they are never going to get over the shyness, but they didn't get that skitterish in a day, and it was the earliest experience he had with humans that empressed his opinion of us. It isn't going to be changed in a day.
He had the first 6 months of his life in that abusive situation. That made a very deep impression.
Good luck to you with this little guy, and if there is any way I can help just write me.
I'm sorry I can give you a quicker way to get closer to him, but he had so much damage done before your in-laws got him.
I hope the creeps that had him are found soon and put behind bars, where people like that deserve to be.
I would like to see even tougher pennalties given then than they get now.
Just tryo to remember, in time, he will relax and see how loved he is.
It will be worth the patience and time.
Charlotte