Well, fast forward over ten years, and here I am with Zephyr, a non-Doberman. He is turning out to be just a great family dog and home protector.
Saturday night I took on a rat. It was a showdown in the basement right before I needed to go to bed that was not very conducive to sleep. I did watch a little more Bob Ross afterward though.
We've been having a problem with what we're pretty sure are rats. They're like 8 or 9 inches nose to butt, not including the tail. In a corner of the finished basement where we were having a moisture problem, they made a hole. I have a rat trap and this thing does a good job! So, on Saturday I noticed the trap was sprung. I hoped it would have something in it, and it did. The trap was on our side of the wall, and the rat was on its side. I pulled don the trap gently and it pulled back!
My thought was I would just leave it to die (sorry, the thought doesn't particularly please me either). The risk in trying to pull the rat out of the hole is it could get loose and take off into the house. I also could easily be bitten, as evidently its head was not in the trap. Long about bed time I heard that the thing was chewing. I decided I needed to take action.
I brought Zephyr down there with me on the off chance he could provide useful backup.
I pulled on the trap. I saw the attractive grey fur. Rat pulled back. Then it relaxed its pull and I got it out into the open. I had gloves and sturdy shoes on. So, then the endeavor got even more unpleasant. I had a board with me that was about 4 feet long. I also brought a hammer to the fight. That trusty trap held onto the rat's hind leg and I pinned the thing against the floor. The poor thing started making pitiful noises of pain and distress. It came kind of close to wriggling free a couple times. Zephyr was getting more and more interested, almost touching the thing. I moved him back with my leg a few times as I really didn't want him getting bitten, or really even to bite it.
Eventually, I went full beast mode on the thing and repeatedly rammed the board hard into its torso without picking the board up. I found myself making grunting and growling noises as I killed the thing. Laying on its back, its head soon went from being raised up to sinking down to the floor and I saw the life go out of the animal. You might be surprised how sad that made me, and how it is still getting to me. I could not risk the thing getting loose in the house, and you should see the mess of drywall and insulation that it made on the floor doing who knows what. These things gotta' go.
Then, it was hammer time. A couple smacks to the head ensured the thing was not going to come back to life.
Here's the brag! As I was getting all grunty growly, Zephyr was getting more amped up. He wanted at that thing His prey drive and probably defense drive were overcoming his characteristic caution. It was too much for me to juggle, and I couldn't momentarily walk away from the siutation and have the rat get loose. So I commanded Zephyr to sit. He did right away! Then, as I used the hammer and the board to pick up and carry the rat outside, I told Zeph to stay. I went out, bagged the rat (amazingly, there were two Target bags right near me, in the basement and I picked one up with my foot and used it) and threw it in the trash can.
When I came back in, Zephyr was still holding his sit stay!
. As for a shameless brag, we take Sasha for ice cream pup cup drive through. The kids there know her and come to the take out window to watch her. We hand her the pup cup, she takes it, keeps it upright, and sits it on the back seat. If there is any left when we get home 2 miles away, we tell her to “bring it” and she carries it upright from the truck to the house. It is the simple things 
