I accidentally shut my dog in my son's bedroom recently - the dog followed me in there and I didn't realize it.

Less than 5 minutes later he barked. He hates to be apart from me!

Years ago I accidentally locked my sheltie in the barn. She and my collie used to go out with me to feed the horses. I poured grain in the horses' buckets and got out hay for them, then turned to head back to the house and realized I had only one dog with me. I called and called, and walked all around the barn, then checked in front of the house, but no Tippi. As I was getting ready to comb the neighborhood, the hubby asked "You didn't close her inside the hay room did you?" I went back to the barn and opened the door and out she came, barking all the way! It would have been more helpful if she had barked while she was *in* the barn, but she always was an odd little creature!

It sounds like your dogs and mine are from the same tribe, maxmom! You would think they would "call for help!" Perhaps teaching a dog the command "Speak!" would have a useful purpose.

Funny, Spedigrees. One of the dogs I referred to is the Sheltie I have now, and I'm not certain I would want to (or need to) teach him to "Speak". He does enough of that already without asking. I would have thought that calling to them would have brought some response, though.

One day years ago we couldn't find our GSP and looked throughout our house, calling his name. Each of us thought the other possibly hadn't brought him back inside or that he may have slipped out as one of the kids went out. So we all went outside and we were asking everyone in the neighborhood if they had seen Chester. Neighbors went out in their cars looking for him. About an hour later we went back inside to check again and opened up the one closet which had a touch latch. There he was, waking up from a very nice nap on a blanket which was on the floor of the closet. He didn't appear to be worried :-)...we were exhausted!

**raises hand...guilty** pea and bentley were outside with me while i fed the pigs. pea and i came in the house, bentley usually goes in through the dog door so i figured he was already inside since he wasn't fond of the winter cold. an hour later, i was getting their supper ready which would always bring bentley out of the bedroom (where i hadn't even been yet). no bentley. i looked all over outside and then it dawned on me to check the feed shed. sure 'nuff, i opened the door and he bolted out, made a mad dash to the house. LOL

Maxmom, teaching a sheltie to "speak" might indeed be something you could live to regret! LOL! But it would probably be the easiest trick you could teach, like teaching a rabbit to hop or a fish to swim! (The second easiest trick to teach a sheltie is "spin" first one direction and then the other!)