Derek Hough and Hayley Erbert-Hough Want Everyone to Experience the Love of Adopted Dogs
Millions of Americans brought a pandemic puppy into their homes back in 2020, and Derek Hough and Hayley Erbert—stuck quarantining in their Los Angeles home—were among them, deciding to adopt their second dog.
Rescue puppy Luna immediately livened up their home, forcing the Dancing With the Stars couple to adapt to chewing, destruction, and potty training. Then there was the effect the youngster had on Romie, Derek's longtime dog.
Before Luna's arrival, Romie wasn't doing well. As they waited for construction to finish on their house—staying with Derek's sister Julianne—Derek and Hayley noticed he'd gained weight and seemed depressed. Derek even wondered if his dog was nearing the end of his life.
But Romie slimmed down as they moved into the new house, and with Luna, he transformed.
"He was a brand new dog," Derek tells The Spruce Pets. "... He was doing things that I've never seen him do ever."
That included fetch, a concept that failed to interest him until his younger sister began retrieving toys. His energy was up; he was playing more.
"I really, truly believe getting Luna brought the puppy out in Romie," Hayley says. "It made him like four years younger."
That pandemic bright spot occurred three years ago. Romie is around 13 or 14; Luna is 3. Their parents are now married and have embarked on the three-month Derek Hough Symphony of Dance tour, a 59-city trek across North America. They'll be leaving their animals at home, and like most pet owners, Derek admitted in August he was "dreading" being away from them.
To celebrate National Adopt a Shelter Dog Month, the newlyweds (Hayley is now Hayley Erbert-Hough) shared their dog adoption journey with The Spruce Pets: the quirks, the challenges, the love, and even coming to terms with one day having to say goodbye.
Adopting dogs is nothing new to Derek and Hayley, who each witnessed how it saves canine lives as they grew up. Hayley volunteered at an animal shelter as a teen in Kansas, often considering forging her mother's signature so she could bring home another pup (who would've been her family's third). She soon resolved to "never" bring home a dog from a breeder.
In Utah, Derek's family adopted a Dalmatian who was scheduled to be euthanized later that day. They named her Lucky.
"It literally was going to end that day, so as a kid, that kind of stuck with me," Derek says.
Fast forward to 2012. Derek is in Los Angeles, in the middle of his successful tenure as dancer on DWTS. (He won six seasons alongside his celebrity partners, a record unmatched so far.) He misses having dogs, so he volunteers at a local rescue, taking pups out for walks. One of them is Romie, and the shelter tells Derek he can take him home for the night.
"He jumped on the couch and laid on my lap and I was like, 'Ope, OK. You're mine now,'" Derek says.
Derek and Hayley began dating about three years later after she joined the DWTS cast in 2015. She'd enjoyed a successful run on So You Think You Can Dance in 2013, and she met Derek the following year when she joined him and Julianne on their MOVE Live on Tour.
When she moved to LA, she didn't have a dog because she lived alone in an apartment. Dating Derek also offered the opportunity to "cuddle up on" Romie, a big added benefit for a dog lover like her.
"And then we obviously got Luna because I convinced Derek to adopt a puppy during quarantine," Hayley says. "And it was the best decision."
Luna's adoption journey began on social media. Hayley—failing to fight off a case of self-diagnosed puppy fever during the pandemic—saw an Instagram post from the Labelle Foundation: a photo of tiny Luna, who'd been found in a field with her sister.
"It was the most adorable photo I've ever seen in my entire life," Hayley says.
Derek had been holding out, telling Hayley that Romie and their two cats (Palo and Lily) were enough. Then he saw the photo of Luna and agreed to go meet her.
Game over. They brought Luna home the next day.
"Honestly, if I could adopt every single dog in all the shelters, I would," Hayley says. "That is actually my goal one of these days. I keep saying to Derek, I just want a farm, but I don't want typical farm animals. I just want to adopt 1,000 dogs and let them roam free and have the best life."
Luna arrived at the Houghs' home and wanted to play with everyone—including the cats. A perplexed Palo was definitely not sold on the oblivious new puppy, giving her a couple whacks to the noggin when she tried to play with him.
So that was a no-go. But Romie became her best friend. She encouraged him to be more playful and active, while he took the reins on teaching her how to dog. When she would get a little too playful and in his face, he'd give her a little snap and bark, nothing more beyond that.
Derek and Hayley found it helpful, believing Romie was instructing Luna on behavior that could cause other dogs to react poorly.
"He was doing it in such a kind way of being like, 'Hey, no. This is not how it goes,'" Derek says.
The pups weren't only helping each other. They were quite the silver lining to their parents as the pandemic stretched on and on. In normal times, their humans would be gone frequently, rehearsing, performing, and touring. Derek had never spent that much time with his animals, so it was a blessing for him to observe their individual quirks he might have otherwise missed.
A self-described overachiever—he writes, sings, and acts, too—he can get overwhelmed about the future, thinking he needs to be constantly on-task. The dogs offered him a breather.
"Sometimes, you just kind of look at Luna laying on the couch, just looking there," he says. "You know what? That's a good reminder that hey, I could just do that and be just fine."
Being at home constantly also offered a non-stop showcase of both dog's personalities.
"Old man" Romie—his parents say his face actually smells like a human grandfather—is a mix of four breeds: Rottweiler (41%), chow chow (23%), pit bull (18%), and German shepherd (17%).
He loves a game of tag with Derek—and giving and receiving attention from anyone in the house. His trademark move is to approach someone from behind, stick his head between their legs, and look up at them.
"You don't want it when you're in something nice and you don't want fur on you," Hayley says. "But at any other time, you're like, 'This is the cutest thing ever.'"
She's not Romie's "spare human" by any means, but she says he's definitely Derek's dog.
"If Derek's not home and Derek all of a sudden pulls up into the driveway, Romie cannot focus on anything else, even food, nothing, until he says hi to Derek," she says. "He is obsessed with Derek. It is so cute."
Then there's Luna, who's even more of a potpourri than her brother. An Embark DNA test revealed the genetics of six breeds: Siberian husky (32%), American bulldog (23%), pit bull (15%), chow chow (8%), German shepherd (7%), and bulldog (7%).
Nicknamed Lunatic, she cuddles so hard that she's deflated all the couch pillows. She doesn't wag her tail as much as she wags her entire rear end. The pool is life. So are toys.
Those toys—she has more than most children, her parents say—are the basis of an important daily ritual. When Derek and Hayley return home, they'll see Luna and her expressive eyes waiting for them through the glass door. As they unlock the door, she bolts away to grab a toy.
It's up to Derek and Hayley to guess which toy she'll bring. Giraffe? Turtle? Narwhal?
"Literally every time we walk in the door, we play that game," Derek says.
While Romie is Derek's dog, Luna might be Romie's. Hayley taking him for a walk? Luna doesn't care for that at all, and she lets her mom hear the howls from all the way down the street.
"She just loves Romie so much," she says.
-----
Derek and Hayley each have their favorite things they like to do with their dogs, but simply lounging on the couch with them is one of the best ways they all spend time together.
"Just that feeling of when the full body weight just kind of lays in your lap," Derek says. "There's nothing better than that feeling."
Hayley enjoys the occasional trip they'll take to the beach. Luna of course loves the waves, but even water-despising Romie enjoys a romp in the sand.
"We have so many videos of Derek sprinting with them, Luna getting all tangled up," she says. "It's really fun."
Unfortunately, the beach trips and couch time have taken a hiatus while Derek and Hayley dance their way through North America. Their Symphony of Dance tour begins Oct. 2 in Salt Lake City and ends Dec. 30 in Reno, Nevada.
That's a long time to be away from the animals, who will stay at home in Los Angeles. A DWTS judge since 2020, Derek gets to see their pets as he pops in and out of LA. But those brief trips certainly won't be as often as he'd like.
"We're kind of dreading that part of it," Derek says. "It's kind of sad, but we just know that they're going to be way more comfortable and it's going to be a lot more safe if they're at home being taken care of."
Care will fall to a rotating cast of friends and housesitters, each of whom will be tasked with sending photos and videos along with coordinating FaceTime calls. They'll also need to be well-versed in each animal—and their special talents.
Luna, for starters, can open sliding doors. The cats can open cupboards and doors with handles. Or they can knock things off counters and onto the floor, where the dogs can get into them.
"For me, that's the hardest part, trusting somebody to really make sure the animals are good," Derek says.
Four animals are a lot to look after, but the Houghs know who they can rely on while they're gone for three months. It's similar to how they've counted on each other.
At the risk of offending parents of humans, Derek compares it to caring for children. He and Hayley have to coordinate who's home when, who's doing the feeding, and who's going for walks or taking them out for bathroom breaks. It makes life for two busy people even more hectic.
But they're up for it.
"He's just always loving on them and it makes me love him even more, so I would definitely say that it strengthens us," Hayley says. "We have a mutual love for these fur babies and also it builds teamwork because we have to. We have to take care of things together."
That mutual love was on display for the 106 guests at their wedding. The pets' faces appeared on guests' napkins and on the outside of the photo booth at the reception. Physically, they were at home. They would've been distracting as the newlyweds chatted and danced with all their friends and family.
"I would love to [have them there], but it would be chaos," Hayley says.
-----
Along with guessing Luna's toys and playing tag, Derek has developed another, more heartfelt, ritual with Romie. He'll pull his dog aside and thank him.
"I just thank him so much for just all the love he's given me and everything, so I just want to thank him while he's still here," he says.
The topic understandably makes him emotional. While Romie almost seemed to reverse his aging when Luna arrived, he's still getting older and grayer after accompanying Derek through more than a decade of adulthood.
Derek started thanking his dog after seeing his sister Julianne similarly thanked her dogs for all they'd done for her as she mourned their tragic loss.
"It's gonna be a hard day for sure, but I just am so thankful, and I look back at our journey, and it's pretty wild how far we've come," he says.
That day is what we sign up for when we adopt our new dogs—and it certainly is the worst, as Hayley says. But the years of antics, cuddling, games, and love are undeniably worth it.
"The love they give you back is just, yeah, it's incredible," Derek says.
