Monday, March 7, 2016

Off Leash Fun

To celebrate the beautiful day on Friday (and to tire out certain unnamed puppy's) we headed out to Wet Noses for some field time.

Fitting in

Since Nike doesn't have her full set of puppy shots yet, this is as close as I want to come to running around fields where I know there have been other dogs. Also, the fact you rent for a hour and you get the fully fenced field to yourself is awesome. Means I can work on recalls with good levels of distraction, but not be too worried about puppy misbehavior.

The dogs were crazy. Spencer was zooming around for nearly 45 minutes before he toned it down a little! It makes Nike SO MAD that she can't catch him (which might be good, since she should start to run more efficiently and less bouncy!)

Hopefully signs of future friendship?!


She's only "caught" him since he stopped and changed direction to come back


Penny is the only dog who will play with Nike in the house. So the girls stick together a bit. Penny runs naked now though, as Nike will grab her collar and drag her around the house!



Not to leave the rest of the dogs out ...

SO MUCH happy!

Aww Fluff <3

Baby fluff!


Piglet!




Saturday, March 5, 2016

Confessions of a Dog Trainer: I




So, my puppy is now 14 weeks old, and I JUST taught her to sit (and down, and stand.) Or rather, I just taught her the verbal cues for these things. Sit has had non-verbal (positional/prop based cues) since she was about 9 weeks.

I think this (sit) is one of the first things anyone ever teaches a dog, but I wanted her to learn to  about shaping first. Specifically, shaping movement - like backing up, pivoting and paw targets.

Also, shaping movement is fun! Sitting and staring is not so much fun. I want my puppy to have fun learning right now. We're working impulse control and "It's Yer Choice" games (aka don't mug the hand for food and your butt needs to stay on the ground to get out of your xpen/kennel.) Just not sitting (on a verbal, for duration.)

So, I'm confident in the order I did things. Regardless if that is the "right" order or not, it's the way I wanted to treat things this time.

But that doesn't make it any less awkward at puppy class when they are telling us to get the puppies to lay down on their mat and I'm sitting there having her sit. Or pivot using my iPhone as a perch. Or do nose touches. So the instructor comes over to help me and I get to explain that we just aren't working on that right now.

At least sit is on a verbal now, right?!

Photos from Saturday - she was 14 wks on Wed. She's slowed down on the growing taller and is now filling out so not just a insubstantial fluff anymore!