4 Months Old! Already!

Time has just flown by, I don't know how Sizzle can be 4 months old yet ... in fact, when I signed her up for puppy class I might have actually gotten her age wrong!

Since 4 of the 6 puppies in the litter live in Calgary, we got together last weekend for a play date. It was pretty adorable and very symmetrical. 2 boys, 2 girls. The 2 largest and the 2 smallest. 2 tri colors and 2 sables.

I like how Sizzle and Cedar both have one long sock on the front and then one short one, mirroring each other.

The puppies had a great time. Sizzle was a little unsure for a few minutes and then she was all for it. It's funny how she likes adult dogs but seems unsure of puppies. They loved racing around outside and then we went inside to measure puppies and play a bit more.

Ash is still looking like she might be oversize, I didn't catch her height. Sizzle is in the safe zone, so she isn't going to end up really tiny. She was at 11.5" (I think?) while McFly her little tri brother was looking just a little smaller than she is right now.

Sheltieing! aka someone has cookies and they need to share!

Mom, Syrah and brother Cedar

In the house the play styles in the puppies really came out. Cedar is a very laid back, serious fellow for a 4 month old baby. There was a lot of barking from Ash who doesn't have dogs in the home and he was pretty ticked at her for the constant barking. Sizzle and McFly love the toys and the tugging and the chasing.

Surprisingly, Sizzle was not barking the way she does at home, she was actually pretty quiet. Except for the growling like a demon with the tug toys. It was very cute. She played a lot with McFly since they both love toys and are similar sized. She also paired off a lot with Cedar to play when he was being kind of cranky with all the other puppies for too much barking and shenanigans. 

She definitely wasn't put off by the larger puppies anymore, since she wrestles with Nike all the time at home!

This week we came off of winter break and have started up the dog training routine again (with me teaching and barn time being rented) Sizzle also started a puppy class just for the socialization with people/ function with new distractions aspect.

She came out to the barn to do some baby recall work, work on impulse control and toy play in a new space with dogs running. I've also started to work more on some of the baby puppy behaviors/foundations I teach for agility.

Never before seen ...

I think it might be an ominous thing when the vet you are taking your baby to is just utterly baffled by a Sheltie's ears being glued.

Maybe it's because I'm in agility and have seen more than my fair share of baby Shelties?! But she didn't say this was the first Sheltie she's seen ... just the first one with ears glued. 

Also interesting is wanting me to spay my puppy before she is even 6 months old ... so I expect on our next visit when I decline the rabies vaccine and just finish the puppy DAPP series (I'll do rabies a month later on its own in case of vaccine reaction issues) that I'll be looked at oddly for that too. But in the almost 10 years since Baxter has come into my life, I've learned a couple of things and always advocate for my dogs.

It's really too bad that vets just push early spay and neuter though. At least with Nike they asked if I was doing health testing when I said we wouldn't be spaying before 2 year of age and that vet was pretty receptive when I explained I just wanted her to be mature before removing hormones/spaying and it didn't necessarily have anything to do with breeding. This one just listed all the things that could go wrong if you didn't spay before the first heat cycle.

I'm not a standard pet owner - not that there is anything wrong with being a standard pet owner. I know a little more than a lot of people about dogs and dog related things. My whole family has me clip their dog nails. Spencer brings his own muzzle to the clinic. My dogs aren't fat. But for the love of Dog - don't try to scare me into doing what YOU think is right- maybe explain signs to watch for IF those things are going wrong. Mammary tumors. What symptoms you'd see with pyometria. But don't tell me Pyo is life threatening (I know it is ...) when I'm here with a 12 week old baby - maybe save that conversation for my 2 year old dog who is still intact, hey?! 

On a happier note, this is 3 weeks since Sizzle came home on 26-Nov-2017. (Or at least it was 3 weeks when I originally wrote this!)

The first week we just settled in and figured stuff out - was a pretty big change coming into a house with 4 resident dogs, none of whom are Shelties. She came out to class with me and hung out in the building after classes. She also came to work with me and met about 20 strange men - working in Oil & Gas is fantastic for socialization with men!! Not really loving food as much as I'd expect, but oh my the play & tug drive!

The second week was mostly a repeat of the first week, except we started coming out to family gatherings and meeting my nieces/nephews and the various other "family" dogs. 5 kids under 8 is a lot of children in one house when you're the center of attention!

She is delightfully confident little ball of fluff. LOVES people. Confident with dogs - some we say hi to - some we just observe from a distance. MANY opinions on everything that she has zero problem voicing.

Loves to chase stuff. Bringing it back - well not so much. But play and tug?! Oh my, someone forgot to tell the Sheltie that she isn't a terrier! I love it! 

She also sleeps through the night. Her first night we got up in the middle of the night and then the second day we got up at 5 am - other than that she has zero problem sleeping through the night and not waking me up at an ungodly hour. 

Stacking the Deck

There was some interesting, shareable discussion on one of the Fenzi FB groups this weekend. But, if you wanted to share one of the posts, the author requested that both were shared.

These really resonate with me.

Denise Fenzi
Admin · November 12 at 3:43pm

Here is why I don't think anyone can ever tell another person that their dog is, or is not, suited for dog sports or a particular dog sport.
Because no one can know how good of a trainer another person is - or how good they might become.
No one can know how important it is to another person. Commitment and determination are a big deal. That is for the person to decide.
No one can know how happy/unhappy their dog can be before they decide it's time to throw in the towel for ethical reasons - also an individual decision.
No one can know what level of achievement they would need to attain before they can feel it was "worth it". My goals and expectations are mine - yours belong to you.
No one can know, for sure, what the future holds, based on better/different training options, the effects of maturity, changing sports, etc etc etc
So it must always remain up to the person - how far are they willing to go? Is their dog happy enough to keep at it? It's just not my place to make those determinations for another.
The only thing another person can do is tell you what route they would take. From there, the owner decides if/when/how much they can put into it.

Denise Fenzi

Admin · November 12 at 9:50am
A meme here got me thinking. What have my current dogs taught me?
Well, a lot of dog training. But that's not what I want to talk about.
What have I learned from Lyra? I have learned that I don't enjoy training her because she has no passion for working - and that's okay. I didn't do something wrong - she comes with opinions and her own interests, and they don't happen to align with mine. If I stand back and consider the route that I think I would have to take to change that? It's way beyond my level of time, energy and commitment. She is a fantastic pet dog. That's fine. We are both much happier with this lack of expectation. If she indicates a desire to work - we do some stuff. Otherwise, no worries if she is happy to watch. Yeah, I can make her look good but it's a glass house - it would fall apart in the face of serious competition and I don't believe all of the best training in the world could fundamentally change her to the level that I would need to enjoy working with her
And Brito? I have learned that if my training is exceptionally good - we can make progress. That is intriguing to me and keeps me in the game for the sake of understanding, so I like to train him. He likes to work and frequently asks, so we train, and it's all good! He has also pushed me dramatically in a variety of training areas, and as a trainer, I truly value that. But if I had serious competition goals - to the level of expectation that I hold for competition readiness? Not fun then - our progress is way too slow and would be exceedingly frustrating. And that's fine.
I no longer beat my head on the wall trying to figure out what I need to do. I just accept that other beings have opinions. As long as I am entertained and the animal is willing - I will train and see what I can do. And if that changes - I'm not having fun or the dog is opting out - then I'm not going to push through. It's okay. I can move on. I don't believe that great training guarantees anything at all - animals come with innate qualities.
If I ever get serious about dog sports again, which isn't looking too promising at this time, then I will specifically look for a dog that will want to play my games without jumping through million of hoops to get us there. With that dog, I would work to create amazing behavior chains that can hold up under specific stressors and without a high ROR at a very high level of accuracy. I've done that before and that's cool too. But I would start with a dog that was just as eager to master this as I was to teach it.
In the meantime, I got the dogs I needed. Because what they taught me - what I wrote above? I could not have truly internalized that if I hadn't gone through it. I needed to learn about slow/forgetful learners, low drives, high environmental interests and...at the end of the day....why I do dog sports. And what I found is that it only interests me if the dog and I are on the same page. And all of the best training in the world may, or may not, turn any given dog into a highly engaged and willing partner that can compete at the levels that would interest me.
And I guess I had to learn that so that I could better help other people. So that they could accept that maybe they weren't going to get there with their own dogs either and it's not just a matter of learning more or trying harder.
The animal has an opinion too. Great training can maximize a dog's potential, but it's not going to turn them into something that they are not because innate temperament is a real thing. Just like you can't "will" your human child into being a great football player when their heart lies with chess, there is no reason to believe our dogs are any different. There's no reason for guilt or self-doubt simply because the dog you haven't isn't quite right for what you had in mind.

Penny doesn't play dog sports because agility is my sport. I could potentially train her to play something else, but lets be realistic here. She's a Chihuahua with depth perception issues. They're not exactly known for drive, and she specifically doesn't have a lot of drive - except maybe to find another patch of sun, or cuddle on your lap. And that is fine. That is what and who she is. 

Spencer can have fun playing agility, but being around other dogs in a trial environment is incredibly stressful for him. So we play when he wants and train bits and pieces here and there. He's an amazing little dog. He's an awesome little agility partner on the days he feels comfortable, and on the days he doesn't - we don't need to prove anything. He's happiest chasing his frizzee in the field and running like a wild thing, or swimming in the lake retrieving his bumper, or even just hiking with his humans. And that is also fine.

Baxter is my rock. He is my first everything dog. First dog I've owned. First dog I competed in agility with. First dog I put a title on. This weekend we received the "Picture Perfect" veteran dog award at the CAA Remembrance Day Agility Trial for the photo of him I took @ Island Lake. I was pretty emotional. He's going to be 10 years old in a few months and his career is winding down.

He is so full of try. Yes, I wish I had done some things differently when we were starting out, but all in all it's been an amazing journey and he has been an amazing partner on it. We may not be in THE competitive height classes in AAC Agility, but we've done pretty well where we are at. 

Nike is a work in progress and while I won't quit working with her, I'm still working to find that key to unlock the drive to want to play my games with me. She's very smart and super sweet, but also so very soft and so very independent. 

Agility is my game. I wouldn't mind competing in some other sports, like Rally-O, but Agility is my game and I want a dog with the drive to WANT to play my game with me.

Baxter wants to play with me. Spencer wants to play in training. Nike does sometimes. But what could I do with a dog who really wants to work with me? It's a thought in the back of my mind for now, and I won't feel like a failure if my current young dog isn't quite right to be super competitive in the sport - she's got an opinion too. No amount of pressure is going to make that come if it isn't in her temperament, pressure will only suck the fun right out of training and trialing.

But for the next time... Next time I'm stacking the deck in my favor.

13 Weeks

Sitting like a dork, but pretty little ears!

Still growing like a weed. Last weekend the little purple harness fit perfect. This weekend it is almost too small - we'll have to move up to using Spencer's harness!

This weekend we rocked demo doggin the warm up drills for my Saturday agility classes (just flatwork, not really a drill per say.) Usually I'd use a student dog, but since I have a handy dandy untrained dog of my own now, I can demo with her and work on tiny bits of stuff with novel new distractions!

We also did some fun shaping after class. Starting to shape retrieves - or at least rewarding the return of the ball to the human. It makes it a better game when you actually bring the toy to the human instead of running off to chew on it. (At least in the eyes of the human.) We also did some bang game stuff, which was very adorable and precise. Very nice 2 foot "pouncing" on the end of the board and no worries whatsoever. Handy how all the pivot/perch/feet on the thing work has translated into her putting two front feet on everything!

Today we all went to agility practice. The boys were wonderful. Spencer has remembered how to weave again, which is nice. Hopefully that will hold over into competition since our next trial is coming up in March. Baxter reminded me about some of our weaknesses with threadles, at 8 though, there isn't a whole lot of retraining that I'll be doing with him. Mostly I modify my handling to what he'll get right - and that works too. Such a good boy. Love my Fluff.

Nike hung out and didn't scream in her kennel. Then we did some recalls and just chased our human around. Relationship building is still very much a work in progress. Despite being a herding breed and smart, Nike is also very independent. So far training isn't a lot different than training my non standard breeds at this point. Very much a case of convincing her she does want to do this thing with me. Or rather, make it easy to do what I ask and reward heavily for it. 

Super high value human! Hard at times. Actually harder than my boys to be honest, but we're learning together.

Legs, legs more legs and now, lots of tail too!

Learning the ways of the indestructible squeaker ball

No back feet!

One Month (and 12 weeks)

Time flies. I've had Nike for a month now, and things are starting to fall back into place and come together. She's 12 weeks old now.

Penny is pretty okay with her, but wishes she'd stop playing so rough now. The boys are slowly starting to accept her and tolerate her better. Once she's got her shots and we can go run off leash I hope she and Spence will discover that they can play chase and that should cement a friendship. 

12 weeks. I need to figure out a better way to stack her!

She's grown like a weed and is now (visually) taller than the other dogs. It may just be puppy fluff, but she looks larger than Spencer already!

She's not a fan of being contained in the xpen - especially since she can't get to the other dogs. However, she is fine kenneled. So she's been coming to work with me and just staying kenneled in the car. That way I can play with her at lunch/feed her lunch and I play with her at the end of the day before we drive home too. So far with the mild weather this has worked great. In the summer I really hope she'll stay quiet in her kennel so I can continue to bring her (it'll be too hot to crate out of the car all the time, but if she's quiet no one cares if she's in the office.)

Self stacked(ish) 12.5 weeks

She is still a very confident little thing.

At puppy play time on Thurs she figured out bullying with a worried Coton. He was a lot of fun. If you bounced at him, he'd run away and you could grab a mouthful of his fur and play tug with him ...

It was also the first day for a 11 week old Mini Aussie. He was twice the size of her! Pretty little black tri with a much nicer head than she has. It was quite funny to watch her gravitate to him.

Finally she ended up having a great game of bitey-face with an older Corgi puppy. It was pretty cute.

This past week she's made appearances at agility since she now has 2 sets of shots and I am slightly less paranoid. With all the melting and dog poop everywhere we haven't been out walking or socializing much and I wanted to work on that, especially since one of her sisters is having some issues with people.

On Tues she came to TA and hung out/ did some shaping in between my runs with the boys. She did really well with both and generalized to working in a new environment. She's not always keen on being touched by strangers. I'm not sure if that is just reserve or if it is just because strange people have no value to her and she is rewarded for turning back to me. Regardless, strangers now feed cookies for the time being. 

I'm not too worried about people having more attraction than I do - what I am concerned about right now is her vacuuming food off the floor at puppy play time (I keep having visions of Penny.)

Pretty puppy profile

She's got "blushing" coming in on her cheeks!

Yesterday I took her to an agility trial to socialize as well. We met many more people and ate lots of cookies. She was very brave and outgoing. Such a fun little puppy!

First time in a comfort flex harness, she fits Penny's harness without any adjustments now. She's also graduated to a "real dog" collar. The tiny puppy collar was too hard to find in her fur and since loose leash walking isn't a thing yet I was worried about how thin the collar is on her neck/trachea with pulling and bouncing like a crazy thing. I will say that I am pretty proud of myself for not buying any new collars/leashes or harnesses for her (yet.) I have so many old ones she can wear those until she stops growing so much!

Crazy? Who, me??

Recalls!

 She did great at the agility trial as well. Met people. Heard noises. Learned to focus on me in this environment too. Did some more shaping. Met a friend's Kelpie puppy who is a week older than she is. Met another friend's Shetland "pony" (17.5" Sheltie.) She thought he was great fun despite the size difference. She is very much a rough and tumble little puppy! We worked on calling out of play (with cookies in front of her nose, but still) Had some moments of brilliance where she thought about leaving but didn't. Good girl!

Herding Breeds

Nike is my first herding breed. She's also my first purebred dog (the Lhasa and Poodle my family had when I was kid don't count.)

I can already see where people could run into issues with higher energy herding breeds. Especially people who maybe have not had a dog before or aren't sure about training. She is a handful. Small does not mean lazy or low energy that's for sure!

I'm also beginning to see just what the addiction is for sport people. When they want to work. Wow. The train-ability is incredible. Coming from my "non standard" breeds, it's jaw dropping and Spencer is very smart.

Pretty and smart!

Nike has learned about shaping and the clicker with me from the get go. But, to let you in on my dirty little secret ... I'm not putting a lot of emphasis on pet dog manners yet. Really I don't care if my dog jumps on me - the other 3 do, what's one more? I also don't care overly much about biting my clothing - especially with Nike. She doesn't really want to tug yet - if tugging on my sleeve makes her happy, I'll work with that until I can transition it to a toy. Maybe we get a CGN, maybe we don't. Not a really big deal.

I don't want my dog to sit there in a shaping session and offer attention instead of interacting with an object. I also don't want to break her backing up, which is being shaped and not on cue yet.

 So in our first puppy lesson, I wasn't working on "handler focus/attention." I want my dog to DO things, not just stare at me when I don't offer any information on what they should do.

On Saturday our first real puppy lesson was on loose leash walking/nose touches. Do you know how is hard to do any kind of walking, let alone on a loose leash without any handler focus? We struggled quite a bit with focusing on the other puppies and ignoring the human on the other end of her leash. It didn't help that she wasn't very hungry having eaten a TON of cookies for nose touches.

So I changed up my plan a little.

Not having handler focus is not setting my puppy up to succeed in class. Especially considering how she loves other dogs. I don't need her to practice ignoring me to look at/try to get to them. So I've modified handler focus (like I've done with pretty much everything taught in puppy class!) Attention is the thing we do on a mat. 4 feet go on a mat and you offer attention for cookies. Sitting, laying down, standing - whatever you want. Just be on that mat.

We have done 1 and a half sessions on this. For 3 handfuls of kibble.

Tonight in class I plopped our blanket down and Nike was a rock star. Absolutely ignored the older higher energy puppies who really wanted to play with her. Howling, shrieking, flailing puppies? Not a problem - they're not the game. The game is stare at mom for the click then eat the cookies. Tons more handler focus. After playing the game with the mat and the clicker for 5 min at the start of the class, she's watching me as we move as well. It's crazy how quickly she picks things up. I love it!

Very impressed with my little one (and my training with her so far.) Clickers for the win!

Weekend Adventures!

Weighed Nike on Sunday, on my parent's scale that may or may not be accurate. She's 5.6 lbs at 9.5 weeks and around 9.5" tall. She is supposed to theoretically finish around 10-12 lbs, but I'm not sure on the height - since under 12" seems unrealistic, I'm hoping around 14.5" to 15". Ideally the closer she gets to 16" the better it'll be.

9 weeks

Adventures this weekend included:

Friday - Visited Kal Tire. Heard lots of loud noises. Met about 7 men and a couple of women. There was also this surprise give away thing and they set off a confetti bomb. Basically it sounded like a loud balloon pop. She stopped what she was doing and just looked, but wasn't too upset and was happily bouncing around again within minutes.

Sunday - we went out to my favorite dog field under the power lines to play in the snow. The boys went out first and played ball until Spencer was cold and Baxter was covered in snowballs. Then it was Nike's turn. She had great fun chasing me through the snow. However, it's hard to get awesome puppy pictures when she just comes running every time you crouch down to get a photo on her level!

Hey! Don't forget about us!!

I think the snow was a hit ...

Pretty ears!

We also did supper again at the Parent's with K & C and my 5 year old niece and 3 year old nephew. Nike isn't worried about the kids anymore, but neither does she particularly want anything to do with them. We did do some shaping of the multi wraps in the living room. She stuck with me and worked! Good baby! I need to video and review this stuff.

This week we start her puppy class, so that should be lots of learning and fun!

The worst part about containing the baby in a xpen to prevent bad behaviors is the fact the bars get in the way for cute pictures =(

Week 1 - Adventure Day!

Today marked Day 5 with little Miss Nike. It was also the first day she was home alone in her pen while I went to work (only a half day today but still.)

When I got home she was still in the pen, so that was a success. I think she was probably sleeping because she didn't start screaming right away when the rest of the dogs did. (They're a little excited when I get home and don't mind telling the world about exactly HOW excited they are!)

Today was also adventure day. Once a week I'm planning on taking Nike somewhere for a big adventure for socialization. Ideally we will do something every day, but once puppy class starts up I'm off the hook for 2 or 3 days a week depending how many classes I want to go to! After fearful Spencer I don't care if this is overkill - I'd rather over kill it than not kill it enough.

Today we went to Sunridge RONA. I have no problem with my almost 9 wk old puppy walking somewhere that isn't a dog centric environment, but we won't do pet stores etc until she's got the full set of puppy shots. Likewise, I'm not worried about agility trials with people I know, but some of the other agility places are a no go as well.

She was very brave. We went pee in the parking lot before heading over to see the sliding doors, which were a little worrisome at first. So we watched those and ate some cookies and finally walked through them. She's never really walked anywhere on leash before so this was quite the adventure in and of itself.

No sense of self preservation with the human feet. Not one ounce! So I have to be careful not to punt her as she squirrels around on the floor. Mostly we got the hang of staying to one side or the other of the feet. I'm glad I practiced this with the Chi's when they were babies who at least had some self preservation. It's just like falling off a bike ... or not punting the puppy!

We walked on a pallet and climbed on 2 carts to move lumber. One was solid but wiggled some and the other had a grill instead of being solid. Both were no problem!

We listened to people loading carts with hardwood floor. To the big saw running. To the squeaky bird noise over by the paint aisle. No worries about the noises, that's for sure.

We also met some people! A few worker people pet her and said Hi. We also met some friendly strangers who also said Hi and some people that we just walked past. She was very good with all of it. No repeat of the backing between my feet growling that we had at the airport when I first picked her up thank goodness. Not over the top mindlessly friendly meeting new people, but also not super reserved and suspicious of strangers. We're also doing well with defaulting in a sit looking at me when I stop moving (not that this is something I've actively worked on.)

Sadly we don't have any adventure pictures from RONA. Not that I mind looking crazy, but she doesn't hold still far enough away from me to get a picture. Enough to handle the puppy, without complicating it with a camera too.

Week 1 Adventures

Friday - Car rides to the pet store and back (didn't come in)
Saturday - E&D's house and met them, the kids and Fiona their dog
Sunday - Mom & Dad's - Met K and her kids as well as Sidney the parent's dog and saw E and kids again
Tuesday - Sunridge RONA - Recalls, Friendly Strangers/Noises and Leash Walking

Saturday - Discovered playing with Penny

Started playing with Toys

Met Fiona, who is 9

Played with new toys at Mon & Dad's after Sidney proved defective in the play department!

Learned to relax and sleep in her puppy pen. It's exhausting being a baby!

Clicker Training

With a new puppy there is always the question, what are you going to do this time? What are you going to do different?

For me especially, I have never trained a "performance puppy" from the get go.

Penny did puppy class, but as the tiny dog in the class didn't get much from the socialization aspect since there were no puppies small enough or gentle enough to socialize with her. She was however taught to hoover the floor for lost bits of treats ...

After the abysmal fail with Penny, I didn't do puppy class at all with Spencer. Maybe it would have made a difference. Maybe not. The first class we took was a Intro to Rally-O @ 6 months. He can left pivot like a pro!

The point is, I have a bunch of puppy raising theory, but no actual plan of "this is what I did, my dog turned out like this, I love what I did!"

So with Nike I've read/watched all the puppy stuff I can get my hands on. Susan Garrett's Puppy Peaks. Justine & Jessica's Puppy Diaries. Silvia Trkman's Puppy Diaries. I think like most people it'll be a somewhat blended approach with bits and pieces from many things based on what they feel is important.

Blurry, but still cute! Learning about toys!

Wobble board does not faze her in the least

We've started with the clicker a la Silvia though. It seems the most fun. Movement based is easier for her right now, and with my focus on agility movement and enthusiasm make sense.We're also starting crate games and some It's Your Choice stuff of don't mug my hand for food, you won't get it.

So far I've discovered that training with kibble isn't going to fly. It doesn't matter how hungry she might be. Also, she is small with tiny little teeth. So eating a kibble takes a bit, lowering the reinforcement rate.

She's magnetized by my other dogs and the cat - great play skills with those and respects Baxter and Spencer so I don't worry so much about them out together while I'm supervising. However, right now they are too much distraction, so we're learning new stuff in the puppy pen before we generalize to working outside of it. Also, none of my dogs will wait their turn for treats, so it's hard to shape the puppy with the others bulldozing in! (maybe I should train that too ...)

Rewards have to be rewarding!

Today, after 4 days we had a break through and it almost seems like Nike has figured out the idea of offering interaction with a object to get clicks and cookies. We had pivoting this morning and then tonight we had 4 in behaviors once I got the objects right.