TRAINING THE PUPPY

I know the dogs most people are interested in are the Bassets, but at the moment I am kind of heavily involved with this NOTABASSET, Doc the Belgian Sheepdog Puppy. This is what he looked like when he stepped out of his crate at O'Hare airport, in Chicago.

Sweet li'l Thing, isn't he? All fuzz and wondrous eyes..............

This is Doc now, two weeks later or so, when he has grown a little and settled in here at home:

 

Not quite the same shy, innocent, nervous little thing he was. Not even a little thing anymore, weighing in at over 16 pounds and able to run like a gazelle.

So the Puppy (Doc) goes to class. Once a week. We have learned sit and down and sort of sometimes "come" and now working on around, and a couple of things I have already forgotten about.

 

 

1.THE SIT
Call the puppy to you and hold a treat over his head slightly until he sits. Good puppy. Give treat. Call the puppy. PUPPY!! HEY YOU!!!
Grab puppy as he shoots past trying to leap on the 2.5 pound mini Aussie puppy to "play". Grabbing puppy by tail as he goes past is frowned upon by most trainers as is snatching him off the floor and trying to avoid shaking him until you can hear his brain cell rattling because he does this PERFECTLY at home, time after time.

2. THE DOWN

This is actually called the "partial down". It is a specialty of Doc's. The next step is to push the front legs out further propelling with the rear and sliding along the floor without actually having his butt end touch the ground.
The other variation is the SEAL TEAM 6 CRAWL-- in which nothing really touches the ground but the puppy crawls, military style, after the treat.
The cure for this is NOT to step on the puppy to force his rear to the floor. That will get you excused permanently from class and perhaps from owning other dogs.

 

This is how Doc looks at the trainer. He is sitting because she told him to. In a moment he will do a perfect down. He also came from across the room just to do this for her.

 

I am standing by the door while other owners cast sidelong glances at me and shake their heads slightly as they pass by with their 10 day old baby Chihuahuas heeling and doing fronts and finishes. (Well not really that young, but you know what i mean.)

Even the evil wheaten terrier is perfect.

 

As she goes past with the dog in perfect heel position,  the trainer says to me "I don't understand what problems you are having with him!"

 

 

                   'I don't know," I respond sulkily, "Ask Conley."

TOYS

I have never seen dogs with so many toys.
Some of them are left over from dogs that are long gone. Some are relatively new. Some were gifts, some from me.
Some have spent entire seasons in the yard until their "fur" was green and I had to wash them with bleach.  Some still squeak, other's are voiceless.
Right now the most popular items are the ones in which other items arrived: cardboard boxes.
Not like cats-- not jumping in and out and hiding in. For eating. Ok for chewing since the puppy is not allowed to swallow paper products.

This is the most expensive toy I think I have ever bought. It was $20 and I think I got ripped, but that's ok. I like it.

 

 

Remember Cooper's Rat? We still have that. I am not sure where he is, maybe at the bottom of the toy basket, but he spent all summer in the yard and managed to survive. Typical rat.

A whole mess of toys. During the course of the day these become alternates. They are often used as distraction toys-- to stop unwanted behavior.

 

This is a puppy who has just been seriously corrected for getting into the trash. For the fourth time in a row. As you can see, this is what he thinks of my prohibition about trash cans, and since I even yelled he is going to assume I no longer love him and that he doesn't know I exist. Eventually we reconciled.

He has a toy I was unable to find. Heidi gave it to him and it is a little pink ball with tentacle kind of things and he loves it to death but I am not sure where, at the moment, it is.

The following photo shows him sleeping with his most favorite thing, which is unfortunately also one of MY most favorite things, but in this case he got to keep it for awhile.

NIGEL

Nigel wants to play with the puppy.
Since Nigel cannot walk,much less run, this is difficult. we were allowing him limited access to the yard until he ended up with a sore on one back legs and very owie looking testicles, and then I decreed that he was no longer allowed outside without the cart. (Before the puppy arrived, he would lay in one spot with his brother, in the sun.)

But once he saw that the others were playing Bumper Basset with the puppy, he wanted to play as well.
Now.
Nigel has a cart. He loves his cart for walkies but somehow he hates it in the backyard and has always refused to move, just stood in one spot, everything drooping, miserable. It seemed possible to me that the excitement of the Basset/Belgian 500 (The black car always wins) might excite Nigel enough to (gasp) move while in the cart inthe backyard.

 

It took a day or two. But my new rule is: no cart, no yard. And so now we are delighted to say that Nigel does indeed roll around the yard in his cart, trying to play.

 

Mostly he stands in a central location and barks as the other two Bassets and Doc zoom past. Sometimes they use Nigel as a center point and he keeps trying to turn the cart fast enough to keep track of who is where, even though I could tell him: Doc is in the lead so far he is coming up on Llewis who is last. Conley is closing in on Doc from behind as he slows up for Llewis.

(Rare footage of Nigel and Conley discussing the upcoming election and the way our society treats teachers and cops. They are working on their economic recovery program and medidog changes.)

Anyway Now Nigel carts around the backyard, the puppy almost always goes to the back door when he needs to go, and Nigel would like to remind people that he would not be the first President in a wheelchair.

SUGGESTIONS ABOUT THE BLOG

Recently I got some suggestions on how to make the blog better from Anonymous. There may be more than one Anonymous.
The gist of the suggestions seems to be why isn't my blog either more like Anonymous's blog, or why isn't it Pioneer Woman's blog?

Because.

That's why.

Not enough photos for you? Too many words? Too bad. Change the channel, turn off the set.

I am sure (uhhhh) the suggestions were made in good faith and so I have answered in good faith.Anonymous refers me to his/her own blog so I can see what a really GOOD blog should look like. Thank you but I will stick with what I have.

                                Have a relaxing Sunday.

RAINY DAY

It is raining. More or less. It has been raining (more or less) all day.
Wet Bassets smell like wet dogs.
Wet Belgian Puppies have no odor, but they know how to soak your legs and and arms.
None of my dogs, either breed, care about weather. This amazes me because I am constantly reading about dogs that refuse to go outside in the rain or snow.
Mine don't care.
They may not go far, but they go. Out the door. Maybe not for long but they go outside. Meaning, they "GO" outside.

 

So here I am with this new puppy and what does he think about the rain?

Nothing.

Not a thing.

No thoughts at all.

Rain?

Whazzat? Who cares?

 

So all day I have been drying dogs. Bassets with soppy ears, Belgian puppy with soggy fluff.

He eats sticks, cardboard and leaves. He drinks water from anywhere including horrible spots in the yard. He is totally without brains. Almost.

Can't wait for snow. Only once. I don't need anymore snow than one time. This puppy is from Texas. The others are all from Wisconsin or here. Snow is built into their genes.

Not Doc.

My guess is, snow is an amazement.

We'll see.

DAYS GONE BY

 

Dis usta be such a nize place to lib.



We all sleep togedder an dere plenty of room. Da peepels dey juss step ober we. We got along purty well scept when dere food involved youse nose, like onna floor or sumfine but afferwards we frens agin an goes out inna yard checkin everyfing out meke sure it ok.

Dere awways sumfin cool goin on like da bebe squrrl watch-- ole Nigel he culd walk den, waitin for one a dem fall inna he mouf. And dey almost awways did, too. He sit dere for ours watchin and waitin... (Ise nebber cared much for raw squrrl bebe, mysef.)

 

 

An dere awways a lap avaleabel avab a lap ta siddin. No lotta noiseys and leepin about an butt bitin an kill-da-basset games.  I no nose whut happent. But I gots a suspicion.

 

               Look cute, dont he? Got sum news for youse.

 I catchim he in BIG TRUBBEL.

Fondly to youse all,
Dis be da aggravaded Conley

OTHER THINGS

Yesterday  I found my ancient iPod and decided to add some stuff to it only to find it was no longer possible to do that unless I deleted EVERYTHING I had put on it and started all over. So I did. I spent all day putting stuff into iTunes and then into the iPod. There are CDs stacked everywhere. Some are mine and some are John's.Mine are mostly bluegrass-- Doc Watson, especially. The rest are classical if you consider Enya to be classical. Lots of Bernstein, Strauss, two spoken ones: Fierce Pajamas which is stories from the New Yorker, and ...and... uh...oh. The Capitol Steps-- which is a combo of spoken and songs all terribly dated having to do with the Bush (first bush, not shrub) administration.

(This is a crowned crane.. I have to have photos in this blog or it's no good. Since I am not talking about anything important, I thought something living but decorative would be nice.)

The dogs spent most of yesterday outside. I can only let two out at a time-- puppy and Conley or puppy and Llewis but otherwise, three is a barkfest. If it doesn't bother the neighbors it drives me crazy.

Like a Tiger or Leopard, Doc goes for the back of the neck when he is "playing" I have not seen a puppy play this way before and I am not sure what to think. He does not have stripes or spots but I am wondering if this is a dominance thing, so early. He is slow to show his belly unless one of the others is REALLY pissed at him. Most of the time when that happens instead of rolling over he dashes off and stays away. Doc, I think, is not short of ego.

Beneath this sweet and innocent exterior beats the heart of a dictator. He is already losing some of this sweetie-pie look: the nose is lengthening, the eyes are more alert, the fuzz is full of sticks, twigs, leaves and some burrs which I am forever pulling out. When he plays, he bites. I gave him (he took) a huge cardboard box when he arrived. It is now two small pieces about 8" in diameter, each. Maybe six.
Every night and every morning I crawl around the room picking up tiny pieces of chewed up cardboard.
I try to picture my Mother living this way and now I know why we didn't have dogs. Or cats.
Now I understand why, when a kid says "Can I have a puppy?" the sensible Mother says "I don't know." instead of "Oooo how many??"