What are you and your dogs up to today? Part 2

[delladooo]

That awkward moment when you've got girl friends over for afternoon tea on the patio and your pug jumps in your lap and leaves behind a bit of... errr... 'residue'.

only way to solve this is no visitors

[Nettle]

Better in your lap than theirs - "Oh isn't she swee - argh yuk!"

[Sanna]

That awkward moment when you've got girl friends over for afternoon tea on the patio and your pug jumps in your lap and leaves behind a bit of... errr... 'residue'.

gotta love that Sweetie

Bendog way to go, I am so jealous! The best learning experiences are the ones that really push you don't you think
Having a less 'straight-forward' dog like P, and also volunteering now with a local (and very good) behaviourist (I get to assist her with some long-term in-rescue dogs w various issues), I am learning so much and find myself more and more into this dog training/ behaviour stuff..
Can I ask which course you're doing, is it the 4 day Instructors one? I would love to do some of their courses at some point (I have some way to go before I'm ready for that tho and I think I'd want to do the 1 day behaviour ones before even contemplating anything more- have you done any of those as well? Would love to hear about it )

P really impressed me yesterday (tho to be honest it doesn't take much ).
He really enjoys searching and tracking, so I try and do some with him whenever I can; and have recently asked him to 'find the car' when we turn back on our evening walk. So far I've only ever parked in 2 different spots so I've not been quite sure if he's finding the car or just the usual parking spot, or even if he actually understands what I'm asking him to do or just generally heading back the way we came- but he has been back-tracing our route perfectly to get to the car (including de-tours we may have made on the way out).

Last night tho, I had parked in a completely different place and we went a really roundabout way so came back from a whole different direction. There was no way he could just go back the way we'd come. But it got dark really quickly so I figured I could use some help- I had no idea where he'd take me tbh when I told him to find the car.. Little Mr Cleverclogs led me across a field, straight through the woods taking the quickest (tho not most suitable for humans..) route- and directly to my car
Treat fest ensued

[JudyN]

Little Mr Cleverclogs led me across a field, straight through the woods taking the quickest (tho not most suitable for humans..) route- and directly to my car

I tried that with Jasper once - he went off looking behind trees, under bushes, wondering where I might have hidden it. And probably not wondering how the hell he was going to bring it to me in exchange for a treat when he found it

[delladooo]

Little Mr Cleverclogs led me across a field, straight through the woods taking the quickest (tho not most suitable for humans..) route- and directly to my car
Treat fest ensued

Very jealous, Laufey loves to find things but is a bit rubbish at the game, if it's not obvious he just looks at me for help

I'm slightly worried about Laufey; he's been sick three times in two days. Although, the second time I think is just because he ate too fast the other two were very mud-like with fat and hay in them His mud and hay eating isn't improving either but if that's what is making him sick then I don't know what to do. I can't "starve it out of him" either as it'll make him worse for trying to eat things when I take him out. I was hoping for a nice quiet day of making some treats and starting a bone broth

[Erica]

Long story short - took Opal to my vets, dad likes them loads better too, walked out with a possible diagnosis for tick borne disease and a prescription antibiotic. They said they could test for some but not all tick diseases and they treat them all with the same medicine, so as their number one suspect we are just going to try the meds. In order to get Opal to eat I have permission to feed her raw because she's not touching her kibble. Vet was just concerned that I feed raw right and was not at all combative about it. Also they were cheaper and more thorough. Dad was very impressed and is going to switch to them as main vets. (it's amazing what a little friendliness will get you!) I'm very glad he will no longer be going to the vets who diagnosed her stiffness and weight loss as depression over not being the alpha dog.

Old vet was closed for lunch (for three hours!) when dad went to get the test results to bring with us, and old vets took their sweet time about faxing them over to new vets, so I'm still not sure what was tested, but the new vets will look at the results and let us know if theres anything else we should get her checked for. (New vets have employees take lunch on a rotating schedule so they can remain open during standard business hours.)

We should know in a few days if the meds are helping.

Congrats to Precious for the path finding!
I hope Laufey feels better

[delladooo]

I hope Opal recovers quickly, I assume if it's a tick borne disease then she'll feel better soon, on the plus side she gets to try raw so good luck there!

Laufey seems fine today, no sick and eating as per usual. I have a bone broth brewing in a (borrowed) slow cooker and the house smells rather like a kebab shop which isn't the nicest thing to smell when you walk in but I'm pretty confident they'll like it so fingers crossed. I'm also going to give a bit to the dog for his owner supplying the slow cooker. Hopefully he's going to continue feeling better and can try it

[Erica]

Yay Laufey

Opal is very happy with her raw. Dad's going to try to give her kibble tomorrow morning because, y'know, after knowing I feed Delta on a towel and having observed Delta pull pieces of food out of his bowl to maneuver on the towel, he fed Opal on her bed...so I'm going to wash that tomorrow, lol, and probably get out a towel because she really needs to eat with this medicine (and in general - she's lost about 15-20 pounds off her usual weight) and she is not enthusiastic about kibble.

I was very tired today so I thought "Oh, I'll just make Delta a box with newspaper-wrapped treats and we'll skip training for today." Did the newspaper box, played with him a bit, then went and chopped up some treats anyways because I just don't feel right retiring for the night unless he's had some training. Inspired by Amy, we're working on Uber Dude stuff. We've got nearly half show-ready, and most of the others are fairly reliable and just need to be put on cue. I just realized I've been working with him on crawl, which I intentionally hadn't put on the list because it's difficult and he's not having much success with it...but we'll keep working on it anyways because it's a fun trick.

100% ready:
-Paws Up (front paws on object, his favorite trick of all time)
-Shake Paws
-Which Hand (granted I think he's reading my body language instead of sniffing it out, but that's clever too!)
-3 hand signs only, no verbal cue (touch, paws up, shake)
-Push Ups, sit/down/sit/down/sit/down (probably. This one may be 99% instead of 100%)

Pretty Good:
-Peekaboo (dog walks between handler's legs from behind and stops. He's okay at this one, sometimes goes to the side instead of between my legs)
-Spin
-Twirl (these two might be 100%, but I'd like to make the cue a bit subtler. Right now it's "hand on the nose and move a bit in the direction of the circle.")
-Target Stick (he bites it if it's too far from him. Bites and chews.)
-Guilty (down plus head on ground. Needs to be put on cue.)

Need Work:
-Hoop Jump OR Crawl - need to get a hoop for him to jump through (very low jump as he's a young'un - a few inches off the ground at most), OR really need to just work on it. He'll lunge a bit but it's definitely not a coordinated crawl.
-Fetch Leash - still working on picking the leash up and holding it.

[delladooo]

Wow Erica, he's really starting to know a lot of tricks. Now I feel guilty; I've not taught Laufey something just for the sake of it in a while. We'll have to get on doing that again.

He seems completely fine now so whatever was wrong with him has passed BUT in other Laufey news. We have PEE in the GARDEN!!!!! I don't know how or why but mum witnessed one this morning and then we suspect he's done it two other times that we've not seen. Super impressed.

MiMi had a funny dirty-dog smell that we couldn't identify so last night she had a bit of an all out pamper. A good brush, her feet trimmed, a good wipe down and her face washed. Now she feels really soft and silky and doesn't smell so that's a bonus

Edit: I just realised that actually I am teaching Laufey something for the sake of it - "on" things, namely at the minute tree stumps

[JudyN]

We have PEE in the GARDEN!!!!!

Hurrah!!!!!!

[Erica]

We have PEE in the GARDEN!!!!!

Hurrah!!!!!!

Hip hip hooray!

The training is mostly self defense, lol...he would bug Opal constantly if I didn't actively entertain him enough.

[delladooo]

Actually made my morning

Ahhh, that sounds like a good idea. I want to try and train MiMi and Laufey together but he is impatient and she always seems to hit a limit of "he's stealing my treat" and jumps up at his face she's slowly improving but it's a long road

[Nettle]

Don't set PhD targets when you have kindergarten dogs train separately.

[delladooo]

Don't set PhD targets when you have kindergarten dogs train separately.

ahahaha I think sometimes babies still learning to walk is a better comparison but I see your point. I think I need to just spend more time with MiMi, I don't do as much with her and part of me feels guilty but then, she's still not really "my dog"

[Nettle]

Guilt is part of being a proper dog owner. We always feel we should do more for them.