Scratchings-and-Sniffings |
| Posted: 07 Aug 2009 06:14 AM PDT My wife Chris is totally smitten with Miles, as am I, and she has said on a number of occasions, "Maybe we should get a dog like this." He is one of the best behaved puppies I've ever been around. He is always happy and ready to play and his overall disposition is just perfect. He's a Lab! We took Miles to visit Tyrone last night and things did not go so well. Tyrone was a little protective of his turf and seemed to take offense at the presence of this goofy, puppy interloper. Ty had to go to his room after nipping at Miles on several occasions. My guess is that it was a male thing. Ty plays with the ladies in his own yard without incident, according to Alexandra. Chris took Miles over to the dog park this morning and he had a good time. He had a few minor altercations with another little dog with a Napoleon complex but other than that he had fun and did some serious fetching. He's a typical retriever and loves to chase stuff. He just doesn't like to give it back. He's really into bird watching, too, and is mesmerized by our hummingbirds. We have three feeders and Miles loves to park beneath them and just watch. I'm going to try to teach him a few things over the next week. I want him to learn to "drop it" after he fetches. The best way to teach "drop it" is to start out with what the dog sees as a low value item. You don't want to start with his favorite toy. The first step is to engage in a very limited game of tug with the low value item and then to stop the game after a few seconds. When he starts to drop the item you have to be on your toes. You have to pair the command "drop it" with a really tasty treat. You catch him in the act of dropping, give the command simultaneously and then reward him with the treat and praise. If he refuses to drop the item it's time to withdraw. Pay him no attention at all and certainly don't try to grab the thing away from him. You may even try to find a lower value item, something like a stick that is just laying around the yard. The next step is to give the command to "drop it" after you have stopped the engagement. If he does drop it be ready with the treat. Over time he will begin to associate the command with the action that elicits the reward and that's exactly what you want. Soon he will be retrieving and dropping stuff at your feet in anticipation of a chunk of Beggin Strip. The other thing we are working on is loose lead walking. Nothing worse than an 85 pound dog pulling you around the neighborhood. We did a post on this before but the basic idea is to reward the good behavior and withdraw attention at the first sign of bad behavior. When he pulls, stop walking until he stops. Reward him when he is walking at your side in sync with your stride and reward him when he stops when you stop. I'm going to get Claire to enroll him in a basic training class at her local humane organization up in Albuquerque. It will be money well spent on my part. I'm going to take some new pictures of Miles for this post. He's about three times the size he was when we took the last pictures. He's really growing up fast. We are buying him a big bag of large breed puppy food too, just to be on the safe side. I can feel his ribs and he's on the lean side which is good for a big puppy. I'll let you know how the training is going. |
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