Teaching Manners, Behaviors, and Relationships
Pinball takes on his foremost nemesis: a stick in our backyard.
Finally a sunny and comparatively warm day we decided to combine some fun outside for the newest addition to the family, Pinball, along with a chance to test out our newest gadget – a Flip camera.
Pinball was the only member of Callie’s litter – the only boy in the litter – who wasn’t adopted from the shelter right away. When she died it seemed right to bring him here. He seems to be liking it – or at least the stick.
Enjoy!
Teaching your dog the rules of tug and setting up boundaries helps control their natural tugging behavior and gives you both what you want.
Ask Professor Boo is our recurring, positive reinforcement dog training and behavior question and answer column. If there’s a question that you would like to ask Professor Boo, please feel free to contact him.
Just what is it tug? In short, you’re seeing a social manifestation of millions of years of their evolution.
As canids evolved and their hunting techniques developed to allow the hunting of larger prey. As a result, tug offered a solution to new issues:
At some point one canine grabbed one end of a kill and another canine grabbed the other end and tug was born. What started as a solution to communal hunting and eating became what we see today in dogs as the game of tug.
If your dog is a tugger, you will be shocked to see how quickly he/she will learn the rules. Tug is of such high value to most dogs that the game itself becomes a reward for other great behaviors.
Good luck, let me know how it goes, and stay positive!
On this remarkably comfortable summer morning Pax’e and her new friend Ruby ran, tumbled, chased, and mouth wrestled to their hearts content.
Occasionally Pax’e would chase another dog, but back she would come to Ruby. It was a good long time of this tumbling until they were wet and tired enough to take a breather and pose for their picture. Maybe you can see how soggy they are.
Perhaps the sixteen-week-old Standard Poodle Ruby inspired Pax’e’s mothering instincts, or maybe Ruby is just a great playmate.
Thanks to Ruby’s human, Karen, for the picture!
If puppies have plenty of proper toys to play with, it is easy to teach them to ‘leave-it’ and ‘drop-it’ and tell them “all done” when it comes to the items we don’t want them chewing.
Don’t limit their toys.
Instead, expand their horizons because they need to explore and chew in order to learn what is and is not appropriate.
Because of this, we can use this play to teach them how to leave their toys, drop them, ignore them, and hopefully not guard them. And, we can prevent them finding toys like boots, shoes, socks, etc.
If they have plenty of proper toys to play with, it is easy to teach them to ‘leave-it’ and ‘drop-it’ and tell them “all done” when it comes to the items we don’t want them chewing.
In teaching her to tug at my sock, she learns that commands can be fun. She learns socks are boring. And, while she may have wanted to tug with that sock instead of giving it up at first, the ‘drop-it’ command worked.
It’s never too early to start teaching, playing, having fun, and building your relationship with your pup.
Over the next several weeks/months Pax’e’s training exploits will be showcased. Sometimes with success and sometimes, maybe not.
Regardless of success, it will always be a learning process.
Recently I was able to wrangle three Golden Retriever puppies to compare and contrast their differing colors.
For some time, I have noticed Golden Retrievers are turning up in some very different colors.
Until now I have not had all three colors in the same class.
However, in a recent Basic class I was able to wrangle three Golden Retriever puppies to compare and contrast their differing colors.
Notice (from left to right) Tucker-the-Cream, Redgie-the-Red, and of course Willow-the-Golden.
My question is, in the future will we be looking at a true color split in this breed like we see with Labs? Will we be making similar designations for Goldens just like we do for Labs?
We will probably have to wait a decade or two before we know how this is going to turn out.
But in the meantime, here is some three-colored Golden-puppy play.
Enjoy!
