I had to go to Saskatoon for a few days. Ron is being such a sweetheart about managing the dogs while I’m gone. I know he likes them best when they’re old and ready to lie quietly beside him (though I did catch him watching a football game with Spider).
It seems to me that Spider has grown two inches in the 3 days I was gone. It’s ridiculous. And his ears are flat on his skull again.
Friend Barbara and I met for the first Training Levels session for our puppies. We’re planning on this being a weekly event to keep us on track with the foundation behaviours competition dogs so badly need. These aren’t the “glitzy” behaviours and it’s easy to skip them but it’s plain to see what’s missing in other friends’ dogs when they haven’t done the work on the basics.
Both puppies are pretty well behaved with a good start on recalls, crates, doors, positions, etc., but Barb and I both found plenty to work on in Level 1. We worked a couple of Level 2 behaviours to keep ourselves interested, but otherwise stayed with the program.
Spike has a full set of new incisors – thank goodness, now he can start figuring out where they are so he doesn’t have to spend the rest of his life swallowing my hand in pursuit of treats.
He’s learning to catch treats – partly because it’s cool, and partly because sometimes I just don’t feel like thrusting my innocent hand into the gaping maw of hell.
What I actually mean by “learning to catch” is that if I make a certain motion with my hand, his mouth opens automatically, and if my aim is good, I can hit his tonsils. It looks pretty good, though.