Seriously Fun

I can't even express how much I am enjoying this puppy.  She carries something with her at all times that just makes me laugh and smile.  I am going to have to be careful because I could let her slide on discipline because she is so frickin' cute.  It is hard to draw the line when you are laughing hard.

We had a fun shaping session this morning, this pup wakes up to work.  She now has an awareness of her back feet.  Last night and this morning we worked on putting her feet on a balance disc. 

In shaping sessions at this age it is always a negotiation of what the trick will  be in the end.  Last night Hoot decided that she would put a front and back foot on the disc (I was aiming for 2 back feet), I went with it because it is all good.  This morning however, she did give me the back feet!  Good girly.  The two totally awesome things about the session this morning beside reaching the goal of two back feet was:

 1) Tip and Tangle where right there begging (the distraction factor, not the begging was good).  Hoot was not phased by it at all.  Fed all three, Hoot was being shaped and the other two were being props for me.  She has an amazing ability to focus for this age.

2) After I ended the first session and played for a little bit, Hoot offered the back feet again.  I love it when my dogs offer/invite me to work with them.  Really good for an 11 week old, she wasn't done working, she wanted more.  Yep, she was probably hungry, but like I said, it is all good at this point.

Puppy Table Games

Hoot is telling me that she is ready for more!  Her play is getting more vicious and mischievous and I am beginning to see that look of "what are you going to do about this?". A bored border collie is a bad border collie!

Her nickname is now Hoot-a-vicious instead of Hoot-a-licious.

This morning I decided to play puppy table games with her.  This isn't really about training the table for me,  but it does build a love for the obstacle.  Really it begins to introduce two things 1) shaping without food 2) there might be some rules in order to play (get her thinking). 

This is our second session playing this game and the puppies catch on really quick as to what makes that toy fun again.



Tangle loved this game.  I never really "trained" the table with him.  This game just kept progressing to the point that I would restrain him about 20 feet away and he would run onto the table to tug.  Tangle still has a great table.

Yesterday Hoot learned the word "back" for her back-up and can do it for food or a toy.  She also went out to eat with us and enjoyed getting all the kids to play with her.

The rhythm of life

It has been 4 weeks that Hoot has been with us now.

I noticed today as I was going about my morning routine that she has learned the rhythm of the household. Every house has it, it is what you *tend* to do everyday. My whole pack has it down and falls right into the rhythm.

After we get up in the morning and have at least a moderate amount of caffeine in our blood, we, actually I start to bring chaos to the morning. I generally go jogging with the dogs and then we work out a bit, either agility, shaping, something to make me laugh and the dogs to have fun.

Intense

Then, on work days, I settle into my office chair for a long duration of sitting, programming, and focusing.  I take a few breaks during the day, but generally speaking no fun reigns on the house again until after work hours.

Hoot has figured this out and has started to adapt to that rhythm.  She is a wild little thing in the morning, biting, running, and playing.  She loves the walks and groves on the tricks.  Then, she looses her energy, settles into a slumber in the xpen for MOST of the work day.  Right now she makes it until about 3 pm without asking for more activity.


In the evening there is NO peace until bedtime.  She is like a 2 year old and just gets more wound, playing, biting, picking on the other dogs, harassing the cat, etc.... We have our constructive training moments, but she is all energy!

This routine works for us, or at least me.  I can get my work done, do what I do to get paid to do, but then the dogs pull me away from serious life to do something fun again.

Red Rocks Park

On the social front I have found a new favorite place to socialize dogs.  Red Rock Amphitheater.  Lots of joggers, bikers, tourists, etc...but mostly people, kids and dogs who are willing to take a moment to say hello.  There are steps, trails, rocks, puddles, mud, all sorts of things to get acquainted with.  And best of all, it is 10 minutes from my house!

The amphitheater

11 Weeks and a Confident little thing

Wow, is it possible, Hoot is 11 weeks old.  This pup still amazes me everyday!

It's funny when I was talking to the breeder about this litter I think she told me her girls start out soft and gain confidence quickly given encouragement.  I think I missed her soft phase LOL.






This pup is everything I wanted and more!  She is confident, loves people, sassy, thoughtful, smart, persistent, and uber active!

This week we have been working on some shaping.  She goes around jars and poles.  Now we are working on backing up.  I need to get those on video!

Her field trips have been to parks, home depot, a giant pet store, and walks around the block.  Cars seem to be the only thing that gives her pause (can't blame her).

Road trips, new dogs, friendly people and swimming

That says it all!

Hoot went to an overnight USDAA trial with Split and Tangle this weekend. What an awesome traveler she was.  It was only about a 2 hour car ride, she slept the whole way.

The trial was outdoors which made it perfect for her to run and play with other dogs and kids.  She had such a great time.  I am super pleased with her greeting skills with other dogs.  She seems to read them really well.  She spends a moment figuring out the dog, and then can accurately peg who is going to tolerate her rude jumping in their face behavior and who isn't.

Each time I had to go run or walk the course I was really surprised at how patient she was waiting in her kennel until I came to get her. 

Chillin'

Hoot and Seeker

This morning I decided that Hoot needed more new experiences.  She takes each one on so well.  I introduced her to the lake.  Split jumped right in and began swimming around.  Hoot couldn't handle not being able to get to her favorite guy so she jumped in after him.  Didn't phase her at all!

Hoot swimming with Split

Today is the day she begins to learn a bit of self control.  She is getting REALLY obnoxious with her other pack mates and everyone is about really to give her back.  We will begin with It's your choice games!

She Sleeps!

Hoot is a very active dog and only become more so.  She loves the world, chewing on ankles, attacking her pack mates and cat...she loves just about everything.

We decided to go to a park last night, have dinner and socialize the pup. 

We took her down to the lake.  She loved investigating the smells on the shore, and watching the ducks in the water.  On our way back, we walked along the jogging path.  Ha, that was an experience.  First, she wants to say hi to EVERYONE.  I had her on a long line so she managed to get to several people who seemed like they would say hi.

On the way back, I dropped her long line and she decided that she was going to chase after joggers.  Who can blame her right?  I have been playing chase games and this was just another right?  Note to self on this one...she has no idea that the whole world isn't her pack.

We wondered over the the skateboard park.  This was an amazing, cautious, fascinating experience for her.  She kept her distance, then would go closer, then got more distance again.  After about 20 minutes of watching this it was clear she was exhausted!

She Sleeps!

Took her a minute to crash when we got home.  A rare thing in the evening, which is usually her rage time!

Her first snow!

Yep, it is mid-May.  But it is also Colorado.  We can get snow almost any time of year.

Hoot got to see snow for the first time in her life.  Really didn't phase her and  she ended up just loving running and poking her nose into the snow.

 

This past week as been fun.  Hoot is turning up the dial on being naughty.  She has started running away, wanting to be chased, going under the gates to get into the agility field and in general looking for reactions from me on her naughtiness.  Ah, I remember this well with Tip!

I had to get creative and block off the AFrame, Dog Walk and Teeter.  She doesn't hesitate to climb each one.  So instead she started doing tunnels.  She had an awesome session of the puppy crazy's a couple of days ago and did the circuit of tunnels over and over again on the field.  She loves interacting with all the equipment.

But to counter the naughty she has also stepped up her understanding on being shaped.  She knows what the clicker is for and starts offering a behavior.  Almost always the last one we worked on.  She doesn't hesitate offering something else if that doesn't work.  Nice!!

Hoot is 13.5 pounds, up from 10 last week and still LOVES people.  She greets everyone she can and is sure they are on this earth just for her.

She is 9.5 weeks old.

Courage and Fear

Funny, yesterday Hoot was all filled with courage.  She was absolutely sure that she could do no wrong.  She harassed the big dogs to no end, bit me every place possible and was just generally full of herself.

We took a walk at the local park in the afternoon.  Kids were playing either soccer or rugby all around her.  She was almost beside herself wanting to go play rugby with the kids.  Soccer wasn't as exciting to her.  She still holds firm to her belief that EVERYONE in this world wants to and should say hello to her.  When someone doesn't she is genuinely disappointed.

Today she seems to be in a mini-fear stage.  Probably more emphasis on the fact that she is noticing to world around her to a greater extent and perhaps realizing that it is a BIG PLACE.  Birds are the big discovery today.  After a heavy rain there were a ton of them out and Hoot noticed them all.

We played some chase games this morning to get some energy out of her.  Boy is she getting fast.  Loves to chase.  She believes that her reward is biting my ankles rather than tugging on a toy.  We are trying to change that, but it might be a little bit.

We worked on CnT hand touches at the soccer field, up in the loft (her first visit), in the backyard.  She seems to be able to work in a lot of different places and always happy to tug and play.

Morning walk with the big dogs

Hoot got to participate in the morning exercise with the "big dogs".  She did awesome, loved to run in the field. 

She got to experience sprinklers, prairie dogs, baseballs,  mud holes, following the pack

The ears are going up

First mud hole

Her prize find

Loves the tall grasses

The Pack

She's a keeper (but I already knew that)!

I have had Hoot for a week now and she has had so many life experiences.  Visiting kids at college, agility class, a USDAA Regional, wondering the backyard in discovery of new things.  She loves it all.

This little girl has such resilience.  I took her to a USDAA Regional.  She got to meet a ton of people ('cause everyone holds the puppy), many dogs, several puppies and a judge stole her.  In each of encounters with people she was happy, tail wagging and nose chewing.  With each of her encounters with dogs she was confident, thought for a moment, gave the proper signals and ending up playing with almost all of them.  Never once did she retreat or give up trying to figure something out.  I am impressed.

The sounds didn't bother her, nor all the dogs barking, she was solid.

It is really fun.  At a week you hardly know your puppy.  With each new experience she learns from,  you learn too.  All of this information is great so I can better know the type of dog I am training and shape her lessons appropriately.

Trick of the day:
She learned to put all 4 paws on a pillow.