Who you lookin at?
I got back yesterday and I'm still not caught up on all my email, but wanted to post about our trip before I put it off. The last trip to NY in 2008 went well and Dazzle saw his first real snow while at my parent's house in the "snow belt." They had 6-8" of lake effect snow which thankfully I didn't have to drive in much as it was falling (though I hit some pockets of bad weather going through PA.) There was a good bit of snow fall while we were there, but by the time I left, the roads and sky were clear.
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On my way north, I stopped in Columbus to meet with Sarah and Chad and see Cynic (their Malinois.) We met in a park to let them stretch their legs. Dazzle barked at Cynic as we were walking toward each other, and Cynic wasn't too keen on that, so we played with them separately instead of trying to see what might happen if we let them get close to each other. They took some action photos of Dazzle, but I haven't gotten them yet. I'll post some when they send them to me.
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When we were in Albany NY, I stopped at a park to tire him out and we found some huge piles of shredded leaves the park maintenance people had piled in the parking lot. Some of the piles were nearly 5' high! Dazzle had a BLAST climbing them, rolling in them, and digging in them. I left my video camera at home thinking it would be a repeat of last month's trip and not wanting to worry about losing it or having it stolen or damaged. So no video of this or his first snow. When am I going to learn!?
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The temps were frigid (low teens) so we did most of his exercise and training at the malls, mostly in the mornings with the "mall walkers." He's doing really well now with his sit/down/stand discrimination and we practiced stays in those positions too. But I have been lax about having him "sort of" walk in heel but because I'm not really intending to work on heel, it has gotten really sloppy. I decided that if he's supposed to do loose leash walking, I'll hold the leash in my right hand and have him on my right side. If we're working on heel, it will be on my left side (obviously) and I'll hold the leash in my left hand. Not sure how quickly he will pick-up the leash holding thing (or how long it will take that to become habit for me) but he was fine with walking on my right side. His walking on my left was turning into a bad case of forging (too far in front of me, but still giving eye contact as though he was trying to "heel".) I went back to basics today with heel during our 15 minute training session because it was clear he was confused about where heel position really was and now it looks really good again. I was even able to get him to back up straighter in heel position than before. We also worked a bit on the ladder, but he was having trouble and getting frustrated so we moved to heel work instead.
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At our last hotel stop near Beacon NY, there was a nice big grassy area behind the hotel where I could let him play fetch. We did that in short sessions because it was too cold to stay out for very long. He seems fine with the cold, but I don't handle it very well- even in many layers. He didn't seem to mind.
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He has traveled several thousand miles (over 3000?) and I noticed that by the time we were at the last hotel stop, he was starting to go the other way when I opened the van and asked him to get in. Can't really blame him. I had been giving him a few pieces of kibble each time he hopped in, but upped that to pieces of string cheese and he was willing to get in again. I'm sure once we aren't travelling so many hours at a time he will be fine again with getting in.
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He had fun in the snow at my parent's house. He was bounding in it, more jumping than running, and he would stop, dig, bury his nose and snow plow with his nose. He also liked to eat it and the first time in the snow it looked like he wanted to roll, but ne never did. I did get some cute photos of him in the snow (below.) My dad took him out for a bit to play frisbee (since we knew the ball would just sink in the snow.) Dazzle would chase it, find it on top of the snow, then dig at it till he had it buried and on the ground. He would get it out eventually, but my dad had to help him a few times. A couple times he got it rim side up and when he dug at it, it scooted under his feet and he ended up digging a trench! :-)
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On Saturday morning, I put on my Carhart suit and boots to take him for a walk. It was 7:30 in the morning and no one was out, so I let him off-leash. He had a blast running ahead and back, ahead and back between pounces into the deeper snow, so he got more exercise too. I found it was quite a work out trying to walk in the 6-8" of wet snow so we only went around the cul-de-sac, then went back inside where I kept him busy working on sit/down/stand till my parents woke up and we could play fetch. Thankfully my spry, 92 yr old grandmother didn't hear us so she got to sleep-in upstairs.
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She was very tolerant when Dazzle found her ball of string while she was out of the room and dragged her crochet project through two rooms! Thankfully he didn't unravel much. He also liked her puzzle pieces and I stopped him twice from stealing a piece of the puzzle. :-) She told him that unless he knew where it fit into the puzzle, he couldn't take it.
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Some snow photos:
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Are you coming mom? (back porch of my parent's house)
He was really begging to go out quite often. I can't tollerate the cold very well, so I didn't go out with him nearly as often or for as long as HE would have liked. A few times I wasn't sure if he might need to pee, so I opened the door to let him out, then closed it (I stayed inside.) If he didn't have to pee, he wasn't amused by this. If I opened the door to let him in, he would just stand there. dogs might not be able to talk, but the communication was crystal clear! Twice he stood staring in the back door with me just looking back at him, then when I didn't come out, he ran around the house to the front door. Thankfully he was willing to come in through that door. He really does love the snow and cold.
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When he was looking through the back door in the evening, he saw deer on the hill (the one in the background of the photo above) and barked menacingly at them. When I let him out (after they were gone) he didn't seem to have any interest in where they had been- thankfully! I did have his dinner on the table right inside the door to motivate him to come if I called though.
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Yippee!
Diggin' it! This was the start of one of his "trenches" created by digging at an upside down frisbee...
What's under there?
Pouncing on the snow was fun too!
Dazzle playing frisbee with his Grandpa. Dazzle has a great retrieve!
On Thursday during our trip, I took a few photos (below) of him to document his 16th week. I used the GPS to find a list of nearby parks. One that was called "falls park" looked promising (all I could see was names of the parks), but it turned out to be more of a drive-by attraction than a real park. I stopped anyway and pulled off the road/driveway just to get some photos before we had to head back to the hotel so I could get ready for my presentation. Because the "falls" were right along the road, I couldn't use them as a backdrop. :-(
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11-20-08
16 weeks old...
He's growing up! He lost more front teeth while on our trip and the four adult teeth (2 upper center and 2 lower center) are really getting big (& obvious.) No more Christmas song for him about wanting front teeth. :-) When I met with Sarah and Chad, they measured Cynic who is 20" tall at 6 months old. Dazzle is 17" tall at 16 weeks (not even 4 mo. old yet)!
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He's also starting to challenge Coyote a bit more (they are the same size now.) He has tried a few times (unsuccessfully) to keep Coyote away from me. When he tries that, I move Dazzle away and call Coyote to try to teach Dazz that it doesn't work for him to try to keep the other dogs away. That worked to teach Coyote to not be possessive of me, so I'm hoping it will also work for Dazzle. At this point, Coyote is mostly ignoring him, but this afternoon they did get into a barking match. "Let's see who can bark louder" they seemed to be saying as they barked toward each other. I could just imagine them as kids with Dazzle doing the annoying mimic game:
Coyote: "Stop barking at me"
Dazzle: "Stop barking at me"
Coyote: "I mean it! Shut up!"
Dazzle: "I mean it! Shut up!"
Coyote: "I'll tell mom on you"
Dazzle: "I'll tell mom on you"
It didn't seem to be escalating though and neither looked to me for help, so I let them work it out.
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On the way home, I again stopped in Columbus to meet up with Chad and Sarah. They were doing tracking, but I'm going to hold off on that with Dazzle. I want him to get past the puppy stage of "everything on the ground is interesting and must be eaten." Hopefully he will grow out of that :-) If nothing else, he will have more practice with "leave it." I know he won't have any problem learning to track when he's a bit older.
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I did some quick errands today while Mike was at a meeting, but I was hurting and that was lowering my patience levels and I knew I wouldn't be in the best mood for training. So I left him home in his crate to practice "alone time." He seemed to do fine with it and I'm thinking he slept all or most of the time we were away since he was wired till after dinner time and didn't act like he needed a nap till then.
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He starts his first "obedience" class tomorrow night. I signed him up so we can practice working with distractions and as practice in an environment closer to a dog show (multiple dogs around, new building, etc.) I talked to the instructor about him this evening and he suggested I take the intermediate class instead of the beginner class, but that I should sit in on the orientation during the beginner class. So we'll be sitting for the first hour and then working with the intermediate class during the second hour. I think that will work well and allow him to get comfortable in the new place before being asked to concentrate.
