Where the Wild Things Are

[barbarianoftheuniverse]

I have an eight month old Border Collie called Meg. She is far from perfect (and so am I).
Today she has been about 60/40 good. The 40 included chewing up my camera memory card which DH is sure he put safely on the mantelpiece. Every time I look down at this screen she takes a quick munch of the coffee table with her eyes on mine. This despite a 2 hour walk which included much in and out of streams.

Aw, Meg sounds like such a sweetie - and fetching a blanket for sad people is just the sweetest thing ever.

Pip brings his favourite stuffed toy to people sometimes. He doesn't want to play with it, he just likes to give it to to his favourite people to hold disgustingly manky thing it is too. You know he really lurves you if he brings you Goosey Lucy.

Mint I know - well you know what I'm like about worrying if my dogs might disturb my neighbours - I'm the absolute worst for it. It's hard to ignore them when you have attached neighbours to worry about isn't it?

Pip is sweet and loving ... most of the time. Other times he's a typical norty teenager and loves nothing more than pushing the boundaries.

He is a lovely cuddly lap dog that loves nothing more then to flop upside down across my legs for a cuddle but recall and LLW is a serious work in progress. It has been said that Labs are eternal puppies...meh!

Teenage border here...but of the terrierist variety. Lots of energy but with renegade terrierist tendencies. Eeek!

Luckily he does not seem to be a furry killing machine but he does harbour the usual terrier propensity to throw himself into heart stopping situations with relish. Has anyone ever read Jeremy Strongs 100 mile an hour dog to the kids? Well the illustrations are wrong. Streaker is not a laid back pointy hound...she is a fully fledged terrier if you ask me.

He is very sweet and loving but only comes in two speed settings - off and on!

Lilcamper, isn't it funny how they can drive us to distraction with things like recall and LLW, but all they have to do is give us a nice big floppy cuddle and our hearts melt? I honestly believe that dogs are far smarter than they'll ever let on to us daft humans.

Fanof, I've not read that book, but am now looking it up. Sounds like my dcs would love it! I love Border Terriers. That's what we'd agreed we were going to have this time around, but when the time came I knew in my heart I wanted a rescue Lurcher pup.

Dh wanted a greyhound/whippet/lurcher and we did go to see a rescue grey x whippet who was lovely but he set off DS's dog allergy. We decided to look at BT's for their low allergy potential at first but I think I'm team terrier for life now...suckered in!

lilcamper - nice to have all who wish to contribute I reckon

fan - can't imagine having anything else but a spaniel now, apart from a retired greyhound when I am retired and grey myself.

I realised recently that our old BC was far too intelligent for me - well, he was cleverer than me.

Our Springer x is really quite dim - suits me perfectly. When I mentioned this to the husband, he just nodded sagely and quietly agreed with me. Ratbag!

I have that with my two. Lurcherboy is gorgeous, but thick as two short planks. Clicker training him is painfully slow - you can see him trying and almost hear the cogs in his head squeaking, but he takes forever to make the necessary connections.

Pip on the other hand is sharp as a knife, super fast with clicker training and you can kind of see him weighing situations up, considering his next move. He's a crafty beast when he's in the mood.

Both totally different but utterly lovable for their own quirks and ways.

Lilcamper, do you have any thoughts on what might be going on for Lurcherboy as per my other thread here. I'm really worried about him. He's booked in at the vets later this week. There's something I just can't quite put my finger on about his general demeanour, as well as his change in behaviour out and about. If you have any thoughts I'd be really grateful to hear them.

we have a "teenaged" Westie - 2, so just coming out of it now (only teen behaviour he still exhibits is the sheer exuberant joy of chasing a bird off his patch - including those on the telly)

He is the cleverest dog I ever had... the girls were playing with monkey toys the other day and he dragged HIS monkey toy over as if to say "come on - can I play too"... he also got given a toy at Christmas by my MIL - and whenever she comes he goes and gets it and sits at her feet as if to say "I've still got it, come on play with me"

And my girls have trained him so that when they say "where do you want to go?" he makes a warbling sound that everyone says sounds like "wa-wa-wa-Walk"

Your boy sounds lovely - and very bright, Shadow.

I thought our Springer was pretty bright, he picks stuff up quickly. The cocker puppy - blimey, super clever

Funny how they are all so different isn't it?

The springer has been house bound for 3 weeks due to a paw injury, I noticed on our first walk yesterday some selective hearing, so I will be working on him this week

he is....

mine also does the Pip thing with the "most valuable" mankiest thing he owns - and drops it ON you to let you know you are part of his family and he loves you......

my hubby particularly "likes" the way the dog shows he loves him by occasionally putting a mouthful of food in his shoes....

Shadow

Are we too young to join? My 5 month old cocker puppy shows distinct signs of teen-dom. He regularly gives me the finger [figuratively speaking] when I ask him to "come". Happy to circle round me, keeping close, but actually come up to me so I can put on the lead? No way. I have resorted to sneaky luring tactics......

Hey moose no problem.

At 6 months old my springer used to frequently reduce me to tears.

Ok, I am pleased with my mutts today

Just come in from a walk at the local park/public space. Lovely day here, so it was packed, clearly a lot of the schools had a training day too. Lots of dogs.Lots of dogs with owners not in control. Which is unusual, as this place usually has tons of really well behaved dogs.

Pleased with ddog1 for recalling brilliantly, even after having 3 weeks of not walking so he was highly excited, but even more so with the puppy, who recalled just as well, and did every 'watch me' or 'sit' that I asked, even when out of control dogs were charging around us, with owners trying to catch them. All of the dogs also stole my dogs balls, but they didn't react, so happy with them. All of the dogs followed us, rather than their owners

Three incidents of dogs chasing us as we played, an insane Labradoodle, whose owner I did judge, until I chatted with her, and found she had only had her 2 months, then an insane pug, then a lovely but boisterous lab.

All good experience for a 13 week old puppy

There will be many many posts moaning about them, so I will take the good days while I can!!!

Needa - will you come and train my two please!

Between Lurcherboy's odd behaviour and Pip's attempts at being a teenager I am feeling like a pretty useless trainer just at the moment.

No moose, because next week your two will be fabulous and my two will be driving me batty I am sure it works that way.

I think I have found the last three weeks harder than the dogs, lack of routine, exercise etc.

It just went well today, tomorrow will bite me in the bum

Finn is beginning to show signs of being a teenager and I was only saying earlier we need to go back to basics. I find it difficult with three different people walking to be consistent. DH is especially poor, training school for Husbands anyone?
I think he thinks dogs arrive fully trained and doesn't quite get the hard work I put into our previous dogs but this time I'm working full time so he has to do a lot more.
I've got a uni end of module assessment due in next week so keep promising myself I'll get stuck in to some intensive training after that.

My pointer cross (apparently) is about 6 months old and is so wonderful.
Unless you try to walk her on a lead, or let her off the lead then she fucks off and all the things she loves indoors hold no appeal. It's pure luck that we ever get her back, she just goes onto another planet when she's sniffing and all her other senses shut down.
I heard that pointers stay in their rebel phase for about 2 years. FFS.

Nigella, sorry, missed your post somehow. Everyone's welcome, we just didn't want to scare the younger puppy people with our tales of delinquent teenager behaviour!

Needa, I don't believe a word of it. You are so dedicated and put in all the time and effort, therefore you deserve the well behaved dogs you have.

NCIS, how old is Finn now? Please excuse my dreadful memory.

I made dh sit in on all my dog training sessions when we lived up North. He even switched the times of his lunch hours and worked late so he could take me to the puppy training group I wanted to go to, as it was 40 miles away.

I can't wait for the fields to dry out so we can get some non-park walks and my two can have more freedom. The way down to our local fields is impassable at the moment, as there's a flood under the railway bridge.

Laughs at Evenbetter, Liver is my friend, or those cheap dreadful hotdog sausages

Nigella - all welcome, nice to chat

NCI - I am sort of in between moose and your DH re my own DH. He actually did all the KC training, and gets up every morning with the dogs, does lots of training, but doesn't do clicker, or interact as much with them and is more likely to tell them off, thinking they understand. He loves both tons though

Lab lump seemed to have forgotten all his LLW today and literally pulled me all the way to the field. Always a reason, he was desperate for a poo and was good as gold for the rest of the walk. Even chose to ignore some other dogs in favour of doing some trick work with me

My secret weapon for recall (well not so secret now I suppose) is chorizo (I buy the pre cut snacking stuff from Tesco as, being veggie myself, I can't stand the stuff). I find my two love it because it's so stinky. I also use little trays of good quality cat food and the occasional mini tray of Butchers dog food - but only the ones that are just meat and rice or meat and veg. I try to vary the rewards, throwing in super tasty surprises every now and again to keep him guessing. So, a basic recall where he comes back with no enthusiam or speed might get a bit of cheese, but if he stops what he's doing and comes flying back at rocket speed he gets something much tastier.

Pip is at that nearly always responds, but every now and again decides to push the boundaries and ignore. He's been on a longline anyway due to a recent leg injury, so I've been working hard at getting him to recall shorter distances on that and building up the distractions.

I could really do with finding an enclosed field to hire so we can start working on free-running again - if the vet says his leg is ok when we see her this week.

Like Evenbetter's girl, he is unlikely to be mature until 18 months - 2 years though, so I'm not thinking he's going to be reliable any time soon. He's still very much a pup, full of cheek and fun, he doesn't cock his leg yet (still squats to wee) and doesn't appear to have noticed he's a boy. Mind you, he's my third male dog and none of them have ever shown any sex related behaviours because I am a horrible prude and constantly interrupt and redirect the poor sods.