Wild Child to Perfect Puppy

Dec. 14, 2008

Today Kruiser went from "Wild Child" at the cabin--playing ferociously with Pat, bothering the cat, begging for us to throw sticks--to "Perfect Puppy" on the groomed cross-country ski trails at Devil's Thumb. I had taken both him and Pat on the dog trails at Devil's Thumb the day before and it was total chaos--tangled leashes, lots of tugging, having to pick up after them, my hands freezing in the wind chill. Then on Sunday went to ski with Ed on the regular non-dog trails. At the last minute I decided to at least give Kruiser a try. I put on his vest, his self-correcting collar, leash and started out. He was PERFECT. He stayed in a heel, watched me the whole time, stopped when I stopped, switched sides when I asked him to (my arms got sore poling on just one side.) It was like he needed to work, that he was bored at the cabin.

Here's a staged picture of him in his vest and me on skis and wearing a goofy hat in front of the cabin--we didn't have the camera with us at Devil's Thumb.

Another Puppy Raiser

November, 2008



Judy from my yoga class is now a "puppy raiser" to one of Kruiser's litter mates. Here she is with Kookie at training. Kookie is more challenging than Kruiser, if only because she hasn't had a continuous puppy raiser the way Kruiser has had. However, she definitely has the aptitude--she brings Judy her keys, the remote, the paper, almost without asking. A great litter!

This month Kruiser went through a lot of teenage behavior. He unlearned "down stay" and we had to remind him of it over and over. On the other hand, he learned how to retrieve the paper (Kookie & Judy gave us the idea) for Ed in the morning after only 5 minutes of teaching him using an old paper. His only issue was that he wanted to play with it on the way up the stairs. It just took attaching him to a long lead and giving him a gentle tug along with a "come" and he got it. Since then he's been getting the paper every morning. The first big Sunday paper threw him, but now he can even handle that. It's almost as if he says, "Why didn't you teach me this sooner!" He's also getting better with handicap buttons, though I still don't think he's made the connection between pressing the button and opening the door--his connection is between putting his paws up on the button and getting a treat and lots of praise. The women working at credit union and the city hall get a kick out of the training and have loved to see him progress at opening their doors.