Welcome Home

I have a puppy! Asher is home and I’m interested to see if there is much difference with him as opposed to the other puppies I’ve brought home. So far there is one HUGE difference, Navarre is PISSED. I don’t know how he knows that THIS puppy is staying, but he’s sulking, pouting, clingy and being all angsty and weird. He’s never done this before! So there is lots of if I’m playing with puppy I have to be MOSTLY playing with Navarre, and making sure Navarre knows he’s still special, even if he isn’t the baby anymore. Still, Navarre, who loves puppies, is not happy that Asher is here AT ALL. He’s not mean to him at all, it’s just like a petulant sulking child. OMG, the looks and drama – who knew?

Bright and Haku are the same as they always are with puppies, basically ignoring him unless forced otherwise. Asher has glomed on to Haku, as all puppies gravitate to him and Haku lets them. Bright gives Asher some ugly face, but mostly ignores him. She doesn’t seem to think he needs discipline and likes that he respects her authority.  Asher has been SUPER appropriate with the cats, so they are not upset with him. Though he hasn’t really ‘met’ Dragon as he leaves the room if the puppy is around. But just very gentle sniffs and no rushing, pouncing, or being obnoxious at all with the cats.

As for Asher, he’s an interesting puppy. I just love his energy. He NOTICES things, like I have never had a puppy notice the different types of flooring in the house. But he had to stop and explore the hardwood, the carpets, the linoleum. He quickly became comfortable with everything, but he has such a quiet, thoughtful presence to him. Yet he’s way more of a rambunctious tugger and player than Navarre was at the same age. OMG, I am going to have to be careful with him, this dog is a toy DESTROYER. And even at 8 weeks he can rip off pieces of a toy within 30 seconds – that is one powerful chewer already! And he does like to CHEW, and not just a little, but back of the mouth molar destruction. I did give him a bully stick, but I think that was too hard, he whined at it and then tried to go steal the other dogs’ chews. So I gave him a fish skin I had gotten just for him, and he didn’t think that was food at all.

He is ridiculously sweet, and just connected. He has his own agenda, and he’s not needy, but he knows where you are and has such intense eye contact. He made himself at home quickly, he’s okay being out in the yard with the dogs and usually just curls up next to wherever Haku is (most puppies seem to do this with Haku!). So that makes life easier. I have not attempted an x-pen or crate yet, he slept on the bed all through the night, no problem. He had plenty of room as Navarre was not having any of that and went and slept in a corner in the living room, sulking. In the house he’s just explored and played with the toys and attempted to play with the dogs. Haku will play toy games with him, of course, but Bright and Navarre just tell him, ever so politely, to push off – and he does, he doesn’t need much to back off and doesn’t seem to take it personally. At this point he doesn’t seem that all interested in the other dogs, really. They are off running and playing and he doesn’t seem concerned, just keeps doing his own thing.

We have done a tiny bit of training, we worked on his wave and down, both lured behaviors and he remembered that. Then we did some freeshaping ‘click anything cute’ in the bathroom and ended up with targeting his nose to the drawer pull, backing up, smacking me with a paw and eye contact. Then we did a formal shaping session of paw target, and he figured that out and was purposely driving and smacking that in no time. He is getting the idea that the click is controlled by him, but still figuring out the game. He enjoys it, though not terribly food motivated, he thinks it’s okay (I was just using two different types of kibble). He ignores distraction, like the cats or other dogs and tries to figure out what I want.

As for what we tentatively have on the list to train to start with:

• Wave

• Down

• Paw Target

• Nose Target

• On Object

• In Object

• Name

• Recall

• Hold paws, mouth, head, ears, tail

• Crate/x-pen intros

• Frog

And introducing all sorts of toys, switching toys, two toy, chasing toys, tugging, race to toy, restrained recalls, opposition reflex.

As for socialization, mostly just planning to take him along everywhere I go next week, which unfortunately is looking to be super hot. So we’ll go to classes, play at the arena, out in the field, go to the park, hiking, watch some herding, see the river, maybe take him somewhere where dogs can be on the patio. He’ll get to see lots of different breeds of dogs, lots of barking and new people. Learn to walk on a leash, he had a harness on last night and was fine with it. Hopefully just learning about everyday life around here and getting used to my crew – and them getting used to him. And hanging out with me, because he is REALLY fun to hang out with.

So far, day two of Asher, he’s just awesome ❤