BrunoBella

Well, I was very excited today. Bruno pulled a weed out of my garden Much better than the 20 missing plants On a worser note, he also chewed through the base of a climber which I have been growing succesfully for two years RIP climber...

Cyclone Bruno is now 6 mths old. He hasn't had a toileting accident for at least 2 months. Occassioanally he complains at 3am and I ignore him . He can now easily go from 10.30 to 7 without a toilet stop. I think Coda is old enough to hold for the night and it would be worth trying the ignore. If you have to clean up a mess occasionally at least you'll get some sleep I value sleep above cleanliness Good luck ------------------------------ ETA: Had another good idea (I'm procrastinating from doing some serious work). If you need to let him out to the toilet, put him on the lead and take him to his toilet spot without talking or playing. And don't let him drink more ammunition. Take all the fun out of it.

Have fun Bruno and I have just finished puppy school To stop nipping you have to sit down and put your finger in the electra's mouth and get her to bite. If she bite's hard, pull your finger out, stand up and be quiet. If she bites gently, say good girl good girl. You need to do this quite a bit for maybe 3-4 minutes at a time. Make it fun when they bite nicely and boring when they bite too hard. When electra learns to bite without hurting stop playing the game as you don't want to encourage biting long ter. This worked wonderfully for my two dogs .

And I drove to see Steve last weekend for our second lesson. No more bad walk days for me Bella is a pleasure to walk now and can get past birds which were her greatest distraction. The best thing that came out of this training in drive is the confidence I now have in what to do which is reflected in Bella's confidence in me. We still have a few things to fix but they are negligible compared to where we came from - a serial bird lunger You'll have it sorted soon

You poor thing For a soft bland diet I use boiled rice and chicken. Bella was on this for 10 days after her bout of gastro (20 days in all). I bought an enormous rice steamer to cook the rice and steam the chicken. I have an enormous dog though

A crate is fantastic for puppies. No problems with toileting accidents in the house and no destruction if you're out. Dogs feel safe in a crate. I would put the bed in a crate in the bedroom for a week and then move it to somewhere else A crate has been the most useful purchase I have ever made. Once the pup is older she will sleep in the laundry without it. Whippets have no body fat so may get cold in a laundry.

Have been away visiting K9 for further training.. Good to see the stories continuing ;) My new electric fence is working beautifully Have also discovered my best bushes have flat middles from dogs sleeping in them

Hi apollo Sounds like she needs a time out / relaxing safe place like a mini crate. I find my dogs feel much safer enclosed in a crate. Have you tried this?? Have a look at the crate training articles, heaps of them in the history. Let me know how it goes

Where is he scratching himself and how often? Is he damaging his skin?

Digging up fresh turf is much more fun than playing in the sandpit. Turf is softer My dogs haven't shown a preference for particular plants - herb fetishes are great and a dog that weeds properly would be wonderful Have to say my electric fence is working wonder :D My garden remains untouched - except the bit they have access to! Cyclone bruno is learning the rules well now and staying away from other plants much better And I forgot the damage by Bella who had stopped digging ages ago but rekindled her love of digging when I put a compost bin in the backyard. She tunneled under that from three sides I now have a circle of pavers around the base

Poor rocks glad my two don't eat them. My garden ends up chewed up inside as well Bruno just dragged his bed outside in the rain and the mud

Pups aren't vengeful they are chewful - you leave it they chew it Pups have no discrimination about cost - will chew anything from cardboard boxes to your entire watering system

Bruno prefers green branches and leaves as well I forgot about the six garden lights all my plant pots and the water sprayer that I very occassionally sprayed him with when he wouldn't leave something alone Also the multiple holes in my soft new topsoil which are actually easier to fix. I did some gardening today and found that Bruno loves the leafblower - he stands 5 metres in front and jumps around in the leaves . Also found how easy it is to garden without someone trying to help you trim the plants Neither of the dogs are the least bit interested in helping me pick up dog poo

It's my own silly fault. I had Bella trained to not damage my plants (she's 2.5) and then decided I needed another puppy I will need some new plants. Are you in Canberra labsmum? Good idea about checking for poisonous plants. I started my garden from scratch about 4 years ago so all my plants are dog and allergy friendly. I did a lot of research before I decided which ones to get and I use dog friendly fertiliser as well. I have also lost various lots of watering system. Bella liked to pull the whole lot up and chew all the expensive bits. I hand watered until Bella was old enough not to dig them up anymore and now Bruno is doing it. I have learned from a few other dolers about electric fences and so have blocked off my largest garden bed which has a watering system. The dogs are surviving happily without access to this except they had to find another toilet area. Bella put on her very disgusted face Now I can go and nurture the plants that have been only half killed

I feel so much better Sezy knowing that I'm not the only one

Oh no. How did you explain that

This morning cyclone bruno pulled one of my plants out by the root shook the dirt off. Dug a big hole and buried the plant roots up He has also beheaded numerous plants and broken stems off my bigger plants . He and Bella both lie beside my plants and chew on the stems That's not to mention the mulch which has been moved to other parts of the garden As of today, I have an electric fence around my garden and I am going to try and resucitate it What has your puppy done?

This is a great thread I have always been critised by people for treating my dogs as dogs. Making the poor things lie in the dirt when there are perfectly good beds inside. Since I seen these discussions on Anthromorphising I am much better able to reply to my critics. I also pay very close attention to my interaction with my dogs to make sure I don't accidentally do any of these strange activities I don't expect my dogs to understand anything bar what I've taught them. I did start off using totally positive training but soon discovered that this did not work for Bella. I also find myself picking apart any posts on this looking for Anthromorphysers

I don't do drive building on our walks with Bruno. I was told that was for at home. Leash training is the same as normal. Neither of my dogs are interested in their toys on their walks. With Bruno, my 4mth old pup, I call him and reward him for looking at me. I teach him "slow" which means he can walk anywhere and sniff (without pulling on the lead); "walk" which is my word for the baby version of heeling. He is taking to this very well. On our walks I practice "here", "sit", "wait" and "drop" all using treats as a reward. I'm not sure if this is right for Kaos but it is certainly working for Bruno. Bella, my 2yo, I teach "slow" as well and practice "come", "sit", "stop", "drop", "sit-stay-come" and heeling. I don't take my prey toy out for either of them. I would if I was doing long-lead work somewhere else but at the moment this is all happening at home. Bella is allowed to sniff the ground with the slow command but I can get her attention instantly with any of the commands so she is obviously in a lower drive level than what she was in before. I think K9 Force has a different program for different dogs but this is my interpretation of what my dogs are supposed to be doing I will be going back for my second lesson next week and will find out which bits I've mucked up Have fun :D

My new pup, Bruno, got beaten up for two weeks. I taught Bella the word gentle which helped heaps. After two more weeks I could let them play unsupervised. Now they play together fine all the time. Bella was the only dog that suffered injuries in all this. She got bitten on the nose four times by Bruno . There is a lot of growling, snapping and barking which is normal but took me a while to get used to. Yelping is not good but if you watch the dogs, the offender should stop being rough if the other one yelps. If they don't then you should intervene. This is not an issue of jealousy, just normal dog behaviour. Have fun

I have just been working on leadership with my GSP. There is some really great reading on getting control of your dog. Here is a quick intro to being a leader Flying Dog Leadersjp. A search on Dominance will also find lots of information. Have fun

Not sure about that the floor cleaner. You can use spot flea killer (put it on the back of the neck) for puppies. More comfortable than a collar. Do you have fleas where you live??

I agree blacklabrador. I do clean the dogs bowls but not everyday as my dogs eat garbage from the garden all day long and they only get dry food.

NILIF is what Bella and I are working on at the moment. She has had me trained to respond to her requests and I am slowly turning this around. We are both much happier now and her listening to me has improved dramatically. I can hardly believe it Dogs are smart and sneaky, they keep trying to figure out more ways to beat us

Definitely a dominance/leadership issue. If Loki behaves for other people then he's playing up cause he doesn't consider you the leader. There is some great reading here and in the puppy forum on dominance and how to be the boss . I'm not the best on describing what to do as have just been figuring out most of this stuff myself with Bella who had me trained It's not hard to reverse, just need to follow some steps. Have fun ;)