TangerineDream

I walk Tango on a 10' lead made from a lunge line. We do some intensive heel work from the moment we are out the front door all the way up the street (he's 2 years and 9 mos btw) - lots of about turns, both left and right, sits, downs, stands, stays etc..when he's completely focussed on me I let him wander at will with the proviso 'don't pull' - he understands this to mean don't go to the end of the lead so far that it tightens....he's actually able to work out exactly how far he can be from me..... If I don't start the walk with the obedience and focussing exercises, 'don't pull' doesn't work.... efs

Broccoli????????? eeeek - Tango has a bit with his meal (about 1 floret a day...)

Tango is still a leash puller unless you remind him to 'don't pull' and then he settles down....to control this the first 100m of our walk is all obedience, about turns, downs, halts, stays...till we get to the end of the street...but forget to tell him to 'don't pull' and we'd win any sled dog race (if he was pulling a sled)

Tango (GSP) is outside during the day with no coat and it can be as low as -2C when I leave for work. he has a pile of blankets in his kennel in an undercover area and a hessian bag hanging over the doorway ...stick my hand in the kennel when I get home and his body has warmed it nicely and it's quite cosy....

Might not hurt to pop an antihistamine down his throat anyway...can't hurt and might help....hope he's feeling better soon.

Tonight I taught Tango to hold up his front paw - and the paw he holds up depends on which hand I put out....I put out my left hand, he puts out his right paw and vice versa... took him about 5 goes to get the hang of it and you could see the lightbulb go on when he worked our what I was doing!!!!!! all taught with praise and no food

I buy my chicken mince from the chicken shop at Airport West and it is stunningly good!! best I've ever had in 25 years of buying it at various places (both human & pet) - very little fat in it, no preservatives. I've had problems with Lenards (overpriced and underweight) and with some other places (more fat than meat).. The other thing I like about this shop is that they mince it very fine....

Finally had to admit that it had beaten me after I taped up the tip of one ear last night so I wouldn't have to clean splatters off the wall.... Definitely an allergy - exactly the same time he had the allergy last year that affected his scrotum & between the toes, but this year the ears have decided to play the starring role...(the scrotum was much easier!) So we are now on antibiotics, ear stuff, more tablets and everything has already started to work because he's asleep and hasn't shaken his head for hours........at least he clots fast! Vet said he's seen a lot more allergies than usual and attributes it to the dry weather. Hopefully that's the end of it. Mind you, he loved having to come to work with me today

I've found that pasta doesn't do anything, but rice with some oatmeal in it helps do the trick for my dogs. I feed chicken mince, dry food (Pal Natural fixed the Supercoat runs), rice & oatmeal and have to be careful how much I feed adult GSP's on because they do so well on it. I also add 2 scoops of Thrive D (online pet supply places have it) to Tango's tea daily and it helps improve the absorption of food amazingly and keeps motions in much better condition.....

Had the ears checked about 3 weeks ago - no mites, no nasties on the slide or in a culture. It's not actually the inside ear that's the problem - it's the outside leather. The Polaramine and Phisohex has settled one ear down within 24 hours and I've had him with me in the car all day and there's been less head shaking and very little scratching, so I think we might be getting somewhere...just have to give the other ear time to hold a scab for long enough on the point to be able to heal properly...... Vote 1 for PhisoHex Thanks for the advice...ear cleaning happening tomorrow as well. Coat is in lovely condition - except where he's been sunbaking where it's not quite the right colour any more

Head shaking and scratching been going on and off for the last couple of months but hasn't been continuous - still isn't overly frequent, but now because there's a nick in one it, it won't heal. His diet is chicken, rice, oatmeal, veges and a dry food (haven't got the bag & have a memory like a sieve) that he's been on for the last 18 months. Am giving him a Polaramine every day (for the last 3 days) and doing the ear flaps with PhisoHex, some of the timy lumps seem to be disappearing and the ears feel cooler. Will also clean his ears out too. It was having to was sprayed blood off the walls last night that made me realise it had 'crossed the line'

last year, at about this time, Tango had some sort of allergy that gave him whitehads on the scrotum. This year, it's something that seems to be making the inside of his ear leather irritated...tiny little lumps. but not bites of anything. No mites, no fleas, clean ears.....he's scratched and shaken his head so much that 1 ear has a nick at the edge and he's scratched the other ear enough to scrape the outside of the leather......toenails haven't been cut recently & they are pretty blunt. He's aiming for the ear leather, not the inside deep down of the ear. In desperation tonight I hypothesised that if PhisoHex worked on his scrotum, maybe it would work on the ear leather if I was very careful and it seems to have helped somewhat... - no change in diet - no change in habits - intermittent..can go for a couple of days with no shaking or scratching and then you get a stretch of it. - no change in bedding (except to be washed) - not grass seeds any ideas to stop him continuing the cycle by scratching and shaking? trying hard not to have to put a bucket on it atm..want to try everything else first.

Tango had the same problem last year...PhisoHex fixed it very quickly...and I must admit he enjoyed standing in the bath every night for a couple of weeks with me 'playing with' his balls :rolleyes:

I once did a training session with a Golden Retriever with a frangipani flower Tango is more play driven than food driven with obedience training.....will retrieve till he gets hot & works brilliantly. Show training is 'strictly business' as he's totally 'overenthusiastic' at shows so it's all serious...although he does get to bounce madly up and down in the ring if he gets awarded (that's his play). have never really used food much in obedience...always been play with all my dogs (Dobes & GSP's)

;) I just tried the techniqure for correcting a dog that breaks stays, only had to use it twice on Tango, and third time he thought about getting up, I took one step towards him and he got one of those....'it's just not worth it, I might as well stay here' looks and stayed put for half an hour till I released him :D :p ;) ;) Brilliant - just brilliant!!!!! Footwork and other hints are great too!!!!! Well worth a read. Thanks for posting....

Sounds very much like Tango......he's dominant towards people in demanding attention and being territorial (in a friendly but in your face..don't forget I'm here manner) and will 'follow' you around the house by walking in front of you and watching over his shoulder....but he demonstrates submissive behaviour when he wants something or wants to avoid something (like having tablets). He stops behaving like this the minute his needs are satisfied or I stop doing to him what he doesn't want done........He's also quite dominant in his body language to other dogs. He's a champion manipulator of people - he had next door neighbour throwing the ball for him tonight - it was cold out and she was in the middle of arriving home but he still had her throwing the ball for him from the other side of the fence, but if you'd seen the lengths that he went to to get her to do it, it was quite amazing to watch . Also has the pain threshold higher than any other dog I've known (except Tegan, my old Dobe bitch) - and she was dominant too. I like the term "obnoxious submission"

GREAT WORK!! keep it up! delighted it's working for you.

When you are trying to extinguish a particular behaviour using silence / ignoring / immobility, you will quite often find that the pup will get 'creative' and when one doesn't work, will try another, and if that doesn't work, will try another etc etc and as the others have said, will try all sorts of new behaviours to try and get your attention (at this point, any attention will be perceived as being a reward). This is why you have to be STRONG and resist the temptation to react to any behaviour other than the one that you want. It may help to set your pup up so that you can reward him more frequently for the 'desired' behaviour and that will help extinguish the undesired behaviours faster... Good luck, be strong, be really, really patient (I know how many tricks pups have up their sleeves....and you may begin to find out over the next week or so), and stay sane and above all - be consistent!! It'll take some time, but it'll work!

Tango & I went for a walk around some farm country on the edge of town this evening. A small herd of Angus steers (26 of them) in one paddock we passed were down the other end, but they had moved up to our end as we came back....all of a sudden, 26 steers wanted to talk to and play with Tango and came trotting, bucking and snorting over to us...we're outside the wooden fence (with an electric wire running at their shoulder height - which they were very careful to avoid), and all 26 are lined up with their heads down peering through the fence at Tango who was trying to bounce, squeal & wag his body all at the same time...I thought 'what a great training opportunity' and made him sit about 5' from them and just watch them...he got so bored with that that he lay down.....and they just jostled and snuffled through the fence at him....it was great...Tango, the Pied Piper of Angus steers

The bit about her being relaxed in the yard made me think.......I wonder if it might possibly be because she has associated you with all manner of incredibly exciting things to do whenever you two leave the backyard together, so she's excited all the time when she's with you - I suggest this because Tango (who's a very high drive dog) gets incredibly excited when he knows that something exciting is going to happen and he will spin like a top....and if my mate is coming in the car as well, then it's going to be INCREDIBLY exciting and his activity level reflects this even more. Another point that I should make is that if she is as highly attuned to you as Tango is to me, she'll pick up on you getting the tiniest bit stressed about her behaviour and this will become an intensifier...... (Tango picks up on me if my adrenaline level goes up for any reason) These ideas might be of some help......... To help 'sllooooooowwwwww' Tango down (he was nicknamed "Mr Overactive" by my show buddies) I've started doing the following and have found that it is starting to help... 1. I'm being consistent with my corrections at all times. 2. If he gets excited about anything I stop without a word and wait until he stops spinning or leaping about. Everytime he starts this behaviour I stop silently and stand still......and when he stops I start again....can take up to 3 minutes for him to calm 'down' sometimes and then a number of repeats. 3. He stays on his mat in the evenings before tea and he is fed an hour after I have tea (That actually made a huge difference). 4. We don't get in the car till he's calm. 5. We don't put a collar on till he's calm. 6. We don't go out the front door till he's calm. 7. In the car, if he stands up, I stop. 8. He is made to sit before he gets in the car, goes out the door, is called... 9. All my commands are sloooooow and quiet, and I've started to whisper commands rather than speak them (and blow me down that actually works!!!!) I've found that these things are making him far more controllable and better focussed... Hope you find something that helps...it can drive you to distraction and the more stressed you get about it (and you might not even realise how stressed it's making you), the more it will 'agitate' her - she may actually be anxious as much as anything.

If he's a Dobermann, it's a perfectly normal breed trait all mine loved soap and would steal it given the chance..the GSP's have never been interested in it at all. On the other hand, he might have something lacking in his diet, or some irritation in his gut that the soap is helping?

Tango gets odd front feet occasionally, not sure what it is, just a general pinkness in the webbing, but if I weas them occasionally in pHisoHex (yep, that stuff we all used as teenagers) it disappears overnight.....

I was put onto it by greyhound people years ago and swear by it - helps absorption through the gut, makes stools much nicer to collect and smaller.....great for young GSP's whose guts seem to take longer than some other breeds to mature and handle food well. Wouldn't be without it !!

I'm with bella - I've got exactly the same 2 digital cameras!!!!!! Thrilled with them both! Canon 400D / Panasonic Lumix FZ20 (now up to FZ50 I think)

I get the feeling that some of the stores sell 'human' grade chicken for 24 hours longer than they should (I've had dodgy human grade chicken from at least 2 Lennards stores which was definitely not fresh ) so I think that might be the problem. If I don't like the smell of chicken mince when it is raw it goes straight out the door - refuse to feed it if it's that 'off'.