wyvernblade

Well mine has LOST the brand new Orbee ball I loved it more than he did! But have searched everywhere and can't find it! I think I'll be starting to tie mine up inside first and then move him to outside as he doesn't seem as upset inside, I think because I started him on the TOT outside, he thinks I'm going to tie him up and leave him for awhile!

J O's ideas are great, or maybe try putting her in a harness and tie her to that instead? The Medium one fits my brat. You are doing well at having her tied up to play, mine still refuses to play tied up. He just sits down and refuses to even look at me! Hmmmm have to work on that one!

I hate the one where people come home and the dog has trashed the house and they say "He knows he's in trouble because he slinks away" So then they punish it. We have the same problem in horse training, people attribute more intelligence and human characteristics to these animals that don't exist, and I personally believe that until you totally understand where an animal is coming from, and how and why it behaves the way it does, you are never going to be able to train it. It's funny or cute to make out that dogs (Or horses) think in human terms and make them seem more human, I do it all the time! However I am well aware that they are not human, nor do they have human emotions or reasoning ability. It has to be kinder to the dogs to be able to interact with them in their 'own language' rather than trying to enforce what to them must be alien concepts, by trying to make them more human, or expecting them to react in a human manner.

I would also go back to basics, i.e what are the main goals of your club? Do you have a club 'philosophy'? If you sit down and evaluate what your club wants to actually provide to it's members, then it will also help you to pick an instructor (Kind of like hiring employees I suppose!) If you are training well mannered pets with novice handlers, then you'd want a trainer that made it fun, and simple. The qualifications wouldn't be so important as the communication skills. If you are training more experienced dog people, with the view to having them compete, then maybe someone with more 'across the board' experience that has some titles with various dogs behind them. It comes down to what your club's goals and position is. Good luck, it's hard finding a good trainer to help train your own dogs,let alone trying to find someone to train everyone else's as well!

Ohhh that sucks Mina! I have allergies too, but only to my cat and the horses thank goodness! I don't know what I'd do if I sneezed every time dogs were near me as well! And yes Erny, the new pup has been great and is just so adorable, I love him to bits already................... Definately better company than the hubby.................... ;)

see? This is why we are still learning and YOU are the expert!! LOL I know that everyone is different and had different ideas and it makes it hard when you can't have regular lessons with the one person! I have been doing it exactly as I have seen and it's working well, pup just has short attention span, so I just do little periods of time, often during the day. Off topic completely BUT what does it mean when dog WON'T eat when you're NOT there??? I have to stand or sit right next to him, otherwise he follows me, i.e I can't leave him to eat his dinner as he wants to come with me and the cat will have it! If he's inside with a bone (And he gets fed inside) he has to sit on my lap or be right next to my legs to eat it, otherwise he just leaves it in the middle of the floor and ignores it if I keep moving. What the hell is that all about?! And are you supposed to allow your puppy to sleep in the bed with you......................?! Rhetorical question, I KNOW the answer, but he's sooooo cute, and it's so cold here at the mo, it's like having a furry hot water bottle............................... ;) and hubby's not here, and personally I prefer the dog............................

LOL!! Puppy is doing fine!! Drive is still about the same, but he loves playing the game and as it is pretty much the only thing I do with him now, he gets beside himself!! I circumnavigated the whole lead issue thing while waiting for answers, by tying the ball to a rope and then tying that to a stick, so he'd grab it, but coldn't walk off with it, which seemed to work just as well, but will go back to lead again now! He LOVES his new ball from K9, he has decided it is THE best thing ever! Would love to post pix but have been told I am not allowed to by his breeder, just because his tail is docked and had a few people jump down my throat last time I posted pix, so pm me if you want recent ones and I'll send em privately Some people have WAAAAAAY too much spare time on their hands! ;)

I haven't been around the last few days and have just been catching up on all the replies! Thanks guys, all the questions asked, and answered have helped my original problem heaps!!!

Yep count me in too! Wouldn't care where Steve came back to in Victoria, I'd travel to see him...................... ;) Oh and listen to him of course!

If I'm not playing with horror head, he's in his yard or in his crate. Put a bone in the crate with her, or a pigs ear, that way no fights! I don't think a bone constitutes a toy, especially if it's part of their diet for the day. But to horror head EVERYTHING is a toy!! My clothes, socks, shoes and slippers, pieces of bark, clothes pegs, empty AND full toilet rolls, they are all fair game. (We won't even talk about when I saw him trot through the house with the toilet brush the other day........ ;) ) So what do you do in that instance? I'm lucky because I can take him to work with me and I'm home a fair bit as well, so he gets to play with me almost constantly, but when he's out of the crate, he just grabs everything that's on hand and plays with it!! :rolleyes: What do you do in that situation?

Ok, I am having a few problems with my puppy when it comes to buidling up drive. Firstly I cannot tie him up and get him to play with ball, he gets too stressed and will not get interested in the ball at all. Secondly when I have him on a long line and am playing with ball, even if I let him 'capture' it heaps, he still decides after awhile to start grabbing the lead! He was chasing the ball WITH the lead in his mouth trying to fit that in as well. Also I appear to have inherited two left feet, obviously one from each parent, and find that after I have finished spinning and the world comes back into focus, the lead is nowhere near my feet, but laying miles away from me on the ground. Now I don't THINK I'm moving all over the place when spinning, but unless my lead is possesed and tired of this game and just wanders off, I must be! Now I try having it over my left foot, with my left foot slightly forward, and yet this still seems to happen! ALSO (Yes I admit, I am hopeless and in need of desperate help!) Whichever way I try to pick up lead to 'helicopter' puppy, he always ends up either walking the same way and keeping pace with me, OR he just sits down and looks at me with ball in his mouth, and I didn't think I was supposed to 'drag' him around in a circle??! Apart from all that we;re doing really well! Honest!! ;)

Well update on our GHOD! I tried LL's suggestion last night of using it as a prey item, and he was more than happy to pounce on it and take it away and try to destroy it..................So once I eventually got it back off him and did that several times, I managed to brush him with it, I still had to hold his collar to stop him running away, but he just stood there instead of trying to squirm away and escape, so thanks guys!

well you could, but it would get kinda messy.......................

My Dobe pup has taken to chewing the coffee table corners. We also have a wood fire at home and if we leave wood out to go in the fire, he chews bits off them and spreads them everywhere! I actually spread mustard all over the corners of the coffee table tonight and so far it has worked a treat Now he's just chewing our clothes, my shoes, the cat's dishes, the cushions, his bed, the laundry basket, clothes pegs, table legs and people! Phew! One down, six hundred to go!

Pax, have just posted a whole heap of pictures under the General section of my pup and his full brother playing today

Well I shall try all your ideas, but maybe not all at once *has mental image of hurling Green Hand of Death around house as a 'prey' item whilst covered in french pate and filled with yummy treats-Hmmmm *

I'm waaay ahead of ya guys! Have already sent him a heap of pix of my puppy He has dobe puppy picture overload.....................LOL

When you just pat him he's fine! It's just the GHOD that he freaks out at! He's fine to clip his nails and he's fine around the back end (Had his temperature taken at the vets the other day no probs!) Just my deadly grooming mit he's worried about! Oh and he's also good to bath, so I figure I'll just wash and dry him, he's short coated so the brush isn't REALLY neccesary, I was just wondering why!

I have, inadvertantly, purchased from a local pet supplies store, what can only be described as a "Green Hand of Death". To most people (And I dare say dogs) it is otherwise known as a grooming mit. HOWEVER to my paranoid 12 week old Dobe puppy it is a Green Hand of Death and it is certain to kill or at worst, maim him in some terrible, brutal fashion. Here is how a usual attempt at grooming goes: "hey puppy, ready for a brush?!" *puppy jumps and down as he really doesn't understand english, but hey! I'm happy so something good must be coming* "Ok, puppy come over here and we'll give you a brush" *I slide Green Hand of Death onto my right hand,puppy jumps and down still not understanding english, and as yet has not seen aforementioned GHOD* "Ok, puppy come and sit on my lap and I will groom you with this wonderful grooming mit" *puppy sees GHOD and takes off tail between legs "I'M GONNA DIE I'M GONNA DIE, I'M GONNA DIE"* "It's ok puppy, here come and have a sniff, honest you are NOT gong to die" *puppy sniffs glove tentatively bites a corner and as soon as hand moves, zooms across room "I'M GONNA DIE, I'M GONNA DIE, I'M GONNA DIE!" "NO puppy, you are not going to die, here let me run this along your body, trust me it feels nice!" (Ok I'm lying here as I have never run it along my own body to actually ascertain WHAT it feels like, but I'm still working on the presumption that the puppy doesn't understand english) *puppy zooms around and around room, now thinking this is the best game ever invented, and is play bowing, barking, making brief lightning quick forays to nip the GHOD and then zooming off again* "Now look here puppy, you HAVE to get groomed, you have been rolling in dirt, digging up rabbits, climbing through hay bales, you are FILTHY!" *quickly I sneak in a 'brush' to which the puppy zooms off again and turns and play bows and barks at my Green Hand of Death* Now my question is, how on earth do I solve THIS dilemna by using drive training???!!! Now this may sound weird (This coming from someone who has called her grooming mit the Green Hand of Death ) BUT I ran a calculator along his back the other day (He was there, the calculator was there, what are you going to do?!) and he had the exact same reaction. Suggestions anyone?!

This is my 12 week old pup doing the TOT. We removed the back tie around 2 weeks ago and are working on increasing the time. He watches me the whole time until I say ok, the worst he's done is snuck a few steps forward towards the bowl and then sat quickly again and looked at me as if to say "You didn't see that, it's a figment of your imagination............." So I moved the bowl a few more steps away........................

I really really really don't understand why some people have dogs. If you DON'T want to train it, or spend time with it, why buy it in the first place???? Buy a stuffed toy and stick it out in the backyard!! I can honestly say that if I wasn't lucky enough to be able to work from home most of the time, and my husband and I have our own business, so the dogs can come to work with me, I wouldn't bother having one! But I have dogs BECAUSE I LOVE the training!! I love teaching them things and it's such a buzz when you see them 'Get it' and to be able to compete at top levels would just be a dream come true! My latest poor puppy has been dragged all over the place with me and I have been doing all kind of weird things with him!(making him walk up trailers, and hay bales and posts and playground equipment and tarpaulins etc etc!) He's loving it tho and you can tell he enjoys learning...we have always had shepherds and this is the first dobe we've had, and I still wasn't ready for how active he is................I'm happy he is because drive training is progressing nicely, but I shudder to think of people that have no idea about dogs or training buying a Dobermann....................... Oh and we've just enrolled in a schutzhund club (pup is 12 weeks old) and his breeder is very happy!! She used to do it with her dogs too, and has told me she would like a ScH III titled dog in that line

I had my dobe puppy at a local park a few days ago and it's school holidays here so there were kids everywhere! A little girl came up and asked if she could pat the puppy and she said she had been given a puppy for her birthday last year (She was 7) I asked her all about the puppy, it was a female Labrador they named Charlie. So I asked where Charlie was today and she said "Oh mum and dad got rid of her ages ago because she kept wreaking stuff and digging holes and barking all the time" People really do have NO idea what having a puppy is like! I had my pup in at work with me yesterday and the cleaners were here. They admired the pup and said they had just bought a $500 puppy from a pet shop for their daughter as it was school holidays and she was getting bored and the puppy was so cute. I asked what breed it was and they had NO IDEA!! I give up now. And yet it seems so sad to me that these people will never know the full joy of having a working partnership with a dog, and having one as part of your life. Coming from me who has just lost a much loved canine family member, it makes me so mad when people just get rid of these dogs because it's too hard for them

Well time is nowhere near healing yet, but wanted to write something in memory of this special boy, and have been unable to bear reading this thread again. But thankyou to everyone and your words of sympathy, and those who PM'd me as well, it has been a tremendous help just knowing others were so supportive and have been trhough similar. My family has no idea why I get so emotional over an animal (In the same way they can't understand why I have so many!) I wanted to let everyone know that we were able to bring Lane home for one day before he was PTS, and we had a ball with him. He had his favourite foods, we played with his toy Panda (He didn't race after it, only trotted, but he was so happy playing!) he slept by the fire with us all day and we sat on the floor and spoke to him, and told him how wonderful he was and how much we were going to miss him, and we thanked him for being part of our lives. We told him how sorry we were that this had happened to him and that we wish he had been given more time with us, but we knew he was in pain, and we wanted to let him go. He came and slept across our feet which he never normally did, it was as if he was telling us it was OK,he was ready, and he didn't blame us, he knew we tried everything. He had a tin of cat food (His favourite) for dinner and the vet came out to our house to put him down. He will be buried on the property with his Panda (He has had since he was a puppy and was the only toy he didn't destroy!) We have found out that he had cancer. He had a large tumour in his liver and it had spread to his bone marrow. Even if we had tried Chemo, we would have only extended his life for 6 months at the most. RIP Lane, you are missed, loved and our lives are now lacking. Hope that you are chasing something over the Rainbow Bridge, and you actually get to catch it (Think mean mummy ticking him off by not letting him capture ball all the time!) Thanks again everyone, and I will be still training with the very very active Dobe puppy who has been a godsend really, as it has helped us take our minds off things (Hard not to when your shoes, socks, plants, hands and coffee table are being chewed into small pieces!) And here are a few pix of our beautiful boy.

Aha! Well I won't feel so bad about my 'little' 8.9kg, 12 week old then! Altho he does seem quite small, there was a 12 week old BC at the vets when I took him for his shots the other day, and it was TWICE the size of him, and it was a female! I'm used to BIG dogs tho (GSD's and Bullmastiffs!!) My last Bullmastiff was 73 kg at 18 months, don't think he's going to be even close As far as his training goes, he just seems to love learning, I'm just so happy with him, he's really attentive and switched on, no problems with drive! He has two nicknames, one is "Horror Head" and the other is "Hellspawn", I think that says it all really! Can't wait to hear how you go with you're lovely Diva! Please keep us updated!

She's gorgeous! You must be pleased to have her home at last! How old is she? Just wondered as 12 kgs seems very big for a puppy! LOL Don't regret that she's not being destructive, I think mine is making up for it.......................Hmm shredding carpets, shoes, plants, socks, digging, barking, and taking me at a run EVERYWHERE! And that's in spite of being hyped up in drive several times a day and doing training!! We've joined a schutzhund club on the weekend, he can do a 2 minute sit stay and a drop stay, will recall from over 200 metres away and can follow a 20 or 30 metre track! Not bad for a 12 week old huh?! I'm very very happy with him (Except for the hot chocolate spilt all over the floor this morning that we won't talk about) I am definately a Dobe convert