Puppy School

[Nekhbet]

now our school is all about socialising and making great friendly dogs ...

I can now certify 3 puppies are critter friendly I took my friendly ferret down and he had a romp with the pups that turned up. Even shared some treats with them! He's absolutely bomb proof which is great and doesnt react back at them so they got used to him so quickly. The pups loved him and had a great time learning how to behave around small animals nicely

[Clyde]

[MavericksMission]

aww! Thats cute!

What a gorgeous ferret!

[ILK]

Is that a harness on your ferret? Does it actually walk on lead?

[RufusTheDoofus]

That's great!

[Jigsaw]

What a great idea!! If he's used to dogs and doesn't get stressed it's a good idea!! Now to add bunnies, chooks and lizards!

[Bisart Dobes]

When I worked for NDTF & ADT I used to take my cats down for socialization (Mozart and Napoleon). They ruled our house with 3 Dobes and thought that the socialization with puppies and dogs was just one more chance to prove that cats were superior to dogs (in their minds ). They would walk down a line of dogs or around a circle and look at them with that total look of distain and flick the tail !! I always had them on a harness and lead ofcourse and their crate open for when they had had enough and all dogs were under control - can only remember one that freaked out as soon as it saw the cat - it was removed to a distance where it could be controlled. I think that most dogs were more shocked than anything that the cats weren't running and so they didn't know what to do. A few would pounce at them when they got close I'm sure to instigate the flight response but the cats would stop and stare at the dogs with a look of total disgust (as only a cat can do) if they did that until the dogs backed down - they had them sooooo bluffed. They really enjoyed it and as I said totally ruled our house.

Mozart lived to 21 and Napoleon lived to 19.

[Snowball]

Bisart Dobes, that is the coolest story. I love my dog, but I also love my cats, so I can totally relate to the look of disdain a cat can give , although I wish my cat would learn to do that with our goldie puppy. Instead she jumps on our goldie, attacks the neck and our goldie just lies there and wags her tail furiously in excitement. I guess any attention is better than none for a goldie

[Erny]

BD - I remember that .

You'd also remember, I think, when someone brought their chook down. They had that on a harness as well. Dogs were kept at a distance so as not to stress the chook. And then there was the time we sequestered the horse and rider who just happened to be on the grounds at the time we were training.

LOL .... not to mention us roping in the Mr. Whippey Van to be part of our socialisation class, when he happened to visit one warm summer's day.

Those were the days .

Edited April 17, 2010 by Erny

[Nekhbet]

yup Winston is leash trained. He also tried to crawl up the other trainers leg for dog treats I thought it would be great for the younger dogs to learn how to behave around the smaller creatures which many cannot get access to in their younger days.

Same concept Bisart, the ferret was totally nonchalant about the border collie pup that tried to round it up and just looked at him, turned around and waddled off poor BC just stood there puzzled and then followed him about for a while like 'well you can't herd em, join em'.

Nah Jigsaw I wouldnt let my special little man get stressed out. All our ferrets are very used to my giant dogs and are absolutely fearless about them so I thought it great to introduce the school dogs to something different and non reactive. The two whippets on the other hand thought their eyes were going to fall out of their heads!

ETA I am thinking of bringing down the other ferrets soon in a cage and maybe the rabbit who is also harness trained. Although he is a bit of a liability, he'll beat up any dog no matter what the size! His tally is 2 Griffons and a labrador so far O_o

Edited April 17, 2010 by Nekhbet