2008/10/23–Ranger at Puppy School, Week 2

I’m quite pleased with how Ranger is adjusting to his new life here as well as the new skills he’s learned in the past few weeks.

He was having issues with housetraining (he still has a few, admittedly), however that has gotten better now that he understands what the bells that hang on the door are for. The problem now is that he rings the bells about every five minutes to get to go outside.

He also has learned to offer a sit to get a treat or praise. That’s awesome since I want to do performance with him in the future, as well as conformation. He’s also working at learning to walk on a leash now that’s he’s big enough for the smallest collar I have for him. He’s had his nails trimmed once and that went much better than I expected. I can show his bite/examine his bite one or two times, then he’s very done and fights me a little bit. I’ll work on that so when we go to shows he can handle being looked at often.

True to breed form, he loves to chase things and has discovered the moles in my yard are easy prey. I’m glad it’s fall and the grass has the winter to recover from his mole-finding expeditions.

Beau’s lost a lot of weight from the near-constant playing with Ranger. I had to start giving him about an extra cup of food every day and that seems to help him not be so skinny.

My hope is to get him ready to show in the non-licensed class in December (I’m still undecided if I will go to Ontario in November), and then the licensed class in February.