Clean Run - April 2017 - 19

Training Freedom:

HERE I go AgAIn!
By Jo Sermon, photos courtesy of author

This month we're going to discuss the
training I did with Shade between the
ages of three and four months. The important thing to consider, when training a dog of this age, is the associations
you are building. Step back from the
number of rewards you're giving and
the tricks you are teaching and look at
the big picture; overall, is your pup having fun with you? Do you have a happy,
confident pup? Are the responses you
are building snappy and fast? Do remember that each pup is an individual. I
once ran an agility foundation class that
consisted entirely of littermates, seven
pups. In the beginning, it was very difficult as the handlers were in competition
with each other. It took a lot of tactful
people training to get them to view and
celebrate their dogs as individuals and,
more importantly, to start supporting
each other. There's nothing worse than
putting pressure on a pup to do something he's not yet ready to do; it's sad to
see handlers who are disappointed with
their puppy simply because another
pup is "more advanced." They all get
there in the end and no amount of early
success is worth risking a pup's longterm health-unless you have a dog
with strong inherent working drive, that
rush can sour a puppy. It's much better
to build your foundation well and the
most important part of that foundation
is having fun with your pup.
April 17 | Clean Run

Assessing Where You Are
with Life Skills
Shade-let's start with an assessment.
He's a happy boy, body all over the
place, legs and feet akimbo; the gangly
adolescent stage. He's growing like a
weed, but he's still not a good weight
even though he still has four meals a
day. He's willing and bright, he's also
highly independent. In fact, in 35 years
of Beardies, he's the most independent
I've had, which is just another example
that even within the same breed puppies can be so different.
Yesterday I was playing with my granddaughter so Kris, my daughter, went
to get the dogs in. They all trouped
through the door apart from Shade,
who sat a little way off to see if any rewards were involved with coming in.
To take the other five dogs out of the
equation, Kris shut the door behind her
and called Shade over. He happily trotted over, accepted his reward, and then
walked away. When Kris called him
again, he trotted away a little faster!
That made me laugh and laugh. Take
away any emotional labels (Kris wasn't
impressed!) Shade simply finds life outdoors, with access to the 25-acre field,
far more entertaining than being stuck
indoors. I admire the brain behind
that and I've always loved the chal-

lenge of harnessing an independent
mind. People often ask me why I have
Beardies and it's that ability to think
for themselves that keeps me coming
back to the breed after all this time. I've
fostered and loved a fair few of other
breeds for various rescues, but they're
not the breed for me.
Socialization is going well. Shade has
no problems walking around supermarket car parks, no problems with our
local town, Ledbury, and few problems
with our local city, Hereford. I will continue to take him every time I go, but
it's time to be more creative and look
for unusual events to take him to.
Our town has a celebration when
the Christmas lights are turned on so
we went and wandered through the
crowds, visiting Christmas stalls and
listening to the choir. It's a lovely occasion. Shade loved it, finding lots of
dogs to greet and plenty of children
to say hello to. As the sun went down,
which it does at 4:30 pm at this time of
year, he started to get a little unhappy
and started spooking at odd things.
Wary of fear imprint periods, I decided
that 45 minutes was enough and took
him back to the car. It's important to
remember that socialization needs to
be under the pup's control. All the time
Shade is happily going forward, confidently looking around, I'm happy for
19

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Clean Run - April 2017