Otto's 5th Week

 Otto is 17 weeks old, officially 4 months, since its the 25th today. We had QUITE the week. It started out with a bang...er....with a bath. Poor Otto! It was the first time I've seen him really scared. We went to a self-serve wash place, since my tub is not ideal, and he had just the worst time. The dryer was even worse than the bath, and TBH,**I** found it a little scary too, lol. It was LOUD and STRONG. So I sat on the floor with him in my lap and dried him that way. We're now borrowing a dryer from a friend so he can get used to it at a slower pace. 

Socializaion

He continues to be un-phased by environmental stimuli. Our big outings this week:

• A trip to the dog park parking lot to practice focusing around dogs. It was BUSY and he did a great job!
• A long line nature hike, just the two of us. He had a great time hunting critters in the tall grasses and running in big circles around me.
• First trip to Petsmart! It's getting too cold to do focus work outside, so we plan to hit up dog-friendly stores at least once a week.
• Met lots of people
• Convinced shy lab puppy Cedar to play, played with BC pup Everest again, played with my Aunt's two labs, Lola and Harper. 
• Met Jun for the third time, this time with both off leash in the yard. They're doing really well together!

Training

Certain things are really starting to gel.

• Focus and attention: As above, and we went to Monday night training and he was able to focus SO well that we actually trained--on a dropped leash, no less! He focused for a good 15 minutes. We worked mark-->send-->recall at about 30' and got some great speed on his sends and recalls! We worked on adding the criteria of eye contact to sitting in heel position. At home, there is nothing to look at so it's not an issue. At class, there are other dogs working! So we learned that heel position is for active attention. You can't just passively sit there and look around and expect cookies. If he looks away, I just step out of position, signaling that his opportunity for reinforcement has been lost. He caught on well and we worked on a release to look around on cue, but this is a lifelong exercise! We also worked on some mat work. I am SO pleased that even though he is so enthusiastic about FRIENDS he is quickly learning to ignore them and focus on work!

• Impulse control: We continued to advance this with hand touches and sits around cookies on the ground and recalls away from cookies on the ground. Added more duration on his station behavior.

• Nosework: Last week, he was doing a great job with IYC. This week, he really caught on to the "searching" portion! We worked containers and after about three days of doing containers, he figured out that it is about the ODOR and started actively searching rather than indicating on all containers. We are now up to 5 containers and he's doing a great job! I also love that he has a really nice, still nose-pointing indication. Ira does too, and I'm not sure if its something about teaching staying at odor in my hand the builds that because I didn't purposely teach it to either of them. I really thought I was going to have trouble with Otto smashing things with his paws because he's so paw-oriented, but nope. 

• Tricks!: Generalized Superdog to different locations. Started "peek" - stand between my legs with eye contact. He's got this as long as I toss a treat and turn. I want him to be able to find it from different angles, so we're working on that. Tricks like this are awesome for working obedience concepts without actually working obedience. I can teach the concept of finding a position in relation to me without screwing up my positions. And since he's between my legs, he'll be naturally straight!

• Obedience: This week we focused a lot on tuck sits. We worked on coming into pressure and tucking into a sit as foundation for fronts. I start this by sitting on the couch and having him come in between my knees and tuck in as close to me as possible. I added criteria of a tuck sit to the heel and side work I'm doing. I'm still luring him into position, but now he has to tuck in. Before I was just having him sit however and stepping into position myself. We also worked on his pivot bowl. He's getting stronger and more confident with this and we advanced to start pivoting at my side. We also advanced his stand-stay to have me standing and starting to take steps.

Otto's 4th Week

 Otto is 16 weeks old and we've been together for an official month! We had a really great week! 

Housetraining

Perfect week! Gold star! 

Socialization

It was a COLD week here in the frozen north. Not as cold as it's going to get, but colder than it's been. Too cold for bare-fingered treat dispensing for the most part. But we still put in work! On Saturday we went to a friend's hobby farm to look at big animals and birds-not-for-chasing (chickens) and other farm stuff. Otto thought it was great! He was pretty suspicious of the pigs, who were big and moved fast. He didn't mind the cows until they started moving. By the end, we walked past both of their pens without any issues.

Sunday we took out first indoor field trip to Home Depot! Otto was a champ at ignoring people and focusing on me! He tries SO hard! He sees a person and gets excited, but then whips his head back to me with a full-body wiggle! It's adorable! He also climbed on, around, over, and through a bunch of things laying in the aisles.

Monday was class night and we worked attention, loose-leash walking, recall, and tuck sits with human and canine distractions. He rocked it! He attempted to play with Koolie puppy Vivid, who was still a little bit scared of him, but got to play with big Koolie Pan instead!

Tuesday we didn't go anywhere, but he met Jun in the yard for the second time. She ignored him. Works for me. 

Wednesday we went for a walk around the block. We haven't done much walking in our neighborhood yet, so it was very exciting! We walked past a dog that barked at him and he did great pulling himself together and walking past with focus! I like to use a "follow" cue for these situations ( follow me as I walk backwards) rather than having the dog walk beside me. Easier for them to stay focused. We also went to class and worked on quiet in a crate, which was not as successful as last week because now he has FRIENDS at class! At the end of class, we worked restrained recalls and then my so-called "obedience friends" encouraged all kinds of naughtiness and he just ran from person to person getting treats and loves. He had a great time! 

Thursday we hosted a playdate with a lab puppy, Cedar, we tried to play with over the weekend. Cedar was too scared to play on Saturday, but we tried again and he brought his big sis Arrow along for confidence. Otto enjoyed playing with Arrow and even convinced Cedar to warm up to him after awhile! 

Manners

We had a couple of really great days with excellent crate and pen manners. Others were harder. He's doing great with quiet during his daily crate time. He goes in his crate for 1-2 hours a day, either while I'm home or when I go out for a bit. This week we've had no barking, maybe because I left his crate covered like I do for bedtime. Pen time has been mixed. He is getting more active and wants to be out with everyone else, but when he's out he spends all his time being naughty, so loose time is only under strict supervision.

We are working on quiet while I do things with the other dogs. This week he's been much better about quiet in his pen while I take the other dogs out to play frisbee. Just a little barking before he stops. Going to the basement is still tough. Training the dogs upstairs in front of his pen started to be tough this week. Especially his "best friend" Ira. He just can't stand that Ira is having fun and he's not! 

He learned about staying on the deck, while I go in and out the gate to the back yard. In general, he's so polite with thresholds and waiting for release. He needs reminders in his car crate, but otherwise waits for the ok to leave any confinement. I hate door bolting more than anything, so we're putting in the work up front on this!

He is mostly a good, good puppy, doing a good job learning patience and waiting!

Training

His focus and stamina for work amazes me! He's like the energizer bunny, he just keeps going and going! "Wearing him out" with mental exercise just doesn't happen. 

This week we focused on:

• Attention and focus. Always.

• Marking - this will be a crucial skill for his future sports of obedience and hunting and for some reason it makes me super nervous to teach, even though it is simple. Put a reinforcer out, send while they're looking at it. Gah! But Ira is a terrible marker and so I'm worried I'll screw it up. However, Otto is not a herding dog and has completely different tendencies. It's going much better this time. He's finding his target on the word "mark" and running to get his cookies!

• Wrapping a cone. We added a cue "loop" and he is really gaining confidence with this behavior and gaining speed as he does! He seems to be having fun with it!

• We played around more with luring a tuck sit and that's coming along nicely. I broke down and decided to teach "sit" (put your butt on the ground) and not worry too much about how he gets into a sit. I will continue to work on building good sit mechanics and hopefully they will transfer over. And eventually his tuck sit will be on a different cue if needed. I first tried to capture/shape a sit but was getting too much extraneous behavior, so I went to luring it, and faded the lure to an empty hand, and then just the verbal. We've only had a couple of sessions, so this is nowhere near fluent, but coming along. This is another cue I get overwhelmed with because in theory it's so simple (every dog knows how to sit, right?) but in practice I need a dog who sits instantly on the first cue regardless of his position in relation to me. So much to mess up! Also another cue that past dogs have had trouble with (I'm looking at you, Lok). But Lok was a very "sticky" border collie and I'm a much better trainer now. So....I need to just get over it.

• Ball pick-up. I successfully shaped a pick-up from the floor with a tennis ball. We had been having a pretty tough time getting mouth-related behaviors. Part of this is, he tends to lie down a lot and then when he's lying down he doesn't necessarily re-offer what I want. So I got him out of that by tossing treats for each rep (kudos to Jo Laurens' method in Force-Free Gundog Training) and then we worked a HIGH ROR and high number of reps to fluence at each step on looking, nose-touching, mouth-open touch, partial bite, full-mouth bite, and finally the lift. I revisited this behavior because he's supposed to be doing ball therapy for a maloccluded canine and he's just not into balls at this point, as a play object. But I don't think I'm going to continue. A) Per google research, ball therapy doesn't work on baby teeth, it should be done while the adult canine is erupting, B) the divot in his mouth is so deep I worry I'll do more damage if the tooth shifts a tiny bit but not fully to where it needs to be, C) he needs to carry the ball for 15 minutes 3x/day to have an effect and there's no way I'm going to get that kind of duration in such a short period of time without building all sorts of undesirable behaviors into his shaped retrieve. I will leave this here until we move to bumper and dumbbell retrieves

• Superdog! His first trick! Sat down for a free-shaping session and that's just what he offered me. 

• Its Yer Choice with odor. Step 1: tin in one hand, cookies in the other. Step 2: tin on the ground. His first scent work! He's learning that the odor pays! I love teaching nosework as a foundational step to obedience scent discrimination and also as a fun activity to burn energy in the winter months.

• He's starting to like the hand touch more! I've been just asking for a few reps here and there and not pushing it. I really started to notice a difference in his enthusiasm when I added a level of difficulty by adding hand touches into his impulse control work. He has to leave the food on the floor to do a hand touch. So, as always, making the behavior harder is making it stronger.

Goals: take marking outside/build distance, generalize "sit" to different locations, work duration on stationing, progress nosework exercises.

Otto's Third Week

We are really getting into a grove here at Casa De Misfit Dogs! We have a good routine. There is less screaming. Otto is really picking up on how things work here and how to be a patient puppy! He had his 15-week shots and weighed in at 20.2lb. I swear I put him in his pen for a nap and when he woke up his nose had grown an inch! I moved him from a 24" crate in the car to the variocage and he now sleeps in a 36" crate!

Our third week together focused on getting outside and working focus and attention! We did not do as much with training fun behaviors, but we did make some progress on a few things. We took lots and lots of field trips! 

I was a little alarmed when he first came home by his BIG reactions to dogs and people out and about, staring and barking/boofing even at people 100 yards away. Turns out I needn't have worried. We got on that behavior fast and he is VERY quickly learning alternate behaviors for dealing with things out and about. 

He has quickly caught onto a "look" cue (Leslie McDevitt's "Look At That" game) so I am now able to cue and reinforce looking at distractions in his environment that might otherwise surprise him. He's really good at this game and the time he needs to process what he is seeing is decreasing.

We've also been working on auto-reorienting. In other words, people, dogs, and other "things" in the environment are cues to look back at mom rather than cues to stare and escalate arousal. Again, he is doing GREAT with this. On one outing he saw the first person before I did and quickly snapped his attention to me! I had to look around to see what had cued him. 

We worked: 

• In the yard (Otto big, tough, guard dog!)
• A spot in the neighborhood adjacent to a walking path
• At Monday night training (worked around other people he did not get to greet and focused around another dog working)
• At the gym, watching people doing all kinds of crazy stuff
• At a park
• In the grocery store parking lot (at the back the first day, and worked up to the sidewalk on day 2)
• At a different park on a walk with Stafford puppy friend Cicely
• At Wednesday night training (barked at his new friends until they got down on his level, but they were close and staring at him, so that was a tough one)
• On a walking path with Terv friend Nova (joggers and bikers!)

I'm super, super happy with how his focus is coming along and how well he's learning to handle all the exciting things in the environment.

Otto and Cicely. Photo credit: Laura McKinney

Housetraining

The momma has been trained! If one thinks "maybe I should take the puppy out"....one takes the puppy out. One does not justify that he "should" be fine because he was just out fifteen minutes ago. 

Otto apparently decided that litter boxes are for babies and so that thing in his pen must be a weird kind of bed/chewing station. So we no longer have a litter box. 

Socialization

Daily outings, as described above. We had a nice reprieve from winter here in Minnesota (temps in the mid 30s or above) since Otto came home, but we are about to enter the deep, cold, dark. I will be keeping up as best I can and hoping I only lose a couple fingers to frostbite. Luckily, Otto will soon be able to go to indoor locations to work.

Things (weird sculptures, workout equipment), noises (dropping barbells, dropping stuff in the kitchen, loud music, shaking open a garbage bag), surfaces, obstacles, all continue to pass without notice or with happy, curious interest. So confident! 

Goal for this week: A trip to Home Depot, a trip to a farm, a trip downtown.

Manners

He's so good! This week I've been able to go to "the fun places" (outside and the basement) without him with....less....freaking out. He came to Wednesday night class to hang out in a crate, and he was quiet the whole time, even while I worked Jun! Good boy!

Training

This week we focused on:

• Focus and attention, as described above
• Recalls and cued collar grab (put your collar in my hand)
• Shaping rear foot movement on a pivot disc. What a super-star!
• Go to mat - I still have not managed to turn a camera on for this. Right now I'm teaching his mat as more of just a foot target. No particular behavior is expected on the mat. I just want him to run to it with enthusiasm. And since he LOVES slapping things with his paws, he thinks this game is great! I'm working on both send AWAY from me, and stopping on the mat on the mat while running back TOWARDS me (foundational concept for drop-on-recall).
• Release cue: worked on adding some duration with my movement to his crate behavior. It's so cute, when he self-releases he corrects himself and goes right back in. Worked on stationary duration on his pet cot (up to 10 second).
•  Nose touch. This is my most interesting challenge with him so far. This week we worked on a nose touch to an electrical plate instead of my hand to see if he would be more into it. My training mechanics are atrocious, so no video, lol. My click timing is bad and he really wants to get his paws in there and I keep accidentally clicking paw movements. He's only offering me super light nose contact and sometimes it's hard to tell if he even made contact or not. I will keep puzzling through this one. I have an idea of teaching him to put his nose in a little nose-sized box attached to my target with duration and then cutting down the box over time. Do I NEED a nose touch? No, but I like a sustained nose touch for scent indication. And if I can get a sustained nose touch to my hand, that will help with retrieve to hand. 
• Stationing. Introduced the pet cot and the idea of a required position on a station (a down). Adding a cue "place."
• Added distance and varied my position on his kennel sends. 
• Worked on luring tuck sit.
• I did not get around to playing with scent. Next week, hopefully.

Goals for next week: Introduce stimulus control, now that he has at least one verbal (kennel send only pays when I say "kennel."). Add duration to stationing. To teach a sit or not teach a sit (yet), that is the question.....

Play Skills

Fave toys this week were mostly trash and recycling, haha! But he's getting a super nice trash retrieve and learning about reusing and recycling! 

Grooming

Face done, ears cleaned, brushing done a couple times, feet....(why do his nails grow SO fast?!)...check and check. One of these days he should get a bath.

Hunting

The most anticipated event of the week! My sweet puppy is a mighty hunter! I introduced him to live pigeons and he took to them right away. Feathers are tasty, tasty snacks! This is totally new to me, so I am doing tons of research to try to educate myself. Currently reading "Force-Free Gundog Training" by Jo Laurens, and really enjoying it.

Just Otto Things

He is an absolute joy and makes me laugh! His first priority in the morning is cuddles and he will cuddle as long as I let him. This dog LOVES physical contact and personal play. We end every training session with personal play. He loves to have his neck and back scratched and will droop his head down, his nose just about touching the ground and just stand to be scratched. He loves having his belly scratched/rubbed. Basically, the dog just loves being doted upon. 

Sometimes in the house or the yard or on walks, he just stops and stares at me. I have no idea what he's thinking or waiting for.

He REALLY loves Ira and tries to get him to play every day with wiggles and bounces. It's adorable! Sorry, buddy, Ira is lame. 

His favorite chew is a pig's ear. Everything else is meh.

Otto's Second Week

 Otto had a BIG week! So many new things to experience! We introduced a lot more behaviors this week, went on more outings, and met more people and dogs. Here's the recap:

Potty Training

Going great overall, all the mistakes are mine. I finally got my litter order, so now he has a litter pan in his pen and that's a big help. He has an appropriate place to go if he needs to and I don't have to stress over accidents. I've learned that yes, he still does need to go out before/after training/playing and I can't just use the clock to know when to take him out.

Socialization

• Met a few more people at small family thanksgiving and adored them all.
• Had a photo shoot, met the photographer and saw (and bit) camera equipment
• Met dog friends! Nova and Eevee the Tervurens. He hung back and watched them mostly, but played with Eevee a bit at the end. BC puppy Everest! They were great playmates. He met Everest's brother Meru the Koolie as well.
• We went to the (empty, closed) gym to check out the sights. He was a confident puppy and happily explored.
• Came to training on Monday. Explored the space, no problems! Walked on different surfaces. Met three people, and worked on supervised separation to prep for the CGC. He did great!
• Went to petsmart to get some of his favorite pig ears (I carried him so he wouldn't be exposed to germs). He was VERY excited to see other dogs. I thought he was shaking at one point, but it was just his tail wagging so hard!
• Out and about in the big wide world is harder. People are bark-worthy and he's a bit environmental. He does a lot of looking and freezing and needs time to process. As we get out more, his body language is changing to happier and more playful, so that's good to see. Working on a plan to change his response to seeing strangers and strange dogs at a distance out in the world.

Goals for the coming week: We exceeded last week's goals! This week we plan to meet at least two dogs, get outside for outings every day, and go to Monday and Wednesday night training.

House Manners

What a good, patient puppy! Confinement is an unfortunate reality of life in the House of Misfit Dogs, and he's rocking it. We have a good routine down. Train and play in the morning. Go in the ex pen with a chewie for some chew time and a nap. He's been spending a couple hours in the pen in the living room while I work in my office and is such a good, quiet puppy! We've been introducing crate time in the office while I work, and he's happy either with a chewie or napping. We've been introducing crate or pen time while I leave the house for an hour or two. He gets a stuffed Kong and has been calm and happy when I get back. He's figured out that the basement and outside are fun places and he freaks out if he's in his pen and sees me go to those places, especially if I take another dog with me. We're working on counter-conditioning that. He picks up on the rule structure of "just chill out" very quickly. He's good at chilling, which I'm thankful for.

He's got pen and crate exit manners (wait for release) down pat. We're working on staying off the counters. Overall, he's just a super easy, good, willing to please little pup.

Training

SO many things this week!

Review:

• Name game/recalls. We've taken this on the road. He's done recalls in the yard, at puppy playdates, at the gym, in public. Yesterday he recalled away from barking at kids at the fence. What a good boy!
• Collar grabs are super easy now.
• Crate games: Added a verbal cue ("kennel"), he sends from about 3' now, gives eye contact to wait for his release, releases on "ok." Adding my movement into his stay.
• Puppy zen/reverse luring: Gives eye contact with treats in my hands and treats on the floor. Stays with eye contact to wait for release to his food bowl. Added zen hand into his chin rest and stand-stay.
• Shaped mouth behavior/hold. This one is still tough. We're taking it slow. We have a full-mouthed bite from my hand and a bite and pick up on the floor. 
• Lured positions: more work on this, started asking for a tuck sit, which is hard!
• Lured heeling: more work on duration sitting in heel and got some advice on getting a prancy heel with food follows, so working that on the right side. He's still little for this, so not doing very much.

New this week:

• Free shaping! First session he turned on 30 seconds in and starting offering a back up. We will keep playing with this here and there.
• Chin rest. His FAVORITE trick!! He learned this in about 10 seconds and we are adding duration with eye contact, adding distraction with motion, and varying my hand position. 
• Go to mat. Shaped this as basically a paw target. I am not requiring any position on the mat and prefer to keep him up and moving. Vary my position and distance in relation to the mat. He thinks this one is fun too!
• Hand touch. He is just really not a fan of this for some reason. It helps to work on it with motion in between other behaviors. Doing it sparingly. Honestly, it's not something I need from him, so not a big deal.
• Drive-to-target with restraint/opposition reflex, focus forward. We're starting this with a food bowl. I figured he would happily run to food and I was right. 
• Shaping a wrap of a jump stanchion. He picked it up, but wasn't a super-fan. Figuring out this feature with him. He offered a few reps and then laid down. I'm not sure if this was confusion, him just being lower energy when we worked this, or what I keep hearing about poodles not liking repetition. My hunch is he just didn't really get the point. We will revisit this in the future. I think he'd like it more if it were higher-energy, but his toy play is not there yet to reward with a toy.
• Shaped two-feet up on a pivot platform. No problem! He got this very quickly! 

Goals for next week: Introduce scent work, continue to build previous behaviors, shape some rear-end movement on his pivot platform.

Play Skills

Coming along! His retrieve this week is a bit stronger than his tug. Last week he really wasn't fetching at all. This week he's happily chasing toys of all kinds and his instinct is usually to bring them back to me to play together. He doesn't really drop for another throw right away, but that's ok. He definitely prefers to play together rather than on his own, which I love about him! The udder tug is his favorite and his tugging is getting stronger. I bought him some fur tugs, but he's not a super-fan. He prefers rope/fringy tugs. We started working on some two-toy games. He easily switches to the toy I'm asking him to engage with. I found that I really don't enjoy working on play skills, and having rules I'm supposed to follow. It's a buzz kill for me. I prefer to just play, engage naturally with him, and have a good time. He likes this better too, so we will skill build gradually as his drive increases. He also really loves personal play and I love that about him, so we build that in to all of our play and training sessions and throughout the day as well. 

Grooming

We did his face twice, his feet once, and brushed twice! He is great with his feet and ok with brushing. He is not a fan of the face clipping. On the advice of a groomer friend, I am being firm but patient with him. That and working on it after a nap while he he's still a little sleepy seems to work best.

Hunting!!

Next Friday....Otto meets birds!!