Kane has definitely gotten more brave and WAY more energetic than he was in past. He drives me a little batty now when he is bored. Thankfully it has warmed up and we have been able to do longer walks and he can play outside with Rosco in the yard too. I am also very grateful that he is easy to tire out with training. Working from home means I’m around all day with him. He is a lazy bones in the morning and generally only gets up at 8:30am, which gives me an hour to enjoy my coffee in peace and quiet. When he does get out of bed he goes outside and then snuggles with me until noon. When I get up to make my lunch he figures it must be time to play and wrestle and generally make a pain of himself.
After I’m done eating I usually do a little training session with him and sometimes that plays him out enough for a few more hours of cuddles and sleeping while I work, but sometimes it’s not enough and he bugs Rosco until he comes and plays with him. I’m very thankful that Rosco is such a great big brother and will play with Kane for hours on end.
We also finished our puppy classes this week. I’m sad that they are over, it was an outing for me, and I’m happy to say I learned some new training tricks, which I will share in future posts. Kane also loved them, the first class I had to coax him in, the last few classes he cried to get in because he was so excited for them.
Because he is so young (as all the pups in this class were) the trainer recommended that we all work with our puppies on what we learned, but don’t start another class until they are a couple months older. Which fits with what my plan was. I want to put him in swimming and do that for a bit and then we can figure out what class to do next. I know I was very interested in the scent tracking class that they offered and I think Kane might really excel at agility. However, he is young, so we will make those decisions on what we should explore next when he is a little older and his brain can hold focus for more than a few seconds 🙄
The one thing that we NEED to focus on with him is building confidence when meeting new people. This last bit he has started “bluffing” at new people. He kinda barks, but it’s more a puff when he blows his cheeks up and backs up when he meets new people. If they keep coming for him he barks and backs up. Tail between his legs the whole time. I find if people ignore him he warms up faster, but most people see a puppy and want to say “hi” right away, so I am getting people to offer him treats and get him to sit or shake a paw for them. That seems to work almost as well as people just ignoring him until he comes to them. The problem of course is that due to the covid19 restrictions in our area it is hard to get him to meet new people consistently. The trainer from our puppy classes suggested bringing them to pet stores, which I think is a brilliant idea and I will try with Kane next week. Stay tuned for how that works for us.
Common Scents Living 