More Puppy Tales

11. 10. 2008 at 4:36 pm

Taboo has been doing very well with his potty training.  We very rarely have any accidents in the house now.  He will first scratch at the door to be let out.  If he don’t hear him doing that, he’ll bark at the door.  If we ignore that, he’ll run into whatever room we are in and bark and jump around like crazy.  IF we ignore that, he leaves a trailing lake all over the house on the way to the door lol  He’s the only puppy I know that will walk and pee at the same time haha

He’s learned what “Taboo”, “outside”, “inside”, “truck ride” “get your {name of toy - fish, cheeseburger, alien, spaghetti monster, chewie, frisbee, ball, rope}” and “beach” mean and the commands “sit”, “off”, “down” and “come” are done almost instantly - most of the time.  He still gets easily distracted though and forgets what he is supposed to be doing.  Butterflies, dragonflies, flies, leaves falling, wind blowing, shiny things, sticks, rocks, strings on my hoodie, shoelaces…  All distracting items LOL!

Pointing to the floor makes him sit or lay down (usually).  Pointing in a direction makes him look that way or fetch an item.  Pointing at him makes him pay attention to what is being said to him (though sometimes, it makes him jump in the air trying to eat the pointing finger LOL).  Pointing at the door of a room makes him leave the room and sit in the hallway (usually).

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Puppy Tales

10. 19. 2008 at 4:51 pm

Taboo (the name we decided upon for the energizer puppy) has now learned:

  • to sit (most of the time)
  • to take treats nicely (without biting off a finger or 4)
  • to walk on a leash
  • how to sit for rides in the truck
  • to play with the other rescue dog, Shelby, that shares our yard
  • how to chase butterflies, dragonflies, leaves and airplanes flying around
  • that even though flowers smell yummy, they are not to be eaten, dug up, gnawed or peed on
  • learned that Mommy and Daddy’s shoes are not chewy toys and that socks are not to be chewed upon ever, but especially not while they are still attached to toes and feet
  • that the huge Rottweiler next door really won’t eat him and likes to play
  • that the washer, dryer and dishwasher aren’t going to eat him either, but don’t like to play
  • that pizza crusts/steak scraps/etc may magically appear in the food dish for good behaviour (he constantly checks his food bowl for a ’surprise’ now and if there isn’t one there, he barks and looks at the fridge LOL!!!!)
  • that Mommy and Daddy get angry when the garbage is knocked over and thrown around
  • to drag his bed out of the bedroom and into the hallway when we wake up in the morning

and…

  • how to catch… AND EAT.. little garter snakes… (I found half wiggling around in his mouth and half on the ground…. ugh.  Over the fence the half went when Taboo wasn’t looking!)


We also found out from my co-worker/animal rescuer when she talked to the neighbour of the previous owner that he just got back from a week’s vacation in the Rockies…

He left the 3 month old puppy ALONE WITH NO FOOD FOR A WEEK while he was on vacation.  He also didn’t seem to concerned that the puppy was “missing” when he got home.

Thankfully, the town the man lives in, is over an hour away, so I don’t have to worry about him coming to take the puppy back to starve to death.  Not that I think he’d even bother to do that much.

I just don’t understand people like that.  It does explain some of the puppy’s gulping of food though and the snatching of treats and food begging though.  Poor thing never knew if he’d get something else to eat before!

Uhhh

10. 13. 2008 at 4:53 pm

how does such a hugemongous stink cloud come out of the back end of such a small puppy?

even he ran out of the room….