When I became a dog trainer I wanted to help people with their problem dogs and also help people raise puppies that were exactly what the human wanted. I raised my puppy Nigel this way. I formed him to be my training partner. He has hundreds upon hundreds of hours of training and socialization. I started his bite inhibition training and socialization the day he came home at ten weeks of age. He is as close to perfect as I wanted him to be. He is good puppy trainer and a great helper at in-home private training sessions as well as in obedience classes. I'm proud of him as a mom and as a trainer. Since him, I've adopted an adult pit bull and married a man with four dogs that have pretty good training considering my husband a "civilian".
Training priorities changed when I became disabled. I never in a million years expected to be diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. It really changes everything when it comes to how I want my dogs to behave. MS causes different issues for different people. For me, my main issue is balance. My legs are weak and spastic and I stumble easily. This poses quite a problem when two of our dogs are Saint Bernards that are clumsy and weigh nearly as much as I do. They love to bump into people, lean into people and their brakes don't work very well when they are gallivanting around the yard chasing each other and don't see you standing there watering your plants. They also take up a lot of space when they sprawl out on the floor (and they always have to be touching each other-yes they are litter mates-so they ALWAYS lay near one another). If I'm touching a wall or a piece of furniture for balance, I have no problem stepping over them. We also have five other dogs of various sizes that mill around the house, under our feet. They all now know "out" when we need them to move out of the kitchen and they all (mostly) know "move" when they are laying down or standing and we need them to move out of the way. One thing that both of us humans have been working on is making sure that the dogs lay still unless we ask them to move. We don't want them to get spooked when we try to step over them. If a 130lb dog stands up suddenly it could knock anyone over let alone someone with balance issues. Certain things that I had no reason to think about in the past are now priorities in my home.
As a trainer I had considered training service dogs but now I'm even more interested in helping people train their own dogs to be exactly what they need them to be. When my legs feel weak I can count on my pit bull to stand strong in front of me so I can push off of him to help me stand. So far the that is the extent of useful things that I have taught my own dogs to help me with. The other six are here for comic relief, head-dip push-hugs, snuggly cuddles and to make sure that I never get so down that I forget supper time.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Friday, September 17, 2010
Long Overdue Update-Blending Families
A lot has happened since my last blog post. Scott and I are now married and living together with all seven of our dogs who all live reasonable well together considering that we combined all adult dogs including five males, two females. Luckily Roxy has always been good with small dogs so I wasn't worried about her getting along with the resident female in the house (who weighs six pounds). They actually share the Queen Bitch title quite well.
When blending families or integrating a new furry family member it is important to go slow. We spent more than six weeks working on introducing all of the dogs. Luckily our house has a split yard so we had options for slow, safe introductions. Once we all moved into Scott's house I realized that Nigel was afraid of the Bigs. He would growl whenever they came near him. I thought I did a great job socializing Nigel but apparently I forgot to introduce him to enough gigantic dogs. We did one on one interactions with Nigel and a Big until he became comfortable enough to play with both Bigs at the same time. Again, we went slow and didn't force anything so that today, this is my living room: (Charlie, Nigel, Rufus, Bruno)
The next challenge was my Serial Rapist of a pit bull. He is a horny guy and when he gets excited, he humps. I didn't figure that Rufus would have a problem with it but Bruno was a concern. Enzo got to know Rufus one on one off-leash first and he did mount him but Rufus thought it was a fun game so they wrestled. Next stage was meeting Bruno one on one, off leash. This went well. He did try to mount him but Bruno gave him a snarly-snap and Enzo stopped! I was so proud. Slowly we started adding more dogs to the play groups. ALL initial play groups were supervised by both myself and Scott. Once I saw Enzo do his signature roll-onto-his-back-googly-eyed-crazed pit-bull-open-mouth maneuver, I knew were making great progress. (Bruno, Enzo, Rufus)
We eventually had all seven dogs in the yard together. When play escalated we jumped in and calmed the crew before they could resume playing. We kept the all-seven group play sessions short at first and built up time over a few weeks. Once we had a few all-seven meet and greets outside, we tried having all seven dogs in the house together. Again, we didn't force anything and kept the time brief that all seven were loose in the house. Luckily all dogs are crate trained and the Bigs have their own room so we could crate and rotate when needed.
We have had a couple minor scuffles in the house since we started this whole project but nothing major. I truly believe that if we had gone too fast or forced introductions, this could have been a total disaster. Now, we can let all the dogs out into the yard together, unsupervised, for potty breaks. I don't believe that we can EVER trust them all together loose in the house when we are not home, but this is an easy thing to manage. Rufus and Enzo even have a relationship now that allows Enzo to be himself (and Bruno allows it to happen).
As a trainer, this has been one of my biggest challenges. I've learned a lot and now have more knowledge to pass along to clients. Here are some more cute pictures of our dogs living peacefully together:
When blending families or integrating a new furry family member it is important to go slow. We spent more than six weeks working on introducing all of the dogs. Luckily our house has a split yard so we had options for slow, safe introductions. Once we all moved into Scott's house I realized that Nigel was afraid of the Bigs. He would growl whenever they came near him. I thought I did a great job socializing Nigel but apparently I forgot to introduce him to enough gigantic dogs. We did one on one interactions with Nigel and a Big until he became comfortable enough to play with both Bigs at the same time. Again, we went slow and didn't force anything so that today, this is my living room: (Charlie, Nigel, Rufus, Bruno)
The next challenge was my Serial Rapist of a pit bull. He is a horny guy and when he gets excited, he humps. I didn't figure that Rufus would have a problem with it but Bruno was a concern. Enzo got to know Rufus one on one off-leash first and he did mount him but Rufus thought it was a fun game so they wrestled. Next stage was meeting Bruno one on one, off leash. This went well. He did try to mount him but Bruno gave him a snarly-snap and Enzo stopped! I was so proud. Slowly we started adding more dogs to the play groups. ALL initial play groups were supervised by both myself and Scott. Once I saw Enzo do his signature roll-onto-his-back-googly-eyed-crazed pit-bull-open-mouth maneuver, I knew were making great progress. (Bruno, Enzo, Rufus)
We eventually had all seven dogs in the yard together. When play escalated we jumped in and calmed the crew before they could resume playing. We kept the all-seven group play sessions short at first and built up time over a few weeks. Once we had a few all-seven meet and greets outside, we tried having all seven dogs in the house together. Again, we didn't force anything and kept the time brief that all seven were loose in the house. Luckily all dogs are crate trained and the Bigs have their own room so we could crate and rotate when needed.
We have had a couple minor scuffles in the house since we started this whole project but nothing major. I truly believe that if we had gone too fast or forced introductions, this could have been a total disaster. Now, we can let all the dogs out into the yard together, unsupervised, for potty breaks. I don't believe that we can EVER trust them all together loose in the house when we are not home, but this is an easy thing to manage. Rufus and Enzo even have a relationship now that allows Enzo to be himself (and Bruno allows it to happen).
As a trainer, this has been one of my biggest challenges. I've learned a lot and now have more knowledge to pass along to clients. Here are some more cute pictures of our dogs living peacefully together:
Monday, March 15, 2010
Blending a Family
One question that has never come up for me in dog training is how to blend a family when both families include multiple dogs. I had never thought of how to blend multi-dog families until now. I have three dogs and my boyfriend Scott has four and we are moving in together at the end of the month. Of the seven dogs, two have minor issues that are concerning. My boy Enzo is a Serial Rapist and Scott's boy Bruno isn't always perfect with all dogs. If Enzo tries to mount Bruno it could be a disaster. Enzo weighs 65lbs and Bruno weighs 140lbs. Neither one would back down from a fight and that's not a fight that I would want to have to break up...
We are combining five males and two females. Here's the breakdown:
My dogs:
Roxy-seven year old Border Collie/Australian Shepherd, rescued at eight months old, female, 60lbs
Enzo-six year old American Pit Bull Terrier, rescued at five years old, male, 65lbs
Nigel-four year old Skinny Brown Dog, rescued at 10 weeks old, male, 40lbs
Scott's dogs:
Kaida-four year old Rat Terrier, from a breeder, female, 5lbs
Charlie-three year old Rat Terrier, from a breeder, male, 9lbs
Bruno-three year old Saint Bernard, from a breeder, male, 140lbs
Rufus-three year old Saint Bernard, from a breeder, male, 130lbs
Bruno and Rufus are litter mates.
Scott's dogs are classified as The Bigs and The Littles. The Littles and my dogs all get along well. The Bigs met my dogs for the first time this weekend. Scott and I and my friend Laura (who is an experienced dog handler) met at my training studio to do "neutral territory" introductions. We started easy with Nigel and Rufus. Rufus was on-leash, Nigel was not. Piece of cake, no problems other than Nigel being a little scared of Rufus because he is huge. Next we took Rufus out and brought in Bruno on-leash to meet Nigel off-leash. Piece of cake, no problems. Then I put Nigel away and brought in Roxy off-leash with Bruno on-leash. Roxy curled her lip a litte when Bruno got too close too fast and Bruno backed off. Good boy Bruno! Bruno was swapped for Rufus who was completely fine with Roxy.
Now it was time for Enzo and Bruno to finally meet. I had Enzo on-leash, on a Halti and Laura had Bruno on-leash. We made wide circles in the room gradually getting closer together. The boys noticed each other but I had chicken jerky so Enzo's focus was on me. We finally got close enough for the boys to sniff and Enzo slammed his face into Bruno's chest trying to rub off his Halti...oops. Should have seen that coming, BAD TRAINER! Bruno appropriately snapped at Enzo, telling him he was being rude and Enzo snapped back half-heartedly. We widened the circle, I removed Enzo's Halti and we started again. Enzo did a half-bark-lunge at Bruno on our first pass post-Halti, which Bruno ignored, and we slowly made the circle smaller again. After less than ten minutes, the boys were sitting next to each other taking treats. We then brought Rufus back into the room, on-leash, and tried all three together. Again we circled wide moving closer together and within a few short minutes all three were sitting nicely by each other taking treats. Enzo was taken out of the room (on a super positive note) and we let Roxy and Nigel out off-leash. They were all getting along so well that we dropped Rufus and Bruno's leashes. All four were coexisting peacefully, off-leash.
They all did so well that we decided to take all three of my dogs to Scott's house and give it a real life trial. The Bigs have their own room in the house so they stayed there and the Littles and my three roamed the house for about an hour. After they all settled in, Rufus came out briefly to say hello to everyone and all was well. We didn't want to push our luck so the Bigs stayed separate for the rest of the evening.
Phase 1 was a success! I was surprised at how well they all did and am looking forward to our next session. Hopefully one day we can all live peacefully together but for now we have separate rooms and separate yards while all the pooches settle in.
We are combining five males and two females. Here's the breakdown:
My dogs:
Roxy-seven year old Border Collie/Australian Shepherd, rescued at eight months old, female, 60lbs
Enzo-six year old American Pit Bull Terrier, rescued at five years old, male, 65lbs
Nigel-four year old Skinny Brown Dog, rescued at 10 weeks old, male, 40lbs
Scott's dogs:
Kaida-four year old Rat Terrier, from a breeder, female, 5lbs
Charlie-three year old Rat Terrier, from a breeder, male, 9lbs
Bruno-three year old Saint Bernard, from a breeder, male, 140lbs
Rufus-three year old Saint Bernard, from a breeder, male, 130lbs
Bruno and Rufus are litter mates.
Scott's dogs are classified as The Bigs and The Littles. The Littles and my dogs all get along well. The Bigs met my dogs for the first time this weekend. Scott and I and my friend Laura (who is an experienced dog handler) met at my training studio to do "neutral territory" introductions. We started easy with Nigel and Rufus. Rufus was on-leash, Nigel was not. Piece of cake, no problems other than Nigel being a little scared of Rufus because he is huge. Next we took Rufus out and brought in Bruno on-leash to meet Nigel off-leash. Piece of cake, no problems. Then I put Nigel away and brought in Roxy off-leash with Bruno on-leash. Roxy curled her lip a litte when Bruno got too close too fast and Bruno backed off. Good boy Bruno! Bruno was swapped for Rufus who was completely fine with Roxy.
Now it was time for Enzo and Bruno to finally meet. I had Enzo on-leash, on a Halti and Laura had Bruno on-leash. We made wide circles in the room gradually getting closer together. The boys noticed each other but I had chicken jerky so Enzo's focus was on me. We finally got close enough for the boys to sniff and Enzo slammed his face into Bruno's chest trying to rub off his Halti...oops. Should have seen that coming, BAD TRAINER! Bruno appropriately snapped at Enzo, telling him he was being rude and Enzo snapped back half-heartedly. We widened the circle, I removed Enzo's Halti and we started again. Enzo did a half-bark-lunge at Bruno on our first pass post-Halti, which Bruno ignored, and we slowly made the circle smaller again. After less than ten minutes, the boys were sitting next to each other taking treats. We then brought Rufus back into the room, on-leash, and tried all three together. Again we circled wide moving closer together and within a few short minutes all three were sitting nicely by each other taking treats. Enzo was taken out of the room (on a super positive note) and we let Roxy and Nigel out off-leash. They were all getting along so well that we dropped Rufus and Bruno's leashes. All four were coexisting peacefully, off-leash.
They all did so well that we decided to take all three of my dogs to Scott's house and give it a real life trial. The Bigs have their own room in the house so they stayed there and the Littles and my three roamed the house for about an hour. After they all settled in, Rufus came out briefly to say hello to everyone and all was well. We didn't want to push our luck so the Bigs stayed separate for the rest of the evening.
Phase 1 was a success! I was surprised at how well they all did and am looking forward to our next session. Hopefully one day we can all live peacefully together but for now we have separate rooms and separate yards while all the pooches settle in.
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