This little Lab is our guest for a few days, and our regular guide dog trainee Spice is staying with another couple. Her name is Pippa. She’s half the age of the other dog, and twice as fast. So fast that this was the only picture I could get, by having her held. The rest looked like smears of licorice. Pippa presents lots of training challenges. She jumps, and is kind of bitey. Very cheerful. Not very compliant yet, however she is highly motivated to get kibble so we are reinforcing her to “wait”, and be calm when she sits.
Substitute Puppy
Filed under animal communication, photos
Invisible Mikey 
She is a very good looking dog though!
I agree.
Hello Pippa! You can also be my guest!
I’m sure she would love that! I’ll write more when I get to know her better.
Thank you, Aina. I try to remember to give first-time commenters a “gift basket”. Here’s yours:
(This lovely young Journalism student writes skillfully and emotionally about nature, women and ethnicity. She’s from the Phillipines! http://abuenaobra.wordpress.com/ )
Thank you for the gift! I appreciate it. We also have three dogs here and I’d love to have one like Pippa.
Good training method idea. John, my dog, only responded to treats and positive reinforement.
Yes, if they love kibble they’ll do all the right things just to get some. Thanks, Liz.
As you already know, I love learning about the training process. What a good idea to get dogs used to other people. I was at a college graduation a couple of weeks ago. One of the graduates used a guide dog. The dog was amazing, leading her from her seat up the steps of the stage, across the stage, and back to her seat. There was a person helping, too, so that the graduate knew where to stop and get her diploma, but the dog was watching out for everything. I thought about you. Maybe that was a dog you trained!
Not me, but someone like us trained that dog for sure. We haven’t had a successful graduate yet. We’ve only been involved with about a half-dozen pups, and they all got career-changed for behavioral or health reasons. One of them was SO close. Vivian got all the way through her eight levels of training for the blind, then developed panosteitis in her final week. The vet disqualified her because the rigors of guiding would have caused early hip displasia.
Aw – so incredibly cute!!!
The farm where we’re staying at the moment has a dog that loves to chase cars and we’re trying to train the owners on how to manage her – it’s a long and painful process because they’re very hard to train 🙂
She is attractive all right. I know what you mean about the arduosness of training. It’s partly up to the dog as to whether they wish to participate in directed behaviors. Some are more willful. Some are more eager to please. When they are puppies it’s hard to tell which they are, since all of them are energetic and easily distracted at first.
This puppy is beautifully behaved – she just needs a little guidance – and I’m finding it hard to get the owners to give it. Once I leave she’ll be on her own again (chasing cars) and this concerns me greatly – not just for her sake, but for the dirvers and their passengers!
Dogs aren’t ‘set and forget’ creatures:)