Movement

Faro seems better in himself and has had a normal poop, however he has not learnt his lesson! He continues to try to eat things he shouldn't! We are having to watch him closely.

We have a blockage!...

Poor Faro. he has done the usual puppy trick of eating unsuitable items one too many times and he is definitely blocked up and off his food now.
We think he has chewed and swallowed some bark, possibly stones and he has pinched a spring cabbage which we think he ingested some of and think we have seen coming out the other end.. yuk.

Here's hoping he manages to pass whatever he has swallowed or we could be off to the vets  :o(

Video: Walk with Faro

Took the camera on Faro's daily walk at Springfield Park today. Look out for the funny bit where he starts running up and down a hill and at the end where he decides to have a go on a rope swing! LOL

Positive & Negative Reinforcement

How easy it is to encourage undesirable behaviour!

We started to notice that Faro was whining and barking more frequently to get out of his crate.
Inadvertently we had obviously told him off for making a racket one too many times, together with letting him out when he is being noisy. This has enforced the behaviour of making a noise in order to get out of crate and if he gets told off for being noisy - even though it is negative attention, it is attention all the same. Thus we were giving him what he was asking for so he continued to be noisy as it was working for him.

Therefore we have had to concentrate hard over the last two days and ensure that we do not speak to Faro at all if he is not quiet and make sure that we DO fuss him and give attention when he is quiet & patient.

I am pleased to say that he has gone back to being very good in his crate in a very short amount of time.

As for the bad night we had of barking at 2am - that was a total one off. He is still superb at nightime. phew!!


We filmed one of our walks today and will upload that in the next post :o)

Bad Night

Faro has always been a dream at night-time and when we all go to bed we do not hear a peep out of him.

However last night he decided he needed to pee at 2am!!! He whines if he is bored and wants out of his crate but if he actually barks we know he 'needs' to go out. Well he barked the place down so Jay got up and let him out then made the mistake of letting him drink half a bucket of water before going back in his crate!

So guess what happened at 5:10am ? Bark Bark Bark and Jay had to get up again LOL

Tonight we will let him out later - just before we go to bed and hope that he doesn't do the same again and develop a behaviour of barking in the night.

_______________________________________

This morning he went for a walk but then was still itching to get out afterwards so I took him in the back garden for a run around for the first time!
Well his little nose went crazy and he ran around like a lunatic! He got hissed at by geese, butted at by the big billy goat through the stock fence and stuck his nose everywhere it was not wanted by chucks, rabbits and anything else that looked interesting.

It was fun to have him follow me around watching me do the feeding and he stood watching the ducks taking a bath while I refilled their water. The only trouble he got into was trying to bite the hose so I splashed him with it and he got the message!.. bite hose = wet face  :o)

The front garden where he normally goes will seem a tad boring now I'm sure!

Waiting Alone

We decided that because everyone at Lucian's school know that Faro is with us, it would be safe to leave him at the gate and take Lucian in without one of us waiting with the dog.

So I tied him to a post and went inside the gates while Jay went ahead with Lu, I hung back and watched Faro without him seeing me.

I was pleased to see that he just sat nicely and watched people walk by. He did not seem to notice or register that we had left him and showed no signs of anxiety whatsoever. He started to play with his own lead and when we returned he did not seem excited or anything. His demeanour did not change.

It was nice to see that he has the confidence to sit on his own and not feel worry that we are not in sight. I have always been highly impressed by other dogs who can do this so feeling very proud of Faro atm

:o) *****

Other Dogs

Just been for our long walk of the day and one of the fields was unusually busy with other dog walkers.
Faro doesn't often get to meet other dogs whilst off lead - he usually just sees one from afar.

Today I got to thinking about how important it is to try to ensure that your dog is a good influence and a good role model for other people's dogs.

The first dog that Faro met was a staffie pup of the same age (5months old). The owner was a lady who seemed a little overwhelmed with how to control her pup and when he inevitably started to play with Faro, she was relieved when they played nicely but tried to call her pup back to her. I do not encourage Faro to meet other dogs, I would rather that he ignore them because I believe that if all dogs are trained to pay no attention to strange dogs, the whole dog walking experience becomes more pleasant for those who have problem dogs and can often land up not walking their dog at all. For those who enjoy seeing dogs playing together... get two of your own!!

So anyhow, I went to put the lead back on Faro so that the lady could concentrate on getting her pup back to her but she then asked if they could play together for a while as she liked to see her puppy play.
Her pup then tore off to play with an elderly dog whose owner clearly did not want her jumped on or harrassed.
So, how could this lady expect to teach her dog that it is ok to play with one dog but not the next?

On the way back we then met a pair of Old English Bulls who were on lead. The owners stopped to chat with us about their dogs and said that the male had a habit of trying to bear hug other dogs and they had been told off by somebody for letting him do it. Well, Faro has a tendency do the same thing (in a puppy 'playing at it' kind of way) so rather than let him teach this other dog that it is ok to have bad manners and try to dominate another dog, I kept him away. But the owner then brought his over and what did the bulldog do? He tried to bear hug Faro, lol
So why did the owner allow the bulldog to meet Faro when he knew he would display a behaviour that he was trying to disallow?


Totally irrelevant to 'puppy walking', per se, but I thought I would share the thought about teaching our dogs to ignore strangers and making the dog walking experience a pleasant one in popular dog walking areas.

Coconut

Faro's latest toy is a new 'ball'. ok it's a small coconut but he really loves it!

Cardboard

I have discovered that Faro loves playing with cardboard vegetable boxes/trays.
It is a bit of a mess to go around the garden picking up a shredded box but he really enjoys 'killing' it, bear hugging it and chewing down which probably soothes his teething gums.

General Care

As time goes on, Faro's NEW experiences become fewer so there is less to post about.

So I thought I'd make a general post about his daily care etc

So, Faro hears us wake up in the morning and starts to whine to go out.
First job of the day is to let him outside to pee. He usually then has his breakfast of 2 scoops of dry mix and then gets a varying length of time out of his crate to let off steam.
At this time in the morning he is at his highest energy level so is bouncing off the walls.
However he cannot go out for a walk immediately because we have a 4 year old to get ready for school!

Faro usually gets to come on the walk up to the school which is his first exercise of the day. However sometimes he has to wait patiently in his crate if there is only one of us available (as it take 2 people.. one to take Lucian into school and the other to wait outside the gates with Faro).

On return from school, we have to finish feeding/watering/cleaning of the horse/goats/chickens/rabbits/guineas/ducks & geese.

Once this is done we are free to take Faro for his long walk of the day which is designed to wear him out.
He might be on lead, off lead or on and off like a yo-yo. We might stop to play or we might just walk continually. We always try to take different routes and have not yet done the same walk twice.

On return, Faro goes straight in his crate to signal that his job/work is over for the time being.

At some point he will have lunch which is one scoop of dry feed and in the evening he has another scoop.

There is no structure to the afternoons. We basically let Faro out when we have time to go outside with him.
We aim to leave him in his crate for no more than 2 - 3 hours at a time, during which time he either rests, sleeps or chews on a bone (as he is teething).

Sometimes he will whine to come out for a short burst and we try not to let him out immediately if he starts to whine because we do not want to teach him that is the way to get out! Similarly, we try to let him out when he least expects it. We know if he whines then barks it is because he actually needs the toilet so at that point we would let him out, give him chance to toilet then straight back in.

So that is how it goes with the crate. Faro is allowed in the kitchen/hall and the front garden.
He is not allowed in the back garden where there are other animals, or in the sitting room which is Lucian's place to play in peace without having his toys pinched!
Plus, one floor is quite enough to have to keep clean of muddy paw-prints lol

So, quite different from raising a puppy who needs to learn to be a house pet. Raising a working dog is a LOT easier in many ways and you don't have to make so many adjustments to your life/home.
We are not able to enjoy Faro sleeping in front of the fire, sitting with us on the sofa or just being with us of an evening while we do family stuff in the sitting room. But then we do not have a constant 'second child' who needs to be watched 24/7 and we are able to thoroughly enjoy walks with him and bursts of play at a time to suit us.

This way of life with a dog has also taught us that crate training enables you to spend QUALITY time with a dog. The whole time he is out of crate you can interact purposefully with him. When a dog is a member of the family, you interact an awful lot with him, but unconsciously. Therefore you are more likely to teach the dog bad behaviours without even knowing you are doing it. A crate trained dog is ready to switch into obedience mode for the period of time you have him out then he gets to be at rest in his crate, knowing that you have no expectations of him and he is free to relax. A luxury some dogs never enjoy.

Bonfire Night

We took Faro outside to watch fireworks on Saturday night and he did not react.

In fact, he watched them! Then he got bored and just lay down.

It honestly sounded like a war zone. It was just as if there were bombs and gun shots going off all around us.

Totally amazed that he was unconcerned.

*thumbs up*

Look what I can do **!*!*!** ....

I can look really FIERCE
... all the better for chasing the baddies...

and I can wade in water....

just incase I have to track somebody down one day with my big sniffy nose...

Springfield Park vii

Yesterday we took Faro to the disused quarry at the other side of the park which is quite a long walk for such a young pup, but he sure has lots of stamina! He got plenty of time free running.

He really enjoyed it :o)


Taking him again just now, but not so far this time.

Halloween

No problems with Faro over Halloween, he did not react to the trick or treaters or any of the fireworks that were set off early. We are having a bonfire and fireworks tomorrow night but I'm sure Faro will not pay any attention.

Trick or Treat

Lucian getting spooky!

Springfield Park vi

Faro had a great walk today (well three actually, but his main one was to the park)

He came to the brook and luckily there was a labrador and we all know how well labs and water mix LOL
So Faro saw this lab swimming around casually in the water and he jumped in after me. He even went underneath the low foot-bridge a couple of times so was very brave indeed.

We walked across the usual field and over a new field off lead. Then Faro got to walk over a canal lock bridge which has about four big chunky and uneven steps up and down with a narrow bridge in the middle. No problems at all, we even waited on the bridge and he could hear the lock water filling up and gushing away beneath him.

I got him back on lead as I had encouraged him into water, I had visions of him jumping in the canal.
So we walked together a good way along the canalside tow path which had massive puddles and was muddy in places. We splashed through all the puddles and I kicked the water all over Faro as he stinks anyway. He is now even smellier so will be getting his first bath tomorrow!...

Later, we picked Lucian up from school and my brother, who was staying with us, walked Faro back home. Faro walked very well for him and seems to enjoy himself each time we walk with different people.

Sanders Park

On Sunday, Faro went to a different park and had a good time.

His journey over wasn't great again. There was some anxiety but not as bad as his first car ride. As with last time, he was perfect on the way home.