Kenai listening to his brother moving about downstairs, 32 wks old
I took my camera outside to get some pics of BB in the pool. It got wet, of course…DUH! So you’ll have pics of Kenai at 32 weeks or younger until I get it fixed. Good thing I had a bumper crop of them this week. I don’t know what I’ll do with BB’s blog, since I don’t get as many pics of him. Well, there’s no point in being stupid if it don’t show, right?
Being the pre-teen that he is, Kenai has acne. Not a big deal, common with the undeveloped immune systems of puppies, but still needs attention. I wipe his mouth after eating and drinking, but Dane pups drool a lot more often than that. Some people use a vinegar wipe, the acidity drying out and killing bacteria. Others opt to boost the pup’s immune system, or use antibiotics. I’ve used Ox-e drops to wipe with, but it’s water soluble so the first drool and it’s gone.
Thinking a little, I’ve decided to try a triple antibiotic ointment, since the petroleum base is not at all easy to slobber off. And at night when he’s sleepy and isn’t going to drool much, I touch on some antibacterial soap full strength. If his skin doesn’t agree with the Dial, I’ll stop it, and return to the tea tree oil soap. The joy of home remedies—cheaper than seeing a vet for minor stuff.
Thursday is usually Mom’s day in town, and that means I have both puppies for a 6 hour plus stretch. She didn’t go this week, so I helped myself to her hair appointment slot. It’s the first cut I’ve had in a year or more, which I guess made me a little overdue. We whacked a solid inch and a half of damaged ends off, the last of the layers all gone at last. It’s amazing what even a simple hair cut can do for your outlook!
Also good for my outlook was FINALLY getting the mowers in for repairs. I managed to smash my hand between the trailer hitch and the truck, but it’s not so painful now as I thought it would be. The big mower’s going to kill us, needing all new tires, a new blade, and a good cleaning. At several hundred pounds, it’s way too big to turn over and clean underneath. The push mower won’t start since Mike was messing with it, so that’s in the shop too. Big bill coming. Ouch.
Friday morning, my brother was supposed to go back to work, and Mom and I planned on having brunch. Pancakes and bacon, with jam and syrup, and yes I was going to enjoy every last bite. We were going to have our house to ourselves again, all day. You might have already guessed, but it didn’t happen. So my lovely brunch is put off until Monday.
Despite the exertion of getting BB in the pool Friday, Kenai got his grand self a second run outside for the first time in weeks. The exercise was as good for his outlook, as a hair cut was for mine. BUT…He’s reverted back to the ignore-you games again darn it. It’s really starting to tick me off. I don’t like having to ride herd on a wilful pup, but I can’t have this nonsense.
When I need him to come, I need him to come! And Friday evening, I needed him, taking another fall outside. I guess he heard the change in my voice as I called for Mom to help me get up, and he turned up the same time she did. He did lots of kisses, sniffing and whining with puppy anxiety. He was very careful and cautious the rest of the evening.
Lord, I’ll be glad when I’ve gotten the boy grown and trained. He’s too immature at just 8 months old to expect adult behavior all the time, or to use him for getting up. Still, he’s old enough to be more reliable on his recall, especially after all the effort I’ve put into it. Grrr.
At least the weekend is an Emily Free one, so I don’t have to be listening for her approach and popping up off the couch for BB’s “look at that” game. My ankle is swollen, and the second hard bounce in a week makes every part hurt. I still have to be careful not to leave the boys alone in the house with my brother, BB in particular.
Monday, Monday, glorious Monday… who the heck actually looks forward to Mondays? ME! I won’t have to keep track of where the boys are, and if my brother or his daughter are nearby. BB is glad for the weekend free of a fussy little girl, I’m sure.
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Just 6 or 7 weeks ago, BB would growl and snap at any child that came near him. Kids are a common fear for timid puppies. He would bark and hide everytime he so much as heard her coming. To make things worse, My 2 year old niece was loose and unsupervised every weekend for months around him, while my brother laid on our couch.
Em was chasing little Beebs, cornering him, throwing toys at him, hitting him with bones, yelling commands at him, and even hurting him when Mom or I weren’t there to make her stop. Naturally, he was terrified of her and added snapping to the barking, growling, and hiding. I’m surprised it took so long.
So I started a couple new traditions: BB is NEVER alone when Mike or Emily is in the house–Mom or I are with him. Secondly, I began a game called “Look at that” with him, where the moment he sees or hears Emily, he looks back at me and gets a treat for redirecting his attention.
The idea came from a book by Leslie McDevitt, called “Control Unleashed”. This reconditioning is to change not just behavior, but the emotions behind BB’s reactive barking. Instead of “screaming 2 year old = I’m gonna die”, the feeling is “Emily appears = I get treats”. He’s started associating good things with her, and knows he’s protected.
She gets out of line, or BB is getting too upset, she has to leave the room. All their interactions are tightly controlled, and heavily supervised. She’s a little hesitant of Beebs, and I guess she should be. Kenai she can muck about with all she wants, and enjoys it. But she should understand, especially as she gets older (almost 3 now), that not all dogs are going to enjoy her attention, nor be tolerant as Kenai.
Sure it’s sad that her innocent perception of dogs has to be altered a bit, but the world isn’t a perfect happy place. Hitting some dogs with bones or pulling on their tails can get her chewed on. BB would run long before he bit, but any dog will draw blood under the right circumstances. They aren’t stuffed toys.
Most dogs are really gentle with small children, but not all. She has to learn to approach them politely, and respect them if they don’t want to be messed with. She’s not learned to be respectful yet, being not quite 3. That’s life. You want a perfect world, don’t live on this planet…
After 6 weekends of the new rules, roughly 12 days, BB can walk up to Em, sit quietly by her chair, take treats from her hand, and sometimes even sit on the floor and play with her. His experiential reactions, ones based on his past experience of her, are vastly different now.
He still cannot handle being run at or cornered, which is an instinctual reactivity. Changing experiences isn’t so hard, but changing a defensive instinct takes repetitive, controlled encounters to ingrain the response you want. Time, time, and more time is needed, without a single reversion to defensiveness or you start over.
12 days to go from freak out to friendly most of the time is a supersonic change. If you walked into a psychologists’ office saying you where terrified of elevators and wanted to be able to get on one without any discomfort, and by the way, you have 12 days to get it done… they’d laugh you out of the building.
I think BB has made astonishing improvement. I spent 3 years working with my beloved late Shabah before I could trust him to walk into PetsMart without growling at men and children. He never wanted their attention, and never changed his mind about it. Perhaps if I had known about the “look at that game” he would have. Who knows? Less than 2 weeks for BB is absolutely warp speed! Good for you little boy…
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It’s interesting how some habits and nicknames stick with a dog from the start. Kenai has gone through lots of changes, picking up new behaviors, dropping old ones, getting nicknames and loosing them. But he has some that haven’t gone away. One tradition is the 2nd step stretch. He will go down 2 steps on our bedroom stairs, then stretch. He never forgets, getting every last millimeter out of that stretch before moving on.
Another Kenai tradition is the silent alarm clock. He wakes me up in the morning at 6 am on the dot, by walking over to my side of the bed and resting his head on a leg or arm. Never fails, 6 am. Even if I’m up already, he will stay put until 6, then get up from his bed to say good morning. And if I’m napping during the day, I get precisely 3 hours. No more, no less. He’s a silent alarm clock, that never needs winding. Sometimes he needs unwinding, but power outages don’t cause any flashing or resetting.
Kenai has 2 toys that he cannot live without, that were waiting for him when he came home with us: fleecy lamb baby, and yellow ducky baby. He will pine for them and refuse to play if I put them away in favor of other toys. They have to be down where he can see them, even if he doesn’t play with them for a few days. God forbid they should ever become too damaged to repair, or the sorrow would drown us all in puppy tears. Good thing he is gentle with his toys.
Of his training commands, there are a couple he learned and has never looked back on. These haven’t slipped into needing practice again: let go, and up/stand. Some commands are typically good with only occasional slippage, some are typically not so good with occasional solidness. But let go has never been an issue, and neither has up (from down to sit) or stand (getting to his feet).
His final tradition from day one has been ham bones. He will pass up food for those darned old messy things. That’s the only thing he passes up food for. We go through spells where he likes pressed rawhide bones and spells where he’d rather chew nothing at all than chew them. Bully sticks are a new discovery of mine this summer, and they are destined to become forever favorites. But his firstest and truest love is ham bones.
Of course, nicknames are habits of mine, unlike toys and stretching. Kenai’s had himself an oversized suitcase full of nicknames over his short 8 months of life. Some have gone into the vaults when he was suddenly too big for them: little toddles, tiny tots, and baby buddy. Some I’ve just forgotten and had to read old posts to remember for listing here: platypus puppy, wumpy rump, slurpy burpy, and whiney hiney. Some I forget about then recall from time to time: rhino baby, goober puppy, beige bottoms, and buff beauty.
Other nicknames have just stuck on my little big man. The most common are toffee tank and toffee tush, bull elephant, and Sasquatch. I call him by those like second names. I wonder which ones will still be in use next year? He’ll always have big feet, so money goes on Sasquatch staying around. I’d also bet on toffee tush, the way it rolls off my tongue real easy and affectionate. Guess I’ll find out in a year.
[...] greatdaneservicedog written a readable editorial. Here’s a quick pieceSome I forget about then recall from time to time: rhino baby, goober puppy, beige bottoms, and buff beauty. Other nicknames have just stuck on my little big man. The most common are toffee tank and toffee tush, bull elephant, … [...]