What's in a name?

For everyone who's not interested in dogs and/or training--sorry.  You can skip this if  you want.  I am going to try to keep a journal of puppy training for a couple of reasons--for fun, to keep myself focused and for future reference.

Our puppy's name Beauregard.  This literally means 'beautiful gaze'  or 'beautiful to look at' in French.  We call him Beau around the house but the kids are very particular to tell people that his name is Beauregard. I am wondering if we should register him with one of those fancy registration names like Beauregard of the Idaho valley or something elegant like that.  I don't know. 

Funny how the simplest things make me so happy...

Beau asked to go outside by whining at the door for the first time.  woohoo!

We still have potty training accidents but it is getting better both because he holds it well and we know when he needs to go out better.  I should have bought the gallon sized pet cleaner solution. 

Beau has been sleeping through the night on the floor of our bedroom.  I know-I know--so much for the 'just for tonight' short term solution to the puppy sleep training.  We have all seen Lady and the Tramp right? 

But he never even asks to get up on the bed and he has never had an accident in our room and he immediately lays right down.  So I'm not complaining.  Molly never slept through the night.  I'm not kidding.  Until we got a dog door when she was 18 months old I got up EVERY SINGLE night and let her out to the bathroom.  I didn't even get up with my babies that long...  But trying to avoid a screaming puppy or pee on the floor is quite motivating.

Speaking of dog doors--I have plans to put a dog door in the family room this weekend.  

I hesitate to even write this because I don't want to jinx anything but... we don't have our yard completely fenced in and Beau has never ventured away.  Did you hear that!?  When I was trying to train the beagle (Molly) to stay home I remember watching a family carry groceries in with their dog just trotting along beside them and seriously feeling my eye tear up with jealousy.  I know we are still in the puppy phase but we have never experienced such a miracle.  A dog that stays home!

Working the training levels:

All training is done with feedings.  We don't just give the dog any of his food.  He has to earn it.  The first day I waited for Beau to sit from being tired of trying to get food from my hand.  I just clicked when his butt hit the flour.  Bingo.  He got that the first day. 

Once he was offering sits continually, I started moving his treats so he would stand up to get them then I started adding the 'Sit' cue just as his butt hit the floor.  We did about 100 repetitions of that.  Very quickly. And then I started saying the cue 'sit' just before he sat.  We did that for the next day and now he is responding to the sit cue in all areas of the house from me or Rustin or the kids.  We haven't tried it outside and we haven't added any other behaviors yet--which is the tricky part. 

We are working on target (my hand) for a treat but haven't really added the cue.  I just started to try to get some downs this morning but it's hard when he's starving.  I used Sue Ailsby's method of putting the treat back and just in front  of his paws.  At first he kept standing up to try to get the treat and I realized that I needed to keep the tread closer to his body on the floor so he would fold in.  Bingo.  But that was luring.  Still need to get him to realize that laying down in the trick.  That's the trouble with luring.  I will try to capture some downs when he offers them when I'm not feeling too lazy. 

Today Benson sat on the floor with a bowl of food and Beau started to mug him for just a second and then he quickly backed up and politely planted his bottom and Benson started dolling out the food. Beau was very polite after that.  This is great because a wrestling session  yesterday ended up with a deep scratch on Benson's ear.  Seriously ouch.  I spent some time having Benson practice being in charge. 

I have a million questions and worries but Rustin reminds me that like Rome, good family dogs aren't built in a day. 

What were we thinking!!!

I knew I would say this but I forgot how exhausting a new puppy is.  ugg.

Potty training stinks.

The kids slept on the floor by the pup for the last two night but last night everyone was ready for their own beds.  What to do...

 Last night I broke the *this dog will never see the inside of a bedroom* rule and put him on a mat on the floor next to my bed (when exhaustion kicked in at midnight...).  He whined for a second and put his paws up on the bed but I pushed him off once and he didn't ask to get up again.  No accidents during the night but I took him out three times.  Tonight I am going to try to get him to go back to sleep instead of getting up. For the next couple of nights I will have him sleep on the floor next to my bed but then hopefully to the crate without crying all night... 

Crating  would have been easier for Beau  if he had spent time in the crate with his litter mates.... so we will work  on it gradually.

I forgot that I love training.  I don't know what it is--something about learning to communicate with a creature.  And dogs love people...

Training:  we are using regular puppy kibble and we are training during meal times.  We have lots of offered sits now.  Beau does great with the "Puppy come game."  I also started working on targeting today as well as clicking for sitting politely to get dinner from my hand.

Tomorrow all my puppy-sitters go back to school so we'll see how it goes!

New puppy training basics

Apologies ahead of time. Once I get an interested audience on this subject I have a hard time stopping!

Some of you that are getting our puppies are interested clicker training and some of you are just curious so I'm going to put some links here to the sites that I found to be most helpful when I first got started. Fifteen tips to get started with clicker training is a good beginning. If you are a visual person and need to see training in action then click here. The dog in the video is learning to push a button on the floor. The trainer is using shaping to gradually get him to do what she wants without the dog becoming too frustrated. Keep in mind that the dog in the video is advanced.

For those first few hours at home I love Melissa Alexander's description of how she handled her dog. She also has a great section about bite inhibition that we found very helpful for those extremely sharp puppy teeth! I also love to read Sue's description of what she did with her puppy here. What a great trainer.


Some other really helpful articles are on my favorite dog training web site, www.dragonflyllama.com . The first article explains basic positive reinforcement theory and is a great story. Another article that I love from there describes how patience is a big part of training. From there the articles on Dominance and on Sue Eh?'s training rules are great to read at some point as well.


I do think it's important to take the puppy straight to the potty area first thing and to try to have the atmosphere be calm. Let the puppy smell and meet you before all the noise and excitement of kids.

The easiest nuts and bolts example of how to train is found on Sue Ailsby's web site (dragonflyllama.com) here. Start with Training levels, the book. Just start with the 'Puppy come game' and move from there. You can read and get answers to more FAQ at the Clicker Training site HERE as well.

As far as training goes here's what helped me the most. First--you aren't going to say "sit" and expect the puppy to sit. He doesn't speak English. With clicker training you are going to get the behavior you want (ie. catch them sitting) and then you are going to click and treat to encourage that behavior to continue. Once you can predict that a sit is going to happen THEN you can start to say the cue just before or as the puppy sits. Eventually you won't need the clicker.

Second--avoid the temptation to repeat yourself. You can actually teach your puppy that the cue to sit is "sit, sit,sit." If you yell 'come'as the dog is running away and you have no chance to stop him, then you will have a dog that takes off every time you say come.

Third and most important--be patient. This is a learning process that is supposed to be fun. I didn't even find a training method until Molly was three months old and we have done great!

Here is an example of the treats I have been using

I slice it up into cm cubes. I think it's a great idea to use the dogs kibble as well. If we're working on something really hard (like come) then I sometimes use a higher value treat like left over roast beef or chicken.

There is a wealth of information available and there are several chat-type discussion group sites that have really expert people giving real live advice. Of course I am always looking for a fellow training enthusiast as well so don't hesitate to call!

All is well

I believe we are finally well around here. Hopefully we can keep it that way for a while! I just read a very interesting article from the New York post. It's written by a journalist who was assigned to study exotic animal training. She took the positive training ideas and applied them to her life. She has now written a book about the whole experience which I can't wait to read. I find myself absolutely fascinated by the intricate way we can change and shape behaviour of everything and every person we interact with. I first stumbled across Karen Pryor's book called "Don't shoot the dog" (which seemed prudent advice at the time--dealing with another dog, not Molly) years ago. I have been slow to really incorporate the principles into all aspects of my life but it has changed the way we parent and interact with each other for sure! Anyway, I hope some of you can be inspired, too.

Puppies are healthy and growing. They are starting to interact with each other a bit (more than just piling on top of each other). Rustin commented last night, "They look like dogs now!" Very cute.


Two of the little girls, "Mo" and "Sparrow" resting on their brother

Here we go...

We are a family that loves dogs. I don't think we ever planned or expected to find ourselves permanently attached to a little four-legged, hairy, wet-tonged, big eyed girl. But we did. Every last one of us. Molly is our 2 1/2 year old beagle.

Our five children were very young (8,8,6,2,1) when Molly joined the chaos so we went in search of a training method that even our little Benson could help with. We stumbled across clicker training during our "this dang dog just peed on the floor again!" stage and we have been forever thankful. Benson's first three words were "sit, good girl" and it didn't take but a couple of days to have our little puppy sitting all over the house to earn a treat from anyone who would look at her. And yes, Molly is completely, reliably house trained.

We don't claim to be expert trainers in any sense but we continue to make constant steady progress. We love and have been working with the training levels program outlined by Susan Ailsby. It' s a great step-by-step training program that is easy to use and understand.

Molly is a happy dog who doesn't just tolerate the kids but actually seeks them out. She doesn't complain when Jenna (our only girl) dresses her up as a "princess" or when Benson straps all of his star wars guys into her collar so they can "have a ride." She never fails to tuck herself in to the twins beds at night time and she is Austin's favorite pillow in the morning.

So, it is with extreme pleasure that we will welcome our first litter of puppies on or around February 16! Check back for more updates about progress of pregnancy and all the fun preparations we have in store!