Post by oceanaussi on Apr 1, 2008 0:50:50 GMT 1
Quentin is 12 weeks old today and has been with us for 3 weeks now. He's a gem and a really well behaved puppy. So far we've done obedience and started on tracking (workshop coming up mid-April) and also do show training. Last weekend we had a retrieving workshop and it was great!
Met heaps of new people and dogs and they were all really nice! They gave us a demonstration first and then split us up in groups and taught us. Obviously Quentin was the youngest and I didn't think he'd be able to do (or want to do) anything. All he cared for was playing with the other dogs. And I mean they were dogs, not puppies...
So of we went, a bit off leash and on the way I introduced him to the cows. I decided to take Hera with us next time as cows are very curious and always came up to us. Hera's done herding so she would have been rather useful.
Anyway, Quentin had already problems walking as the grass was higher than him. I watched what the others were doing and introduced Quentin to the rubber duck. He had some problems holding it as it's fairly big and hard. When it was our turn, I took him off leash, kneed and had him between my legs holding him getting him exited for the duck which Jim then throwed - just a few meters away. From what I've been told, for a pup it would already be great if he would go and have a look at what's been thrown. I didn't even expect him to do that as the other dogs are just far more interesting for him.
Well, we all were wrong! As soon as Jim has thrown the duck, I let go of Quentin he chased towards the duck, picked it up, ran towards me, sat in front of me and dropped it in my hand!
Do I have to mention how proud I was?! We did this a few times, then had a rest and then we did it in water. Quentin has been swimming only once before and the dam was full of sealillies (or whatever these flowers on the surface are called). He wasn't keen at all to go in. So I practice in a little puddle with him (waterlevel was underneath his tummy) and after the first few careful steps he was fine with that. Then I didn't watch him for a second (he was off leash and I was trying neither to fall in the water nor in the cow shit), when Quentin decided he waited long enough for my next throw. He saw somebody with a thrower throwing a duck and off he went. He raced to the point, jumped into the deep water (which was where the duck was located), picked it up and raced straight back to me!
He's just unbelievable!!! I'm so proud of him! But shortly after he fell asleep in the grass, so it was the right time to introduce him to the riffle. He's seen it before and I went shooting with him before but Jim wanted to make sure he's really alright with it. So we showed him the gun, made some noise with it and then we shot while standing next to him. And Quentin? He looked into the direction the riffle went off to and yawned! He couldn't care less! He didn't care at the beginning about all the gunshots and he didn't care now. Later I carried him back to the car and let him rest.
I was so proud and went on to order a shirt which says "Get a real dog, get a gun dog!" Quentin will be a great gun dog, I'm incredibly proud of him!!!
Story and pics will be soon on his webpage: quentinsdream.blogspot.com/
Met heaps of new people and dogs and they were all really nice! They gave us a demonstration first and then split us up in groups and taught us. Obviously Quentin was the youngest and I didn't think he'd be able to do (or want to do) anything. All he cared for was playing with the other dogs. And I mean they were dogs, not puppies...
So of we went, a bit off leash and on the way I introduced him to the cows. I decided to take Hera with us next time as cows are very curious and always came up to us. Hera's done herding so she would have been rather useful.
Anyway, Quentin had already problems walking as the grass was higher than him. I watched what the others were doing and introduced Quentin to the rubber duck. He had some problems holding it as it's fairly big and hard. When it was our turn, I took him off leash, kneed and had him between my legs holding him getting him exited for the duck which Jim then throwed - just a few meters away. From what I've been told, for a pup it would already be great if he would go and have a look at what's been thrown. I didn't even expect him to do that as the other dogs are just far more interesting for him.
Well, we all were wrong! As soon as Jim has thrown the duck, I let go of Quentin he chased towards the duck, picked it up, ran towards me, sat in front of me and dropped it in my hand!
Do I have to mention how proud I was?! We did this a few times, then had a rest and then we did it in water. Quentin has been swimming only once before and the dam was full of sealillies (or whatever these flowers on the surface are called). He wasn't keen at all to go in. So I practice in a little puddle with him (waterlevel was underneath his tummy) and after the first few careful steps he was fine with that. Then I didn't watch him for a second (he was off leash and I was trying neither to fall in the water nor in the cow shit), when Quentin decided he waited long enough for my next throw. He saw somebody with a thrower throwing a duck and off he went. He raced to the point, jumped into the deep water (which was where the duck was located), picked it up and raced straight back to me!
He's just unbelievable!!! I'm so proud of him! But shortly after he fell asleep in the grass, so it was the right time to introduce him to the riffle. He's seen it before and I went shooting with him before but Jim wanted to make sure he's really alright with it. So we showed him the gun, made some noise with it and then we shot while standing next to him. And Quentin? He looked into the direction the riffle went off to and yawned! He couldn't care less! He didn't care at the beginning about all the gunshots and he didn't care now. Later I carried him back to the car and let him rest.
I was so proud and went on to order a shirt which says "Get a real dog, get a gun dog!" Quentin will be a great gun dog, I'm incredibly proud of him!!!
Story and pics will be soon on his webpage: quentinsdream.blogspot.com/