He's a bold fella with loads of charachter, full of energy, bright and very quick to learn both good and bad things.
This is my first gun dog so I have just as much if not more to learn than he does.
He settled quickly to a routine for sleeping. He sleeps in the utility room which is just off the hallway and closed off with a stair gate. In there he has his crate and bowls.
Training consists of 5 dedicated minutes every morning, then throughout the day we will practice what we have learned here and there.
Sleep Time
He cried and yelped for 3 nights when we put him to bed. We ignored his please and that paid off. We've spent the first 3 weeks at home with him, and every time he wanted to sleep during the day we would let him nod off a few minutes wherever he dropped then took him to his room and closed the gate. He'd winge for a few minutes but as he was tired he'd fall asleep quite quickly.
Three weeks on almost and this has paid off. 22:30 he goes to his room, we close the gate and he sleeps through to around 6am when I wake him. During the day we can put him in his room where he can do 2-3hr stretches to let us get on with life as normal.
Toilet Training
From day one we take him to the front of the house every 2hrs during the day. At night I take his water away 2hrs before he sleeps then put his bowl down with about 1cm of water for night time, that way if he's thirsty during the night he has enough to wet his mouth but not enough so he needs to empty.
After 3 nights he's had dry nights. He has had the odd accident but that was down to us not adhering to our rules rather than it being his fault. He has started to cry if he wants to go outside, but not every time.
Sit Command
Sits to voice, hand and just started to sit to the whistle too. Indoors I can get him to sit to around 2 metres away, but not out doors yet.
He has his routine, when its feed time, at the front door to put his lead on and take it off, he sits automatically without being asked. Other times he responds pretty much every time on voice and hand command. Whistle is new and this morning he sat every time to it so was pleased with that.
Recall
He recalls to voice and the whistle very well. Even in the park when there are lots of distractions and other dogs. He hesitates every now and again when he's really having fun with other dogs, but he never ignores me; He stops looks up and he looks backwards and forwards to me and the dogs a few times, but a second peep of the whistle and he sprints to me.
Heal
The little bugger just doesn't get it
He doesn't really pull hard, but if I loosen the lead he zig zags in front of me and goes around from behind to. To be fair, it's all so new outside to him, and since he is so good at everything else, I haven't really pushed him hard on this. So we will continue to try to improve.
Stay
Started to stay up to about 4m in the house and garden. He is still a little excited and eager, so I'll steady him there before we start this in the park.
Socialising
Very nervous when he meets bigger dogs, wee's himself sometimes. But he want's to play and as soon as he see's the other dog/s want to play too then he gives as good as he gets.
Generally, I'm really pleased. He's definitely bright, he's an absolute bugger when he's full of beans and he knows how to get your attention!! Come 19:00hrs though he starts to mellow and relax for the night. He's affectionate and loving and the family adore him.
More than happy for comments both positive and negative about what I'm doing so far, as I said, I have far more to learn than he does so always willing to listen.
I'll keep this post going updating progress (or not) as we go along.
Thanks for reading
Cos
