Pepper's 1st Birthday

CC: Audrey, Laura, John, Allison, Nathan, Portia
Dogs: Pepper, Willow, Maxie

Today is Pepper's 1st Birthday.  I picked a pet friendly restaurant, La Madeleine's Bakery, for his party, and called ahead so management expected us.  It lasted about 45 minutes, took no prep time, and worked out great.  Our closest circle of peeps came after work, about 5 p.m.  Nathan secured us a lovely table on the porch, and John started snapping pix with my iPhone.   I bought a fruit tart, and onlookers were amazed how the dogs sat and stayed with the tart under their noses while we lit the candle, sang Happy Birthday, divvied it up onto 3 separate plates, and waited for my "Okay" command before eating.  I put this slide show together in Windows Live Photo Gallery, just to see how that works.  Not so well, as I can't put the slides in the order I want.  (Hit the "REFRESH" button if it doesn't show up the first time you open this page.)





Pepper at 8.5 weeks old.

Pepper at 6 months, with huge ears,
a long nose, and not much fur.

It's so hard to believe I brought Pepper home last January. Seems more like last month.  Where has the time gone? 


I never intended to keep the fat little fart with the huge ears and big feet, just sell him to raise money for my agility expenses and increase the Papillon population in our area.  Did I really need a 3rd agility dog?  When exactly did I decide to keep him?  Don't know.  He grew on us gradually, but neither John nor I would give him up for anything now.

Pepper at 1 year, growing into his ears and nose.

From day one, he just fit in.  Everyone accepted him -- dogs, cats, family, friends.  Going from 2 paps to 3 was no great effort.  No extra crates or beds.  He posed no problems, other than an extra vet visit and some puppy chow.  Of course, there will be training expenses.

It's going to be a fun trip learning more and more about our new Birthday Boy, tracking his progress, training, and reaching for another gold ring.

Lucky is almost 4, Maxie is 5.4, Willow is 10, and FoohFooh is almost 13. And I'm about to turn 66.  Time is flying by.  Will I still be training dogs, running Pepper, at 76? Can I do right by this amazing little guy?  I shall try.

Upwards and onward!

Tunnel Jump Relays

Yesteday I set up my tripod and took video of Pepper and Maxie doing Tunnel Jump Relays --  comparing the first attempts of a puppy with my seasoned agility dog.  Audrey came along as a second trainer.  This was Pepper's first attempt, Audrey's first crack at dog training, and Maxie hasn't done this in over a year.  Pepper's performance was sporadic. 

The most imortant things I learned are that

• Pepper values boiled chicken liver treats more than gizzard treats.  After I switched to liver treats, he came to me more readily.  I had given Audrey the liver treats because they break up more easily, and because I can put the gizzard treats in my mouth (I love gizzards).
• Pepper will have no trouble jumping12", though we'll continue to practice mostly 8" until he's older.
• Pepper needs a lot of flatwork at home before doing much sequencing.
• Maxie has forgotten how to do the exercise spontaneously,without any direction like he used to do.  We'll have to work on that.

If I hadn't been so anxious to capture this relay on video in the short time allotted, I would have backchained the exercise first -- straight tunnel, slightly curved tunnel, deeply curved tunnel, add one jump, then the second jump.  Pepper started doing straight and slightly curved tunnel relays at about 4 months.  But I was in a hurry to assess Pepper's ability to sequence before Beginners class begins next week.  My bad. After practicing a few more weeks, I'll take another video, hopefully with better results. It's a process.

Here's the video, about 8 minutes.  The whole exercise took about 15 minutes with both dogs.  The weather was low 80's, nice and cool, and mostly in the shade.



Next I'll post the Dog Walk Relays we did the same day after a brief rest.

Upwards and onward!

Conformation Class with Pepper

Min-E-Me wins Reserve Winner's Bitch,
6-9 month puppy class,
on June 16, 2012

Tuesday night I took Pepper to his, and my, first conformation class ever, encouraged by cousin Lois who just showed Pepper's half sister, Min-E-Me, and won "Reserve Winner's Bitch" in the 6-9 month puppy class.  The show was in Florida, June 16, the puppy is 7 months old.

We were the only team that showed up for Netta's class so we got a private lesson.  There's more to this conformation stuff than meets the eye. 

• Walking a puppy on leash with their head held high and a few feet out from the handler, not sniffing the ground, wabbling too and fro, or looking all around,
• keeping a steady trot that shows off the dog's structure, in a circle and also in a straight line,
• dog standing frontways to the judge,
• having an "interesting expression on command",
• stacking on the table,
• standing for exam,
• not minding having their teeth and body examined by a total stranger,
• having the dog interested in the bait, but not lunging for it.

That's a lot to train for.  So our first lesson I pretty much got exposed to the lay of the land, but no information on how to train these skills.  My homework is to work on a good stack, which is "front feet near the edge of the table, shoulders straight, and back feet placed so the rear pasterns are perpendicular to the table, pretty much as in the photo above.

I also got a few important pointers on how to behave at a show:

• Get to the ring early and watch how the previous dogs are asked to move around the ring by your judge.  Then when it's your turn you can concentrate more on your dog than ciphering the judge's instructions.
• Make sure the dog is freshly washed and well groomed.
• Handlers are often seen holding the dog's tail in the UP position BECAUSE even breeds who usually carry their tails UP will tend to drop their tails when approached by a stranger or even just ill at ease at a show.
• Get the recommended thinnest possible white show leash for Pepper, so it won't show up in his white neck hair.

There are tricks to every trade!   

Pepper was feisty, as usual, concerned almost entirely with smelling, exploring the parking lot, and getting his chicken gizzard treats.  In other words -- all over the place and pulling hard on his leash.  Netta remarked she wished she had a video camera to film her pupils so we could see our gait, I whipped my brand new 4GS iPhone out from my pocket, and she took my first video on that phone.  Learning to point and shoot with an iPhone takes some getting used to, and all but one position requires rotating in Windows Live Movie Maker, but here's the little snippet she got.



Being as Pepper is trained to sit when I quit walking, I was pleased how quickly he caught on to remain standing, though I couldn't get him to face the judge rather than me.

When I got home, all the dogs were psyched.  They don't like being left behind while I take Pepper places.  Pepper and Lucky began a friendly tug of war, with Maxie watching on.  This went on about 5 minutes before I decided to video that, too.  John held the camera.  We are always amazed at the way Lucky regulates her tugging to suit her playmate (she's very strong and can tug your arm off, shake you up and drag you across the room), and the way she handed the toy off to Pepper time after time.  It was in a darkened living room, so we got to test the flash feature on the new iPhone.  It lit the room moderately well but made the dogs' eyes look like Tasmanian Devils.  Even so, the video is an interesting study of cooperative dog behavior (sharing a toy), and self-regulating behavior, so I'm sharing it below.



Upwards and onward,