My sisters and I decided to join the Train Your Dog Month Challenge sponsored by Something Wagging This Way Comes and cohosts Alfies Blog and Rescued Insanity. In case you did not know, January is National Train Your Dog Month.
I’m sure some of my friends learned fancy tricks like ballet moves on top of a fence post, surfing a 20 foot wave, or herding a flock of Seagulls, but we did a wide variety of things, some old, some new, nothing earth shattering. Our main goal this month was to help our little sister Bailie get her basic obedience commands down so she can pass her Obedience 1 class at All Breed Obedience School next week. Aside from working on the basic commands with Bailie, all three of us have been working with our K9 FitBone and Nose Work has been keeping Bailie and I busy in our home course and attending class.
Bailie needs to do many things to pass her class, but some of the more difficult things are down stay for an entire minute, sit stay for thirty seconds, and sit stay when a stranger wants to pet her. To practice these things, Mom has been taking her all over the place where difficult situations could arise.
Mom goes to the office for a few hours several days a week and Bailie has been going along. This is her practicing sit stay at the copy machine.
She also practiced sit stay at PetCo next to the Zukes treats…talk about a tempting challenge!
At PetsMart she was working on her down stay in the bone aisle, another tough place to concentrate.
We found that if Katie and I or just I did the commands with her, she learned better, so we did a lot of that which was a great refresher of us. Bailie actually had a lot of trouble at first with down, but when we did it with her, she got it right away. Mom has also done a lot of one on one work with the commands and Bailie, but doing it as a family is so much more fun…especially all the treats! Mom made a short video of our command training for me. Note that Katie knows the commands, but with her arthritis it is hard for her to get up and down, so she is a bit slower. I saved the most proud accomplishment, a trick only Bailie does, for last. She is quite proud of herself for mastering rollover. Take a peek at the video to see our choreography! Not all the commands are things we need to know, but you have to have some fun when you are learning!
Honestly, we are training all the time these days, and we are all enjoying it. With the extreme cold weather we haven’t been able to be outside as much as we would like to be, so indoor training has been a perfect solution to keep us fit and not get bored!
I’m also joining Fitdog Friday, the blog hop sponsored by SlimDoggy, Peggy’s Pet Place and To Dog With Love! Stop by and see what other dogs are doing to stay fit.
Good job you guys. I loved the video. Best of luck to Bailie. I bet you will do tremendous on your test!
We are hoping she has a cooperative, mellow mood the day of her test. It was supposed to be Monday but we had another class cancel because of the cold, so not sure if Monday is still the test or not.
Oh guys we just loved the video, we watched it twice BOL.. You are all super good, now Moms going to do some with me.. ” Treat jar Mom! ” xxxooxxxx
Mollie and Alfie
It is awesome with all the treats around out place these days! Learning isn’t so bad afterall!
Good stuff. You deserve another high-5!
Thanks…at least our brains our fit this month!
wow you are so great on this , doni is so bad 😛
Well, I aced obedience as a puppy, so I guess I can show Bailie things, but she seems to be coming along.
Pawsome video and we can see how clever you all are. Bravo and high 5 to you.
Have a fabulous Friday.
Best wishes Molly
Thank you. We make a pretty good team with one, two or three of us.
You guys are great to help Bailie learn. What a bunch of smart dogs you are.
Mom had the idea because she realized that Bailie learns so much from us. It works really great.
You gals are all very good. We are sure Bailey will ace her tests.
Millie & Walter
We have our paws crossed!
Just absolutely pawsome! Is there nothing more priceless than the look on a scent hound when they are concentrating? You and Katie are great big sisters. The mom says she should have Sparkle sent to you for training before she comes home to Florida! XOXO Panda the Boston
LOL! I think Sparkle will be happy to get to a warm place! It is way to cold for tiny puppies around these parts. Bailie is just now starting to be better with the cold and super deep snow.
Wonderful, wonderful job and video of all your hard work! I loved the shot of little Bailie watching you, Emma, to be sure she gets it right. Terrific roll over, Bailie. I’m sure your big sisters encouraged you and are very proud of you.
Bailie always wants to be like me, so I have to try to be a good example. She is the first dog Mom has ever had to learn rollover, so it is pretty exciting!
I think the stay next to the copier looks the hardest for Bailie, Emma. Those things are noisy! When you do a great job at obeying commands near treats at the store you just might get to eat all of them (or so Wilhelm thinks.)
She tried to steal some kind of a knuckle thing and a stuffingless squirrel toy but both attempts were foiled by Mom.
It’s great to have some siblings help you catch on to the best training techniques. If you can make it in the pet store, you can make it anywhere! I loved that synchronized “down” with Bailie and Emma, it looked like a mirror image.
We have done all we can for the little one, so if she doesn’t fly on her own, it is her own fault! Mom says we do so many things exactly the same she has a hard time telling us apart sometimes, like synchronized sit 🙂
You are all so good! High-paw! =)
We give it our best try!
We are sooo impressed! Synchronized tricks and sitting next to treats are hard to pull off! (howling and stomping paws) WooHoo!
Thank you! We will see if she passes or not. Mom says it is still iffy.
That was very impressive! We love to work on training too but mom worries the treats out weight the fit part! Love Dolly
My mom is super stingy! She actually takes a 3 calorie Zukes Mini and cuts it in 4 pieces! We are always walking and playing too, so we can have a few extra treats.
Oh man, I do the same! XD Also we use carrots and green beans as training treats. 🙂
I don’t like veggies much, so that wouldn’t work for me, but my sisters would probably work for veggies.
Yay for you guys!!! I love doing training stuff and tricks! You always get good treats for that stuff!
Treats are exactly why we enjoy helping Mom out!
What a cute trick! 😀 I’m sure all that hard work will pay off! We know Bailie will ace her test for her obedience class!
We have our paws crossed.
The video is so adorable that I want to shriek! They are so cute and good! I love Katie scooting down to her down from her sit!
Terry from MatildasJourney.com
She does her best to keep up with us young ones!
Is this like a competition obedience class or a regular obedience class? It seems a lot harder than Onyxx’s basic class! We just started “stay” yesterday and none of the other dogs can do it for more than a few seconds.
It is Obedience 1, an 8 week course that dogs normally need to pass to move on to agility and other dog activities. It is not a walk in the park. A lot is expected of the dogs/puppies, but we think Bailie may be able to make it with all the work she has been doing.
That is so great Emma that all you girls are working together to help Bailie. I love how she learns from you. You all do so good in the video….I love it!
Thanks. Humans know what needs to be done, but sometimes a pup just learns easier from another dog.
You will rock that fur sure! Hey, I need a Train Your Dad month!
Maybe a train your pet parent month would be a good idea?
You guys have been busy! Especially Bailie. There’s a lot to learn when you’re a puppy. You and Katie doing the tricks with her is very sweet! I did that too when Petal was a puppy, I had Lassie and Ella do them with her. It’s a great help when you have older siblings to show you the ropes! 🙂
She loves to do what we do, so it is fun and we want all those treats, so it works well all around!
Adorable video! Bailie is so cute doing rollover 🙂 We’ve found our other dogs to be invaluable for training puppies or young dogs, too.
When Katie was a pup, Mom’s other dog was a lot older and not so interested in the puppy. I went to obedience school and loved it, but Katie was a wild girl and never very obedient, so she wasn’t much help. This time around it is working out well and Katie has gotten pretty obedient in her senior years.
Fabulous video! And great job to everyone.
Sit and stay is very hard to teach such a young dog. Bailie is doing great. But she’ll get better and better at it the older she gets.
And very impressed by that rollover. I’ve never been able to teach Honey that.
Since I temporarily have three dogs, I’ve been working on getting them to respond to cues when I call their name. Instead of everyone just doing the same thing. It has been very challenging to say the least.
So glad you joined the Train the Dog Challenge.
Normally we do things one at a time or separately, so for us all doing the same command at the same time was a new thing but it worked pretty well. Thanks for hosting the challenge, it was fun.
I love the high five trick! How cool! High 5 from me for the video!
Thanks pal! If you can do shake, high 5 is pretty easy 🙂
We’ve been glad to have indoor training to do to keep us busy, too! This polar vortex is the pits. We tried getting Flattery to learn sit and down by watching me and it was a no go. Mom says she gets so excited about the treats that her brain must short circuit or something.
Bunny
P.S. That K9 Fitbone is awesome! I’m drooling with envy!
Flattery and Bailie would be good together – one track food minds, but Bailie seems to understand that she has to do something to get food. The K9 FitBone is kind of scary for me, but Bailie handles it like a pro.
Rooo Emma – I love the video of you and your sisters training together, pawsome *Waggy tail*. But you’re letting Bailey go to work with your human? You better watch out so she doesn’t get any more treats than you!
That is part of my jealousy problem, but that will end this week when she finishes obedience school. That obedience training is causing Mom to spend way too much time with Bailie alone and I’m not happy about that.
You guys are great. Bailie will have no trouble passing her test. But the two of you may need to go with her.
Since two classes were cancelled because of the extreme cold, and they need to graduate this week, the second make up is on Nose Work night, so we have to leave Nose Work early to get to Obedience late which means I get to go along. I figure I will growl at her if she isn’t doing the right thing…much more effective than a no from Mom!
How great to do training as a family, especially with the cold weather. X Talent Hounds
And you forgot about the best part – the treats 😉
You all are adorable and so smart too! Loved the video and the training at various places. All that is such great foundation work for everything else in a doggie’s life! Sit next to the copy machine is brilliant… great distraction! We had the chance to try out the FitBone at a dog show this weekend. I think we need to get one!
Your pals,
Diane and Rocco
I bet Rocco would love the FitBone! Dog school in Germany was so much more practical as we had class where we learned how to ride a bus and on a train and we went to a shopping center one day and learned about elevators (not escalators). Since dogs go almost everywhere there it was great. Here is it tough to find places other than pet stores to take us but Mom does her best.
Really great job! I loved the video, so cute to see them all concentrating do hard together. Training is a constant thing at our house as well, whether we are learning something new or maintaing good behaviour. It looks like you know how to keep it fun and.no doubt this is a huge part of your success!
We are always doing something, but lately it has been serious training!
Look at the three of you go! Fab tricks, well done all of you.
Thank you, we are a good team.
Great job Emma! (Like I ever had a doubt.) 😉 Glad to see you jumping right in there and showing Bailie the ropes! I’m sure she’ll do well when she takes her obedience exam! Will you be going to lend support for her, or must she do it solo?
She should be doing it on her own, but two classes were cancelled because of the extreme cold so the make up for graduation is the same night as Nose Work this week. We are going to do our turns first in Nose Work and leave early, then go to Obedience for the second half of that and I can sit in a kennel and watch. I will growl if she is messing up, it may help.