Tick-tock
Owning a Tibetan Spaniel, in fact probably any dog or any pet, means you own a canine clock. Somehow you train them in the rigours of time management and then they remorselessly hold you to that as time goes by.
Hooman - it is time you fed my breakfast
Hooman - it is time for my walk
Hooman - it is time for your lunch, at which point you will feed me a small piece
Hooman.......etc.
How does this all start, well it is a good point, you don't really notice. Then one day it happens, the dog has come to fetch you....."what do you want" is the polite question. The reply comes in many forms, quite often ‘The Stare™’. You've had that 'stare', I know you have. Initially you pretend you don't know what the stare means, but it always comes at a relevant time, the time for one of the above items. This stare is very hard to ignore but if you manage to ignore it, there will come a time for your Tibbie to ramp up from the stare. It might involve standing up at you, bringing you a toy, maybe even a little nagging noise of some sort, a whine or a woof.....but not the usual "there is someone at the door" woof, oh no, this is a very different woof entirely.
It is safe to say that Finlay has reached the advanced level of time management. He knows when he is 'due' to receive all his daily allotment of items, and he knows how to keep us on our toes and provide what he feels he needs.
The nose
Of course canine noses are way better than a human nose, we know that. But our previous Tibbies haven't had such a good nose as Finlay. If you dare to leave something on the kitchen side that he thinks is either his, or should be his, then he finds it and stand or jumps up at the side. Currently he can't get onto the kitchen worktop, but he does give it a good go. Turning the nose to good use, to keep him occupied we hide treats in the living room and tell him to "find it", off he will go sniffing out the treats pretty much without fail. Of course this training does loop back on us too, I refer you to the first paragraph 'tick tock'. This nose would also lead him into mischief, so it is imperative we don't leave anything his nose would find, that he shouldn't have, that he CAN get to.
Obedience
Despite his waggy and puppy-like behaviour, Finlay is very quick on the uptake when it comes to training. As well as ringcraft and all that is required of him there, Finlay has been gradually learning the other staples of fun dog obedience, such as "paw". We want to go through Bronze Good Citizen dog with Finlay and we think that it should be fairly easy. Well, I say fairly easy......when Finlay is in the mood he is very obedient, but of course when distracted this is not necessarily the case.
When out of walks he is becoming more reliable, as I have said before, 'more reliable' is not at all a guarantee of him coming when called, so we are still very careful about where we let him off. Of late, he has come away from other dogs when called and been good from a distance particularly to a whistle. It is great to be able to let him off-lead because he loves to run. At only 18 months old he is in peak physical condition to being able to run and he would walk for miles too.
The challenge
Finlay is an absolute joy to own, but his desire to get his own way is never far from the surface. The opportunity to get away with just that little bit more than you were prepared to allow is constant. He can be a little devil at times and will try your patience if it means he gets his own way. Make no mistake about it, the humans do have to assert their dominance on a frequent basis, but the ease with which Finlay shrugs this off is alarming. This is of course a Tibbie trait, they love to be in charge.
Despite our protestations to the contrary, is any human really in charge of a Tibbie I wonder.......
Some recent pictures/videos
The boy likes to make himself comfortable, what self-respecting Tibbie doesn't!
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| Mum's chair, she's gone so I must keep it warm |
Finlay met a puppy. He is so outgoing and exuberant normally you'd worry that he would overpower a puppy. But he totally changed, and was ever so gentle with this little one. I love this picture, not one I took myself though.
I posted this video on Facebook. You would have thought it was a setup but it really wasn't. Finlay has discovered toilet rolls in true 'Andrex puppy' style. What a devil.
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