The Training of Tawny - Part 7

Grooming, performed regularly, is the best possible way of developing trust between you and your animal - and essential in working dogs to find ticks, treat hidden wounds, and so on. And it's a good moment to reinforce some of those important basic commands.

 “Look!”

At six weeks old a puppy is intensely curious. “Tawny, look!” I would call, poking my finger at anything of interest within reach of her nose: a bone, a fallen bird’s nest, an insect, perhaps.

            Before the first day of doing this was done she came snuffling up to see what I’d found as soon as she knew the word. (She’d forgotten it by morning but remembered it again after breakfast.)  Actually it was my hand I wanted her to notice more than the word, for this was the first step in learning hand signals.

            Soon she learned to follow my finger to the object of interest when I described a small arc  in the air on the way.  Then we moved  to objects not on the ground, gradually to arm’s length left and right. Pointing straight up still foxed her.

            When she was eight weeks old I could call her to look  without pointing and she would stare at my hands, waiting for an indication, and by that I judged the lesson learned well enough for the present. Later this could be extended to other forms of finding and searching.

“Sit!”

Like all very young puppies Tawny sat down every few moments throughout her waking hours. It seemed a shame not to take advantage of this stage, which soon passes. Virtually all I had to do was teach her a word for it.

            I watched for it and tried to coincide my command with her action; better still, anticipate it. I did this a great many times and after a week or so she seemed to have got the connection without even realising it. There was something rather vague and automatic in her response, but it was a start. By then I was also ready for formal grooming during which this command and the next (“Lie”) would be taught anyway.

            At first Tawny was not easy to groom. She wriggled and rolled, chewed the brush and my fingers and tried to turn the whole exercise into a game she didn’t really want to play. I gave her a cloth to play with and merely stroked her with the brush, making soothing sounds. Very soon she began to like it and then had to be taught to take her turn and not interfere when I was grooming another animal. This would seem a small matter but it was very important for Tawny, for there were going to be times when I’d have to give my full attention to another animal – one that was injured, say – and I didn’t want to have shut Tawny away every time I did so.

            Formal grooming followed a routine procedure.  The same time every day, and in a sequence that was regular and predictable. First Tawny was given a good rub over with the brush and fingertips to loosen any dirt and stray hairs. Then she was required to sit while her head and chest were groomed and her ears, eyes and mouth examined.

            Because of the groundwork already done the Sit was now hardly a problem. Occasionally when her mind was on something else, Tawny needed a little physical assistance. Then I placed the palm of one hand against her chest to prevent her moving forwards and with the other hand over hips and tail-head, slowly push her down into the sitting position, giving the command several times and praising her calmly when she was sitting securely.

            It is a crazy feature of training a puppy: you manhandle her into the position required, then praise her as if she’s achieved it all by herself!  But it works.

            Tawny was not being trained for obedience competitions and so was not required to sit exactly so. As long as she was sitting where I wanted her to sit, it didn’t really matter if she sat a bit crookedly or something.

            My hand signal for Sit is slapping the palm of one hand against the fist of the other where the thumb and forefinger join.  This is not a convention signal; I evolved it simply because it resembles no other. Tawny was a year old before I got her onto this. I could have taught her as early as eight or nine months old but at that time she was learning many things and this particular hand signal was a lesser importance.

“Paw”

The next step in Tawny’s grooming routine was to have her forepaws brushed and examined, especially between the toes for grass-seeds and such like. Once she was sitting, I wanted her to lift each of her paws in turn when asked. “Paw,” I said, “Give me your paw!”, lifted it myself, praised her and groomed it. Then the next one. Because I wanted her to stay sitting I spoke softly.

            After a while I noticed that she shifted her weight off the paw I indicated even before I touched it. I increased the praise and soon she was putting her paw into my hand, though with no great enthusiasm. She much preferred to lie on her back, a position she felt was so irresistibly endearing as to solve any problem she might encounter, and give me both paws together.

            This is another lesson that is more easily taught when the puppy is around six weeks old than later on: if she is to learn to shake hands now is the time to begin, because puppies of this age naturally bat their paws at each other and at anyone else, especially someone who will bat back, Occasionally, as I batted paws with Tawny, I would catch a paw gently in my hand and say, “Oh paw! Clever girl!”

            I could have speeded up her learning considerably if I had done this with her often. As it was, the lesson was mainly confined to grooming time once a day.

            Confusion can arise, though, at this early age,  - for example, this puppy was also being taught not to jump up with her paws.  That’s why I confined the lesson to grooming time, and always thereafter insisted that Tawny be sitting down before presenting a paw.

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