#My Puppy Dog Trainer

[papersak]

A conclusion to the Pokemon Masters story "Pure Hearts and Rainbow Wings."

the result of listening to Trainer Lodge: Night too many times and finding too much wholesome Lance and Silver content

[border-collie]

Four nights in a row now, so I feel like I can brag about it, but Saga is sleeping through the night!

I've got my puppy potty training routine down to a T now and I kennel them right next to my bed so they* will wake me up when they need to go. On top of that, I don't take them out at night if they don't ask to go to prevent practicing extra, unneeded potty trips. With a potty trip before bed and a potty trip when I wake up about 8 hours later, you can quickly build a routine for the pup while protecting the integrity of the daytime potty training you are doing.

*I've never had a dog that doesn't wake me up to go potty and it's something I actively shape and reward when they do so, part of this is border collies are very clean dogs so if they mess in their crate once they will actively avoid doing so again and icies seem to be in the same category. This might not be as effective in pet store puppies, rescue puppies or dirty breeds like some shepherds can be

[sergle]

side note but it's so funny looking through Hugo's puppy pics, and seeing exactly how trained he was by whether or not he has his houseline on.

[not-poignant]

hiya pia! I just saw your new puppy on Instagram!! congrats, he's so cute! I was just wondering, is he a rescue?

cuddles to him and Maybe 🤗

Hi anon,

He's not a rescue! We've always had rescue cats, which is actually part of the reason we can't get a rescue dog, lol. I'm about to talk a lot about it, so get ready! Lol

So firstly, in Western Australia, poodle x rescue puppies don't really exist at all in rescue organisations , and Glen and I are both allergic to highly shedding dogs as well as dogs with very short hair, and we needed a trainable / biddable puppy because we have a cat with a lot of behavioural issues. We've had to litter test each litter of puppies we've met with to see which ones were suitable / not suitable with our allergy issues.

Unlike other places in the world, poodles are actually very hard to find here, and as someone who's had my eyes on rescue organisations on and off for 10 years I can say with a lot of confidence we were never going to find a non-shedding puppy or dog without significant behavioural issues in a rescue. It was nearly impossible before the pandemic, and it's been impossible since.

Western Australia has a dog breed bottleneck, because before frozen sperm existed, most people had to pay around $10,000 to get a new dog of any kind because of the flight fees. On top of that, we have the strictest quarantine in the world. Any dogs to introduce new genetic lineages into a breed from overseas had to spend three months in a concrete cell, with no comforts and only allowed short visits per day. As a result, many of these dogs developed behavioural issues.

But this has meant that some purebreeds don't exist at all in Western Australia, or are just extremely uncommon. There's no medium poodles in Western Australia. There's only two active miniature poodle breeders. Borzoi aren't here. The list of like... fairly common dogs that don't exist here, or only exist in small numbers, is huge. And this means what filters into the rescues tends to be the most popular breeds - staffies, kelpies, malamutes, huskies, german shepherds, labradors and their mixes - all dogs we can't have as pets :(

So, we looked into purebreeds for a long time, and fell in love with some standard poodle puppies we met several months ago, but they were just too big for our cottage, and for our 12 year old 'I have so many behavioural issues Pia learned clicker training just to manage me' rescue cat.

We actually consulted with a trainer who specialises in PTSD dogs quite a few months ago before making this decision and deciding on Tobermory, and she was the one who suggested we go this path.

Rescues are great, I'm a huge rescue animal proponent, I've worked in both wild animal rehabilitation, animal fostering, and in animal rescue at various times in my life. For most people who aren't dealing with allergies (and keeping in mind that a low-shedding dog isn't hypoallergenic! Glen and I are still having allergic reactions, they're just not hives or asthma attacks, and we can manage congestion/breathing issues etc. with antihistamines + rescue inhalers), or who don't already have problem pets to worry about, it's absolutely one of the first avenues people should try!

But puppies from reputable and trustworthy breeders (whether mixes or purebreed) are often bred for qualities that can be more reliable in people who are trying to meet certain needs. And I advocate people go in that direction too if that's the only way they can have or live with a dog. Especially if they can meet with the breeder, meet the parents, meet the puppies multiple times, see (and check) health testing results, and those dogs are being registered, if not through a Purebreed Register (which honestly guarantees nothing except conformation, and often puts health and sometimes even temperament by the wayside), then through a reputable Register that has a code of ethics where you can report a breeder for poor practices and trust that they will be held accountable.

A small fluffy cutesy dog is actually not my favoured kind of dog in terms of how he looks. If I were picking a dog for cosmetic reasons, it'd be such a different dog!! :D I prefer borzoi, or leonbergers (two dogs that don't exist here), or landseer newfoundlands (doesn't exist here), or large munsterlanders (doesn't exist here) etc.

But in terms of temperament and what we need him for? He's perfect. Plus I can still breathe through my nose today and I'm not covered in hives, which is a win!

Anyway, I realise I could've answered this with a short 'no he's not a rescue' lol, but I feel like a lot of folks don't understand what it's like in Western Australia, one of the most isolated major cities in the whole world geographically, and what that means for genetic bottlenecks, issues with finding certain kinds of dogs in rescue, and how the chances of finding a rescue that works can drastically plummet if you're already dealing with pets that have stress, anxiety, and behavioural issues at home.

Maybe was this kind of rescue. She would have been euthanased before we got her. In fact she was literally 20 minutes away from being put to sleep, before we got her. She went on to develop multiple behavioural issues being a multigen feral with Bengal background, which is a pretty bad combo in Western Australian bushland (multigen feral cats are something else here, and have been mistaken for mountain lines in the bush). She's needed intensive and time-consuming management since we got her, and it means every other animal around her needs to be as easy to manage as humanly possible.

But yeah it's put me in an interesting quandary for about 7 years? Longer? At any rate, TL;DR not a rescue! :D

[valoale]

My intrusive thoughts really be getting to me

After almost two years of living alone with my now retired dog without any puppies or youngsters around to board and train my brain is really starting to convince me to get a puppy again

This is very hazardous

[fluffs-palace]

Our pup, Rin, is staying with my husbands boss tonight cause were at an amusement park today and shes watching him till tomorrow...

... i miss him so much 🥺

[cinnamon-bunni]

NOT okay right now im thinking abt pokemon leaving scars on their trainers + everyday, domestic problems.....

[lyricalchrysanthemum]

🐝

[watching-constellations]

I think people need to accept that there's more than one way to be human. That may sound really obvious, but I'm not talking about identities, or opinions, or looks. What I'm saying is that not everybody wants to do a silly little dance. At all. Ever. It doesn't have anything to do with embarrassment or shyness or ability. Some people just don't want to.

I've been going to this dog training school with my new puppy recently, and one of the things they're having us do is train our dogs to stay put in a sit while we do a silly little dance next to them. I know this exercise is meant to be approachable to standard beginner trainers, but I can't even begin to describe how anxious I was when the trainer told us to do this. I remembered years of getting in trouble at summer camps for not participating in icebreakers and name games, being called a spoilsport in school, being called cold and distant as a teenager, and even been made fun of in a mean-spirited way and getting trouble in college for opting out of "group bonding activities". I refused to do the silly little dance. Instead, I've distracted my dog by shaking and dropping objects, stepping over her, sitting down, doing pushups, whatever. To my surprise, the trainer complimented me on my choice, and I could finally breathe.

It's not that I can't dance— I've trained as a dancer for years. It's not that I don't like being silly, or that I don't want to look stupid. I make myself look stupid on purpose on a regular basis because it's fun, and I love a good joke. It's just that there has to be consent for this to be fun. I don't need to loosen up and enjoy myself. I won't enjoy myself, because I don't want to do the silly little dance. I never want to do the silly little dance (not alone, not in a group). I don't want to be loud and yell, I don't want to do a call and response game, I don't want to mirror your body movements, I don't want to play zip zap zop, and I don't want to introduce myself with an animal that shares the same letter as my first name. It's not that I'm shy or quiet or even introverted— I just don't want to do it. I don't connect that way. It's not fun for me, it's miserable.

There is nothing wrong with any of this. I do not deserve to face any kind of repercussions for not wanting to do the dance. I'm not less fun because of it. I want to play tug of war with you— hand me the end of the rope. Sit down and let's tell a story. Let's make dumb jokes about street names and let the energy bounce off of each other and crackle. If our group plays mafia, no one will ever know I'm the killer. Come walk with me through the woods, and let's look for bugs under rocks and logs. We can eat lunch on the ground and poke at the moss.

I've spent so long thinking something was wrong or broken with me because I didn't want to do the silly little dance. I like dignity. I like elegance. It's not that I'm pretentious, it's that I like being ridiculous on and within my terms only.

Honestly, I was worried that, when I decided to get a dog, I wouldn't be the right kind of person to train one. I mean, have you seen how people act around dogs? I was worried that my lack of external bouncy enthusiasm, and profound disdain of doing squeaky voices, would make my training and my relationship with my dog fail. I thought I wasn't the right person for a dog, because I'm not even really the right person for a person. Turns out, I don't need any of that. Every now and then, because she's a puppy, people come up to Evie in their standard "dog-mode". Whenever they start doing... whatever it is people think they're doing with dogs... Evie pauses and looks up at me. I swear she's asking me what the hell is wrong with them. And, well, all I can do is sigh and shrug. She waits patiently for them to stop with their bouncing and squealing, and then cheerfully greets them when they're done. It doesn't seem like my dog wants to do the silly little dance either.

[wyrddogs]

What drew you to belgians?

I'd spent the majority of my life dreaming of owning a German shepherd, and then in college I met my first malinois during my internship studying Rage Syndrome in mals.

Belgians tick all the boxes that GSDs do, with the added benefit that they are smaller. They're athletic, biddable, do-anything dogs, and they have that shepherd grit. I met several malinois, liked them a lot, and decided I needed one. Unfortunately, malinois culture is Terrible, so I moved over to tervs.

What amuses me is, when I was looking for the shelter/rescue puppy that ended up being Bindi, I was looking for a German shepherd. My dog training mentor (who really wanted me to get a lab, and was grudgingly helping me look for a shepherd) said she had contact with an older couple who had recently gotten a puppy, but it was way too much dog for them, and they were looking to rehome. The puppy was a malinois.

I can't remember why I didn't follow through; I was starting to pick up on my mentor's gajillion red flags so I was bypassing a lot of her "help" at that point. But I did contact malinois rescue to see if they had any puppies. I met a volunteer at her house and got to meet her dogs, and she asked what breed and dog experience I had. I told her I was an apprentice dog trainer and this would be my first dog.

The volunteer laughed and basically said "yeah we're not giving you a dog" and that was that.

I got my fluffy malinois now, so it all worked out in the end.

Thank you for asking!

[luvvsbian]

knowing basic dog training is such a curse. every day i see people getting walked by their dogs with the leash fully taut. or yelling at them to stop barking. or giving a command several times and then giving up.

[grison-in-space]

ooh there's another potentially unpopular opinion that I skimmed over when I was avoiding that bait post: I think dogs are safer when they're treated as relatively expensive and valuable, and I have no problem with breeders potentially making a profit off breeding dogs as long as the breeding program is otherwise ethical.

My definition of ethical involves breeding dogs that are not imprisoned by their bodies and can engage easily in species typical behaviors without chronic pain or breathing distress. (I have the human equivalent of BOAS with my tiny mandible and giant tongue occasionally blocking my airway and would not wish it on anyone.) Similarly, ethics means you're breeding for dogs that can live long, healthy, comfortable lives, and you should do your due diligence on health testing and adjust breeding accordingly. Breeding animals should be kept in enriched environments with adequate social contact and good general welfare.

Beyond that point? If you can market your dog as valuable enough for someone to buy it at your price, and if your dogs routinely find homes they generally stay in for the rest of their lives without injuring anyone around them, go nuts.

[rissslays]

Training dogs is so fun. Why are you jumping silly guy?? you're supposed to be sitting. sit. sit. sit. I'm going to put the treat away. sit. there you go good boy. now give paw. yeahhh good boy have a treat.

[teabookgremlin]

really hate that any time someone seems slightly upset with me i cry

[opisasodomite]

My mother is incapable of not adopting a large, difficult to take care of, and expensive animal that she will inevitably rehome in 6-18 months lmao

[border-collie]

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