Once again, don't be deceived by those eyes and the calm demeanour shown in the photo - most of her favourite things don't currently involve an off switch.
Last week I compiled a list of her favourite motivators at 15 weeks for her training diary. I did the same thing at 9 to 10 weeks and it is interesting to see the changes already in just a 6 week period.
At 9 weeks the things she was crazy about were - her Cuz toy, tugging (with anything) and cheese.
At 15 weeks the list now reads - tugging (still with anything), playing with me with no toys, playing with the soccer ball with L. , playing with her water bowl (so much so that she tries to take it into her crate with her at bedtime - and the reason I spent so much money on toys was..............) running - anywhere, anytime, whether it's just running around the yard with us, doing circle running or even just running around by herself - walking is not a preferred option at the moment. In regard to food it's chicken wings, raw steak and roast chicken scraps.
There are quite a number of things in the next column that I would say she 'likes a lot' such as attention from people, playing with other dogs and kangaroo jerky , but I wouldn't say she is totally over the top crazy about them - which is what I want to focus on right now with the main training emphasis still on building up a strong reinforcement zone.
She still likes cheese too , but is not as crazy about it as earlier on - not when there's steak or chicken to be had during training. As for the Cuz toy, that's moved to the 'Indifferent' section now as she's not really interested in it at all these days.
This week she has graduated to spending some time alone in her own little section of the dog run with the other dogs loose in the yard. As I am on holidays at the moment, I can supervise them all, so the plan is to gradually increase the time that she spends in there until that takes over as her designated spot during the day when we are not home.
This has been a big hit with her (just ignore the sad 'I'm behind bars, how could they do this to me? ' look in the photo- proof that the camera does sometimes lie) especially as she gets a bone to chew on and has some other new attractions to entertain her..............
....... like a little swimming pool and a new sand pit for digging. This has been a huge hit with her. She loves to jump from one to the other until she is totally filthy and there's more sand and water on the ground at the moment than in the shells - but a good time is had by Miss Ivy and that's the main thing.
Cruz's old kennel is a bit of a star attraction too - she likes having a little place to hide away if the others hang around the fence too much in search of her bone - their own being finished in record time of course.
I plan on doing puppy class at the Obedience club once she is 4 months old. It's a bit 'industrial strength' for my liking but the kelpies did it from 4 to 6 months and it was good for socialisation and working with distractions. At this stage I am not planning to spend the whole hour in class (heaven forbid!) and will make sure I go in and out of class and combine her work with lots of play sessions. Unfortunately it coincides with the season of country trials in Victoria and I really want to make up for lost time since the car accident with the kelpies, so she probably won't get all that many sessions. However the idea of actually heeling at my side at a walking pace is not really all that appealing to her right now so I don't think she is going to mind all that much. We currently work on very short 'heeling' sessions where she is expected to walk - now if we are 'agility heeling' at a run - she would be happy to do that all day !
Once she is 6 months old, she can join Foundation class at the agility club. She has had lots of exposure coming down on Friday evenings so far and enjoys running around and playing with me outside the rings. Unfortunately she will turn 6 months old on the last training session for the year so will have to wait until next year to join class. Hopefully we will have done loads of foundation work here by then so she will be well and truly ready.
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