Author Topic: Zennor, six months  (Read 1595 times)

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Offline PaulJ

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Zennor, six months
« on: August 26, 2019, 03:03:01 PM »
I can’t believe pup is now six months old, it has been a bit of a blur. It is hard to imagine the little ball of puppy fat that we picked up from the breeder four months ago.

Zennor is a confident lad with a very strong desire to hunt. We are going to have no problem getting his nose down when it is time. All his training has, and still is, just fun and messing around. The conditioning with the stop whistle has worked and when out in the wild he is bum down when it is blown. I was nervous when we did it the first time but he just stopped and before he had time to think I pipped him back and he recalled at his usual 100 miles per hour. I am really pleased with how he is shaping up. I am sure this will all change once adolescence kicks in but we are ready to go back to basics when the cloth ears start.

I thought at this time it would be good to list some of the things we think we did wrong and what we would do differently next time....and yes...there probably will be a next time!

Sleep. Simply, more of it. Z did not know that he was tired and when tired his behaviour would become less desirable.

Other people have been the most annoying thing for us. Everyone wants to see puppy and it is hard to say ‘no’ sometimes and we have been too polite to poorly behaved humans. They don’t listen and can wind a pup up. As a working cocker, Zennor does need any help with that one! We would definitely restrict and control access to other people more strictly. If they do not like the rules then they cannot interact with pup...their loss!

I especially enjoy the opinion that everyone has when they see Zennor is a working cocker. Sometimes I think all these people must have had a working cocker before but could not engage and stimulate them enough and had problems. They assume we are not intelligent grown-ups have no idea what the breed is a about. I do wonder if they can see the whistle round our necks, training line on Zed and that we are constantly changing direction to keep him tight when “free” running.

Do  ‘nothing’ more. It felt like we had to be doing something with pup whenever he was up and about. Teaching him to settle and relax we did not do soon enough. It’s actually good to just do nothing with Zennor. No one has to think, no one has to do anything and everyone is calm.

At this point now we are working with a local gundog trainer and are really looking forward to training him for “work”. Placeboard training is coming along and we now have some excitement for retrieves. We did a double memory retrieve and a blind yesterday evening in garden straight back to hand. We were both lost for words...how on earth did that happen!

He helped me paint the placeboards hence the white whiskers.

DC8E127A-698A-453D-B900-11F617861CCE by Paul Johnson, on Flickr

Offline ejp

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Re: Zennor, six months
« Reply #1 on: August 27, 2019, 09:33:35 PM »
Not only gorgeous but a bit of DIY'er as well  :005:  I have really enjoyed your regular updates, it has been lovely to share in Zennor's progress.