I have quite a bit of catching up to do on this blog. Totally haven't written about our vacation, totally didn't wish Mickie a 12th Happy Birthday on here and write a mushy post to go with it and totally haven't stayed up to date on Spice or Groovy training info. Well those posts will all have to come another time.
Tonight's post - well tonight's post is about Spice and her oddities but they are oddities that I already love.
Spice is a very cool dog and very unlike my other dogs. Well... she might be a bit like Ruckus but only a bit. She's much more confident than he was at the same age - though I do think she's going through a bit of a fear period right now. She was barking at a sock under the bed this morning - when I pulled it out she jumped back! Once she saw it was a sock she tore it out of my hand and started "killing" it! :)
Spice is... well she's just different. I'm trying to figure her out and I'm sure that will go on for years. She's awesome but odd but still awesome. One word that comes to mind is stoic. Not truly stoic but somewhat stoic. She loves to play disc but doesn't go out of her mind about it. She loves to be with us and near us but again, doesn't go out of her mind about it. Well except trying to be friends with Mickie - she gets pretty excited about that - much to Mickie's dismay - but then again - maybe Spice sees it as her job to be her friend so is employing every method to do so. I guess really it's that she's more business like. One nickname for her is Napoleon - she does try to control resources around other dogs - not in a mean way - but in a "I'll take that cause I'm Spice" kind of way. Very full of herself too!
She listens very well and learns very fast. Unbelievable really how well she listens - especially considering she's 8.5 months old. She is excelling at disc. She LOVES butterfly tosses - she does go slightly out of her mind for those I guess. She's very serious about 90% of the time - but in a good way. She's an observer. One of her disc oddities is her total dislike of us attempting to teach her a "go around". It's like she is either uncomfortable behind us or sees it as wasted real estate. I haven't decided which yet. She also doesn't like to play into a fence... she definitely has that working aussie pressure thing going on. It took us quite a while to get her to do overs and unders for the disc and I think it's related to the above issues but she's finally got that down and is happy to do them. She definitely doesn't want to get up in your business with one exception... butterflys! Turn a disc over and BAM she is on you for it. Cool but odd.
I hadn't really worked any behaviors with her other than disc related ones, house manners (no you can't take food off my plate or stand on my laptop keyboard, etc.), leave Mickie alone manners, etc. I hadn't done any shaping or anything with the clicker. The other night I decided to teach her to shake. That failed miserably... she is not foot oriented. So then I switched to a nose touch to a post it note pad. She did fine learning it but during our session I had a feeling come over me that she was too "good" to be asking her for silly pet trick behaviors. Now I've taught every dog to nose touch to a target so this isn't a new behavior for me to teach or anything. The feeling quite surprised me and I'm still not sure what to make of it. But it was almost the feeling that she was "telling me" something like "hey - just show me what you want - don't treat me like a chicken pecking at a piano at the fair". Weird eh? Needless to say we haven't gone back to the nose touch yet... I know in my head it's likely this thought came to me because of a book I read a few weeks ago but I know it's also partly due to her business like attitude. We shall see... this journey is going to be an interesting one! Of course she isn't really my dog at all - she's Jack's so I "can't" really get involved with her as much as I want to. I'm really trying to let him do most of the stuff with her but she's so cool I can't help myself. I told her breeder the other day I want a Spice of my own so I don't have to share her with Jack! LOL
Anyway... not sure if any of this made sense... just figured I'd write it all down to see if I could figure out what I was thinking! :) I love this dog. She's awesome! But she definitely makes me think in ways the other 5 never have! In the mean time I leave you with some pics of the Spice Girl from our disc dog play day last weekend. OH! She LOVES kids! Imagine that! Not a common trait with my dogs - Mickie is the only one that LOVES them. Ruckus likes them (though he didn't used to). Tali is comfortable with them to a point, Jam is tolerant of them when they are under control and at a distance and Groovy thinks they are aliens. Then again Groovy thinks most people are aliens or zombies! :) Anyway... some Spice pics...
Kiera helped me walk Spice back to the car when we were done playing. Along the way she said "You should keep this dog. Spice is a good girl!". LOL No problem Kiera - this dog isn't going anywhere!
