Undómiel | Canines In Action, Inc.

No Bones on the Couch

We rearranged some furniture this week to make room for an event, and I guess it was enough to make someone wonder if the house rules had changed. (Hint: they hadn’t.)

I looked up from my computer to see that Undómiel had brought a recreational bone onto the chair with her. The dogs are certainly allowed on the chair — in fact, that particular chair has stayed specifically because it is a favorite dog chair! — but they are not allowed to bring chews with them. This keep the furniture clean and prevents any accidental damage by chewing the bit of comforter which had wrapped around the end of a bone, as may have happened once.

Just a quick photo post….

I’m not supposed to work on my computer in bed (spine) but darn it, the company is better here.

Labrador on Klimb platform and Doberman sitting beside, both hopeful

Nail Trim: Making It A Choice Makes It An Easy Choice

I made a mistake yesterday. I went to a drawer in the kitchen. Not just any drawer, it’s the not-a-junk drawer, where I keep among other things the dogs’ nail trimmers.

As I opened the drawer, two dogs materialized behind me, sitting politely with ears forward and eyes bright. So of course I had to get the trimmers out.

Black Labrador holding big bone and standing on frozen pond

Keeping Warm in Winter

The temperature has been climbing all day and we’ve now broken 0 degrees F! (-18 C) so I thought I’d share some of our cold weather activity and precautions.

I don’t keep my dogs inside, as they love to play in the yard, but they definitely get to come inside when they ask. Undómiel has a lovely coat styled after a horse rug which keeps her warm in these temperatures, since she has a slick coat and no body fat to speak of. I usually coat her below 20 degrees F, unless it’s just a quick toilet trip. Penny usually gets to choose if she wants an extra layer, because she’s a Labrador and doesn’t always notice that it’s cold.

Don’t Lie To Me

When I talk about behavior chains, I talk about the importance of completing the chain. Because in a chain each cue serves as a reinforcer for a previous behavior, dropping cues is actually failing to reinforce — and we know that’s a bad thing. Unreliable reinforcement leads to unreliable behavior. Variable reinforcement leads to variable behavior. (That’s great when we’re shaping, not so great when we’re maintaining.)

Today I broke a chain.

I was getting ready to leave the house, so I opened the door and called the dogs in, sending them to their kennels in my bedroom at the far end of the house. They ran past me, and as they hit the hall I remembered that Undómiel’s crate wasn’t in my bedroom, but was outside for cleaning.

Oops.

Doberman sitting on bed beside lap desk with computer and knuckle bone

So You Want A Smart Dog

Be very careful when you say you want a smart dog. Undómiel jumped up to join me and I reminded her “no bones on the furniture” (a cue she knows). So she put it on…

Training at the Vet Clinic

No time like the present…. Undómiel and I had to make a trip yesterday to the veterinary clinic for an irritation on her face, and while I had planned to get around to teaching a chin rest for vet exams and treatment, I hadn’t actually done it yet.

Yes, professionals can be lazy and distracted, too. Guilty.

A solid chin rest can be invaluable for vet exams, especially of the head or face. So there we are, sitting in the exam room waiting for the doctor, and I decided to get started. A few clicks in, I realized it’d be good to get some video of the process.

Why We Train (Hint: For When We Aren’t Training)

We’ve posted several times on training for when life catches you off-guard, like when you forget to put the meat in the fridge instead of on the floor. I had one of those moments today.

Over the weekend I was offered a big mirror, salvaged from a dressing room in the type of expensive store where I don’t usually find myself. I took it, because I didn’t have a full-length mirror, and put it behind my bedroom door. It didn’t have hanging brackets yet, but it was pretty secure in its place and I figured I’d get brackets this week. The dogs had seen it, knew it wasn’t a window to a new playmate, and generally they ignored it behind the door.

Until today, when the bedroom door was closed, exposing the mirror, and for some reason Undómiel decided to desultorily paw it — just once, and not particularly strongly. I saw and called her, but it was already moving. What followed was one of the longest seconds of my life, as the mirror tipped forward over my puppy who was looking back at me and couldn’t see it coming. I was on the opposite side of the room on the bed, with my feet up and a computer on my lap, and there was no possible way for me to intervene in time.

Admit it. At some point in time you've pretended the floor was made of lava and that jumping onto the couches was the only way to survive.

Puppies and Imagination

Do dogs and other animals have imagination?

While scientists now agree that animals are conscious (duh!) and many or most agree they are sentient, it’s harder to say how much creative and meta-thinking animals might do. We can listen to a human child tell us a silly story he’s invented, but the language barrier makes it harder for a young animal to do the same. Take away a common language, and would we think an other-speaking child incapable of inventing the story, just because we can’t hear him tell it?

We know animals can think creatively for problem-solving; it’s one of the aspects we treasure about clicker training in particular, this encouragement of creative and analytic thinking in our learners. But I hadn’t thought much on if or how animals use imagination on their own. I’m a storyteller, but only for my own species. I mean, a game of keepaway can be just as fun if it’s a piece of wood or some faux treasure, because the game is in the chase, right? When we play tug, it’s a fun game whether we’re pulling on a rope or a freshly killed caribou. Imagination isn’t a clear component.

Puppy Socialization: the Physical

I have been a terrible pet parent, and I have not been spamming the blog with puppy photos and puppy stories. I apologize, I’ve been crazy busy, and in the end it’s more important to spend those extra minutes with the puppy rather than writing about her.

But today I’m going to officially spam about the puppy.

Meet Undómiel, who is 12 weeks old now and already gi-normous. Her paws are dinner plates. She’s going to be bigger than Laev.

I went to Denmark to pick her up, so she could fly home in the cabin with me.