For This Cheerleader, The Pom-poms Come With
The furry bits on a Chinese Crested's feet, head, and tail are called their "furnishings." I find that funny.
We're now working on training. No, not Aida. She comes when she's called, sits, stays, and learned to obey a new command (so she wouldn't mow through her food so fast) in about 30 seconds the other day.
Gregg, on the other hand, is still learning to pretend to be firm with her. Or at least to sound that way.
I am, as I would call it, "appropriately firm" or, as Gregg would call it, "Adolf Hitler."
Not "mowing" through her food: Make her work for it!
It's actually entertaining for the dogs if they have to do a bit of work for their food. You can scatter it on the floor, put it in a box full of wine corks, hide it in small piles throughout the house, or whatever comes to mind.
a_random_guy at October 29, 2013 10:03 AM
There's "eat" -- meaning "go for it, wee doggie!" and then there's "Stop." (I bark this. It would be embarrassing if I didn't live alone.) We actually have fun with this. And I dogs really like routine. The one day I fed her in the kitchen instead of on the whelping pad where I have her litter box and where she is crated (rarely these days) is where she gets fed. She loves bounding over there. I love watching her tear over there, too!
There are food toys that they have to play with to get the food out but I'm not sure if her food, which is small bits for a tiny dog -- Blue Buffalo brand -- would work.
Amy Alkon at October 29, 2013 10:32 AM
Draw me like one of your French girls...
Sabrina at October 29, 2013 12:46 PM
So one paw is a Louis XIV highboy, another is a Queen Anne chair?
Annie at October 29, 2013 1:38 PM
Try this home-made treat-dispensing toy I make for cats and parrots. You will need an empty toilet paper or paper towel tube, paper, tape, scissors and a sharp, pointy thing. Toilet tissue tubes are already the perfect size.
Make 3 or 4 kibble-sized holes randomly through the tube-a hole punch works for cat-size kibble.(Otherwise, use the sharp, pointy thing.)
Cover one end with paper, and tape it on firmly.
Place a handful of kibble inside, and a few little treats. Cover and tape the other end. Roll it around and make sure a kibble will come out the holes. You made it, so it smells lovely.
Aida will figure it out in the flash of a furnishing. Roll it around and food falls out - how cool is that? And *you* can play it like maracas to summon her.
Animals are wired to seek food. It turns them on. I bird-sat a Macaw who would find a hidden key and open a locked wooden box to get his daily treats. This activity kept him busy most of the day when his people were at work, and eliminated screeching, feather-plucking and other stereotypies he was developing. I made these-he liked the treats, but shredding the roll to bits was half the fun, for a bird.
bmused at October 29, 2013 2:43 PM
Yer doggie has boxing gloves! ;-)
BlogDog at October 30, 2013 8:07 AM
We have two Eskies that we rescued. Incidentally, they have "pantaloons," not "furnishings." One was found wandering the Pine Barrens in NJ after some unknown amount of time, and clearly had to hunt and scavenge to keep herself alive. Her resultant behavior appears to be an assumption that each feeding may be the last, and she eats with appropriate gusto. I will play "work for it" games with her with treats, but not her meals.
The flipside of that experience is that I can train her to do just about anything using food motivation.
Jeff at October 30, 2013 2:25 PM
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