The Dog Improvement Manual (aka “Don’t beat yourself up about that naughty dog”)
07/04/2010
Things Sudo does well.
- “No”
- Sit
- C’mere
- Sudo
- Play
- Indoor retrieve
- Cute
- Walk
- Eat
Things Sudo does OK.
- Wait (sometimes, it seems to mean something else)
- Lie
Things Sudo sucks at.
- Outdoor retrieve
- Outdoor “c’mere” to my feet
- Being quiet in his crate
I’ve been getting super frustrated with him recently. I realise it’s just projection of my inadequacies as a teacher/trainer onto him, so I thought it’d be appropriate to make a list of the things he does well, not-so-well and badly so that I can see that he’s actually not doing that bad. I spend a lot of time focusing on the things he doesn’t do well, and that’s not healthy for anyone.
I’m coming to the conclusion that having a dog is, fundamentally, harder than having a child. The child will eventually understand what you want from it, even if it has a greater propensity to disobey. That being said, I’d still rather have a dog.