Overview

This blog is to tell the story about the search for and the upbringing of our new German Shepard. We live in Sydney a pretty dog friendly city so we are looking forward to many outdoor adventures!

Wednesday, 19 March 2014

Progressing through March

Well thankfully Murphy passed the vet checkup with flying colours. They all thought he was adorable. He also got to meet a few other dogs while there and the vet showed him how to meet them so Mark said it all went very well which is great to hear. He is in perfect health and he has a few more fans in the clinic too. Other good news is that we can start bringing Murphy out on very small walks but we are to keep him away from dog parks until he is fully vaccinated. Murphy and Mark had a great boys weekend. They went down to the local café for breakfast in the morning and got a ton of attention from passers-by and patrons.



So now the exciting times of lead training begins. We’ve had the lead on him around the house so he can drag it around and get used to it. Every so often he grabs it and starts chewing. I try to stop him quickly but it must feel great to chew because as soon as I do he is back to it again. We have had a few successful walks and a few half successes. He instinctively knows when we turn to head home. I must be giving off some signal that he knows we’re close. He then starts to pull and race ahead. I’ve combatted it by turning and immediately walking the back the other way, this is to teach him that I dictate where we go not him and it seems to be working. It takes a very long time to walk about 30metres and in the evenings I definitely have a lot more time to work with him on it. We had a very good walk today so it’s an improvement but who knows what tomorrow brings.



I was just going to comment on well his toilet training has been going and he has peed on the kitchen floor behind me. I guess we can’t cross that one off the list just yet. The annoying this is I had just walked outside with him to see if he needed to go as well. Very annoying… house privileges for this evening revoked!!

We are trying to alternate his toys as well so he is kept entertained. Clearly this wasn’t enough for him yesterday as he dug a lovely big hole in the garden. If I was to guess he wanted to get into the dog next door. Thankfully our fences go quiet deep and our grass is quiet hard so he didn’t get through. To stop him going any further I brought down a plastic storage box and filled it with water, no chance of him being able to move that. I also gave him a small chew bone and a tennis ball. He has never had a tennis ball before so he had loads of fun with that which is good. I came home to no new holes and no attempts to getting into the one already dug. I’m chalking it up to a success.



Now for some snippets:
  • Murphy loves sitting down on walks
  • He doesn’t chew on the lead that much anymore
  • His ears are starting to stand up… it’s very cute
  • Crate training is the best thing in the world he sleeps like a baby every night
  • I am very grateful to have tiled floors
  • He doesn’t like the broom handy to keep him from charging in the door. Just its presence is enough to persuade him to stay back.
  • He still hasn’t discovered there is an upstairs in the house I pray he never does
  • Murphy discovered his tail yesterday and ran in circles, gave us a good chuckle
  • If someone has a smacko (dried beef strips) Murphy is your best friend

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