Day 156 in 2020 (isolation days...with a puppy)

Bunny watching is serious business, and only one of them is sleeping on the job.

Day 155 in 2020 (islation days...with a puppy)

Fetch is a great way to help a dog get much needed exercise. True it's not quite as a desirable as a good long-lead hike or a meandering sniffari, but since those are not always options, fetch can wear a high energy dog out in a fraction of the time. Fetch training, then, is an important early lesson. There was a time when I was concerned that Gimli would not learn to fetch successfully. I look back and laugh at myself for that now, and then I set April in the yard to watch the master.

Day 154 in 2020 (isolation days...with a puppy)

One of the keys to successful house training (and not just potty training, but also no-chew training, or respect for property) is controlling a puppy's environment. We use a combination of baby gates, leashes, and the crate to make sure we always know where April is, what she is doing, and what she has access to. She is never out of our sight, and usually she is actually leashed to one of us. If we can't watch her carefully for a little bit she  goes in her crate with a fun toy. With these precautions we can usually catch her before a mistake occurs, be that a potty mistake or a chewing mistake, and catching before they happen means we can avoid the rooting of bad habits, not to mention we can avoid cleaning up messes and replacing lost possessions. We followed these rules with Gimli to what seemed like great success, and it appears to be working a second time as well. No shoes chewed, no accidents, another successful day (even if she does look a little sad behind that gate).

Day 153 in 2020 (isolation days...with puppy)

Sleeping through the night, one or fewer accidents in the house per day, already knows her name, sit, down, roll over, and give paw. Plus she and Gimli are doing so well. New today we started actual short walks in the neighborhood. The 8-11 week age range is a fear period for puppies, so new experiences can be scary, and it's vitally important that all new experiences go well becuase the ones that don't can imprint for life, so we're taking it slowly and using a lot treats to link new experiences with yummy outcomes.

Day 151 in 2020 (isolation days...with puppy)

Our first day with April was spent getting the puppy routine back down (it helps that we had puppy Gimli so recently because we remember of lot of the puppy details), and letting her get to know us slowly. We expected an adjustment period, but were wonderfully surprised that she did not cry when we put her bed in her crate last night, she slept most of the night through, and the one time she did wake us up to go potty at 4am, she went right back to sleep without trouble. That's a big win in our book!

Right now we are keeping Gimli and April mostly separated with the intent of taking introductions slowly, but they have interacted through baby gates and play yards and the future is promising.