Whoop! Whoop! New puppy alert!!!! (Malinois) General Chat

Phoebe gets taken for a Groeni all the time! Back in the summer we were at an obedience show sponsored by the Working Belgian Shepherd society. As is usual for these breed sponsored shows there was a rosette for highest placed Belgian in each class and I was told they nearly gave it to Phoebe until someone pointed out that she's actually GSD If the Belgian Shepherd people can't tell the difference I despair of anyone being able to do so Hopefully as she grows, Tia will not have to endure such indignity as she's short coated I think with Phoebe people see black and long hair and don't look any further.

Really enjoying your posts of Tia's progress BTW. I envy you the resources re training available to you, your puppy pre-school sounds brilliant. Round these parts you're lucky to find any decent training at all. Also your trips to Guildford and walks round the Friary make me feel homesick - we used to live in Godalming ans Woking! Now we're about as far away, culturally ans socially if not in distance as you can get - wouldn't go back but still miss it!

I think it's quite amusing that most people think she's a mutt! Not that there's anything wrong with being a mutt or a Groeni, and often I don't even correct them. I just think its funny that I did so much research and reading into what was the best breed/line/breeder/litter/puppy for my purposes and most people think she's a BYB mutt.

I glad you enjoy reading this, I started updating it when I brought her home as a sort of blog for me to look back on. Judging by the number of views there is some interest in her progress so I'll keep going.

I am really lucky with the resources available to me for training. The Company of Animals impresses me more every time I go there. They are so knowledgable, helpful and relatively inexpensive. We are also lucky to have the rolling Surrey Hills on our doorstep and large/small towns when we need them. So I have a big choice of what to do with Tia next, I'm building up to taking her up up to central London on the train for a day. That's not going to happen for quite a while yet!

I am quite envious of you living in Wales! We visit Pembrokeshire a lot because my OH's kids live there, it's beautiful and property is so much cheaper. After every visit we have the conversation about relocating, but I probably won't ever actually do it because my kids live in Surrey. That's probably really selfish I know, but I don't think I'd settle.

As it's raining and I have the afternoon off work Tia and I have come into town to see all the cars and buses splashing around and making a lot of noise in the wet. We are sitting at a bus stop on a busy main road, under cover but enjoying the view of the traffic. She wasn't keen at first but now she's lying down by my feet, really quite chilled out and ignoring the traffic.

A rather dark and grainy group "wait"

We went to our pre-school class again today, and it was the sheep familiarisation session again. After her interaction with Grandma sheep last time Tia took one look and plonked her bottom down and refused to go near them. I normally ignore her if she shows any fear of anything and just keep going, but I reassured her and rewarded her fear and offered her treats, which she didn't want because she was so stressed. So that's a big TICK for sheep socialisation!

I treated her to two more complicated toys for eating her meals out of as she's getting too good at the others.

On the way home she sat quietly in her crate on the back seat of the car whilst I was at the fruit and veg market and didn't object to the man loading all my stuff into the back. Good girl!!!

She has just had her lunch out of one of her new toys and has crashed out for a long snooze.

Tia's "Wait" is really good and soooooo useful. She will wait when I open her crate in the car so I can put her lead on and she will wait when we get to a door or a gate. These are really important because she was trying to rush through doors and gates so she didn't get left behind. Now I can walk alone through the side gate to the front garden without worrying she is trying to slip through too.

Glad to hear she is learning to ignore sheep. How long will the sheep familiarisation course last? Also, and I am sure you are well aware of this, it would be a good idea to continue to expose her to sheep in a controlled environment in as many different scenarios as possible over the next few months.

My lot are (mostly) stock broken, but Yogi will still find it hard to resist a lone sheep jumping up and taking off.

Keep up the good work Tia, your mum is so proud

I will be going back to this place for months to come and will arrange for more exposure to the sheep. And yes I am very, very proud of her!

I have just posted our food dispensing toys on another thread, but just in case you missed them. The silver bowl at the back never moves!

I am going to venture out with Tia and the boys to a fairly popular place. I have de-sensitised all 3 dogs to a Pet Corrector cannister so they think the hissy noise = cheese. Woe betide any of you boisterous dogs with no recall!

That went well. We saw some assorted working gun dogs who were all under close control. Then a really bouncy Staffie X came running over in spite of his owner yelling at him. Ollie and Dusty ran to greet him and he didn't even notice Tia sitting behind me.

Hmmmmmmmn we have some guardy behaviour creeping in. Tia growled at Dusty for sticking his nose down the back of her crate when she was in it, lying on her bed on the other side. So we have had group hugs in her crate with all 3 dogs on my lap and me dishing out treats. It was extremely cramped but all very friendly.

Then I sat in there with her and held her 2 chicken thighs whilst she ate them which went well too. I want to make sure she doesn't start guarding her crate or her food.

I left Tia in her crate with her new mauve toy whilst I took the boys out for a couple of hours. I didn't put the locking bones in which made it easier. When we came back all 11 compartments had been emptied. Very impressive Tia! It doesn't hold enough food for a full meal so I gave her a Kong stuffed with green tripe when the boys had their breakfast. I decided that rather than feed Tia in her crate as I have done before, I would give them a Kong each to eat together. This worked well and she seemed oblivious to Dusty eating his right next to her.

Oh i do wish i could get mine to do this!

Persevere with it and you will. This didn't happen overnight!

I always feed them together, as long as i keep an eye on which mouth goes to which bowl (and repeatedly redirect puppy to his kibble!) they are good eating together, but with toys and kongs they both want each others! I need to keep trying with different food to get wiggins really interested in his kong, rice and dentastick was will's heaven this morning! But will has patiently waited all morning for me to stop looking then grabbed wiggins' and polished that off too!

The rule here with chews etc is that once they have lost interest and left it then one of the others will investigate it, but none of them stop until it's empty now. Until your pup is good at extracting the contents and falls in love with his Kong I would give it to him in his crate.

This evening I put Ollie outside with his bowl of raw chicken portions and hand fed Tia and Dusty theirs side by side. Dusty didn't really understand why but went along with it anyway. No problems. Tomorrow I will do the same in the crate.

Here is Tia joining in the boy's games. It's very dark, so poor quality but you get the idea of what it's like trying to get the tea ready in our house.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ojRzKNH3sD0

And here she is with Dusty, who is not scared of her any more!

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=K8v1JnOyCJI

Just caught up with this thread! Tia sounds fab and is a real cutie! Love how all your 3 match!