Having the luxury of owning a large block of land gives me more scope when training Gus. On this particular day I had riding down the hill to our orchard block to clear some more scrub.
Whenever I leave the house with the dogs I have to put tracking collars on each dog as they love to go exploring while I’m working. Most days that I’m away from the house one of my older dogs, Tig will catch and retrieve possums to me. This is a job that I have trained him to do as too many possums would cause havoc to the orchard. Also Gus gets to see another animal and how I react so it’s easy to discourage him from wanting to target the possums.
While Tig is out looking for the Possums Rastus and Bro will be out looking for Pigs. Right beside the orchard block is our QE11 block of native Bush that has the odd wild animal moving around from time to time.
This to me is my paradise where I get to relax while creating our orchard and at the same time giving the dogs a chance to catch a wild pig.
On this particular day we did not get a pig even though the dogs had a good look around but it was still good training for Gus. When the dogs returned I opened the gate for them which allowed Gus to run through then back through without thinking about the gate so I put him back through again then closed the gate with him on the other side then called him back through as I opened the gate. While this may seem like an easy task, it’s another thing that we are doing together that is helping to build our bond.
Next when I asked him to get up on the motorbike he did not want to. I have had him getting up on the bike OK recently but today he wanted to try me. This is another stage that can annoy some people and if you loose your cool its easy to lose the trust from the dog. So in a calm manner I used Bro as the mentor dog to come to me then show Gus what I wanted him to do. Some times we have to be patient and it did not take Gus long to do what I was asking of him.
When teaching a young dog anything always be patient and don’t keep giving a command that you are not getting the desired result or you my teach the dog to not do what it is that you want the dog to do.