Another chapter

We’ve now opened another chapter in our lives with a new puppy. Visit us & follow rudyCavalier.wordpress.com

Memories: delayed gratification

On our walks in NJ, sometimes we bumped into the post-man who would give Kelly a biscuit. She always would carry it all the way home in her mouth, saliva dripping before eating it. Ken didn’t believe until he came along on one of these walks and took a picture.

Memories: Some favorite toys

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Her flip flop is among the top favorites, and this was a gift from her breeder, Jeff. Flip flop had been a toy that Kelly & her siblings played with since birth. We still have it today.

Getting her to accept the green monster took the longest–she hated it at first and eventually became one of her favorites.

She really likes the soccer ball–this one is the biggest. Someone kicked it into our backyard & never came to get it.

Carrot was one of the 1st toys we gave her. She was teething & thought it was better to tear up than play with.

There was a time when she put all sorts of things in her mouth & wanted to bring them into the house. This image of the leaf is just 1 of those things she’d bring in. Mostly, she’d mouth a pebble or twig, hide it from us when we checked with all the dirty things she tried to bring in. Then, when no one was looking, she’d spit out the pebble, leaf or twig & play with it.

Memories: Kelly burying her bully stick (Feb 9, 2012)

Never understood how she learn to hide her bully stick, but she seems to know how to do this.

Memories: Kelly on the beach at Carmel (March 21, 2013)

Chasing shadows or something else

Memories: Fun match in Elk Grove (Feb 9, 2013)

Going on a “standard” run at the fun match

Memories: Soccer (Apr 30, 2011)

Her favorite sport — soccer in our backyard in Summit

Accident

Kelly had one final accident. A car hit her. She suffered some serious brain damage. After several days in intensive care, she finally couldn’t breathe any more. We’ll just have to remember my super hero.

Just picked up the camera and …

Spelling

I noticed that Kelly has learned to spell.

Sometimes we (her guardians) need to use the WALK word when we’re preparing or planning the activity. But doing so gets Kelly all excited to no end. Then, we’re forced into it. Very devious.

So then we began to spell the word, so we’d say something like, “do you want to go for a W-A-L-K now or do you want to go later?” Having removed the walk sound removes the cue that she recognized, but then Kelly got used to the new cue so she not only recognizes the WALK word but also the W-A-L-K word (4 sounds instead of 1).

Wondering out aloud, can dogs really have a such a long cue word (or words) that signal some behavior. I thought we needed to train them with short and distinct sounds as commands (eg SIT, DOWN, STAY), but if Kelly can recognize the specific sequence of 4 sounds that together mean walk, then maybe dogs are much more capable than we think?

All this time I thought that she just recognized a few key words in some stream that sounds like, “xxx xxxx xxx x xxxxxxxxxx xxx SIT” and then she’d respond with the SIT behavior. But, if she can understand a sequence of sounds then maybe there’s a more sophisticated language understanding.

I think I’m going to test whether she can tell between “do you want to go for a W-A-L-K” and “we need to trim your K-L-A-W” but I’m scared to teach her too much because she’s might eventually break our power over her. No more secret talk.