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Well, Pete celebrated his 1st year on November 4th - as I turned 36 the same day. :-)

It's been a long road, but Pete is doing extremely well these days, and things just keep getting better. We had some aggression issues early on, and after some hard work - and a few training dead-ends - we're now feeding him without any hint of stress. As you know, we feed raw food, so those raw meaty bones have some pretty high value. :-) We're up to 3lbs/day of chicken backs, rabbit frames, meat (venision, bison and beef), offal (green tripe and liver), turkey neck, lamb bones, quail frames, etc. It's a little expensive (almost $200/month), but he should settle around 2lbs/day eventually. We used to chop up the bigger pieces, but now we're giving him the chicken backs, rabbit frames, etc. whole. Our current training consists of approaching the bowl and dropping more food as he's chewing on a piece. He's very relaxed and likes to see us coming towards him when he eats because he expects to get more food. :-) In another 3-4 weeks we expect to introduce larger and bigger bones. We're up to about 2-3 min / piece, but large beef bones can take a good 15-20 mins to finish. We're not there yet, but we'll get there eventually. :-) Pete also developed a dislike for being brushed, having his nails clipped and ears cleaned. We're addressing that by having him "pay for his meals". He has to submit to a brush (just a few strokes), etc. before every meal. If he complains, we postpone the meal. It hasn't happened too often. :-) He's started wagging his tail when he sees the brush, so we're making good progress. :-)

Last summer we tried to get his WC (Working Certificate) but failed because we had not trained with birds or used sufficient distances. Afterwards we joined Alan and Maggie in Maxville, but Pete proved a little too energetic to work with. We decided to go back to basics and work on his fetch, hold, and delivery (to hand). Right now we're putting some effort into getting Pete to pickup bumpers from the center. He has a soft mouth, and tends to pickup bumpers from the corners. When he does this, he can start to "mouth" the bumper. This doesn't happen with dokens or birds, but we want to put a stop to this before it gets out of control. Pete now picks up bumpers from the middle most of the time (teaching the "back" command at the same time). I expect to have a constant and reliable behavior in another 2-3 weeks and then we can start on the "over" command. We're also working on whistles. On a toot-toot, Pete comes barreling towards us, and on a single toot sits at a distance after taking a few steps. We'll be working on getting quicker sits eventually.

We attended the UKC dog show at Place Bonaventure last week-end to see a Conformation and Obedience test. It's a lot easier than we thought, but we saw several handlers (and their dogs) fail the Obedience part. Pete can heel like no other dog, but we still have to work on a few tid-bits. Melanie found an Obedience trainer that gives private courses, so we'll probably give that a try and do Pete's CD next spring. The Conformation was also very interesting - and a lot easier than we thought. Then again, I don't think the judges expect much from Chessie handlers. The Chessies we saw were definately Obedience trained - they kept on sitting all the time! :-) Pete is also a lot prettier - we can't wait to show him! :-)

Well, that's about it for this past year. We're very excited for the future - aside from the usual joy of having a dog, it's also nice having one that can do things. :-) I'm pretty sure we'll try for his CH, CD, WC, and JH next spring/summer/fall.

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