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Or at least according to the vet. I took Cooper in this morning for her first shots and the vet said she was a Border Collie mix, probably with Lab.That brings up a whole new series of questions. You will all be sick of me by the time she's grown, but its been a long time since I've raised a puppy. I have a 12 year old blind Pomeranian, a 7 year old Tibetan Spaniel, and a 5 year old Jack Russell, so throwing a bigger puppy into the mix is interesting. They've all established the pecking order, with the always dominant Jack coming out on top.
Guess the biggest questions I have is how soon is too soon to start with training and commands? I know Border Collies are smart but can be stubborn so I want to start consistently training now. She's picked up on sit already. Any suggestions on how to keep the other wild furkids, who only have ME trained, from interfering? Where is a good place to start?
thanks for any help! With a puppy in the house and my first grandbaby due any time, I'm not sure if I feel old or young again!
would the age of training be any different for different breeds? I know they have lots of energy and need to be exercised a great deal to keep destruction and boredom down. how old is she now? I started my Sheltie and Bichon at about 4-5 months. As soon as they showed me they were ready with house breaking, calling, reacting to their name., etc.
With Jazz border collie X cattle dog her training started the very first day(12 weeks) she actually house trained in a day thanks to my older dog going after her when she did pee in the house the 14.5 yrs I had her she never had another accident in the house! By the weeks end she knew her sits and downs and go to crate impressed all my friends as for some strange reason they thought puppies had to be older to train.
Chaos Cattle dog X? who will be 15 weeks this coming week and was 13 weeks when I got her also knows sit and down and is doing well at wait, doing great at her house training too and is pretty good about coming when I call she will not go to crate yet as she does not like going to bed as she wants to play, play , play but once she is in her crate she is quiet. She starts Puppy class on Thursday and wants to be the rock star in class as I told her the instructor knew Jazz and will expect her to be as good!
I think the earlier training starts the better and think people that feel you must wait until a ceratin age are crazy , puppies are fast learners.
If your puppy is part border collie do ALOT of mental stimulation things with her and give her jobs to do as physical exercise is not enough for most herding dog breeds and mixes of.I could run Jazz for hours and with a 5-10 minute car ride home she would be ready to run for hours again but when I mixed in alot of mental stimulation things as we walked or played she woud really be exhausted and sleep for a longer time. She also stopped all destructive behavior when she got the mental stimulation.
Training can be alot of fun and if you do it all day like ask for a sit before she goes out or a down before you pet her or even toss some trick training in there and use them along with obedience commands like a roll over before you toss the ball so all day long as you interact with her it will seem less like training and be more fun then say seting aside 15-30 minutes where all you do is train. It becomes part of a life long mental stimulation/ training plan.
As for the other dogs I can't help as I never brought in a new dog before my older one (s) were trained so that way I use them in training and will call all dogs in a room and ask a command be it obedience or a trick and which ever does it first "wins" the treat. They really respond fast and we play that game until all have had at least one " win". When we us eto visit my parents I would play it with 4 dogs my 2 and their 2 and while Jazz was my super star the others soon knew that speed mattered and it was funny at how fast they all got and yes they all seemed to love to play the game. They also all learned that If I said "Dash rollover" that he was the only one that I expected to do so and the others sat and waited their turn. but If I just said roll over they all did so.dogs are amazing. When I walked Jazz and Dash I would toss in commands and yes they both were expected to listen and do what ever it kept their attention on me as they never knew when I might ask for something our walks were always a blast instead of the chore to be done.
Cooper is around 12 weeks and we've had her for a week. She has already picked up 'sit' and is working on stay and doing well potty training. I think training her will be fairly easy, but I'm not sure how to go about the actual physical part of it. How do you teach a dog to roll over without manhandling them and rolling them yourself? How do they learn how to do the actual physical command? Am I making and sense or did I just confuse everyone, myself included?
i start training any puppies i bring into this world from the day they are bonr, by the time they go home at 10 weeks there typically housebroken (or close to) know sit, stay, down, come, and have had an intense amount of socilization...
in otherwords its NEVER too early (or too late) to train a dog...
keep training sessions positive short and fun (puppies have short attention spans) multiple times a day, and plenty of excersize.
int terms of where to start, you said shes doing well with sit, so work on downs, stays (sit stay and down stay) and comming when called, also start her on leash training and find a puppy class to enroll her in.
for rolling over you need to teach down first, then you take the treat/lure when shes in a down and move it behind her head and over to one side, essentially luring her to "flop" onto her side, eventually you mold the flop into a roll over.
lures are very helpful, it can be a yummy treat (keep them small, tiny bits of boiled chicken are perfect), or a favorite toy thats reserved for training purposes.
collies are very inteligent and HIGH energy, to the point that they need almost constant stimulation to prevent them from going stirr crazy...so getting her in a puppy class NOW, and doing fun training at home will help, then as she graduated form puppy class id go on to persue ob, cgc and even eventually you might look into doing agility for fun, borders excell at agility!
the petsmart classes can be quite good, look for positive reinforcment, classes should be fun...
youll get out of them what you put in, so always be sure to "do your homework" lol.
classes are always worth it...good for dog and people soclization, mental and physical stimulation and gives the owner a clue on hwo to aproach training their dog, even if you only take a basic/puppy class, youll leave with alot more info you can modify and use to teach new things
Train the pup away from the house and the distractions therein. Go to a park and do the leash training, sit, stay, back-up. Also, if you wish, start out by only feeding the new dog with your left hand, do this for at least eight months then... offer something to the dog with your right hand, when they go for it, YELL at the dog, a loud "NO", transfer the item to your left hand and feed it to the dog, praise the dog --repeat. Eventually you will have a dog that will not take treats from most strangers.
the petsmart classes can be quite good, look for positive reinforcment, classes should be fun...
youll get out of them what you put in, so always be sure to "do your homework" lol.
classes are always worth it...good for dog and people soclization, mental and physical stimulation and gives the owner a clue on hwo to aproach training their dog, even if you only take a basic/puppy class, youll leave with alot more info you can modify and use to teach new things
I have never done a petsmart class but I agree look for positve reinforcment . I myself could easily train a dog without a class as I have trained many dogs but classes are fun and a great way to socialize a puppy and maybe make some friends with dogs the same age so you can have play dates with them. my dogs have always loved going to class as have I because of the fun we do have.
Chaos starts puppy class on Thursday and the woman teaching it is some one I know from agility as she and her late cattle dog and I and Jazz all joined the agility club on the same night. She owns several cattle dogs so I am looking forward to her class as her dogs are pretty amazing. Chaos and I worked on roll over today and I have to say I love that look of the light bulb coming on when they get what it is you want.
Thank you for all the advice. I'm going to check on the classes today!
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the 14.5 yrs I had her she never had another accident in the house! By the weeks end she knew her sits and downs and go to crate impressed all my friends as for some strange reason they thought puppies had to be older to train. 
. They also all learned that If I said "Dash rollover" that he was the only one that I expected to do so and the others sat and waited their turn. but If I just said roll over they all did so.dogs are amazing. When I walked Jazz and Dash I would toss in commands and yes they both were expected to listen and do what ever it kept their attention on me as they never knew when I might ask for something our walks were always a blast instead of the chore to be done.
