26 April 2021

Guest author: Chewie (aged 4)

Some of us have really easy to train humans, and you may say it’s because we got lucky. But the reality, in all our lives, there is are relationships that can only be effective with intensive and considered training methods.

You set the tone of the relationship with your human in the first days. Your human will have preconceived ideas about how the relationship will work, and now is the time to make sure you sort these out.

Now is the time to begin letting your human know who is in charge. Regular small treats should be dispensed with some hint of affection, when your human does something right. Your human will not understand that these treats you offer are a training tool, and will mutter about carpet shampooers and puppy training mats, but you should persevere. As your human becomes better trained you do not need to offer these treats as often, although as with all training, sometimes a follow-up may be necessary.

Food is an area where your human will need assistance. They will not understands your highly sensitive digestive system at first, and will try to offer you prepackaged generic food supposedly loved by your friends. They will learn eventually that all food in the house is to be shared, with preference towards steak, salmon and takeaway chicken. It may be necessary, if they persist in offering you the generic stuff, to leave them evidence of your disturbed digestive system following such a meal. I’d suggest their bed, or under their computer desk, to be the best place to leave this evidence.

You must keep an eye on your human at all times. They will wander off if not supervised. And quite frankly, in those early days, they could get up to all sorts of destruction of your personal property around the house, unless you follow them constantly. A working distance of one metre is sufficient to make sure they know that you are watching.

As the relationship progresses, your human can be trusted to spend some time away from you, but again this must be closely monitored. A certain amount of time is acceptable, but if they breach curfew then of course, the only way to get your message across about effective time keeping, is to destroy a pair of shoes, for instance, to inhibit future lengthy absences outdoors.

Your human has unusual sleeping habits, which you will have to decide whether to accept, or alter. They will try to sleep for a long period of time when it is dark, the time when obviously it is most dangerous. You can take over the security role in the house, if you can’t be bothered training them in a more appropriate sleep routine. There may be noises that you will need to alert them to during the dark hours. But be aware, they often get angry about this attempted adjustment to their sleeping routine. Some times, however, they realise the role you play is invaluable, and give you access to the outside of the house to increase the security range.

Your human needs exercising, if you want them to live a long healthy life. You will need to get them outside the house at least twice a day, preferably more. You can extend the amount of time they spend breathing in all the fresh air, by pretending to sniff the wee of other dogs. As if. Have you smelt that stuff? It stinks! But humans accept this as a realistic reason for making the walk around the block take a bit longer.

Your human needs socialising, if they are going to be nice creatures that don’t scare other humans. You will need to stop whenever you meet another dog exercising their human, to give the humans a chance to practise communication. You can, again, extend the length of this interaction, by pretending with the other dog that you have great interest in each other’s bums. As if.

If you follow these training tips, I’m sure you will eventually have a human that you are happy to keep company with.

In future blogs I aim to write about training your human in hardware store visits, and how to travel with a human.

Keep up the good work, my friends. But remember that a human is a long term project, and can’t just be dumped at a rescue centre if they can’t be controlled. Put the effort in now, and you will have a friend for life.

Even if they are a bit smelly.