Quote:
Originally Posted by Paul
Pretty pup! How good is she about "listening" to you? Folks had a gorgeous malamute when I was a kid. Nice dog with fantastic color/pattern BUT very "selective" hearing. 
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LOL Yeah, I know all about the Sibe/Mal tendency to look at you like, "really?" I read the following somewhere: "Other dogs look at you waiting to be told what to do. Siberians [and Malamutes too] look at you and think, 'how does that fit in my plans?'" It's so true!
Remember that sled dogs were bred to be independent thinkers, problem solvers and decision makers. They have to analyze conditions and make decisions in harness to keep themselves, the team and the driver safe--even when the driver tells them to do something otherwise!
Additionally, sled dog breeds are very much pack animals that follow the "lead" dog. If the dog doesn't see the human as the "lead dog," or at least above the dog in the canine social structure, the dog doesn't put a lot of weight on what the human wants him to do.
I had houseguests for three weeks over the holidays. Sarah loves everyone but she won't obey a guest's command until she is shown that the guest is, in fact, above her in the social hierarchy. She obeys me, my hubby and my teenage son with no question. Everyone else? Not so much at first. It isn't hard to demonstrate that a guest is also to be obeyed but she hasn't yet decided that
all guests are to be obeyed. I'm not sure she ever will.
Sarah is VERY obedient for a Siberian. She knows both hand and voice commands for sit, down, stay (both sit/stay and down/stay), come and others. The one basic command I haven't tried to train is heel--she's a sled dog, she's hard wired to be out in front of me! She does NOT pull on the leash, however. My body can't take that and I started training that literally day one.
I've had lots of people, particularly vets and vets' staff, tell me that she's insanely well behaved for a Sibe. I attribute that to two things: we've had her since she was 9 weeks old so she didn't have a chance to develop bad behaviors, and I've spent every waking minute of every day since training her. I've used the approach that training is occurring at all times and I want to
always be the trainer, not the trainee! Training a dog doesn't happen one hour a day three days a week. Every time I'm with my dog (which is pretty much all day, every day--she's an indoor dog and I'm home all the time) I'm teaching her how to live peacefully and happily in our family. Otherwise she's going to do what comes naturally to her, which may not contribute to happiness or peacefulness.
Sheesh, I can go on and on about her and the breed! Sorry. Anyway, thanks for the compliment!
---------- Post added at 09:59 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:54 AM ----------
Quote:
Originally Posted by flhiker
She's beautiful. congrats on the Magazine article It makes me miss my Shepard/husky Max. He had those Ice blue eyes and we had 15 1/2 great years together. .
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Thank you! She isn't breed standard in several ways but she's the light of my life.
You had a mix with blue eyes? That's pretty rare! Blue eyed dogs are so expressive, aren't they? Sarah communicates a lot by expression.
15.5 years is too short with a dog, isn't it? I'm so sorry you lost him. My dad is going to have to put his pet down soon (old age) and while we were talking about it, I was so glad Sarah is young. I'll have to make that decision someday but God willing it will be many years from now.
---------- Post added at 10:00 AM ---------- Previous post was at 09:59 AM ----------
Quote:
Originally Posted by bballr4567
HA! That is funny!
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You should've seen the bathtub after an hour scrubbing the mud out of her coat--what a mess! Glad you enjoyed it.
Introducing Sarah the Siberian
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