Whats New

Elsie is about 8 months and three weeks now. Her size and weight have definitely grow - she is now about 43 pounds - perhaps heavier then most 8 month old Border Collies, but she does have a little bit of Lab in her which might make a weight difference. She has gotten a more mature look and is really a very pretty dog.

Elsie can "criss-cross" (figure-eights through my legs), stick 'em up, shake both hands, sit, lie down, and a few other things. She actually is not very difficult to train, but I have to be patient, which I am not the best at. Heel is a sort of trial. She will come back to my side, and even sit at times. The trouble is getting her to stay there. Interestingly enough, while my Mom and I where trail running, she actually ran very well partially off leash (I let it drag behind her) and seemed, for a while, to do somewhat better.

I allowed her to sleep out of her kennel for a couple of nights (even made her a make-shift bed out of pillows, blanket and a towel.......). She did reasonably well.

I started brushing her teeth about once every day or so to keep them in better condition.

Elsie is good friends with my Dad, and loves to get his attention. I think, though, for the most part, that she does better with girls (if they are outside of the family).

One of the issues I need to address is come. She will come most of the time I call her. I reward her almost every time for coming to me when I call into the house. Elsie is doing reasonably well at coming from things that make her bark... sometimes I actually have to go get her.... but a lot of the time she will come to me.

I like to read a watch videos about other Border Collies who are exceptional and can do tricks well. One of my "inspirational" dogs is a dog named Dazzle - who can stand on her head, back up stairs, blows bubbles, (just to name a few) and all sorts of other things. Another dog that got me really interested, was a female purebred named Paige. Paige also did all kinds of cool tricks. Probably the first dog that really got me interested was Star. The first video I saw of her was when she was just a pup --- 3-4 months old. She could bring back toys by name, put herself to bed (open and close her kennel), and bring in the newspaper. That is how I would, LORD willing, like to train Elsie...... we have a ways!

Just a little update on Elsie! Have a GREAT week!

~Western Belle

"Squirrel!"

All our dogs love to chase after squirrels. So one (I think it is the same one) that was in our backyard recently, became subject to much interest. Skia and Elsie were both highly interested in the squirrel.

Skia must have caught a sound or glimpse of the squirrel here.

Elsie barking at/about the squirrel.

The whole group! Skia, Poimein, and Elsie.

Skia and Elsie sight or hear the squirrel. I love this one. Skia is so pretty here.

Click to view more photos of Elsie and her antics>>

Vacation with Elsie- and Other Things

So, excitingly, we got to take Elsie with us this year on vacation!

What's been going on!:

To start with, she is an amazing traveler. She sleeps most of the time in the car. She will eat and drink in the car... Elsie is also fine going about 4-5 hours without an outside break! She does excellent in the car. A few time she got upset with my little brother which she sometimes does (something we need to work on).

On our first night out, we stayed at an inn, Elsie slept in the hotel with us. She did very well. We have a small brown traveling crate that Dad bought me on my sister's wedding day. It is a little small but it works alright for a little while. She got some new experiences there too. I have to say, she seemed pretty comfortable just about anywhere (besides one place). Elsie is very good about settling here and there were ever we are.

The second night we stayed at some old friends' house. Here is were I learned that too much Salmon can be bad for dogs. These people knew of a couple dogs that got into salmon and died. Elsie slept out of the kennel that night due to the fact she wasn't settling down very well in a smallish blue crate the people possessed. She was very good outside of a few time she started woofing. That day we took her to my Grandpa's house. I allowed her to run free a little bit there, as there was 15 acres of fenced in property. She didn't like it very much when I decided to jump on the trampoline.

Next day we went of to my sister's house - a couple of hours away. She was so thrilled to see her! She must have remembered Lisa. The first night there she slept in her crate again. She is now basically entirely kennel trained. She doesn't always enjoying being placed in the brown crate, but she will got "Nite, nite" when told in the night time to her home crate. I had to take her out on a leash there as the fence wasn't fully around the property - the house was in the city. I found out that she can climb up partial rock walls if she wants to (if situated correctly). I didn't do a lot of training with her there. My dad (with the assistance of my older brother) helped fix up the house. My brothers helped fix up the yard. I allowed Elsie to wander around a little bit. I tried a little bit of "ignore the neighbor dogs" with her, as a little Chihuahua dog and another dog were hanging around.

On Wednesday we went and saw lighthouses and a smaller beach. Elsie is very interesting. Sometimes she hates the water and other times she doesn't mind it very much. The first little beach we went to was a pleasant, warm little beach. I let her run loose till other people came along. She can be quite a handful to capture. At this beach she enjoyed the water (or seemed to). That night we went to a real, big beach. It was cooler there and the waves were a lot more rough. Elsie decided she didn't care to go in. Even though I tried to get her to many times.

Thursday: We went to a Coast Guard picnic. She some dogs and kids there. She actually did reasonably well. She barked one or twice. I had to keep her under hand due to kids. She, for some reason, has an issue with younger kids. I am trying to get her over it. She did very well though. She was very interested in the CG helicopter at first. That afternoon we went to the beach again. This time she seemed to like it a little more. My older brother and her chased after seagulls while I played in the waves with my little brother. :)

On Friday we left my sister's house. We arrived in the evening to some old friends' house. Here is were Elsie seemed to feel rather uncomfortable. To start with, they had a wriggly, cute Golden puppy. Rather like Elsie. Daisy rather bothered Elsie for some reason. Simba, the adult male dog, wasn't Elsie's fav. either. She did get used to him eventually. But she never really liked Daisy. Along with that there were three little kids under the age of 7. Though they did not provoke her or anything, I think that might have added to Elsie's agitation. She was also tied up to a stake and left alone for a little while, which might not have helped either. However, she did reasonably well. Tolerating the minor attention from the younger kids, and doing well with the older kids. I also have noticed that she doesn't really like the higher brands of food like Purina or Beneful. She seems to prefer Member's Mark or Ol' Roy dog food.

Saturday she spent a lot of time with my dad while I did different things - including riding horseback and later in the evening, water rafting. 7 of us kids rode home from water rafting in the back of a trailer and Elsie came with us. We left that evening and went to the first house again were I allowed Elsie to stay out of her kennel again.

On Sunday she was very good as we traveled for 12-13 hours back to the hotel again. Mom, Dad, and I thought she would do alright loose that night - she ended up being over happy at about 1:5o AM so she was stuck in the kennel.

On Monday we went home and she did well. She must now be pleased to not always have her schedule changing! :)

Yesterday I gave her a bath. I gave her a bath the Friday before we left, but she had been at the beach and all so I gave her another one. She still does not like them (as well as getting brushed). But she behaves well enough.

As far as training goes:

I am trying to re-enforce "heel". She will come back to me (most of the time)... but then walks ahead a lot of the time. She has been doing pretty good the last two nights Mom and I have gone walking. Elsie also needs to learn to walk with other people. It is almost as if she wants to walk with anyone who is not holding the leash. Yesterday night I allowed a younger girl to pet her. I turned her kind of back wards. Instead of allowing the girl to pet her head, it seems to work better to have Elsie be petted on the back.

Anyways, Elsie is doing well. I am planning on taking her in sometime to get her spayed soon!

~Western Belle

Home Made Dog Treats! :)

Homemade Dog Treats~

Pre-heat oven to 300 degrees F. Bake for 1 1/2 to 1 hr. 45 minutes in the oven.

Let cool after done.

2 Cup of Bullion

1 C Corn

1 C Wheat Germ

1 C Cheese

1/2 Butter

1 Egg

1 C Powdered Milk

2-3 Cups of white flower.

How To:

Heat bullion almost to boil. Add butter. Temper egg and mix well. Add wheat/ corn meal. Add cheese and milk. Add wheat 1 cup at a time and till non sticky.

Roll out with rolling pin and cut into varied shaped.

Uses: As treats and sometimes teeth cleaners (or so I have heard).

~Western Belle

SLIDING!

Elsie and I went to the park with my brothers and parents! It was pretty good. Elsie went down on of the slides several times! She also did long distance comes! She is soo fast! It was really great for her to have good new experience at the park. She did very well. And there were some distractions.


A video my older brother took of me and Elsie sliding!

Photo Shoot and an Update :)

Yesterday I took Elsie for a 2 mile walk run... and I have to admit I was a little irritated. I need to not loss my patients with Elsie. After all she is only 6 months old (almost) which is kind of weird. She is so tiny for being almost half a year old. I also took a bunch of photos of Elsie yesterday. They are all on our front lawn or porch.

Heel:

I still have to work on heel with Elsie to a certain extent. A lot of the time she is a very good dog and walks on a loose leash. If she pulls ahead, she will normally come back to me to a certain extent if she walks past me and I stop. She needs a little work with heel when walking past a dog. Next door there is a dog named Jack. She often has a little fit about trying to reach him and will bark and pull on the leash. Why? I am not sure. Shereally has had not bad experiences with dogs. Poimein, Skia, and her do not have huge issues with each other. With Bijou, a poodle, is just her play mate and she has not problem with her. It is almost like when she is on a leash and out of the house, she goes crazy. She is often the same with people. In the house she often befriends people a lot easier, where out on a walk she will almost refuse to keep walking.

I am also teaching her to stay on the deck while I work out front. She does it very well sometimes.

She did very, very well with 200 plus people at a CAP event last Saturday. She heeled extraordinarily well that day.

She also has been staying in the car sometimes while I shop or explore areas. She has decided not to like going in the brown kennel ( her new and smaller one).

Elsie's Photo shoot:

~Western Belle

"HEEL!" With a harness

I do not own this photo.

Elsie and I have been having training sessions with heel. For the first part, I bought her a pink medium sized harness. I tried on one in the PetSmart to make sure it worked and all. The harness has helped a lot with training Elsie to heel.

What I needed was some diligence, a harness, and a semi long walk.

First off, the halter had some major benefits. Unlike the collar, which makes Elsie choke if she pulls to much and if I pulled her back, the harness enables me to make her come back to me. Along with that, the harness is cute and all :). She doesn't seem bothered by the harness at all. She slipped out of it on Wednesday night, trying to get to me while Mom held her leash... but it hasn't had many problems.

Heel!:

Mom and I went for a walk on Thursday night. I had Elsie in her new harness and I had seen some ways to make her heel. One of these was to stop as soon as the loose lead tightens. I would sometimes pull her back, and the harness was handy for this. (I also used the clicker part of the time). I WAS SOOOOO PLEASED! By the end of the night, Elsie was doing so WELL!!!! What a pleasure!

On Friday night, we walked again... Elsie will actually turn around and come back to my side now!!!!! It is so much more pleasant to walk with her not pulling.

How to:

Almost every time Elsie would get ahead of me, I would stop, pull her back to my side (or you can wait till the dog comes back to your side, if it will.) Never move up to the dog. On Friday night, for the most part, I could tap at my side and say "Heel" to make her come back. I would sometimes I would give her a "click" and a hotdog. I also would reward her every now and then as she stayed on my left side. I am teaching her to do the traditional, I suppose, heel, on the left side.

~Western Belle