Big man retrieving

Eighteen-week-old Kaline.

We had a pretty low-key day; I noted in photographic and numeric form just how big Kaline is getting (!!); and I am newly reassured that Kaline will be able to learn a directed retrieve. I worry about these things.

I'm going through what I term a "funk," sort of a really unfortunate combo of fibro fatigue symptoms and depression symptoms. So basically other than the pack walks all I wanted to do today, and all I did, was lie around. Amazingly, Kaline was happy to oblige. Who is this puppy and what did he do with my actual puppy?

I had Juno and Kaline out for a walk in the park in the evening, and we worked on double-dog training. I used to work Juno and her boyfriend Ellis in a brace, and I have this pipe dream of working her and Kaline the same way. We were doing double-dog remote sits and downs, and I had the bright idea of doing a stand as well. Here is the pic—when you see Kaline next to Juno you can really tell how much he's grown!

Only 5 inches shorter than Big Sister.

Then tonight, Kaline was having a grand time fetching his blue squeaky bone. It was a really good fetch night; I hardly had to move. He'd go get his bone, prance around with it, then come nudge my leg like, "Okay, you can throw this again for me now." He's getting pretty nice with his "out" command, letting go of his prize pretty readily. Anyway, he was so amped about the bone that I decided to have an impromptu directed retrieve session.

Our first one, if you don't remember, went pretty crappily, with him becoming less and less interested in even so much as looking at the object (a bandanna) we were working with. But after comparing his retrieving drive to other pups in the last week, I figured we could try again.

First, I dropped the bone instead of throwing it. Kaline was on it. He was just as excited to get it when I dropped it as when I threw it. We did that a few times, and then I decided to up it a little. I took the bone, put Kaline in a sit-stay, then placed the bone on the floor. I stood up and backed away, and only then gave him the enthusiastic cue, "Get it!" For now the word(s) don't really matter, it's more about the tone and body language. And despite the fact that the bone wasn't flying and hadn't been recently flying, Kaline jumped on it and fetched it up with great glee! I was full of glee myself. I know I shouldn't have worried in the first place, but hey, that's what I do.

Yay, I am full of YAY. Good little Doberman Retriever.

Also, Kaline weighs 38 pounds now (we weighed him tonight, thanks Dad). Thanks to Dad, I have also been enlightened that 16 weeks does not actually count as four months. So technically, Kaline is more "on track" with his weight than I thought! Technically, he just turned four months old four days ago, and he is nearly forty pounds, right where he's supposed to be.

More yay.