About a month ago, Miss Possible and I started taking Bogart to Puppy Kindergarten at a place in San Jose. After attending the first class, we found out that Bogart has some SERIOUS shyness issues and we needed to take him to puppy playgroups in order to get him used to playing with other dogs.
As it happens, there are two in our area — one on Friday nights and on on Sunday mornings — that ties in well with our Saturday morning Kindergarten class. This has become our weekends.
The best thing about the classes are the other dogs.. We know all the other owners, and they know us. Well, let me clarify. We know all the other dogs (and thus their owners) and they know Bogart (and thus us). Nobody knows anyone’s first name. Everyone knows the puppy’s name and then becomes associated with it.
For instance, there’s Beau, the Rambunctious Pug; Annie Oakley, the Loveable Puggle; Morty, the ‘Horny’ Bichon (and I say that in the most playful way); Poncho, the Loud Dachsund; Bonnie, The Playful Black Lab.. and that’s just the start.
Every week, we all head off to class — explaining to Bogart that he’s going to see all his friends (and often list them off), but he has no interest in playing once he gets there. He’s definitely making progress, but it’s been a very slow process.
There’s always next week, we say.. maybe Sadie will be at class and Bogart will play with her. Maybe Bogart’ll finally roughhouse with Tinkerbell. These are our friends — puppies. We know nothing of the owners — except a face. It’s kinda funny, when you think about it.
Tags: Puppies, Training, Obeidience Class
My Grandpuppy is NOT shy…he is just selective about who he plays with! By the way, the new pictures of Bogart are wonderful…especially with Octo-Puss!
LTJ left out the part where Bogart was actually playing with dogs at the Sunday Los Gatos puppy playgroup. Granted his version of playing involves frenetically barking at the other puppy and then running around, but hey it’s better than him hiding in the corner. Also, it took him almost the full hour before he got to this point, but he has come leaps and bounds from his first day that we took him. He is actually going up to other dogs and sniffing them which is huge considering he used to just hide behind people’s legs the whole time.