When Pigs Fly_ Training Success With Impossible Dogs - Jane Killion [84]
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I have seen herding breed dogs that will stay in a car, unattended, with all the windows open, and never dream of jumping out until given permission. Not only would I never leave my Bull Terriers in a car with the windows wide open, leaving them loose in the car at all is an assumption of risk. At all costs, I will crate my Bull Terriers when in the car. I know of one person who left her Bull Terrier loose in a car while she took a short run into the store. When she came back, the steering wheel was gone.
There are so many breeds that are relatively easy to keep. They obey commands because they are just waiting for you to give them direction: they don’t fight with each other, they are naturally calm around the house, and they get into bed with you and lie politely at your feet. They don’t scramble on top of you in the middle of the night, inflicting bruises and sprains in a desperate bid to get closer to you than the laws of physics will allow. They make you look really smart in front of other people because they fawn on your every move. They can be trusted off leash, they can be trained to fetch your slippers without eating a portion of them on the way. They don’t have to be watched like a hawk and kept under lock and key in order to keep them from hurting themselves or destroying the household, yard, or car. They are good dogs.
Most people are attracted to “good” dogs, but there are those of us who just can’t resist the dog who is always ready to cut a caper. Obedience in a dog holds little allure for me—I have so little obedience to authority myself, it would be bizarre if I sought it out in my dogs. A sense of humor and a flair for the ridiculous mean more to my day to day happiness than a dog who hangs on my wishes. One of my Bull Terriers once took off running through the yard with a six foot long log in her mouth. She charged towards a group of us and hooked the log behind our legs, knocking us one by one to the ground. We were unable to retreat to safety due to the fact that we were laughing so hard that we could barely move. Most people would not find this funny at all but my family still laughs about it twenty-five years later. I have a thirty-seven pound Bull Terrier who’s favorite activity in the world is lying on her back in someone’s, anyone’s, lap and making grunting noises while you stroke her belly and she licks your arm. That same dog’s second favorite activity is uprooting shrubs and small trees many times her size. If she can’t get her mouth around the trunk, she will jump up and grab a branch, hang with all four feet off the ground, and still find the wherewithal to tug at it until it comes down. I can relate to that dog.
Maybe people like us are a little crazy. We go out of our way to own a dog that demands a lot of time and effort to train. Couldn’t we still get a lot of satisfaction out of a dog that is a little bit easier to live with? Why bother owning and training a dog whose entire mission in life is to smell, uproot, or destroy conceivable object within his reach? Why not go for something a little more biddable?
To answer these questions, think about how you came to own your dog in the first place, and how you feel about him now. When you were mulling over different breeds or types of dog to own, there was that moment when you looked at a dog of your breed and you knew he was speaking to you. Whatever traits he displayed, they delighted you. You got goose bumps when you saw a sighthound unfold and run with a speed and grace you never thought possible. In that silent moment of beauty, you caught your