We all know how quickly babies grow up, but at least with human babies you get a little longer to savour the sweet moments of their little-ness! Puppies on the other hand grow like weeds and it dosn't take long before they loose their cute puppy look.
Of course if they are anything like our two little monsters, they are not always cute an adorable and its right about now (4-6 months of age) when you start wishing they would hurry up and outgrow their puppy naughtiness. Like putting a hole in your leather boots. Or chewing the legs of schleich toys that were left laying around. Not to mention the selective deafness when you are trying to rescue yet another shoe/toy/remote control from the puppy jaws of death.
Has anyone else worked out that baby animals, especially puppies, are cute for a reason? That reason is so you melt when those big brown eyes look up at you instead of getting angry because they have emptied the garbage bin (again) and have just stolen and eaten a box of biscuits for the third time this week.
Lucky for these two, I can see glimpses of the incredible adult dogs that they will grow into. Freckles and Ryley (while most definitely being double trouble) are also the most mature and intelligent pups that I have ever had (after having a few working dogs over the years, that is really saying something!).
As i've mentioned before, these pups are from very strong working lines, but also from succesful trialling parents - which in theory should make them excellent working dogs that are also very biddable. Both pups were switched on to sheep (unexpectedly and very unusually) at about five weeks of age. The first week after we bought them home, I was extremely worried that we were going to end up with at least one chicken killer. Our chickens live in a dog proof enclosure, but every now and then a wayward chicken escapes, much to the puppies delight (Ryley especially). After rounding up the wayward chicken, Ryley would grab hold of it, very gently, but these things have a way of not ending well for the chicken. A week and some gentle discipline later, Ryley worked out that mouthing chickens makes mum very unhappy but splatting the chicken to the ground with both front paws might be a better option (in his mind not the chickens).
All I can say is that its lucky puppies are so cute.
No chickens were hurt thankfully (they didn't learn to stay in their safe enclosure either) and we have now progressed onto the next stage of training where Ryley is helping me move the Dexter calf to and from his yard for the night (he is seperated so that I can milk Charlotte in the morning). Absolutely nothing phases this boy, he is one tuff little cookie who is definitely going to give our dorper sheep a run for their money.
Shoot me an email if you would like to book a pet portait photography session for your fast growing pup or other pet.
