Tag Archives: Puppies

Doing right by the dog

Breeding is one of the few areas where people make far-reaching decisions on behalf of a future life that cannot consent. “Ethical breeding” and “responsible breeding” are familiar phrases, but they can hide very different standards in practice. I find it more useful to treat breeding as a set of decisions with long tails, whereContinueContinue reading “Doing right by the dog”

Thoughts and tips on puppy exercise + book recommendation

I recently started re-reading a book I bought a while ago called “How to Build a Puppy” and stumbled on some interesting stuff, so I posted about it on our kennel’s Instagram account and thought it would be useful to share on the blog too. Since I only thought of sharing it here afterwards, here’sContinueContinue reading “Thoughts and tips on puppy exercise + book recommendation”

Puppy training 101: disengaging from humans

For one reason or another, Astra has found humans mesmerising for a long time – not just hypergreeting in close proximity like Nell, but intentionally seeking them out, as you can see here. I’ve been working on this consistently on every walk, and to be honest, it’s quite frustrating for me after living with Grace,ContinueContinue reading “Puppy training 101: disengaging from humans”

Building curiosity and confidence in search

I’m quite opportunistic when it comes to training. What I mean is that I try to look at the environment on walks through the dog’s eyes and take training opportunities as and when I see them. In this case, our local forest is full of branches fallen after the big storm a few weeks ago,ContinueContinue reading “Building curiosity and confidence in search”

Disengaging from distractions

Disengaging from distractions is perhaps THE most important life skill for a puppy, and the sooner they learn, the better. Of course, their brains are not yet capable of a lot of things – impulse control being one of them, because the parts of the brain that control activation develop faster than the parts thatContinueContinue reading “Disengaging from distractions”

First days with the A-team

It’s taken me a few days to edit this, but here’s a snapshot of our Saturday night. It was quite nerve-wracking to be a part of the whelping process, and you feel a little bit helpless because the mother dog needs to do most of the work. Grace did well though, and we just hadContinueContinue reading “First days with the A-team”

Introducing… Zeta Centauri Litter A!

I know there will be people waiting for the news… we are now in charge of these little hamsters! Everyone is feeling well, Lady Grace included – although she is exhausted, of course. Several have already attempted “prison break” from the nest even though they are less than a day old, so I think we’llContinueContinue reading “Introducing… Zeta Centauri Litter A!”

We have news!

Sometime in the next week, we will welcome the first “constellation” of puppies of Kennel de Zeta Centauri into the world! I’ve been very disorganised getting everything done for this formal announcement, but I wanted to wait until we have the logo and my procrastination led to more delays. We are expecting 4 or moreContinueContinue reading “We have news!”