tsukitsune: yes, we went through the Kishu breeder in Texas. I was expecting to be on a waiting list, but she had a puppy still available from the very recent litter at that time.
Beautiful dog! She looks a bit longer and leaner and maybe a bit taller than say a Hokkaido. Please tells us more about her personality. How is training etc etc.?
I'm on Carleen's waiting list, hoping to get lucky with the July litter!
Please tell us about all about Kaia...Kishus are a bit less known on this forum, which is a shame considering they are kind of the "classic" ancient Japanese dog...hunting dog of Heian aristocracy and all that.
People on this forum will be very interested to hear stuff like:
1) How is she in the house...is she clean? quiet?
2) How is she on-leash?
3) How is she with people? Does she nip at people who visit because she is jealous? (Another Kishu on this forum does this).
4) How attentive / biddable is she...what has training her been like? What kind of training methods have you tried with her and how well did she respond to them (a German Kishu owner reports that negative reinforcement training seemed to break down the trust between him and his dog).
5) How clean is she? How quiet?
6) Has she ever climbed a tree?
7) How does her nihonken "independant hunter" character express itself?
1) How is she in the house...is she clean? quiet?
For the most part she is pretty quiet inside the house, she'll bark if she can't find either of us while she's inside. If she's sleeping in the living room and I get up and go in the office, when she wakes up she looks for me. In the backyard for the most part she's pretty quiet, except once in awhile she'll bark at the neighbors or if someone walks by the front of the house (she only started doing this a couple months ago) I think it was more of a learned behavior as the next door neighbor's dogs bark whenever anyone walks by and of course did so to us when we were out walking.
For the most part she's really clean, except for right after she is digging in the dirt/sand after the sprinklers have come on. But then about 20-30 minutes later she looks like she does in the picture that she is sleeping in, that's about how dirty she gets. Then later she'll clean herself more. Several times that I've taken her to the dog store people have asked me if she just got groomed, and she never has been to a groomer and I don't need to bath her often, she does get brushed often at the moment as she's been shedding more lately.
2) How is she on-leash?
It depends who's walking her, if I'm walking her she's pretty good at loose leash walking once we are outside of our neighborhood. Then for the most part she'll walk next to me, usually with her nose smelling every plant next to her. Sometimes, she does pull and tries to jump ahead of me, I normally just turn around and walk the other way. It normally works with her, although a few times then while we were walking she would try and walk in a circle after she pulled and then continue. If my partner is walking her, she seems to try to pull constantly, he has reverted to holding the leash behind him and not letting her walk in front of him. Which she then tries to go inbetween his legs, but by the middle of the walk she is walking loose leashed the rest of the way. I take her hiking with me know about once a week, while we're hiking she's always loose leashed and next to me or behind me. She will not go to the bathroom while she's on a walk. When we get back from a walk, she heads for the back yard to take care of business. Even on most of our hikes she will try to wait until we are home, or at least back to where the car is park.
3) How is she with people? Does she nip at people who visit because she is jealous? (Another Kishu on this forum does this).
She firmly believes that everytime the doorbell rings it's someone there to play with her. When we first got her she went and hid when someone came over. After having people coming over frequently, she was quickly over her fear of people. It turned into excitement, which is what we've been working on now. She's always licked a lot, and by a lot I mean almost obsessively.
4) How attentive / biddable is she...what has training her been like? What kind of training methods have you tried with her and how well did she respond to them (a German Kishu owner reports that negative reinforcement training seemed to break down the trust between him and his dog).
If she's inside she has to know where everyone in the house is, if I'm in my office and my partner is in the living room area she will lay by the kitchen, so she'll be able to see either of us get up or are leaving. Training while we are inside the house has always been great. She practically came house trained, from day one when let her out the back door when I got her home and gave her a treat for peeing outside, she went to the backdoor and stared out it whenever she had to go. She's never had an accident in her crate at night, for the most part all of her accidents were our fault for not noticing that she was at the backdoor, she didn't bark until she was about 7 months old to go out, even now she won't bark instead she'll tap on the sliding glass door.
I've only used positive reinforcement for her training and it has worked out very well. Within the first month we had her she knew sit, laydown, shake, "five", come(although she wouldn't while we were outside which is the most important to me), she had "stay" down about a month later (of course, all this was out the window at training class or if other dogs were around). Lately I've been working on bring which she has down, but occasionally she'll run out the backdoor with the newspaper instead of bringing it when told to. After any new commands I reward her with a small treat right away, for the ones that she's known I will still occasionally give her a treat but not always or that frequently. She seems to enjoy learning new things. I'm trying to figure out what else I can teach her, so very open to suggestions here on that. Or anything that can keep her busy while I'm working (I work from home, stuck on the computer and phone most of the day).
On our walks, however she was very stubborn and didn't care about any treat and she wouldn't sit, leave it, or really listen until the trainer (I took her a puppy training class mainly for socialization and to get her to come when called better) recommended I use cheese on our walks, which worked incredibly well. Although now if I get out cheese she's right next to me going through her tricks, first she sits, then lays down, then tries to shake, which I don't give in and give her cheese, she's very persistent though.
6) Has she ever climbed a tree?
She hasn't tried to climb a tree yet, we only have one in our backyard and it's still a little thin to try and climb, it is set on this little hill of rocks which she on top of constantly. She has no problems rock scrambling with me on hikes, I will normally make her go ahead of me with any rocks on the hike, and she's over them very quickly and without much effort.
7) How does her nihonken "independant hunter" character express itself?
She will chase almost any insect in the backyard, although with some effort she is leaving the bees alone now. Inside the house, if she has it in her head that she needs a specific toy she will start smelling and looking for it, until she finds it. If it's in her crate upstairs, she'll bark at the room door (we keep the bedroom doors closed, she really likes socks). She can be very willful at times, especially in the back yard, but we're both more stubborn than her. At anytime, she's very aware of what is going on around her, including the airplanes and helicopters that fly over head (we live in Las Vegas, and the military aircraft often times fly over the area we live in, even though they're pretty high up by the time they get out here, her head is up watching them go by), if a neighbor goes in there back yard, she'll give out a little "rough" once in awhile.
If she sees a bag of treats or something else she thinks she needs/wants (like a sock out of reach) she'll sit and stare at it for about 20 minutes followed then by a little whining. If it's a sock or something she knows she isn't suppose to have, she'll try to get it and if she does, she attempts to sneak outside with it. She'll come into my office and grab a piece of paper and then slowly backs out of the room (because I didn't see her or something) and then darts for the backdoor, which is now normally closed so someone has to open it for her. This is why I started teaching her "bring" which has been working great, even when she gets a shock outside if I go outside now and say bring, although she'll probably have to shake it around a little first she'll bring it over and drop it in front of me.
She's pretty stubborn, and enjoys ripping her bed apart, since I started just throwing the stuffing away now, she'll whine that her bed isn't as comfortable as it was before. Getting her to come inside was a challenge for awhile (I don't want her outside for too long in the summer here). She has chewed on a baseboard, for which I know she got scolded at for, followed by every baseboard in the house being sprayed with bittherapple (which if anyone has any suggestions for something else I'm open, I've tried yuck, cayenne pepper [which she seemed to like], even with the bitter apple she will come over and lick the couch occasionally).
This seems as good a thread as any to post this in: I have just mailed actual, real, deposit money to the Kishu breeder! Please keep your fingers crossed, I am hoping to have the dashing and steady male cousin of Kaia living at my home this fall! (Will be overjoyed for the goofy and spacey cousin of either sex though.)
Comments
I love Kishu ken!
Snf
Please tell us about all about Kaia...Kishus are a bit less known on this forum, which is a shame considering they are kind of the "classic" ancient Japanese dog...hunting dog of Heian aristocracy and all that.
People on this forum will be very interested to hear stuff like:
1) How is she in the house...is she clean? quiet?
2) How is she on-leash?
3) How is she with people? Does she nip at people who visit because she is jealous? (Another Kishu on this forum does this).
4) How attentive / biddable is she...what has training her been like? What kind of training methods have you tried with her and how well did she respond to them (a German Kishu owner reports that negative reinforcement training seemed to break down the trust between him and his dog).
5) How clean is she? How quiet?
6) Has she ever climbed a tree?
7) How does her nihonken "independant hunter" character express itself?
For the most part she is pretty quiet inside the house, she'll bark if she can't find either of us while she's inside. If she's sleeping in the living room and I get up and go in the office, when she wakes up she looks for me. In the backyard for the most part she's pretty quiet, except once in awhile she'll bark at the neighbors or if someone walks by the front of the house (she only started doing this a couple months ago) I think it was more of a learned behavior as the next door neighbor's dogs bark whenever anyone walks by and of course did so to us when we were out walking.
For the most part she's really clean, except for right after she is digging in the dirt/sand after the sprinklers have come on. But then about 20-30 minutes later she looks like she does in the picture that she is sleeping in, that's about how dirty she gets. Then later she'll clean herself more. Several times that I've taken her to the dog store people have asked me if she just got groomed, and she never has been to a groomer and I don't need to bath her often, she does get brushed often at the moment as she's been shedding more lately.
2) How is she on-leash?
It depends who's walking her, if I'm walking her she's pretty good at loose leash walking once we are outside of our neighborhood. Then for the most part she'll walk next to me, usually with her nose smelling every plant next to her. Sometimes, she does pull and tries to jump ahead of me, I normally just turn around and walk the other way. It normally works with her, although a few times then while we were walking she would try and walk in a circle after she pulled and then continue. If my partner is walking her, she seems to try to pull constantly, he has reverted to holding the leash behind him and not letting her walk in front of him. Which she then tries to go inbetween his legs, but by the middle of the walk she is walking loose leashed the rest of the way. I take her hiking with me know about once a week, while we're hiking she's always loose leashed and next to me or behind me. She will not go to the bathroom while she's on a walk. When we get back from a walk, she heads for the back yard to take care of business. Even on most of our hikes she will try to wait until we are home, or at least back to where the car is park.
3) How is she with people? Does she nip at people who visit because she is jealous? (Another Kishu on this forum does this).
She firmly believes that everytime the doorbell rings it's someone there to play with her. When we first got her she went and hid when someone came over. After having people coming over frequently, she was quickly over her fear of people. It turned into excitement, which is what we've been working on now. She's always licked a lot, and by a lot I mean almost obsessively.
4) How attentive / biddable is she...what has training her been like? What kind of training methods have you tried with her and how well did she respond to them (a German Kishu owner reports that negative reinforcement training seemed to break down the trust between him and his dog).
If she's inside she has to know where everyone in the house is, if I'm in my office and my partner is in the living room area she will lay by the kitchen, so she'll be able to see either of us get up or are leaving. Training while we are inside the house has always been great. She practically came house trained, from day one when let her out the back door when I got her home and gave her a treat for peeing outside, she went to the backdoor and stared out it whenever she had to go. She's never had an accident in her crate at night, for the most part all of her accidents were our fault for not noticing that she was at the backdoor, she didn't bark until she was about 7 months old to go out, even now she won't bark instead she'll tap on the sliding glass door.
I've only used positive reinforcement for her training and it has worked out very well. Within the first month we had her she knew sit, laydown, shake, "five", come(although she wouldn't while we were outside which is the most important to me), she had "stay" down about a month later (of course, all this was out the window at training class or if other dogs were around). Lately I've been working on bring which she has down, but occasionally she'll run out the backdoor with the newspaper instead of bringing it when told to. After any new commands I reward her with a small treat right away, for the ones that she's known I will still occasionally give her a treat but not always or that frequently. She seems to enjoy learning new things. I'm trying to figure out what else I can teach her, so very open to suggestions here on that. Or anything that can keep her busy while I'm working (I work from home, stuck on the computer and phone most of the day).
On our walks, however she was very stubborn and didn't care about any treat and she wouldn't sit, leave it, or really listen until the trainer (I took her a puppy training class mainly for socialization and to get her to come when called better) recommended I use cheese on our walks, which worked incredibly well. Although now if I get out cheese she's right next to me going through her tricks, first she sits, then lays down, then tries to shake, which I don't give in and give her cheese, she's very persistent though.
6) Has she ever climbed a tree?
She hasn't tried to climb a tree yet, we only have one in our backyard and it's still a little thin to try and climb, it is set on this little hill of rocks which she on top of constantly. She has no problems rock scrambling with me on hikes, I will normally make her go ahead of me with any rocks on the hike, and she's over them very quickly and without much effort.
7) How does her nihonken "independant hunter" character express itself?
She will chase almost any insect in the backyard, although with some effort she is leaving the bees alone now. Inside the house, if she has it in her head that she needs a specific toy she will start smelling and looking for it, until she finds it. If it's in her crate upstairs, she'll bark at the room door (we keep the bedroom doors closed, she really likes socks). She can be very willful at times, especially in the back yard, but we're both more stubborn than her. At anytime, she's very aware of what is going on around her, including the airplanes and helicopters that fly over head (we live in Las Vegas, and the military aircraft often times fly over the area we live in, even though they're pretty high up by the time they get out here, her head is up watching them go by), if a neighbor goes in there back yard, she'll give out a little "rough" once in awhile.
If she sees a bag of treats or something else she thinks she needs/wants (like a sock out of reach) she'll sit and stare at it for about 20 minutes followed then by a little whining. If it's a sock or something she knows she isn't suppose to have, she'll try to get it and if she does, she attempts to sneak outside with it. She'll come into my office and grab a piece of paper and then slowly backs out of the room (because I didn't see her or something) and then darts for the backdoor, which is now normally closed so someone has to open it for her. This is why I started teaching her "bring" which has been working great, even when she gets a shock outside if I go outside now and say bring, although she'll probably have to shake it around a little first she'll bring it over and drop it in front of me.
She's pretty stubborn, and enjoys ripping her bed apart, since I started just throwing the stuffing away now, she'll whine that her bed isn't as comfortable as it was before. Getting her to come inside was a challenge for awhile (I don't want her outside for too long in the summer here). She has chewed on a baseboard, for which I know she got scolded at for, followed by every baseboard in the house being sprayed with bittherapple (which if anyone has any suggestions for something else I'm open, I've tried yuck, cayenne pepper [which she seemed to like], even with the bitter apple she will come over and lick the couch occasionally).