A few months back Tim from the south of England dropped us a line about his dog Kizzy after finding our site whilst looking for Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy weight/age information.
Tim has just sent in this lovely picture of 7 month old Kizzy whilst out walking in Marlow Park, by the Thames.
Tim’s email goes on to describe some of Kizzy’s behaviour. He’s borrowed a method from a Retriever owner (named Ben, that’s the Retriever, not the owner – it’s funny that we know most of the dog walkers that we meet by their dog’s name) whereby three pips on a whistle are used to recall Kizzy. This works most of the time apart when Kizzy sees another dog or something else worth stalking/chasing. This is exactly the same as Louis; trained to return when the situation warrants it (i.e. there’s a sausage reward) but he determines the “situation”. Louis returns immediately when you whistle him; however if you pop another dog, or a cat, or a biped, or a squirrel, or a few other distractions into the equation then it’s hopeless.
One more thing from Tim that reminds me of Louis is Kizzy’s reaction to storm rainwater in a river. Louis is fascinated, at distance, by the foam generated by heavy rainfall run-off into out local Labybrook. He jumps into the river to investigate the foam and tries to capture (by biting) any foam that passes by. Kizzy seems to have the same fascination.
Thanks, Tim, for the photo and the Kizzy anecdotes.