Veronica Learning To Differentiate Speak From Growl.

JazzyandVeronica

Honored Member
We started working on this while V. was recovering from CCL surgery...since we really couldn't do anything that physical.

I had very grandiose ideas. She already knew speak, so I taught her a hand signal Then we worked on growl (which took longer than I anticipated) and I sort of taught her a hand signal. We haven't gotten to whine yet...I was hoping to put it all together in little skit where I would ask her questions and have her talk back...but it is proving to be harder than I thought!

Here is our speak vs. growl :cool: :

 

Gordykins

Experienced Member
Veronica is adorable. It looks like she's off to a really great start.

When we started fostering Breelan (we've since adopted her), we actually thought that somebody had "debarked" her, because sometimes, if she was very startled, she would open her mouth, and the only noise that would come out was a very quiet, rough sounding whisper of a bark. Then one day when I was trying to teach Gordy to shake (like when dogs shake water off-- that whole body shake), I said "shake!shake!shake!" since that seemed to be what was getting Gordy to learn to shake, and Breelan full out barked. So, we let that be her cue to speak, changed it to "speak!speak!speak!" then to just speak. Then we taught her to growl.

Rather than a hand signal, we started teaching her that scrunching our eyebrows is a cue for her to growl, and looking at her with our eyes really wide open and lips pursed is speak. And, now I take advantage of it, because if I want my boyfriend to get off the phone, I give her the "speak" face when he's not looking, and he will rush to get off the phone to see what "his little girl" wants. Shame on me! :p
 

freedomdreams

Well-Known Member
aw V's doing so great- I love the 'chin' cue, that's absolutely adorable. She definitely reminds me of my pit Aliza who is with my dad since i've moved the the city
 
Top