Adler's New Tricks

Since we were on vacation for a week, we thought we'd teach Adler some new tricks. She's a quick learner and halfway through the week she caught on to her new tricks and was doing them automatically - well maybe not the first trick, but surely the second.

First Trick: We asked our friend, Perry, to teach her how to bark on command. Adler isn't much of a barker which is good considering we live in a condo building and I'm not sure our neighbors would like it if she was. But, we wanted hear her deep, scary bark occasionally to make sure she hadn't lost the use of her vocal cords. Anyway, according to Perry the trick for making her bark has to do with eye contact and of course her understanding the command "speak." She mastered this in about four days although you can tell she doesn't like to do it. Now, she's given in to first trying to appease us with a small bark that sounds more like a rush of air coming from her mouth before bellowing out her deep throaty bark that is sure to scare away a few prowlers.

Second Trick: This is one that Tom and I had taught her when she was just a little puppy and at that time she did it pretty well, however, since we hadn't practiced it in the last year and because she had grown considerably bigger, she wasn't sure what "rollover" meant or even how to get her big body going in one direction. Now, with just a treat in my hand, I can say, "Adler, sit!". She then proceeds to sit, lay down and then automatically roll over - all 80 pounds of her - this all without so much as the "rollover" command. Perhaps we practiced that one a bit too much!