Monica Kochelee

In an earlier post, you might have seen two pictures of my little white doggie, PITA.  He came to live with us a year ago.  He was a stray, wandered into our yard on the coldest day of the year.  He was so small; I thought he was a puppy.  I took pity on the little guy and decided to let him in the house so I could call his owners to come get him.  Long story short, he had no identification on him.  I called all the neighbors, the local animal shelters, the area vets, the police, all the local breeders, and the newspapers.  No one ever claimed him, and so he became a member of our family.

When he came to us, he was not housebroken or obedience trained in any way.  That’s one reason I thought he was a puppy.  Turns out that he was NOT a puppy, he had all his adult teeth!  But, apparently he was kenneled outdoors with other dogs, and never trained.  We found out that he was deaf and partially blind!

That made training the little guy very challenging, since he can’t hear, and can barely see!

So far, we have made great progress in the housebreaking department, and have trained him with hand signals (and treats!) to walk with a leash, come, sit, shake hands (paws) and lie down.  We are working on the fetch, but he only will do it as long as he is interested in playing tug of war with us when he brings the toy back to us.  I’d like to train him to do more tricks, but he is resisting the roll over training.