What a (not-so-good) difference it made to skip school last night! On previous nights, Tatsuya accompanied me to classes and worked his little heart out until he just crashed--and then he slept peacefully through the night.
Last night, my cold finally knocked me off my feet, and since it was Shannon's night to teach, we all stayed home instead of going to puppy class--and I paid the price. Tatsuya was a little naughty during his evening "puppy crazy" time (9:00 pm) and tested limits more than usual (thankfully, his "naughty" is nothing compared to Toffee's at this age!). At 2:00 am, he woke me up for the first mid-night potty break in days.
My lesson learned? YES! As Brian Kilcommons says, a tired dog is a good dog! I'll be more careful with timing and duration of Tatsuya's activity level in future, regardless of my own energy level!
Good Owners, Great Dogs by Brian Kilcommons was one of my first dog training reads while I was in Japan with Toffee the Terror as a puppy. (People who see the sweet, mellow girl that Toffee is now can hardly believe the stories of her youth.) I learned a lot from that book, although it recommended more aversive dog training techniques than I'd employ today. Perhaps there's a revised edition that's more up to date with modern positive reinforcement based training techniques? He was still recommending use of the "Woodhouse" collar (a type of correction collar--a choke chain with large links) when Toffee was a pup. Such methods simply weren't a good match for Toffee! With Toffee, it was trial by fire--and without her, I'd have had no reason to become the dog trainer that I am.
These days, it's Patricia McConnell I turn to for dog training inspiration. Check out her book, The Other End of the Leash, to see why she's who I'd like to be when I grow up. :)
For more suggestions, visit my reading list in the resources section at http://en.betteyip.com/cgi-bin/c/recommendedreading.pl .
