Talulah's Torment

Parents invest a huge amount of love, patience, time and energy into their children, nurturing them through their infancy, toddler and pre-teen years, only to be rewarded with the brattish and obnoxious behaviour that all too frequently comes with adolescence.  Poor Talulah was so patient with River when she was a puppy - taking on the role of foster mum, sharing her toys, allowing her to pull her about and stand on her, protecting her from real and imagined dangers - and now all that love and care is being rewarded with incessant torment.

My sweet little puppy has become a bully.  And I take responsibility for some of this as I should have stepped in a lot earlier.  I kept thinking that the puppy licence would run out and Talulah would finally snap and tell her off.  I waited, and waited.....and waited.  But I underestimated the level of patience that Talulah has and just how sweet and gentle her nature is - I also underestimated the force of River's personality!

From gentle tug play, teeth jousting and rolling around I now hear Talulah whimper and squeal when River makes contact and isn't careful how much of her weight she throws around.  In true bully style River picks on someone smaller, and someone who won't stand up to her.  I have been willing Talulah to fight back, but I know now that she won't do it and I feel very guilty for not acting sooner.

Talulah just rolls over and allows River to abuse her!

And when River needs a rest, she just sits on her victim

Despite the torment she suffers, when Tussock deals out some of the same treatment, Talulah is always there to make sure her "baby" doesn't get hurt.

Interestingly though, when it comes to food, Talulah holds her own.  I have seen River dash in and steal something from under Tussock's nose - and get away with it!  But she won't go near Talulah.  When it comes to her food, Talulah can turn into a snarling demon looking twice her size with all hackles up.

Now that I have stepped in to temper some of this thuggish behaviour, I am seeing other facets to River's personality - and she is far more complex than first meets the eye.  She comes across as a Devil May Care But I Don't kind of personality, but she actually is very keen to please and loves to get things right.

When we go through a gate, Talulah is very reluctant to go through as that is when River runs at her and rags her neck or legs.  I put River on a lead at this stage and walk a distance with her whilst she calms down - by this time Tussock is raring to go which takes a lot of pressure off Talulah.  However, further into the walk, the delinquent behaviour builds up, so she goes on the lead again and we do a short training session of heelwork, sitting, down, giving paws - with lots of treats for good behaviour.  It seems that she now seems to recognise there is more reward for coming to me than in beating up Talulah.  We haven't stopped it yet, but we are making progress.  She even seems to recognise when she is getting out of control.  Well, I like to think that, but it is probably my lifted finger and narrowed eyes that is the cue!  Whatever it is, River's brains are starting to match up to the brawn - she is thinking.  So I had better start thinking twice as quickly!

But they are also drinking and dunking buddies.

A couple of people commented on how dogs do feel and show grief, and when we lost Sisko, it was actually Talulah that demonstrated it the most.  This surprised me as she was the one who would curl her lip up at Sisko if he got in her space, and didn't really have that much to do with him.  But after his death, she showed some marked changes of behaviour for a period of time.  The most noticeable was a bed time.  For long enough, her routine at night, when the rest of us go upstairs, is to stay downstairs and have a couple of hours of solitude in the sitting room - I often use this time to go back down and give her a special cuddle.  But when Sisko died - she came up with the rest of us, and even elected to sleep on Sisko's bed a few times, something she had never done before.  She has always slept on my bed from being eight weeks old.  This new routine lasted about two weeks - and then back to normal.  They know, and they feel.



Sometimes River is a bit more loving.....
 

And just for fun......

Hunting for Mice

 

Caught One!