Well he's definitely handsome enough to bring in the bids.......if the auction starts up now I'll start the bidding at 50.00. He's a jewel!

Haha Saffron, $50.00 to start.. not bad Keep in mind he will mature to be the best counter surfer you've ever seen, I expect him to get at least 29" at the shoulder, likely 30, I hope no more than that and with his long neck when he stands with his head up he can already rest his chin on the counter.

So is this a 1 day or 4 day auction?

One day definitely......and it looks like I won!!! YeeHaw! We have a counter surfer in the house already and so have learned to keep food out of reach......I bet he figures out how to open the fridge one of these days though.
I don't suppose your brother will care much for this auctioning off of his best pal......drat again!

Update!

Here is Duke at almost 13 months, working on some OB with distraction in the Park. First time we had skateboards around, this was my intro to distraction in a new environment, trying my best to keep distractions to 15 yards didn't always work. He'd never been to this park before, the photographer thought it would provide a more appealing background for pics (rolleyes)

Focused heeling:

I'm talking to the photographer trying to explain what I'm doing while looking at Duke. Which is kind of cheating because I'm talking but I had no idea he was taking pictures yet I was telling him I want pics of him looking at me just like this while I'm walking becaused its called focused heeling yada yada. He wants to learn more about dogs.


EARS!

Sometimes they both come up! If I had taped his ears as a youngun they would be standing but my brother prefers the wacky ears. Says its more fun to not know what his ears will look like in the mornings.

It was windy as heck yesterday so the longline was whipping all over the place, as was my hair, and the darn leather.

Reward for long down (60 seconds, we are working our way up) under distraction. He has no ball drive, low-medium prey drive and good food drive and a real strong desire to please. I just started introducing prey item as reward for OB, the leather rag is all he gets excited enough about to be a reward. Still working with tugs but right now I have to fix a handle targeting issue from my brother not knowing the handles were not ok:
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb95/ambull1986/Duke/dukereward.jpg

Reward for focused heel while a cyclist was whizzing past:
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb95/ambull1986/Duke/dukereward2.jpg

Good boy. Chest scratch time. Does he look content or what?
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb95/ambull1986/Duke/dukescratch.jpg

Focus! I inadvertently taught him to lift a paw while focusing. Gotta love marker training, I don't plan on changing it I think it adds flair lol
http://i211.photobucket.com/albums/bb95/ambull1986/Duke/Dukefocus2.jpg

The focus work was taught 100% with markers. No treat spitting or holding of a ball or prey item under the chin or anywhere near the face. It was a long process but it's paying off. This dog will not catch anything, period. You can throw a treat right at his face, it can hit him in the nose and he will just wait until it hits the ground. He will not catch a frisbee, a ball, a treat, no toy of any kind tossed towards him or past him. I tried to get him to catch treats for 2 months, he will not take any out of your mouth or when something is within a foot of your face. I am still working on getting him to catch stuff but in the mean time I have markers.

Took me 3 weeks to get 60 seconds of focus at sit and heel, I am now working on focus while down. Retrieves are WIP!

Jeepers is this post long enough?!

Yay! I love getting updates about this guy. He's sooo handsome too.

Great work. I'm trying to get my 8 month old to focus. Hes very easily distracted and if there are other dogs around, forget it. Looks like you have worked very hard with this boy and he's doing wonderfully!

Jenn

Great pics of an even greater pup! He looks like he is doing wonderful with his focusing. Very impressive work at such a young age with little prey drive. I hope your brother appreciates all the work you have accomplished with “his” {wink wink} dog!

Thanks Angella! He has come a long way. When I first got him, and for several months if I bent over him or put an arm around his head/neck the way I do now (in the chest scratch pic) he would have urinated, dropped to the ground, rolled onto his back shaking. Now he loves hugs and runs full on and crashes into me when I say "into my arms."

Jessica - LOL yeah... I sort of confiscated Duke when Cajun was taken. My brother does appreciate it and he is a great pupil, he enjoys learning how to handle him. Though it is really funny when he tries to mimic my happy voice to encourage and praise Duke. My brother is 6' 4" about 250 big bald muscley dude going "Good boy Dukey! Yay!"

My puppy has similar ears, only slightly "floppier". I tried to tape them when he was younger but he would have none of it - he literally freaked out with the glue on. I decided not to put him through that. Although you're right about the surprise ears. haha. You never know what they are going to do next.

Yeah gotta love those wacky ears. Duke usually has one ear up and one ear down. The ear that is up changes daily. I never had a camera handy when both were up though, thank goodness for friends!