Thanks to Chris and Tim of Wildhaus kennel (good working line kennel), Nikon has a green ear. Sunday I drove 1.5 hrs to Julie's (breeder) house to meet her and another friend with her daughter and their puppy. Together we took the farm van with 5 puppies (Nikon, friend's pup Bailey, Julie's two keeps from the same litter, and Julie's Kirschental pup who is a few weeks older). First we went to Julie's friend Margot's house to give her a present and let her see the pups. After that we followed the TomTom to the Wild haus! Chris and Tim tattooed our four pups and then they all had a blast playing puppy fishing pole and barking at Della and Wulf, two of the Wildhaus dogs.
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Nikon and Inja (Kirschental pup)
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Someone's embarrassed about her green ear
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Wulf
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Nikon saying hi to Wulf and Della
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Finally captured Nikon letting himself out. By the time I get my boots on, he's scratching to come back in.
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Nikon's crib - Kenya's crate next to my side of the bed.
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He crashed on the bed so I let him stay while I folded clothes
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I love this little man. We have a few things to work on (mainly the potty training and the over-abundance of attitude as far as being demanding of me), but he has been sleeping through the night (11pm-6am) and is doing so well with the biting (chewing toys, playing with dogs, but not biting us or ripping apart the furniture). He is not scared of any people, noises, animals....so far the only thing I've discovered that bothers him is stairs that are not carpeted, but he's still less than 20lbs so he shouldn't really be running up and down big flights of stairs anyway. At home our stairs have carpet and we have a weird split-leveled house so each stair case is only 5-6 stairs. On Halloween he "helped" hand out candy and did not think anything of all the toddlers, kids shouting and running, teens in very scary costumes and masks. Last night on our walk there were several loud noises like leaf vacuums, some guy who kept revving his motorcycle. Nikon is attentive but curious rather than fearful. He stops and then wants to run to the source. He has a HUGE ego when it comes to other dogs. He's very energetic yet when we wear him out he will sleep next to me on the couch and we can cuddle. I've seen his siblings many times and I really think Nikon is the best, lol. The other males are very pushy and won't really play b/c all they care about is stealing ALL the toys and food. One of the females is a brat and is always picking fights and then looking innocent b/c she is small and cute. Another female will get all the puppies excited for playing but then run away with her tail tucked. I dunno, when I watch Nikon he seems the most well-rounded. He is learning from Coke and Kenya (thank God I have them!) when enough is enough and that dogs need some personal space and it's OK to be in the pen and just chew or sleep for a while. When we were at the Wild's and they took out the puppy rags, he was the first puppy to chase and attack the rag. The other pups were more interested in each other. So it seems his prey drive is good. As far as his conformation, I'm no expert but the breeder keeps saying he is the pick male and if she uses any for breeding (assuming they pass all health screening, get conformation ratings, working titles, breed survey, etc) she will use Nikon. I wasn't really sure what to expect b/c his sire is young (3 years I think) so his progeny are all relatively young and unproven, but the other kennels who used him as a stud are kennels whose lines I like so I'm glad they see something in him.