# Slow & Steady wins the day



## Aimless1 (Sep 25, 2011)

Nitro has been a great puppy and nothing unusual to report there. He is my 5th dog and I've been around alot of hunting dogs and several different breeds. I was fortunate to own one Gordon who was exceptionally smart, but did find that she needed to be trained and handled differently. Nitro appears to be as intelligent, and perhaps more so. 

With that in mind I've removed all pressure from training. If he proves to be like Maizie, and there are alot of training similarities between them, he will need to choose to obey, not taught to obey. Huge gulf between the two concepts. This also means that training takes longer while waiting for the pup to decide it's to our mutual advantage for him to obey. 

Maizie was beyond smart, but her nose was mediocre. Nitro seems to be blessed with a great nose as well. I am thankful that he came into our home now as opposed to 20 years ago when I had much less experience and no patience. Each dog, like each of us, has it's own personality and no one training method works for every dog. I can only hope I'm choosing the right course of action for Nitro.

So for us slow & steady wins the day, the week, the lifetime together.


----------

