Ringo is a high-drive, boisterous boxer with at least one mind of his own. Compared to our previous boxers, who were pretty happy to be ‘just’ pets, Ringo needs lots and lots of stimulation. When he gets bored, which happens with some regularity, he is quite likely to take matters into his own ... paws and either start a game where he’ll use a nearby family member as a toy to tug at and shake or he’ll bark at us in a demanding fashion. Apparently he has the former after his father and the latter after his mother. On these occasions, the obedience training instilled in him (obviously not well enough, but we’re working on it) seems to go out the window. ‘No’ and ‘Let go’ are suddenly completely unknown phrases.
Even though we’ve had dogs for over 25 years, we don’t consider ourselves terribly experienced when it comes to training them. Boxers are notoriously stubborn and with our previous dogs we have pretty much settled for basic obedience (sit, stay, come, etc). With Ringo, we clearly need to take things a bit further. Not the least for his sake, since he’s a good example of a proper working dog boxer. He’s got very good interest in grabbing and carrying objects and he loves to track things.
