Porcia’s Greyhound Retirement Home Retired racers, one small terrier, and everything we learned from them
A Smooth Fox Terrier crouched over a chewed tennis ball, staring at it with total concentration
A Smooth Fox Terrier crouched over a chewed tennis ball, staring at it with total concentration

Fox Terrier Wisdom

As you may know, a Smooth Fox Terrier is a very smart dog. I am still a young girl but I know lots of words. The following is a brief lesson in Smooth Fox Terrier vocabulary, prepared by me, for the benefit of dogs who are still learning and of humans who believe they have been understood.

The Basics

  • Sit: put your butt on the ground for a count of three. Unless treats are offered, in which case you put your butt on the ground until such time as the treats are released into your custody.
  • Stay: remain exactly where you are for a count of three. Unless treats are offered, in which case you remain exactly where you are until such time as the treats are released into your custody.
  • Come: remain exactly where you are and stare benignly at the speaking human for at least a count of five. Unless treats are offered, in which case you run immediately to the speaking human and sit calmly at his or her feet until such time as the treats are released into your custody.
  • Good girl: confirmation that whatever you have just done should be repeated at the earliest opportunity, ideally in front of visitors.

Corrections and Their Meanings

  • No: maybe you should stop whatever it is that you are doing for a count of three.
  • Zoe No (spoken after "No"): maybe you should stop whatever it is that you are doing until the speaking human turns away.
  • ZOE NO!!! (spoken by a human whilst he or she is walking briskly toward you): immediately stop whatever it is that you are doing, pick up the nearest toy and offer the toy to the speaking human so that he or she can throw it for you to play fetch.
  • Leave it: leave it??? Like heck! IT'S MINE!!!
  • Heel: heck if I know!!! Why do they keep saying this to me? Can't they see that I'm busy testing the relative stress points of my leash, collar and neck? If they don't allow me to finish this experiment we will never know just how much pressure it really takes for me to BREAK MY OWN NECK!!!

Nouns of Importance

  • Ball: small spherical object of desire and obsession.
  • Walk: a sacred rite, announced by the sound of a particular drawer. Begins the instant the word is spoken, whatever the humans may believe about coats, shoes or weather.
  • Squirrel: the reason for everything. All other business is suspended. Any prior agreement regarding "come" is void.
  • Dinner: the single word in the language that requires no training whatsoever. Can be heard through a closed door, from upstairs, while asleep.
  • Bath: a betrayal. Cannot be undone by treats. May be partially avenged by rolling on the nearest human's bed immediately afterward.
  • Vet: never spoken aloud by the humans in this house, who spell it, which is how I learned to spell.
  • Anthropomorphize (look it up in the dictionary!): this is what my dad does every time he updates this website.

Webmaster's note

Zoe's account is funnier than it is fair, but it is not wrong about very much. Smooth Fox Terriers are genuinely bright dogs, and the trouble with a bright terrier is that intelligence and biddability are not the same quality. The breed was developed to work independently and out of sight of its handler, going to ground after quarry and making its own decisions down there. A dog bred to think for itself under pressure does not stop thinking for itself because you are standing in a kitchen holding a piece of cheese.

The practical result is that terrier training is a negotiation rather than a chain of command. What worked here was short sessions, unreasonably good treats, absolute consistency between the two of us, and accepting that a recall in the garden and a recall with a squirrel present are two entirely different commands that have to be taught separately. It also helped enormously to give her something to do. A terrier with a job is a delight; a terrier without one will design a job, and you will not like it — the Dead Toys page is the archaeological record of that principle. The general dog care guidance we relied on covers the fundamentals sensibly, and the rest of our reference shelf is on the links page.

For the record, she was better in the ring than any of this suggests, as the show dog page reluctantly admits.