The other day while my considerate neighbor was having his shoot fest I decided as a distraction we would resume max's swimming lessons( for those who don't know he started last summer) So he's not like Bella or some of the many other water experts to many to list. He does try  I waded into the pond &  I hear barking & look back & see a smiling GSP & try to caoks him in . Anyway at this point I take my shirt off & throw it onto the shore . turn towards the pond & then back at max who is gone !  Along with my shirt just a shaking it and a good 200 feet away back at the house. I call him he comes & we proceeded our season 2 lessons. Not a pretty sight but gosh the dog has heart !

We live near the water so both my GSPs swim, but I would not say that they took to the water immediately.  But as they learned how to swim better, they love it.  My puppy is still perfecting her swim.  She will swim out to the bumper with my older GSP, but she does not keep her head high enough out of the water to grab the bumper.  Just not quite confident enought until yesterday, she was determined to grab it before my older GSP got it.   Of course, she has a much softer bite than the older GSP and well it was stollen from her immediately, but she swims along and grabs the rope to the bumper and they both return it to me.

No doubt the competition is what got them both into the water.  My older GSP had my lab to compete with, and now my GSP puppy has and 8 year old awesome swimming GSP to compete with.  She is getting there.  Jumps in on her own to get a head start as the older one is taught to wait until released, but still needs to perfect the grabing of something to retrieve it back.

But that is too cute about stealing your shirt and heading back . . . so typical of a GSP that has alot of character!

What a cheeky wee monster  I would never turn my back on a gsp when there's clothing lying around - the humiliation of watching Kintra running around the garden with my underwear in her mouth was a lesson learnt for me!  They're so mischevious

Both my pups learned at about 6 months old at the dog park. Sort of like kids I guess...."Everyone's doing it!" Maybrie took to it faster, as she is naturally bolder. Kaido took to it while chasing his sister. He fell in, and luckily there was a ledge that he could stand on that allowed only his head to stay above water. He jumped off the ledge though to chase a ball in Maybrie's mouth. Maybrie jumps like a frustrated retriever. She leaps out there and pounces! Airborne. Kaido prefers slinking in! Lol! Just different strokes for different folks! There are a total of 7 GSP's that frequent the dog park we were attending. It's adorable seeing them all play alongside each other. They don't engage in contact with each other, however, to see them chase birds together or butterflies is adorable! I have only seen 4 out of the 7 swim. Most wade out, and one will crouch down in the shallow water. One will not TOUCH the water! I felt blessed at the time because we went during the heat during off peak times. If they couldn't swim, we would have already had heatstrokes. Now, we don't go at all. Too many things can happen too quickly due to irresponsible pet owners. Not going to risk it.