Callie Golden Retriever first “invited” me to play soccer when she arrived at my home at age eight-weeks old.  She spotted an under-inflated practice soccer ball in the back yard and ran to it.  Frankly, I’m not sure why the ball was there or where it came from; it’s part of Callie’s mystery, I guess.  But Callie ran to the other side of the ball, scrunched down behind it, looked me right in the eye, and said, “OK, Fred, show me what you’ve got.”  I gave the ball a kick and Callie ran and trapped it under her tummy.  She was such a tiny puppy that she could hardly get all four feet to touch the ground.  Here’s what she looked like:

Almost every day since then, for over three and a half years, Callie and I have played soccer.  She’s graduated to doing “nosers.”  If she was a person, you’d call it a “header,” but when you’re a Golden Retriever, your nose gets in the way, so it’s a “noser.”  Here’s a recent demonstration of Callie’s “noser” technique:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=woArYgPKbKU Callie Show off Her Soccer “Nosers”

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know that my Golden Retriever puppy, Callie, now 22 months old, started inviting me to play soccer shortly she moved in to my home, at age 8 weeks. Here’s a photo of Callie trying to get a soccer game going when she was about 12 weeks old.

Callie’s been working hard on her soccer skills. Every time I walk past the slightly-open sliding door to the back yard, Callie pokes her nose through the opening, sending me an obvious message, “Hey, Fred, could we please play soccer?”

Usually, the game is that I kick the ball, and Callie runs and traps it under her tummy. Or she puts her paw on it until I kick it away. Like any good soccer player, Callie tries to anticipate which way I’m going to kick the ball. She stays low and balanced and tries to figure out which way the ball is going, so she can trap it right away. If I do manage to get it past her, she races to catch up with the ball, and then she captures it until I’m ready for the next kick.

As Callie has grown, she has become much better at jumping to try to “grab” a high kick. After all, her dad (Cutter, Any Way You Slice It), is an American and Canadian agility champion. So Callie has some good, athletic genes. She jumps to try to “catch” even the highest kick. She can’t really do “headers,” but she’s invented the “doggie noser.” Our soccer ball is slightly under-inflated, so when Callie “noses” the ball, it makes a loud “bonk” noise.

Here are some edited clips of Callie doing “nosers.” See if you can solve the “Where is Callie?” puzzle mid-way through the video. At one point, Callie hides behind a bush and waits for me to kick the ball. She’s just full of tricks.

callie-soccer-nosers