Jillian Dickens
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Sep 07/05) - Faith Embleton will do anything for her dog Corbin.

And Corbin will do anything for Faith, on one condition - food. Corbin will scoot on his belly along the kitchen floor for food.

Corbin will jump up and down from the floor to the chair to the floor to the chair... again and again for food.

Corbin will dance to country music played over the radio for food. He will even obey commands in Japanese just for one little morsel of a doggie treat.

"Dogs are really smart if you give them the opportunity," said Faith. She got Corbin when he was four weeks old and no bigger than a cowboy boot. "I just kept doing the same things with him every day and eventually he learned the tricks."

Now, when two-year-old Corbin wants to go outside, rather than scratching at the door he presses a little bell placed at dog level. He can do 13 tricks, but Faith says they're working on more all the time.

The most impressive is his Japanese shake-a-paw act.

When Faith says "Ote" (shake a paw) Corbin lifts his left hand to shake. When Faith subsequently says "Okawari," (and then the other) he lifts his right hand for a shake.

And then he eats doggie treats.

His second-best trick is "the hand is quicker than the eye" number, where he watches Faith toss a doggie treat from one hand to the other until she commands him to pick a hand.

He gets it right every time!

He'll give you "five," catch food, roll over, sit pretty, sit high, and he'll even sit still twice a week while Faith brushes his teeth - with an electric brush to boot.

Yes, Faith takes the utmost care in her dog Corbin, and always has.

"He's a mutt, but he's not a mutt to me," she said. "I've always made sure he has high self-esteem."

No doubt Corbin could say something similar of his owner... and probably say it in Japanese. "Corbin and I are very close. I love my dog like I love my child."