Go to place and once you lie down, I'll feed you. Stay there while I walk away, and I'll come back and feed you.
Stetson is already working on his down duration. 😊
Daisy couldn't tolerate being in her kennel when she first arrived. Now she's perfectly calm and relaxed in her kennel. We also got her waiting for an invite to come out and we helped her learn how to come out CALMLY instead of like a missile.
A little comparison of old Buddy to new Buddy. 😊
Just building my "wifi" with Cooper (teaching him to move toward me when he feels ecollar).
One of Cooper's first heeling lessons.
Challenging the group class dogs with approach, social pressure, and excitement.
Out in the wild I would intervene before someone got this close to my dog, but these are the types of things people will do if they get the chance.
All of these dogs are in a down and are not allowed to break that down just because someone pays attention to them.
It's important to note here that if I had a dog that was fearful of strangers it would be shameful of me to allow an ACTUAL stranger that I didn't know to do this. This is too much pressure for most dogs that are truly fearful. And it could quickly escalate to fleeing or biting.
Advocating for your dog and protecting their space is important. Even if your dog ISN'T fearful, why should they be subjected to touching by a stranger while they are essentially confined by a command and cannot move?
Joyce didn't actually touch them here, but if a stranger did this it would be pretty obvious they were going to, and I wouldn't give them that chance. I say this all the time: BE PREPARED WITH A PLAN OF WORDS AND ACTION IF SOMEONE APPROACHES YOUR DOG. that way you won't be caught off guard with your jaw on the ground going "I can't believe they just did that".
No fearful dogs in this group today. In fact they are mostly social butterflies.. This was a great exercise for them.
Daisy and Buddy on their park trip. They both did great recalling out of play, away from my daughter, etc.
Shutting things off AFTER they came back was actually the harder thing. Really important to follow through with that because we didn't want dogs that come back to their handler but they stay so excited that they run away again.
A brief clip of Daisy heeling at the park by the river. There are people very near us inflating their paddleboards and preparing their own dogs to go out on the water.
Daisy never tried to approach them, but sometimes she would try to cross over to my other side.
Long line work with Cooper. 😊
All the dogs have gone home as I have a trip coming up and I'll be away for a couple days.
But I still have some video footage that I never got posted during their stay, so as I come across it I will be putting that up.
Here's a brief clip of Buddy working at Rotary Park by the river the other day.
Well. Someone was in a mood last night.
(Psst..it was Snowflake 🐈).
For anyone that's concerned about the dog—he loves this. He provokes it. If you watch closely (at about 34 seconds) he pokes her with his snoot to rile her up. He got exactly what he wanted. 😆
Cooper getting the hang of heel.
Encouraging Rosie to get in the water.. 😆 and working in high distraction environment.
There were several people right next to us. They had a total of four dogs, one boat, and 2 paddleboards. We worked on the parking lot as well around cars, people and dogs.
Rosie, working around distractions. 😊
Getting Rosie out of the vehicle.
Cooper learning NOT to bolt through open doors.
Daisy's arrival at the park.
FREE Group Class For Graduates was yesterday.
Rosie and Cooper both participated and did great. Rosie made a couple mistakes when the unsettling crutches and noisy shopping cart came too near. What do we do? We follow through and start over so she can see how to trust her handler over her reflexive lizard brain. Good stuff.
Cooper held a down for a solid 20 minutes without any handler. We had him on a tie back just in case he broke, but he never did.
Rogue and Bravo did amazing and it shows that their owners are definitely doing the hard work at home.
Great job to all the dogs and humans!!
