Work That Dog

Hello! Is anybody missing the videos? Here is one of me and Indie working on nail trimming. Sorry for all the wind noises, it's blowing here pretty good today! 😆 Indy is about 5 months old and did two sessions with the dremmel prior to this one. She is one of the dogs that handle the whole process pretty well, I usually don't get to touch the nails with the dremmel within the first or the second session, like I did with her. It is important to not rush it, take your time if the dog needs it!

Guess the weight of this little squirrel! 🥰

Do you know what's going on here? I will post the answer in the comments 😉

Use your dog's food to make their "kennel" command strong and fun! Also, at multiple dogs households, it is smart to feed them in kennels, where nobody sticks their nose in somebody else's food, or even worse - growls them away from it! Close the doors and open once everybody is done.

Tonks and her "manicure" session yesterday. Teaching your dog to calmly accept being groomed and examined is good both for their body and mind!

Where did all the snow go?? 😐 It was here just yesterday... 😪 Join me for a minute of my 2,5 hour walk, I have a little tip that will make your dog happy! 🙂

😍❤❤❤ Fun to work with this little one! We just started discriminating between commands today (video in the comments) and she already does so well!

Chewie took a walk to the park and continued working on his recall. W are doing both a "come" command and a whistle recall. It was super windy today and much cooler than over the last week, but at least we had the park to ourselves! Well... almost, notice the couple sets of dogs that walked by and didn't distract Chewie too much! Good boy! I have no video of that, but we also got to work through his initial panic about entering the skatepark's obstacles. We walked up and down the ramps and bowls and he quickly went from terrified to completely comfortable! 😁

Yesterday Chewy visited a store for the second time. He already did much better than on his first trip, but it's (should be!) Just the beginning! It can be surprising how quickly things improve when they are being practiced! 😉 At first, when dogs still struggle with new situations and easily get too excited or too worried, make sure that you give them something to do. The two good options are: the static one - sit/down and do nothing or the dynamic one - follow me and don't get invested in anything. Once these two are not a challenge anymore, you can go for less control and directions, because your dog will be calm, tuned in and quite likely on their best behavior without you reminding them constantly what that means 🙂

Teaching the dog how to be in a nice heel position is important. It really challenges them, makes them pay attention to where we are and where we are going instead of them frantically trying to check the whole world out at once, dragging us behind. Implementing that kind of structure helps creating the relationship in which we are the leader and they are the follower. Let's face it, making the dogs live in this very unnatural (to them) world, puts a huge responsibility on us, we need to prepare them to follow our guidence pretty much no matter what, or it may end badly to somebody. As I said, structured walk, where their only job is to be closely next to us is an amazing tool to practice the leadership, but obviously it is not the only way we will be moving around together when connected with a leash. Make sure that you implement some of that heeling in your daily routine, but also work on a casual walk, where your dog has more leash at their disposal, more freedom and just remember to keep one thing unchanged - no pulling! Not one step should be taken once the dog hits the end of the leash. At first we need to be in charge of making sure that we don't let that happen and that we make the dog step back into the pressure. But if we do a good job, soon the dog will correct themselves, understanding that it's out of the question. Little clip of Maple to illustrate that.