 Practicing long place outside with LaLa as Bandit looks on. | I say this is LaLa's training blog, but it is also MY training blog. I am learning and evaluating our work together as we go along. |
The challenge is it is really easy to get complacent and NOT train your easy peasy dog. When I have a dog with too much energy to spare or a behavioral problem, it becomes really easy to be reminded why it is important to train, fulfill my dog's energy needs, and work on the things that make every day current activities really challenging.
It is also hard to be picky on YOUR (or MY) work when you have an easy going dog. However, my hard work and attention to detail works even better when I have an easy canine student or my own easy dog. There really is not advantage to being sloppy with your easy going friendly dog. The reason people do is that there is generally no obvious fall out to plague them (beyond just being less trained than they could be). When you get lazy with a reactive, hyper, or other behaviorally challenged dog, the fallout of not working with them will be noticable, even if a dog owner does not understand what is happening.
When you have a dog that seems content most of the time (even if you may have some small problems on the leash or whatever) it is easier to put off or forget about the training time. The consequences of that are not clear every day. However, good dogs get a lot from training and they deserve that training time with us. It's not just about the training, but about time together as well. Relationships can stagnate and get stale without doing something new together. The fun begins when you can communicate and understand each other.
Accomplishments this week 4 with Team LaLa:
This week will end on 9 hours of work on training and behavioral exercises. Again, this dog has no real behavioral problems. However, the work we do opens up how easy it is to go out and have the adventures together that I feel are good for both of us. The reactions of the dogs to date of having the world open up make me want this for every dog (at least that I own). With a dog like LaLa, there just is no excuse to not provide that.
It is also hard to be picky on YOUR (or MY) work when you have an easy going dog. However, my hard work and attention to detail works even better when I have an easy canine student or my own easy dog. There really is not advantage to being sloppy with your easy going friendly dog. The reason people do is that there is generally no obvious fall out to plague them (beyond just being less trained than they could be). When you get lazy with a reactive, hyper, or other behaviorally challenged dog, the fallout of not working with them will be noticable, even if a dog owner does not understand what is happening.
When you have a dog that seems content most of the time (even if you may have some small problems on the leash or whatever) it is easier to put off or forget about the training time. The consequences of that are not clear every day. However, good dogs get a lot from training and they deserve that training time with us. It's not just about the training, but about time together as well. Relationships can stagnate and get stale without doing something new together. The fun begins when you can communicate and understand each other.
Accomplishments this week 4 with Team LaLa:
- Got some 4 minutes of actual interested interactive play with me this week. It is going to be quite some time before this becomes useable for training. Right now I am working on the drive and motivation to play first. This was a breakthrough this week. It might not seem exciting now, but the continuation of this in training and playing is pretty exciting.
- Moved onto step 2 of lured heel inside. LaLa does so well right now (inside) that it almost feels like she might have done this before.
- Sits, still sit stays, and circle sit stay goals are easy to accomplish inside.
- Chill factor is much improved around new dogs and other exciting triggers (Robert for instance). Not that a chill dog is totally important to me, but an off switch (espcially around triggers) is nice in order to get things done independent from LaLa with her still out and about.
- Interactive play, believe it or not, has been a real struggle. She has this one toy that she will predictably play with (it is a rope that came with her). I always put it away, since it can be a danger to dogs when it is out. When I open up that door though, she will get her this toy. Today was the first day I could get her to play with me and the rope for more than a few seconds (we got to 4 minutes, which I will make shorter to keep up the enthusiasm).
- Long place has been a struggle ESPECIALLY when Robert (her beloved mostly fun owner) is around. So we are not as far on that as I would like to be, but I also have not kept up as well with the other two parts. So that is probably MY training mistake.
- Send to place can be a long session, but also because I have not kept up with it as much as the heel, sit, sit stays, and so on.
- The treats I buy seem to be upsetting LaLa stomach (I think). So I have held off on the lured exercises (mostly doing her kibble for lured heel as the priority). I keep forgetting to do these at her meals (note to self for tonight).
This week will end on 9 hours of work on training and behavioral exercises. Again, this dog has no real behavioral problems. However, the work we do opens up how easy it is to go out and have the adventures together that I feel are good for both of us. The reactions of the dogs to date of having the world open up make me want this for every dog (at least that I own). With a dog like LaLa, there just is no excuse to not provide that.
RSS Feed