Well, we’re about 3/4 of the way through the month already. Time flies! Last week seemed short for training because I left on Thurs. to go to the Obedience trial in Idaho Falls and I wasn’t home till Mon. night. The good thing is that while we were up there I had a chance to work with both Twist and Rogue in new places.

While we were in Idaho Falls we walked the dogs in the evenings along this really nice pathway that ran beside the Snake River. At the end of the pathway was a dock and our friend’s dog Chase spotted this as a great place to swim. So, since Twist needed work on his stays with distractions, I put him in a “sit stay” while Chase played fetch in the water. It was a really tough distraction for Twist. He did break his stay once, but after that lapse of concentration…he did really well. He also did an awesome job of “leave it” by ignoring the ducks and geese in the water when I set he and Rogue up on the shore for pictures. Both of those things were pretty big challenges of his focus and I was really pleased with how he handled them.

I wanted to see how Rogue would be able to handle working near the ring at the Obedience trial, so on several occasions I walked her up close to the rings, (like 10-20 ft. away), and asked for some basic skills that she knows well. The bad news was that even at that distance she was so stressed that she was having difficulty targeting my hand, or sitting, or anything else. So, we increased the distance from the ring until she was comfortable enough to do a couple things and then we’d leave. I was so disappointed. I really didn’t expect her to be that stressed just by being in the vicinity of the rings.

When we came back to Utah we had a shared private lesson at a new location for both Rogue and Twist. It is a place that you can rent to work obedience or agility, so it seemed ideal. We went pretty early in the morning so it was nice and cool. There was Cynthia and Chase and our obedience instructor and Twist and Rogue and myself.

Rogue worked first. Or maybe I should rephrase that. Rogue was supposed to work first. She was so shutdown that she even refused to take a hunk of Bil Jac treat. This is the first time that she’s ever just walked away from me and not come back when I called her. She just looked over her shoulder and kept going. Right back to the crate. Honestly, I was in tears. It felt like everything that I seem to try to help her has backfired. Even our obedience trainer said that she didn’t know what to think.

Twist on the other hand, was game to work as usual! We did a little bit of heeling, and then a little work on our stays. After that we tried his dumbell retrieve over a jump. He did so well. I have so much fun working with him. He’s really a lifesaver some days when I get down and start taking things too seriously. His enthusiasm for life is hard to resist!

Anyway, that’s our update for last week. Sorry it’s a week late.