Dog Body Language and DINOS posters

I found these lovely posters by Dr. Sohpia Yin online. They have great illustrations of how to greet a dog, how kids should and should not interact with dogs, and identifying fear body language in dogs. 

You can download these and others as PDFs here.

In Training leash clips and Thundershirts

Good grief it's been ages since my last post. I really need to get back on the ball so I can stop beginning all of my posts like that! The holidays really put a dent in my blog life I suppose. I didn't really read anything new or do anything new training-wise with my dogs.

So, real briefly I'll just give an update on my pups. I mentioned that Ace got neutered back in November, and now he's all healed up! We took Harley in to the vet for an ear infection the day after Christmas, and it was so bad that they had to anesthetize her the next day to flush her ear out. They decided to spay her at the same time so she wouldn't have to go under twice and to save us money since anesthesia is so expensive. We took her to get her stitches removed Saturday morning, which was the day of her Intermediate class graduation but when they removed the sutures, the incision was still open and bleeding so we weren't able to go to class. :( But luckily, one of the other students couldn't go to class either so her graduation will be this Saturday! :) Unfortunately, my husband will be gone this weekend for work so he won't be able to attend her graduation. :( Also, when we went to the vet to get Harley's sutures removed, the vet also prescribed an anti-anxiety medication for Ace because he has pretty bad separation anxiety. We left for about 2 hours one night and when we came home, seven ornaments (plastic collectible Hallmark ornaments) had basically been shredded. And another time it was the carpet, and another time it was the dog bed, and the cinnamon pine cones from the coffee table,  and my watch, and the poop bags... and the list just goes on and on. Well, I think that's all of it.

Today, I finally made the "In Training" leash clips I've had planned for months.

Today, I also bought a Thundershirt for Ace. He is very reactive toward other dogs- any time he sees a dog he barks his head off. He's not aggressive by any means, but it started when he was a puppy - he would get so excited when he saw a dog and he wanted to play with them that he'd whine and bark. And now the barking is a lot louder and sometimes turns into almost a snarling sound. Well, the Thundershirt is supposed to be good for reactivity toward other dogs and barking (as well as many many other things), and I've heard that it's a miracle worker. So I put the shirt on him when I got home and then took him for a walk to see how he would do if we saw another dog. Well, there were no other dogs out, but we heard other dogs barking and usually he'd bark back, but he didn't. Yay! The only time he did bark was when we saw the mailman, and it was only a little "woof" and then I was able to get him quiet and calm again. It's also supposed to be good for separation anxiety. I'm a little scared to try it for that though, because I think Harley would try and eat it off of him. :P

One other thing that happened today was that Harley started playing with the door stop again. She hasn't done that since she was a little itty bitty baby! And the funny part was that I just watched the video of her playing with it as a puppy last night for the first time in a while! And luckily, I got her playing with it today on video. :)

Well, thanks for pawsing. More later, I promise. :)

Neutering, comfy cones, and Halloween

We got Ace neutered a week ago today- November 1- and he's getting his stitches removed Thursday. Just in time for our trip to Vegas! We're having the pups stay at the PetSmart PetsHotel and they're going to do Doggie Day Camp for two days as well. I upgraded his neuter to laser surgery- which has a faster recovery time and there's less pain and swelling too. I also got him a Comfy Cone- which is a cushion-y fabric cone instead of one of those awful plastic cones.

Ace in his comfy cone:

Here is the link to the website describing the comfy cone. http://www.allfourpaws.com/the_comfy_cone.php You can't buy it on this website however. But you can buy it on Amazon and I'm sure a bunch of other websites as well.

I plan to get Harley spayed at the same vet- which isn't our usual vet. Our normal vet couldn't get Ace in for a neutering for an entire month! So we took him to a different one- El Toro Animal Hospital- which I just loved! It reminded me of my vet back in Virginia. It had a cozy, small-town feel with lots of cute knick-knacks and a little boutique and a cat sleeping on top of the computer- just like my vet back in Rappahannock! :) Also, El Toro has the laser surgery and my regular vet does not. Well, anyway, I plan to have Harley spayed there too and then we can use the comfy cone on her as well! We also got Ace microchipped, which reminds me, I still have to register his microchip to get him in the system.

I got the dogs Halloween costumes just for fun. We didn't have anywhere to take them, but I just wanted to take some pictures. :P I got the costumes super cheap on Halloween day- I think something like $3.50 each. I got a lady bug costume for Harley and a bumble bee costume for Ace. Not as cute as the frog prince and princess costumes I wanted but still pretty adorable.

This pic isn't great, you can't really see the majority of the costume but I think it's still pretty cute. :)

Trying my best to keep up with the posts!! Sometimes it's just hard to think of something to write! Bloggers Block. :P
Well, hopefully I'll have more soon!
Thanks for pawsing
L

First day of school and anxious dogs

Man it's been a little while since I last wrote something for this blog... almost a week! Argh I can't believe I fell so behind! I'm so disappointed in myself.

Well anyway, Ace has his first day of class tomorrow night which I am excited about. Though I'm also nervous since he gets very excited around other dogs, especially when he's on the leash. He's gotten a lot better on his walks- last night when we took both of them out, a dog was coming towards us and Ace never freaked out. He just watched it as it passed right by us. I was so proud of him! But just to be on the safe side, I'm going to buy a bully stick to distract him with during class if I need to. My manager actually suggested that because the other day I had a dog that was going crazy in class because of all the other dogs. He was barking the entire time and I could barely hear myself think and had to keep stopping class to try and distract the poor dog. So my manager suggested I just have a bully stick in class in case a dog does that again, then I can give it to the dog and let him chew on it and calm himself down. Then I can suggest that the pet parent get a couple for their dog for class times and other situations they need their dog to chew on something and not get too anxious or excited.

I feel like a terrible pet parent, I haven't worked with either of my dogs in a couple days. It's just been so crazy since my colleague resigned- I come home from work exhausted. And then our A/C broke and water soaked the ceiling and leaked through the fire alarm and set it off at 2:00 am the other day... it's just been a mad house here all week! 

Well, I'm exhausted.
More tomorrow, I promise.
:)
Thanks for pawsing!

Velcro dogs and tear-jerking poems

So I was just thinking about that phrase "velcro dog" and thought that it fits Ace pretty well. Whenever the pups are asleep and I'm chilling on the couch and need to get up to go to the kitchen or bathroom or whatever I try not to wake them up - cause they take forever to go to sleep in the first place. But it seems like whenever I get up and no matter how quiet I am, Ace knows it and follows me around. As I was meditating on him being a velcro dog, I decided that that's not exactly an accurate description. It's more like it's a bungee that connects us. Because when I "pull away" it's like he "snaps back" to wherever I am. I can never go very far before he just appears at my side. I think he just likes to be able to see me. Because when I got up earlier to go into the bathroom he just laid down in the hallway and watched me. He didn't even come all the way into the bathroom! lol

I found this poem that someone else posted... I have no idea who wrote it, but it is very touching. My husband would say that I'm a big sissy, by which he means I cry at everything (even Lowe's commercials at times) and so this poem, of course, made me cry.

My family brought me home cradled in their arms.
They cuddled me and smiled at me and said I was full of charm.
They played with me and laughed with me and showered
me with toys.
I sure do love my family, especially the girls and boys.
The children loved to feed me, they gave me special treats.
They even let me sleep with them - all snuggled in the sheets.
I used to go for walks, often several times a day.
They even fought to hold the leash, I'm very proud to say.
These are the things I'll not forget - cherished memory,
because I now live in the shelter - without my family.
They used to laugh and praise me when I played with that old shoe.
But I didn't know the difference between the old ones and the new.
The kids and I would grab a rag, for hours we would tug.
So I thought I did the right thing when I chewed the bedroom rug.
They said that I was out of control, and would have to live outside.
This I did not understand, although I tried and tried.
The walks stopped, one by one; they said they hadn't time.
I wish that I could change things, I wish I knew my crime.
My life became so lonely, in the back yard, on a chain.
I barked and barked, all day long, just to keep from going insane.
So they brought me to the shelter,
but were embarrassed to say why.
They said I caused an allergy, then they each kissed me goodbye.
If I'd only had some classes, when I was just a little pup,
then I would have been a better dog when I was all grown up.
"You only have one day left." I heard the worker say.
Does that mean I have a second chance?
DO I GO HOME TODAY?


Did you cry too? :P Well, I think it shows exactly why dogs need training and why so many dogs end up in the shelter! Please make sure this doesn't happen to your dogs. Please train them! Behavioral issues and lack of training is the number one reason dogs go to shelters. And it's the easiest thing in the world to fix most of the time.  Here are a couple of quotes I found that I really like as well.

Properly trained, a man can be dog's best friend  -   Corey Ford

In order to truly enjoy a dog, one doesn't merely train him to become semi-human. The point of it is to open oneself to the possibility of becoming partly a dog.  -  Edward Hoagland

If there are no dogs in heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went - Unknown

Well I have to go into work tonight for a few hours to cover classes again. I guess I should stop thinking of them as K's classes and think of them as mine, since they are mine now, but I didn't post the class or schedule it or have the students from week 1 so it's hard to think of them as my students. Well I'm only going to be in half an hour before the first class and stay half an hour after the second class- just to give me enough time to set up and then clean up. I wish I didn't have to cover classes on Saturday since my hubby has a 96 this weekend (meaning time off- he doesn't work Friday through Monday) so I'd love to have more than one full day with him. I work Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday, so I have parts of all those days with him and then all of Monday. Still, if K hadn't resigned, I would've had all of Saturday with him too. Ugh. Oh well. I get the commission. I am happy about that. lol.

Well, gotta start getting ready soon. 

Thanks for pawsing. :)

Training classes and puppies as cats

Today I taught some more classes- again, covering for another trainer. I taught a week 2 Puppy class and a week 4 Beginner class and then had a personal training camp in the hotel. First, I'm not going to bash the other trainer, but I'm just confused as to what the pet parents have been taught so far. There are certain behaviors that they should've known by now and they told me that they hadn't learned some of them or had no idea what I was talking about. So, for example, in my second class of the night, they were already supposed to have been taught drop it, leave it, and down. And one pet parent said that they did not do drop it and only briefly covered down which means that the only thing left that they were supposed to learn that week was leave it. And that does not take an hour to teach. So what the heck else were they taught that day?

Anyways... So I kind of had to squeeze a lot into an hour for that class covering things they should've already known so that we could get on to the next things. And one of the pet parents that had missed the previous week specifically asked if they could schedule a makeup session with me. So I scheduled to meet with them on Saturday first thing when I come into work. I'm not sure if that's really right but I don't know when the other trainer will be back and they wanted to get the makeup in before next week's class, and I felt bad that the trainer had not scheduled the makeup with them before she left for this week.

Another whoops for the night- after my first class ended, one of the hotel managers told me that there was a personal training camp that did not get done and the dog had already checked out. And that was the third personal training camp for that pet parent that a trainer did not do. Now, no one had ever told me how to tell if I had training camps scheduled, no one told me when I came in to work that day, and I kind of figured I wouldn't be doing training camps for a while since I just started training. So it's partly my fault- since you know what happens when you assume. (You make an ass out of u and me). I felt so bad and I really hope that the pet parent schedules another training camp that someone will actually do. 

There was a second training camp scheduled- and I did do that one. It was a cute little Boston Terrier mix- brindle with floppy ears and a bit bigger than a standard Boston. He had the sweetest, goofiest personality. He was also one of the most toy motivated dogs I've seen. He actually preferred a toy to treats sometimes and would work to play with the toy. Apparently he's had issues in the past with automatically rolling over when someone asks him to lie down. This is a problem I had with Harley too.  This happens when you create a pattern- if every time you ask your dog to lie down you then ask him to roll over, eventually they're just going to roll over when you ask him to lie down because they're anticipating that that's what you will ask for next. Not once today when I asked him to lie down did he roll over! He did roll over at other times, but never immediately following the cue "down."

Something I want to mention that I find incredibly odd is a behavior that Ace does. I've noticed that (usually at night) he will go to a specific toy, put his mouth around it and then just sit there like that for a while. I'm not sure if he's sucking on it or very subtly licking it or nibbling on it, but sometimes he also wiggles his toes and curls his paw up kind of like cats do when they knead. So I googled this behavior and apparently dogs do knead like cats in rare occasions. I read conflicting descriptions however- one resource said that puppies will grow out of it and the other said that they never grow out of it. I have yet to see any harm in Ace doing this so I see no reason to stop him because it calms him down and he does not do it obsessively. 

Off work tomorrow- so hopefully I can get a lot of reading in! Another of the books came in- High Energy Dogs. I'm really looking forward to reading this one since I have a Lab and an Aussie- two very high energy breeds! haha.

Well, night y'all. :)

Contest, Sit Means Sit, and more rambles

My pups' picture is in a contest for "Sit means Sit" best Action shot. So... please vote for it!

http://www.sitmeanssit.com/photo-contest/?photo=754


On that note though, I decided to look into the Sit Means Sit training program because a customer was gushing about how amazing it is and I wanted to see for myself what was so great about it. First, I hate the way the website is laid out. It's taking me forever to find anything regarding the training program's methodology and beliefs. Plus I had to register twice to get access to articles which is just plain annoying. And I just downloaded an article of theirs which explains why electronic collars are humane. Hmm... not sure I believe that one no matter what they say. I will admit that possibly they are not as awful as they used to be, but I still do not believe in using them. Dogs learn so much faster with purely positive reinforcement (though apparently people want to use the term progressive reinforcement now). Using positive/progressive reinforcement is enjoyable for the dog, it makes training fun, it helps create a better bond between dog and parent and helps stimulate their mind as well. Dogs trained with this method are - I won't say smarter- but better problem solvers, and dogs trained with the "traditional" method (choke chains, prong collars, shock collars, "dominate" the dog, etc) generally end up being very fearful of a lot of things, including the pet parent- plus, they end up being not very independent or mindful or happy-go-lucky or any of those kinds of things.

I just conferred with my area trainer and she was not a fan of their program either. And I read some more articles- and all of them had a plug for their electronic collar. I watched a video where they used an electronic collar on a 5 month old puppy in place of a clicker. They shocked the dog to mark a desirable behavior. One, that just sounds backwards, Two, why would ANYONE put an electronic collar on a 5 month old?, Three, although electronic collars may not be as bad as they used to, why would anyone substitute a collar for a clicker- clickers work wonderfully! If it aint broke, don't fix it.

I entered the contest though because I am somewhat competitive and it's for a $25 gift certificate to their store- and though they do sell electronic collars (ugh), they also sell normal toys and treats... and I could always use more of those. Seriously, I go through like a bag of treats a week! I guess that's what two 5 month old puppies will do to you. :P

That rabies shot really knocked them out. They slept most of yesterday. I was afraid that then they wouldn't be tired and wouldn't sleep through the night, but they did, thank goodness. I still have issues with that occasionally- seems like either Ace can't hold it all night, or he just wakes up and wants attention. So I decided to "test" him and not get out of bed to take him out if he wakes up and whines- to see if he'd have an accident or if he'd go back to sleep. So I tried it- the first night was awful he cried forever but I was hoping he was going through extinction and I just tried to go back to sleep. But now, he rarely ever wakes up anymore- or if he wakes up, he doesn't wake me up. So, I've come to the conclusion that on accident, I trained him to wake me up so that he would get to see me. Does that make sense? I think he just doesn't like to be without us and he realized that because whenever he'd cry I'd take him outside and he'd get to see me, he began crying just to see me not because he had to go outside. So, I extinguished that behavior and now I usually can go all night without having a puppy whine and bark and wake me up!

Man, I really went off track from the original topic of this post, but that's alright. Time to start reading Don't Shoot the Dog! I suppose. :)

Two Shots in the Rump

So today my pups Harley and Ace are going to get their rabies vaccines. They are almost five months old and are about to start training classes. I think that it would be easier to sell the training classes to customers if I can tell them that I put my own dogs through the same program. Plus, I want to get them CGC (Canine Good Citizen) certified and I think this is the easiest way because the Advanced course preps the dogs to take the CGC test.

Harley is a yellow Lab and Ace is a black tri Australian Shepherd. My husband and I got Harley first- right when she was 8 weeks old. And then about a month later we got Ace- when he was 13 weeks old. Funnily enough, they are only 3 days apart in age. Ace is older and they really do act like brother and sister. Harley is the adorable yet irritating younger sister who always wants to play and Ace does his best to ignore her when he doesn't. Though if they are playing and he wants to stop, he always runs to mom and hides behind me.

Ace is also the alpha. If she has a toy and he wants it, he'll take it and she won't do anything about it. But if he has a toy that she wants, if she tries to take it he'll growl at her and then she'll just spend the next five minutes lying next to him and barking in his face. :P