Training games and outings

Kaline got quite the workout yesterday—lots of individual attention at training, because I am already trying to cram him for the CGC on September 17.

Kaline and Juno with our addition for the day, Rocky. He is the only designer poodle-mix I actually enjoy working. Such a love!!

Before training, we had a fairly amusing encounter on our big Palo Alto pack walk. Amusing to me, anyway. We were about to cross the street (me and five dogs) when we saw two people, each getting yanked along by a Boxer in a harness. Each human had the leash wrapped several times around his or her fist, which is unsafe in general but seemed like a supremely bad idea in this case. Clearly the Boxers were not under control, so we remained a safe distance behind and I treated Kaline frequently for looking to me, instead of the dogs.

Then we heard a commotion up ahead—a white fluffy purse rat, at the end of its leash and also in a completely ineffective harness, was yapping and lunging at the two Boxers, whose owners were still a leash-length away and trying to hold their dogs back. Finally, the dogs were all extricated; the yapper was silenced momentarily. Then the puntable turned and saw my five dogs, waiting beside me (I sure wasn't wading into that mess).

It looked at us consideringly, taking in a breath. I looked at the dog (not the owners, so they'd take it as a semi-joke) and said, "Don't even THINK about it." The owners pulled the tiny reactive beast to the side and we passed unscathed. I was just amused that this dog was willing to take on the Boxers but not my guys. Hehe.

I ran Kaline through most of his paces at training, with a lot of emphasis on loose-leash walking. To some people that implies the dog can have all six feet of leash, as long as he's not pulling. To me, it means Kaline needs to walk beside me, but doesn't have to have precise positioning or watch my face constantly, just check in periodically. I made lots of turns and zigzagged all over the place, which usually seems to get him in the rhythm.

We also worked on his retrieving; he's picking up the objects and (mostly) bringing them back reliably, so now Freddie has me walking off while he has the toy, and trying to get him to walk with me while holding on to it. Not much of a problem so far for the Doberman Retriever! Hurrah. Other areas we focused on were: spontaneous eye contact; remote sits and down; flip finishes; and turns in place (also known as the Finding Heel Game).

I came home to find that San Mateo County hadn't issued Kaline's SD tag (they don't differentiate between SDs and SDITs) because I was not specific enough about how he does his tasks (or will do them). I don't know how much more specific than "retrieves dropped items" they really need, but I was pretty angry, since I had sent in Juno's paperwork the same way and gotten the tag without issues. So I typed up two full pages in condescending detail of how each task is performed, and sent it off. Then to cool down, Kaline and I accompanied Mom to two grocery stores.

Again, we were working a lot on walking nicely and on spontaneous attention. I didn't try to stop him from air scenting or looking around, because unlike Juno, it's not like he's been in a bunch of grocery stores before. It's all pretty new to him, so it's understandable he would do that. We just were quick and positive, lots of treats for looking at me and keeping pace with me.

At the first store, we got one of those people who ask prying questions. I now have stock answers for most of those. We got to the one that is so annoying: "You don't look disabled." I replied, "Not all disabilities are visible." She responded by patting me as if I were a small child and cooing, "It's okay, you're doing just fiiiiiiiine." I restrained myself from smacking her.

Next store we got an absolutely lovely woman who couldn't stop complimenting Kaline on his handsomeness and his lovely manners. She had never seen a Doberman with natural ears before and though he looked so nice. Win.

Kaline not sniffing candy at Draeger's.

Today we worked more on the remote down, and Kaline didn't realize it, but we were really working on a foundation for his drop on recall!

Juno and I couldn't play the game properly at the special class, because I didn't have a toy for her (we just used a marker word and treats). But tonight Kaline was all rambunctious, so we went down to play fetch, and I got the marvelous idea of playing the drop game with him.

He caught on really fast that raising my hand means I want him to lie down (he's also pretty much got it that the verbal cue, regardless of hand signal, means down). So I'd pretend to throw the toy, then shoot my hand in the air, give the verbal cue, and he'd drop. And then you throw the toy behind them, they fetch it, and you start the game again. It worked like a charm! We had a great time and he got re-tired out. (Re-tired because they had three pack walks in the morning.)

On our third pack walk, a pretty one.

The pups have basically been chilling today since the walks, except for the fetch session with Kaline. He was awesome at our tdoc appointment, settling nearly as fast as Juno!

At our tdoc appointment (the office is dog friendly, so they only wear vests occasionally).

Oh, and I will post a video of this at some point: Kaline chews hard things like an old man with bad dentures, and it is hilarious. It's because he's losing and growing teeth all the time. His lower jaw does this funny quivering thing as he tries to get the food between whatever teeth are available. My mom does an excellent impression of it.

Horses, ponies, grocery store, and other fun things!

Kaline finally got some good exposure to horses yesterday. We live about 30 minutes (walking) from the Menlo Circus Club, which has a big charity horse show each year. After the two morning walks and a nap, I took the pups over there to see the horses.

Five-pack waiting for their treats at Mills Florist on University Avenue in the morning.

It turned out that it was just a warmup day, so we didn't have to pay admission. It's a dog friendly event, they just have to be on leash. (Should be common sense, having dogs on leash around a ton of horses, but some people are idiots. There's a big sign as you walk in that if your dog is loose, they'll call the SPCA to come pick him/her up.) The big polo field was divided into several smaller rings, with shady corridors in between with bleachers in them. We went in the first corridor and plopped down in the cool grass.

 On one side were the big jumps, and on the other side people were just putting their horses through their paces. Horses would come cantering by fairly regularly on the jumping side. At first, every time Kaline heard thundering hooves he'd startle. I kept treating him for lying down, for looking calmly at horses, anything good. Pretty soon, a fast-moving horse didn't concern him. Two people just let their horses stand, hanging out, near the dogs, which was also great.

Once Kaline was calmly lying down and not paying much mind to the horses, I kind of got to enjoy myself looking at them. In middle school and high school, I used to ride and work with horses (I liked working with them on the ground much more than riding). So I miss them a bit, especially the way they smell. And these horses were just gorgeous. I was especially taken with this exquisite pony. I guess normally I expect ponies to be little chunky, shaggy, somewhat ungainly creatures; this pony was just a small horse. Delicate legs, a gleaming coat, and a fine and sensitive face. So, so pretty.

Pony from far away.

After about half an hour, Juno had had enough and was whining softly (she is still not completely convinced that horses are not enormous dogs). Kaline was a little antsy, too. So off we went back home.

We ended up going out to dinner at Milagros. We ate outside, because there really wasn't sufficient space for the dogs to both be inside. They still went vested, so Kaline would have a signal that it was work time. There were many crushed tortilla chips under our table, so I spent about fifteen minutes not paying attention to anything but Kaline, and trying to redirect him off the chips. Eventually he curled up nicely on his mat, facing away from the crumbs. He will get the hang of this!

The Milagros patio is very pretty.

Training today went really well. I got to work Kaline briefly on a ton of different commands. The only thing we're really struggling on outside is the recall—he can count, I'm convinced. Three recalls, when it's warm outside, and then he is done. On those first three, at least, he is coming in closer, not rocking back as much, and sitting a bit straighter. After three, he'll come in grudgingly, won't sit, and won't even make eye contact. Maybe when the weather cools off, and his attention span gets bigger. Plus, my new bait bags just came, and they have hidden pockets where you can keep super high value treats separate from the rest. Maybe I'll start taking some hot dogs or something, just for recalls.

Other than recalls, he was great. We worked on heeling—right and left turns, about turns both ways, five-step halts, quarter-turns in place. We did remote sits and downs; I think he's ready for me to start separating the verbal cue and the hand signal. We did touch, both hands, with him having to take several steps to get to my hand. For fun, we also did "high five" and "other hand." Last we worked on stand, and I was actually able to stand up and move around him without him moving any of his feet! And he maintained eye contact! Very exciting. A solid stand is key for blocking, which Kaline will need to do when he gets bigger (blocking = standing in a designated position relative to me to keep strangers out of my personal space/keep them from sneaking up on me).

Juno did heeling and off-leash long recalls, which are always great fun. She finally got to do the flyball jumping (four low jumps in a row). Once she was doing all four, running to me at the other end, we started working on getting her to go out and get the dumbbell. This proved to be harder than expected. I think it's partially due to Juno's eyesight, which is good but not great. She's also not a trained retriever—she's locked on my face, while you can tell the trained retrievers to "mark" and they'll pay attention to where the bumper/dumbbell lands.

So we backed off a bit. I put the dumbbell in her mouth, then went to the other end of the jumps and had her do the jumps with it in her mouth. Then I stood with her and only threw the dumbbell over one jump, sending her while it was in the air. She has a much easier time if you send her while the dumbbell is still moving. She did fine on that, so then I threw it over two jumps and she did that too. Then we decided she'd jumped enough for one day!

Kaline and Juno both did nice Kumbayayas with the crazy doodles, plus Peter the Poodle, who has come incredibly far in his training. (Speaking of doodles, Freddie just found out that some idiots calling themselves "breeders" are now producing—I won't say breeding, because that implies actual thought of a breed's well-being—things called "double doodles," Lab x Poodles combined with Golden Retriever x Poodles. How insanely dumb can you get.)

On the way home, I got a call that we needed eggs, so Kaline's first grocery store outing happened. I usually like to plan such firsts, but it went fine. He peed before we went in, and pretty much held his focus the whole time. He was fine with the cold aisle where the eggs were and sat nicely next to Juno while I picked a box.

Kaline being a focused, good little boy in Draeger's.

 Our only issue was waiting in line to check out. Kaline was sitting next to me in heel position, with Juno blocking behind me. Suddenly this woman came up and in an injured voice said, "I can't touch them?" Well, no, that's kind of why both dogs are covered in patches saying that very thing. I tried to be nice, explaining that they were working and that I was training the puppy. She smiled and nodded—and as soon as my back was turned, leaned down to Juno-face-level and said, "I can't touch you—but I can talk to you!" I was so tempted to say something snarky, but by then our eggs were paid for and we could just walk away. The pups actually did a decent job of ignoring her. Pissed me off a bunch though. Perhaps after this training entry I will post a wee rant. Grin.