Training opportunities

Kaline at 16 weeks!

 First things first: Sixteen-week-old Kaline finally got his last set of shots! I am super stoked about this for reasons I don't think I should put on a blog ... If inquiring minds want to know, PM me. He did fine at the vet—was fairly stoic for his DHPP shot, and then wriggled a little about the rabies vaccination. He also (sort of) met Dr. Ulla's beautiful big black and rust Doberman, Anchor. Anchor has some leash reactivity, so they didn't actually get to sniff or anything. Anchor barked, and Kaline got treats for not barking back, and for watching me and ignoring Anchor, and for coming toward me and away from Anchor.

Which leads ever so nicely into what I wanted to write about, training opportunities! I try (unfortunately I don't always succeed!) to view pretty much everything that happens as a training opportunity. It's a lot easier to do when I am carrying my bait bag, so I've been putting that on pretty much every time we go outside. It really helps to see the world in general in a more positive way.

I actually got excited today when I was out with a four-pack in Palo Alto, and saw a woman coming along the sidewalk with what looked like two Chow mixes (or full Chows, I don't know). Clearly they were walking her, and they were staring daggers at my dogs. She saw my dogs and took an extra few wraps of leash around each of her hands.

Practically grinning with delight, I sidled my four off the main part of the sidewalk and right up next to a store's front window. I was ready with the bait bag, all four were maintaining excellent eye contact, and I was just thinking, YES! We are going to have a great reinforcement of how we don't interact with this kind of energy!

Then I realized I'd been standing there for much longer than it should've taken for the dogs to pass us. They'd crossed the street. Drat.

It's so confidence-building to see everything as an opportunity to reinforce what you want from your dog(s). I get happy when we come across barking dogs in cars or behind fences, skateboards on the sidewalk, hissing garbage trucks, creaking buses (or is it busses?), or people using various potentially scary (to dogs) mobility aids. Instead of seeing these things as things to avoid and protect the dogs from, I can see them as a chance to show them how I want them to react—and to show them that when such scary things happen, they're not actually scary, because they mean cookies.

A side note: You may remember that Juno and I won a super-awesome tag from Jen and Elka! Well, I finally got around to doing a wee photoshoot with Juno today. If you like one of the photos more than the others, let me know! I'll probably choose one for the custom tag by Wednesday or Thursday. And yes, the tag will be going on the wide 2HoundsDesigns collar Juno is wearing in the photos.

Some of the photoshoot contenders:

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Twelve weeks old!

Today Kaline turned twelve weeks old! How exciting. He went and got his second set of shots, which I was super stoked about ... and then the vet said I should still wait another two weeks to take Kaline on the big pack walks and such. Argh. I have a lot of walks with this one dog, however, who lives in a beautiful, quiet neighborhood, and I generally have to walk him by himself because he's a bit of a spaz, so Kaline will be able to go along for those walks. No treks to downtown Menlo Park or Palo Alto yet though.

Our big exposure for today was the train station. I thought I was so prepared—I checked the schedule when we got to the station, and in a few minutes there would be a northbound train stopping. We were on the southbound side, so the train would be kind of distant and it would be slow, plus Juno couldn't care less about trains no matter what they do, so she would provide a great example for the wee one.

I didn't factor in the express.

We were just hanging out on our bench when a southbound express (our side of the tracks) came whooshing through. I was not expecting it, and obviously neither was Kaline! Juno stood there as though nothing out of the ordinary was happening, and her wee brother scooted under our bench until the bad nasty train went away. I felt so awful. Poor little man!

Nonetheless, I waited for the “good” train, and while we were waiting, Kaline finally got to meet a person on a bike. I still am on the fence about Kaline and bikes: is he scared of them, or just very interested? After asking permission, I let Kaline sniff this guy's bike all over, and meet the guy himself, of course. After a few minutes, the next train came through, the one I'd been planning on. Kaline sat between my feet and shook a little while I rubbed his chest. He didn't whine or try to run away though, and he definitely recovered his happy-go-lucky-ness very quickly.

Trains: Another thing to keep working on.