May Day Ten -- This Again?

When I started to do "Puppy Push Ups" with Sia today, she looked at me like, "You're kidding, that's kids' stuff." Puppy push ups are exercises you do with puppies when they are first learning their sits and downs. Going quickly between the different commands helps the puppy get into those positions from a variety of positions (frequently "stand" is thrown into the mix as well). Clearly Sia already knows these well.

But now that she's a little bit older, we can through some twists and turns in to make it more challenging for her. This will fit in perfectly with what we've been working on over the last week and a half!

Now we can work on in with distractions nearby. Not only that, but we can interrupt play and ask for a quick down, sit, down, sit, down and then release. Sinbad is happy to be the distraction because he knows he will get to play with her when she is released to play. It's hard work, but someone has to do it.

Sia and Chase can also do their push ups in tandem. Clever girl...

And we can do group push ups. So it's not just exercises to do with the very young but, with a few twists, it can increase the level of difficulty to an appropriate level. Sia is becoming so much more responsive even when there are a lot of distracting things going on.

Of course, let's not forget a nice play session with Chase to reward everyone for their good, hard work!

Sia says "None of that baby stuff for my leash walking!" Sia is doing great with her leash skills. She walks very nicely right next to me giving me lots of really nice eye contact. There are times when it is difficult for her to walk towards something (like walking up to my house when she first gets here) but a few quick little u-turns helps to remind her where she is suppose to be.

May Day Nine -- Control Youself

Sia's Achilles’ heel is her self control. It can be such a challenge for her but she always tries so hard. One of her impulses is to grab what she pleases. A tug toy in one's hand seems to really test Sia. But we've been working hard on waiting for permission to grab things out of my hand. It pays off well for her to do so.

She loves to play tug and she knows I will play with her only if she waits for an invite. Try to grab it out of my hand without an invite? Oh, too bad, toy is put away. This works well for her too if she doesn't drop when asked to do so. I'm sorry, we're done playing. That drives her crazy and she learns very quickly what the rules are if she wants to continue playing.

Another big challenge for her is when I walk by with the cat food bowl. Of course I don't want to give her cat food as a reward so I instead use a lot of praise and talk to her while I'm carrying the bowl. If she jumps up, oh, too bad, a quick time-out. She would much rather follow me sniffing that stinky cat food than being in a time-out. Maybe the cat will even let Sia lick her ears if she's really nice...

Some of the things we have worked on this week overlap. Establishing leadership with a dog sometimes looks a lot like teaching self-control. By using body blocks at places such as the doorway, you are teaching Sia to control her actions on her own. It's much easier than having to physically restrain her and she starts to realize she's not the one calling the shots.

Good leadership and self-control start to spill into other areas of her life as well (how nice that it's a bit contagious!). Her barking has been minimal and easily redirected at first bark with a "That's enough" and a quick peak out the window to show her that I see what she is barking at and let her know that I've got it handled.

And soon she's pudding in your hand. Well, maybe it's not that easy, but over time you will start to see some really nice changes as Sia learns to control some of the impulses. And the best part is you don't lose that gleeful enthusiasm that she exudes.

May Day Eight -- The Things I Love About Sia

I woke up this morning and wondered what our "theme" for the day would be. I try to have a theme for the pictures in the blog to help tell the story of our training. The first thing that popped into my mind was, "The things I love about Sia!" And then I second guessed myself and thought, "What does that really have to do with training?" As the day wore on and I thought about it more, I realized it had a lot to do with training. First of all, enjoying the dog you are working with helps to put you in that place where you and the dog are having fun working together. This keeps the dog and the human engaged. Secondly, figuring out a dogs' strengths allows me to focus in on that during training to help increase the successes. Thirdly, finding what a dog enjoys gives more opportunities to reward behavior.

So here are just a few things I love about Sia:

I love when I say no to her in a calm voice, she stops what she is doing and comes over and licks my ear. Sinbad had to be my model for this because I couldn't manage to get a picture when she does it to me.

I love that Sia will settle even when there is a lot going on around her. Sometimes this is hard for her but she gets better and better every day.

I love Sia's nose and how she uses it to explore her world. She's so curious and adventuresome. Knowing this allows me to use exploring her environment as a reward for her. Walk nicely with me for several feet and you can be rewarded by being allowed to sniff around in a bush. Stay in your down for a couple of minutes, then you can go say "hi" and sniff the cat. What a great thing to let the nose lead for a bit.

I love that Sia takes the most care of the loudest toy in the toy basket and doesn't tire of making it squeak. I also love that she will readily give it up for a minute while I make a quick phone call.

And I love that she will happily share her favorite toy with any one of the other dogs.

I especially love that she likes to be so close. It's fun to snuggle with her and makes for an easy reward when she likes that contact so much. It's no wonder I woke up this morning thinking our theme for the day should be "The Things I Love About Sia!"

May Day Seven -- Where You Lead...

It's common in adolescence for dogs to start to figure out what their role is in the family. It's important that we make it clear to the dog that the leadership role, that's already taken. You don't need to fill that role, Sia. Working on her stays is one way to help to establish that leadership. So is the follow through when she doesn't comply. It's easy to give up the fight and say "Oh forget it, she's not going to do it." and walk away. But that starts to establish a pattern with her and she starts to get the idea that she's the Boss.

Practicing sits and downs throughout the day, even when she's busy doing something else not only helps her with her self-control but also lets her know you are in charge. She's been doing really well shifting off to one hip in her downs showing that she is settling in more and not ready to leap up as soon as the thought crosses her mind.

We are also doing a lot of waiting at doors. She need not charge through and push her way in. One of the nice things about being a good leader though is you don't need to be loud or forceful. In fact, if you find yourself having to do that, it's a good indication that something is lacking in the leadership department.

But a simple body block speaks volumes to Sia. As she tries to go through the doorway, just moving your body in front of hers and blocking her access is enough to get her to back off. At that point you are controlling the space. Dogs listen to body language much more than they do words.

Probably one of the most challenging things to do to establish leadership is to avoid slipping into the mindless petting. This can be VERY hard. She's so sweet. It doesn't mean you can't ever randomly pet her, it just means that you should avoid letting her demand that attention. Have her come to you if you want to pet her or have her do a sit before you pet her. Your attention is a resource to her and as the leader, you control the resources.

Leadership is about your relationship with Sia. The things you do to establish that relationship are subtle and small but they make a world of difference.

When you are the leader, you can teach Sia that it's not her job to defend the homestead. You've got that covered...

May Day Six -- Pleased to Meet Your Acquaintance

Sia met several new friends today at a BBQ. Artie was her favorite canine friend.

They played together, they ran together...

And they explored together. But Sia didn't come with me just to play...there is always work disguised in there.

I armed everyone there with a little bit of cheese and we worked on greetings over and over again. So as she approached people when she sat, she got a little tiny piece of cheese and a lot of praise and pets.

We practiced with different people.

We practiced with distractions. Over and over again. Not only did she get a lot of practice in but she never once jumped on anyone. Good girl!

It's hard work to think and process. She has to decide what behavior will pay off for her and with her mind racing as fast as it does sometimes, she has to process that information very quickly. So to balance out all that hard work, we definitely left time for Sia to explore and be a dog.

It's a successful day when her tongue is hanging and no one has paw prints on their clothes. She will sleep well...

May Day Five -- Quiet Time

Sia is such a busy girl with all sorts of things running through her head throughout the day. It's unrealistic to think we could ever keep up with her or provide enough activities if she was going full force all day long. But luckily she doesn't go full force all day long but she still needs practice going from the state of high activity to low activity and calmness.

Learning to stop activity and settle does not come easy for Sia. She loves to be on the go. So it's something we practice a lot. It helps her with her stays and it's helpful when she's in a situation where it's not appropriate to be the party girl.

Part of how she is rewarded for this behavior is by receiving the physical contact from people. She loves to be close and it's a great way to reinforce her quiet, calm behavior.

Long, slow strokes will help her settle down. Gentle massages and a quiet, soothing tone of voice will help bring her to that quiet, more peaceful state.

Setting small boundaries like this with her where you are establishing your leadership and direction helps her to rely more on you for making sure all is well in her world.

She will still get distracted but she'll be able to come to a more settled state much more quickly and easily.

She will probably always be the one who goes up and down the stairs a dozen times while she's waiting for my slow, pokey labs to make their way up the stairs but being able to relax easily in a variety of situations will help her to be much more content.

May Day Four -- Operation Love My Crate

We've been working hard on getting Sia more excited about going in her crate. We practice this both at times when she needs to be crated for a little while (like when I need to run to the store) and when she doesn't need to be crated. I start out by hiding treats in her kennel when she's not looking.

Determined to get those treats, she finds a way in the crate.

After she finds her way in and finds her treats, she settles down. This was just a practice session so as soon as she is all settled, I release her from the kennel.

Before Sia spends time in her crate, I try to make sure she's had some good exercise before hand so she doesn't have a bunch of pent up energy while she's confined to a small space.

It seems like I've got a lot of pictures of Sia passing Sinbad on the ramp.

Not to worry, they are not trying to avoid each other. They like to play quite a bit (although, I'll admit, Sia and Rosario are the best of friends). Rosario is a pretty low energy dog and she tries so hard to keep up with Sia.

But Sia never gives up on Healey. She loves her so. I think she knows she will finally get through to her and it won't be long before Healey is playing with her.

And speaking of friends, Sia met all sorts of new people when we went out to dinner at an outside restaurant. Some people she knew from previous visits so she could show them how big she's gotten. Others were strangers who helped us practice calm greetings (and, of course, she soaked up all of them telling her how beautiful she is). It was hard for her to settle here and she seemed a combination of a little excited and a little nervous which is what I've experienced with her in situations like this before.

So when it started to thunder, we decided to end this trip on a good note and head home. She did well with the thunder but she was very alert. I wanted to make sure the combination of the thunder and the new environment wasn't too much for her. It can be easy for dogs to associate one thing with the other (for example, I was meeting all these new interesting people and then a loud noise happened...those people must be scary). I kept things light and kept her engaged with me and she did great! No surprise there...what a girl.

May Day Three -- Patience

Sia is doing so well offering appropriate behaviors to get what she wants. I rarely have to remind her to sit before she comes inside, before she gets her meals, or before I put her leash on. We're paying extra attention to her greetings so she still gets reminders with that...but she's also offer the sit a lot for attention as well.

It's not easy for her sometimes. She's a pretty intense girl with a lot of things to do in her world. She would much rather run and play most of the day but there are times when she needs to work.

It's especially hard when there are distractions. She needs a few more reminders, more frequent rewards and most definitely consistency. Not only does she need patience but so does her handler. I need to be sure I'm waiting her out and being persistent with her. Following through and helping her comply will give her the structure that all of you need.

And the best reward? It depends on Sia and it depends on the moment. When Rosario was providing a distraction and she held her stay, playing with Rosario was the ultimate reward.

If it's mealtime, the ultimate reward might be her dinner bowl. By the way, I can tell you all have been consistent with her training around her meals. Her self control at mealtime is much improved! Nice job!!

As a side note, it is easy for tension to build when food bowls and multiple dogs are involved. I am sure to feed them far enough away so they are still very comfortable and I am right there to intervene if one dog starts to approach another dog's area. I feed in small numbers so I don't have many dogs to monitor all at once. Sia does not show any signs of tension with people or dogs around the food bowl, but that doesn't mean I would do anything that might cause tension for her.

Even water can be a resource but I know these dogs well and know that they can handle sharing the water bowl.

Poor Sia...she's not use to sharing her water bowl with all these labs.

She is much happier when she gets some alone time at the water dish.

Well, we must have worked hard today because her head has fallen off the dog bed and she's snoring quite loudly. Rest up, Sia, there is more work to be done tomorrow...