Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Sharing the Moment

I'm running another session of the basic obedience class. I try to limit the class to eight handlers and dogs but for a variety of reasons, enrollment in this one crept up to 10 before I told Community Education "no more!"

It's a fun group of handlers this time with some very interesting dogs. My agility friend MH dropped by last week and was amazed at the variety of dogs: two cocker spaniels (siblings), a Cavalier spaniel, a variety of terrier mixes of various size and hairiness, a "desert dog" saluki mix, a husky (in Saudi Arabia, of all things), a wire fox terrier (named Seamus; he's very cute), and a Rhodesian ridgeback.

The ridgeback, a bitch puppy about 9 months old, is named Sinuk. It is hard to look at her and think "puppy" because she is a massive animal. Then you see her move and you realize, oh, yeah, puppy, just gigantic and powerful! Sinuk has a wonderful personality, very open, friendly, and curious, which is not how I've generally perceived ridgebacks to be. She's also got lovely conformation.

Sinuk's family apparently had done some training with her. This trainer told them that they had to use a heavy metal choke collar and leash corrections. They walked in the door and I saw a pup with no self discipline or control who ignored her family for the most part. Those leash corrections were as effective in changing Sinuk's behavior, or even getting her attention, as a fly on an elephant's back. But a dog that powerful does require firm handling. Still, as you all know, firm doesn't mean punitive. More than anything, it means consistent. And that choke chain had to go!

It took me a couple of weeks to convince them that leash corrections were a battle they were never going to win, especially once Sinuk filled out with her adult musculature.

To my great pleasure, they have been doing all of their homework...and even though I already know that positive training works, it was nice to hear them reporting significant improvements in Sinuk's behavior. For example, the mom emailed me a couple of weeks ago to report that she was able to recall Sinuk back to her for a hand touch...even though Sinuk was taking off to chase some feral dogs. She said she nearly fell over because Sinuk had never come when called before. Now that's a demonstration of the power of reinforcement (I introduce the hand touch game in the first week of class).

Last week, Sinuk was particularly wild in class. The weather was unsettled and some of the other dogs were acting up a bit too. Also, most of the dogs quickly become comfortable in class and do things that they might not do the first couple of weeks when they are still scoping the scene. I anticipate this and don't get too wound up about it. Dogs are animals. They have their own agendas sometimes. I respect that and work around it. Plus, I've found that if I help the owners stay patient and consistent, the dogs usually settle down. In class, I usually spend much more time watching the owners anyway.

After Sinuk's happy day in class (happy for Sinuk, a bit frustrating for her owner), this email was waiting for me when I got to work a couple of days later:
Soo, I think I figured out why Sanuk was such a maniac today..... So far today she has shredded her blanket, eaten a tennis ball (literally shredded it leaving teeny tiny rubber bits allll over the house), whipped her ball on a string across the room and knocked over a lamp, turned over every carpet in the house and gotten stuck under my bed requires extreme extrication measures. This is AFTER an 8km run this morning....
My daughter bought a small bag of sugar cane from the commissary the other day, and apparently left it within Sanuks reach- I went to clean out the shredded blanket out of her bed and there it was- a whole bag of chewed up sugar cane. Just waiting for the crash.......
Frickin' hysterical, especially when you remember Sinuk weighs around 100 lbs and can put her front paws on my shoulders.
 
There are lots of subtexts to explore here but I'll just focus on two. First, my goal is to help owners understand their dogs a bit better than before they took my class. Not to brag, but I usually succeed more often than not. Of course not every dog and owner who takes my class becomes an obedience success story. I aim for a different target: dogs who pay attention to their owners and owners who pay attention to their dogs. Everyone ends up a bit happier.

The second subtext is that owners now experience these events such as Sinuk's crazy day, notice them and think about them, when before they may have just gotten mad or ignored the dog, and then take the time to share the stories with me because they know that something significant has happened, good or bad. 
 
And this is why I teach the dog classes, including the agility class. It's about sharing the joy of the moment with dogs and their handlers.

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