Reactive dog class 2
We’ve had sort of a rough few days. Amika hasn’t been 100% and I’ve been suffering from bad moods due to life’s worries. Those two are probably related! But despite this, and getting stuck on Roe Highway for 20 minutes and being 10 minutes late, we did good.
Class was getting underway when we arrived, and Amika was hyped just getting out of the car. Our trainer came to say ‘hi’ and got the full tilt Amika “eee!” greeting. We’ve been sending e-mail back and forth since last week and I like her approach to training dogs. One of the big stresses for me around experienced ‘dog people’ has been having to turn down advice or instructions and getting those disapproving looks and comments. I am a grade A wuss when it comes to even slight conflict with people. We’re now part of a class run by someone who works with the dogs as individuals / is flexible and is and open to new stuff. Phew, relief!!
I kind of expected Amika to be worse this week rather than better, but it is still frustrating to see. I gave her a break in the car after just a few minutes, as she was barking at the other dogs from the car park. After a couple minutes down time and a drink, she was a bit better.
The class wanted to practice walking on the road (like, taking the dog for a walk) so Amika and I had the oval mostly all to ourselves for a bit. Just walking with her, she had trouble doing basic stuff. I let her do lots of sniffing, and when she did start getting her brain back we did lots of “look at that” and “give me a break” (LAT and GMAB from Control Unleashed). I judged it was about time for another break so headed back to the car – as the class was headed in from their street walk. So she reacted a bit before I got her into the car. Of course, she protested once there, but not in an over-the-top manner.
Once the class was settled back on the oval (and the dogs were doing really well), I got Amika out again. This time, I brought out her dinner in an icecream container with the spoon. I stopped at the fence by the car park, and she barked at the class a few times, but was mostly attentive. When they moved further out, I moved to the edge of the oval and sat down. Amika was really good playing LAT for a while, but when the other dogs started moving around more, she did jump to her feet and bark. Each time, she calmed herself enough to come back, lie or sit, and get more dinner. So I was pushing it a bit. Some of the time she did great, other times she reacted. What is really good is that she isn’t throwing herself at the end of the leash. Her barking is excited, but not of the intensity that I remember in past circumstances.
Despite wanting to join in the class, I called it quits while we were ahead. She’d done well in difficult circumstances (extra adrenaline, lower threshold, whatever). On the way back to the car, I got some extremely attentive heeling. It seems that she had gotten more comfortable with the class behind us, since sausage was that good again. Back in the car, I had to put the blanket over her crate so she couldn’t see other dogs loading up, but this time she made a token complaint and settled. Tired dog, full belly, good night.
As a nice bonus, I’ve borrowed a dog book for the week, and got an idea on how to get calming signals from Amika: try pretending to cry. I’m laughing just thinking about it, but will certainly try turning on the water works and see what Amika does. Thanks Shelah, you’re a star! (I’ve been hanging out for more dog reading too!) I’ll return “Fight!” and loan my copy of “Control Unleashed” next week. Which I’m looking forward to, again.
