Last night we drove the Gator out to watch a dog class. Fabulous boy! He lunged once from his King Seat but I touched him and he turned back for a treat. From then on he lay quietly watching them. I gave him a kibble every time he turned back to look at me, but left him alone to watch the other dogs. Some of them barked at him but he didn’t care. “King Schnauzer here, peasant! Go about your business!”
We worked some more of the Levels. He mostly got his 5 seconds of duration on hand Zen and we did a bit of open-hand Zen. I switched hands on the Touch – left hand to touch, right hand to dish out kibble – and he mostly had stopped trying to eat both hands. He’s understanding that he has to move away from the treat hand to touch the target hand, though that’s hard to remember. Sit on a signal, good. Still luring down. We’ve done some solo comes now that he understands my throwing gesture to mean that a treat might be landing over THERE somewhere.
This morning I gave him a treat ball that drops kibble when he pushes it. He pushed it near his crate, kibble fell out, and he was thrilled. So now he’s pushing his crate all over the living room obviously hoping for a ham to fall out, or a turkey or other roast beast.
Different toys for different boys… I have an old leftover Giant toy made from firehose. It’s been out in the far reaches of the dog yard for 15 years as the Porties don’t recognize it as a toy – they like the soft sucky plush ones. He picked it up and brought it in and now it’s his Very Favourite. Second-best is the toy that you put empty large pop bottles in so he can crush them between his might jaws with a satisfying crunching noise.
I think I’ll clean and medicate his ears one more time and then post them up again. They’re starting to go in odd unpleasant directions.