Educating Darcy

Darcy's calming signals

2012-01-26T07:06:00.000-08:00

One thing Darcy doesn't like is being in an enclosed space. Even when it is me, she gets a little nervous. Unfortunately to go to our backyard she needs to go through a space that puts her in the social space of people (because we have to open the door). With people she doesn't know well she will not go at all. With us she gives crazy calming signals to show that she doesn't like the situation. Once she is outside she is happy as a clam. But getting there is the battle. Here is a video and a list of the calming signals she exhibits:

00:00:18 - Shake off
00:00:19 - Lip lick
00:00:21 - Look away
00:00:22 - Stretch
00:00:25 - Lip lick
00:00:26 - Walk away
00:00:34 - Lip lick
00:00:40 - Stretch
00:00:42 - Lip lick
00:00:44 - Yawn

Can you find any more?

Canine Good Citizen Practice

2012-01-18T07:36:00.000-08:00

When we work with dogs beyond basic obedience one of our main focuses is often getting the dog their Canine Good Citizen certificate. The CGC is an AKC developed test that determines if a dog is a "good member of the canine community". The widest use I find for it is going into therapy work but even if owners are not planning on that, all the steps of the test are behaviors that most owners in an urban environment would like their pups to be able to do. To help our students practice for the test and to educate more people about the test we did some brief videos to outline what is required in each step. Please note: these are intended to be information for practice. We are using treats which is not allowed in the test. But to get a dog to work as hard as they need to in order to pass this test we need to give them a paycheck!

CGC #1: Accepting a friendly stranger

CGC #2: Sitting politely for petting

CGC #3: Appearance and Grooming

CGC #4 and #5: Out for a walk and walking through a crowd
Since we did this in my home we didn't have much room or a crowd to work on these steps!

CGC #6 and #7: Sit, Down, Stay and coming when called

CGC #8: Reaction to another dog

CGC #9: Reaction to a distraction

CGC #10: Supervised separation
Since the only people around were family members we couldn't do Supervised Separation with our dog!

August 6th, 2011

2011-08-06T18:57:00.000-07:00

I love catching "funny" behavior in my dogs. In this video I am annoying Darcy and she starts barking at me. When she is in a certain mood she hates it when I stare at her (most dogs don't like this anyway), make funny faces at her and then gasp when she barks. Something else to notice in this video is that she is pretty conflicted. She is telling me off (barking, ears back, tail wagging) but she also does a lip lick at 24 seconds and is often looking away which means she nervous and doesn't want to start conflict. Just goes to show that you have to take in to account the whole dog rather than just a specific behavior.

May 31st, 2011 - Nose Work

2011-05-31T13:44:00.000-07:00

Our clients are always looking for easy ways to entertain their dogs so here is a simple nose work game that any dog with a sense of smell can do! I'm just putting a few treats in a box (always the same box) and mixing up the boxes so Darcy has to find it. It's a great way to get some energy out of your pup without a lot of work on your part!

Resource guarding - the good, the bad and the Darcy

2011-04-14T15:40:00.000-07:00

Lately we have been making some changes to our web site here at Collins Canine are would like to utilize our blog to help get more information out to people. Our highest priority is to keep dogs in a home and we feel that education is a crucial part in that effort. To help with that we are going to start posting some more general training information here. For those of you looking for a Darcy fix, a lot of the pictures and video will still have her in them.

To start out with I want to post some videos of "good" behavior. Here are some videos of both my dogs around different resources. We have always worked with a lot of dogs that have resource guarding issues and found that it is often helpful to see some dogs that do not guard resources. In these videos I use both my actual hand and what we call an Asses-a-Hand. As trainers we often use this devise so we don't risk getting bit ourselves. One other note on these videos - they were taken by my five year old son so they are a bit wobbly and have a bit of a commentary. When I made these we had an urgent need so he was the only one around. But it does bring up a good discussion relating to this topic and children. Resource guarding is a very serious issue in general but it is something that children should never be around. Kids usually have a very hard time recognizing when they should not be around the dog so relying on the child to keep away from a dog when they have a resource is a recipe for disaster. When kids are around they often carry around food or have toys that the dog may decide is his or hers. When we are working with a dog that has any sort of resource guarding issues one of our first questions is if the dog will ever be around kids because it will have a huge impact on what we need to set as our goals. While neither of my dogs ever had any issues we resources it is something that we still worked on extensively. Only because of this would I allow my son to be in this situation.

Here is a video of Bella, our ten year old Rottweiler around her food. She likes her food but isn't crazy about it. After we adopted her at a year old we did extensive work with resources since we knew she would be around kids at some point.

Here is a video of Darcy, our three year old Pit Bull and her food. She is food crazy and scarfs it down no matter what. She has never had issues with resources and since we adopted her we have not done as much work on resources as we did with Bella. Busy mom syndrome I guess...

This is a video of Bella with a rawhide. Both dogs love rawhides more than any other toy out there.

Lastly, here is Darcy with the rawhide. She does get a bit upset as evidenced by the hard stare she gives me when I grab the rawhide. She does relinquish it though.

August 9th, 2010

2010-08-09T19:31:00.000-07:00

Ahh, again the slacking. I guess I have not so much slacked on Darcy's training but on the writing about it. The end of summer is approaching so I am going to try to get back to writing as my son goes back to school. Darcy is on a pretty good routine but almost too good of a routine. I have been running so much with her that she actually recognized my running clothes. By the time I am tying my shoes she is bouncing off the walls. She has become a pretty good runner but as I discovered recently, she is REALLY good at running while I'm biking. I decided to try it one day (because I had a death wish?) and it went very well. I only have to take her about 1 1/2 miles to knock her out for the day. The really cool thing is seeing her actually running. Her natural gait for my running pace is a trot. When I'm booking on the bike she finally gets into a good gallop and it is a beautiful thing to see.

As far as training, we have still been doing agility though I think we might try flyball soon just for a change of pace. We have also been having one of my trainers, Amanda come over to work with Darcy. Amanda is who stays with the dogs when we go out of town so it is very important that Darcy is ok with her. I can't remember if I mentioned it before but Darcy has been having some fear issues with people in the home when I'm not around. My worst fear is that we will be on vacation and Amanda will call saying Darcy has cornered her in the den or something. But Amanda has been coming every week and just rewarding her as she walks around the house and she said it has been a while since Darcy had any issues. We have also had a DAP collar on her and Amanda said she has really seen a difference.
We are also starting to have the neighborhood kids come over to work with Darcy for the same issues. Not only are they regularly running in and out of our house but someday Justin will have friends his age coming over so I don't want her to have any issues with them. As I've learned from working with so many clients whose dogs are afraid of people coming in the home it takes a lot of work so we are starting now. I'm sure both her and Bella will know when it is someone coming in the house that shouldn't. And who would come in with a Pit Bull and a Rottie anyway? :)

4/28/10

2010-04-28T20:08:00.000-07:00

I'm in kind of a philosophical mood right now. The day started out volunteering at my son's preschool which I love doing. Today it was still fun but the kids were NUTS. Then we progressed into a difficult day with clients and other business controversy. The controversy followed me all the way to agility class today with Darcy so I was sure that it would be unproductive. I don't know if it was the low expectations I had or what but to my surprise we had the best class ever. Stacey had us do our first run with our arms plastered to our sides and with NO verbal cues. I'm Italian and do obedience training - I gesture wildly and talk to my dog. This was hard. But Darcy was a champ - I was amazed. Afterwards I was actually giddy with how exciting it was to see her run like that on so little communication from me. What Stacey made us realize is that we are often confusing them with all our flailing and chatter. It was so good to take a step back and trust my dog that she knows what to do.

That started me on a better trend of emotions. When I got home I started looking at some photographs made by my friend John Caruso and now I am centered. Thank you Stacey Hawk and John Caruso!

4/22/10

2010-04-22T13:06:00.000-07:00

Some are good days and some are bad. Sometimes even within a class things go from bad to good. For the last three weeks Darcy has been not feeling the agility class. She's run incredibly slowly or just balks at every obstacle. The first half of class last night was still the same. I reconsidered if I should continue doing agility with her since she just didn't seem to enjoy it. But then during the last run was a huge turn around. She ran like lightning and took all the obstacles (weave poles, wing jump, tunnel, tire and four jumps) like a champ. The whole class cheered as she finished. I can only imagine how it feels to have a good run like that in a competition!

As a little aside from my normal discussion about Darcy, I wanted to give people some good ideas for things to do to burn your dog's energy up that doesn't involve a lot of work on your part. Two reason I am thinking of this - one is that Darcy has a bit more energy as the only day care she was comfortable at, All For Doggies, just closed. And two is that I have been talking about these things to a lot of clients lately so I wanted something for them to reference. Here are some good ones:

1) Do Something Different Game: Involves getting the dog to continually perform a different behavior for a period of time. Check out earlier postings on this blog for a demo.

2) Treasure Hunt: Instead of putting your dog's food in a bowl, place small piles of it around the house so he or she has to "hunt" it down. Start out easy with the food in plain sight but you can eventually get to having the food in a room with the door ajar or under pillows or rugs. Obviously as long as the dog isn't eating the pillows or rugs!

3) Find Me Game: For this game your dog must either have a great Sit/Stay or you must have two or more people. Have the dog in a Sit/Stay or have one person hold the dog and the other people moves away to the other side of the room and calls "Find Me". When the dog reaches that other person he or she gets rewarded. Just like with the Treasure Hunt, start out easy but eventually you can be hiding in closets or behind furniture.

4) Three Card Money (sorta): Take three plastic cups (or playing cards if your dog won't eat them too) and put a treat under one of them. Move the cups around and then let them go. Your dog will undoubtedly find the treat though he or she might knock over all the cups to do it. It's a party pleaser regardless!

5) KONGS: Feeding all your dog's food in Kongs will use up mental energy in a positive manner which is always beneficial.

All these activities will burn up mental energy which is just as tiring as burning physical energy. The more energy burned throughout the day, the calmer and happier your dog will be!

April 12, 2010

2010-04-12T08:00:00.000-07:00

As happens with most people and training their dog, I too have slacked. Well, Darcy has still been in classes (just agility for now) but I haven't been good about keeping up with the information about her training. I am hoping to do that now.

Here's an update since November. Darcy and I have started volunteering for Safe Humane Chicago which we are very excited about. So far we have just gone to the orientation and gotten approved but we haven't attended any events yet.

The biggest news is that last night Darcy passed the Canine Good Citizen test! Yay! I am so proud of her!

Also as an update to previous training issues we've had with her. She hasn't destroyed anything since I wrote about the couch last (knock on wood!). We still have a bit of a problem with her getting things off the kitchen counter when we are gone but the worst we've lost is a loaf of bread. Not the best but it passed. Literally. Since it only happens when we are gone I think we just continue keeping edible things off the counter and maybe the habit will go away. It keeps our counters cleaner anyway so thank you, Darcy!

So I will try my best to keep this updated better! Hope you enjoy!

11/8

2009-11-08T18:41:00.000-08:00

Here's a new fun fact about Darcy - she can scale about a seven foot dog run. Great. After agility on Tuesday night we decided to have her board at Windy City so she could play on Wednesday and I would pick her up in the evening when we had basic obedience class with Janice. Apparently when one of the people from agility went to check on the dogs that were boarding before locking up on Tuesday night they heard a whining. When they got to Darcy's run she was perched at the top crying. Who knows how long she was up there! Well, they grabbed a few other people to help get her down and put her in a run that had a top. When I picked her up the next day she seemed fine. What an adventure!

11/1

2009-11-01T19:50:00.000-08:00

With the possible craziness of Halloween we decided to board Darcy from Friday to today so not much to report on those days except for the funny picture of Darcy showing her true form that Windy City sent us.

But prior to dropping her off Darcy threw me for a loop. My mother in law came into town on Thursday afternoon and Darcy proceeded to bark at her constantly. I tried to look at it as if I were looking at a client's dog but I couldn't figure out why she was doing it. At first I thought she was nervous so we started doling out treats but then I looked at her body language and she didn't seem scared. Then when Darcy crawled up in her lap and was fine it threw the fear thing out the window. The only thing it kind of reminded me of was when she did a little demand barking when she first came into the house. We stopped it quickly by ignoring her as soon as she made a peep but by the time I thought of this we were already planning on taking Darcy to Windy City so I didn't really test that theory. Regardless it was insanely annoying.

Friday was a rough day because of the barking, a busy day volunteering at my son's school and a little altercation with a neighbor (thankfully not dog related!) so when it came time to do an agility fun run that night I just didn't feel that connection with Darcy so we passed on it. My frustration level from the day was just too high that I thought being out there in front of everyone and having Darcy not respond would push me over the edge. Taking a step back now I should have separated training from all the crap of the day but I'm still human! :) We are starting a new obedience class with Janice Triptow this week so we'll have a new start then!

10/27

2009-10-27T13:14:00.000-07:00

Today we found a new talent that Darcy has. She can not only get herself out of the crate but if another dog is in the crate she can get them out too. Oh and she can open doors with knob handles. I left to take our son to school and go for a run so I put Bella in the crate and closed our office door. When I returned Bella was out of the kennel and the office door was open. With the office door open the girls helped themselves to the contents of my training bag which was a bag of treats (thankfully mostly empty) and a bag of rawhide chips (not so empty from what I remember). I guess we will just have to see if she continues to bust Bella out or if it was just luck. And I might have not shut the office door all the way. If that isn't the case I think we have to put the baby-proof door handles back up again just when our son grew out of them...

Another interesting event recently is that Darcy got her picture taken for the One Tail at a Time calendar and it scared the crap out of her. When we signed up to do it I was more worried that she would barrel around the studio knocking stuff over. As usual, she keeps me on my toes and would barely move at the shoot. Oh except to run away from the photographer and bark at her. Nice Pit Bull! They said they got some good pictures so we will hope so! Check out their web site when they are done so you can buy one and support the rescue pups!

10/2

2009-10-02T08:15:00.000-07:00

Here's a recap of the last week. Trick class on Saturday went well. One big difference between training Bella back in the day and what I'm experiencing training Darcy is that Bella offered up LOTS of different behaviors. She was always on the move. Darcy on the other hand, tends to just stick with one or two behaviors. The trainer in me knows that this is because she hasn't been trained before (or possibly wasn't trained with positive reinforcement) so she doesn't realize that she can get good stuff for more than just Sit and Down. For those of you wondering what positive reinforcement training has to do with not easily learning new commands here's the explanation. When a dog is trained using predominantly punishment (yelling, hitting, leash corrections, shocks...) the dog becomes afraid to try new things in fear that it may be the "wrong" behavior. Often dogs trained like this will for a while seem very well behaved because they just sit there but when you try to teach them anything else they are very reluctant because they don't know when they will get hurt.

So I've been trying to play the "do something new game" (not a good name I know!). This is where the owner just grabs a handful of insanely good treats and waits for the dog to do something different. The dog sits and gets a treat but if they sit again they get nothing. They have to do something different. That may be tilting their head, scratching their ear or even sniffing their butt. Once they get the idea that they can try different things it is much easier to train because they become creative. Here's a video of Darcy playing the game:
With Bella I remember often starting out teaching one behavior but she did something cute so we taught that instead.

On a different note, we are trying something new with leaving Darcy alone. We are trying her without the crate. Yikes! Suddenly she started freaking out in the crate again and now we can barely close the door on the crate because it is so bent out of shape. Unfortunately we can't even baby gate her into a room (which is what "trainer Lisa" would recommend) because she jumps or climbs over our gate. I've left her alone on the first floor twice now (once for over two hours!) and so far so good. I am very worried because the other day while I was home she chewed a 3 inch diameter hole in our living room couch. I think I will get one of those Kong launchers to keep her busy and we'll hope for the best. That is what the really educated trainers say - "hope for the best"! :)

9/25

2009-09-25T11:44:00.000-07:00

Darcy is getting on my nerves. No the best thing to say as a dog trainer but its true. She is always SO busy. Yesterday she chewed half the head off of Cutie Anna, one of my son's favorite stuffed dogs. We didn't tell him and thankfully we were able to find Cutie Anna II online and bought another. If anything chewable is on the floor it's fair game. Toys, shoes, papers... Oh and if anything is in the garbage that is her's too. We bought garbage cans with lids to thwart her from getting diapers and "feminine products" from the garbage and as she proved this morning she can open them. We have no idea if she put her paw on the little step to open it or nosed the lid open to get a dirty diaper and a box from a bar of soap but they ended up chewed and littered all over our bedroom floor.

If I were my trainer I would tell me to work with the dog. She will never get better if she doesn't learn what she is supposed to do. I join the many that don't listen to my advice... :)

9/22

2009-09-22T19:44:00.000-07:00

Today was a busy day for Darcy. Hopefully it will make her sleepy tomorrow! First we picked up Justin (our son) from school and she did markedly better in walking. I did remember treats this time but she really has no interest in them when we are outside. Too many squirrels to watch I guess.

When we got home Darcy and Bella had an INSANE play session in the backyard. I don't think I have ever seen them both that tired. They were cashed out on the couch for the rest of the day.

I finally got Darcy up to go to agility where she rocked. We did some simple courses but worked on some new concepts like getting the dogs to take a number of obstacles ahead of them even if you aren't next to them. Before that we did a course that involved both the "a frame" and the dog walk which have been a bit difficult for her. Last class she discovered the joys of the "a frame" but today she really got the dog walk. After multiple tries with me on one side, Polly the instructor on the other side and Kim at the end of the dog walk for her to target on she finally plowed over the thing. It is crazy how fast that dog is. She got to the top and then just left me in the dust. I was so proud of her!

Lastly Darcy stuck around after agility for Puppy Parties. Her boyfriend Capone, the Neopolitan Mastiff, was there so they played like maniacs. Here's an old video of them playing together:
Courtesy of Capone's blog Capone's House. We'll see tomorrow how resiliant she is!

9/21

2009-09-21T19:37:00.000-07:00

No work on Sunday since I was training other people's dogs for about twelve hours but Monday I took Darcy to pick up my son from school and she did great. The walking took a bit longer since we had to keep stopping when she pulled. I probably should have brought treats to help her stay focused on me. Even a trainer forgets!

All the other parents were interested in the new dog. I can't imagine what they think of me bringing first my Rottweiler and now my Pit Bull to preschool. The great thing was that his teachers thought she was very sweet so hopefully I can get to talking to them about using the dogs to teach the kids animal safety and things like that. A lot of the kids are extremely good aroung the dogs (asking if they can pet them and petting the dogs backs) but some just run up and pull on them. I know both Bella (our Rottie) and Darcy have no problem with it but many dogs would. I would also love to get both the dogs in the school for kids to practice reading to. Bella would love it since she adores kids. Darcy just likes everyone.

Anyway, not so much about training in today's post. Kind of sleepy and writing just train of thought stuff. Hopefully it's interesting... :)

9/19

2009-09-19T12:54:00.000-07:00

This week was a bit of a bust as far as training. My son and I were sick all week so not much was done with Darcy until today. One a good note we didn't have anything bad happen. One shoe was chewed but I've had them for about ten years now and haven't worn them in a VERY long time. They were about four inch wedge sandles which are not really conducive to dog training or being a mom.

Today we did start a trick class at The Anti Cruelty Society. Darcy did wonderfully. We learned Crawl, Sit Pretty, Back Up, Bow and Yes. We attempted to do Shake but she either layed down or chewed my knuckles off (I had a treat in my hand in hopes she would paw at my hand to get it out) so I didn't pursue it much. We are really trying to restrict her from jumping so any activity that gets her front paws off the ground is not so good. She barely did Sit Pretty (sitting up on her haunches) so we probably won't work on that one much either.

So you can see what she learned here is a video of her demonstrating her new skills:

9/14

2009-09-14T18:06:00.001-07:00

My day started today at just a little past midnight with my son coughing uncontrollably. That was off and on until 7am when we "officially" got out of bed. That kind of start is not the best mind set for training. BUT I actually did work Darcy a bit. My husband has been very annoyed with Darcy's dedicated interest in the garbage, the open dishwasher and my son's toys so I finally started working on the command "Leave It" with her this afternoon.

I put her on leash (for control), pulled the kitchen garbage out from under the sink and walked her towards it. When she was about a foot away I told her "Leave It" and then walked backwards away. It took me through the dining room and almost to the front door but eventually she turned around and looked at me which got her a click from the clicker and a tiny piece of string cheese. The next few times got a little better and after about eight times I couldn't get her to be within a few feet of the garbage. Of course the problem is when she is not on leash so I dared to try it with the leash dragging and with me stepping briefly out of the room. She made a relatively slow beeline to the garbage but I told her "Leave It" and picked up the leash and she looked at me and walked away. We then repeated all this with the open dishwasher with about the same response. We'll keep working and she if Cutie Anna, Poochie Woochie and Cookies (my son's stuffed dogs) will survive long enough for him to grow out of them.

We also had some good experiences with the kennel today. Two times in the kennel that were about 2-3 hours each and when we returned it was only moved a few inches and she seemed relatively calm. We are still doing two stuffed, frozen Kongs, a quarter cup of dog food sprinkled on the crate floor and the Comfort Zone but we will wean off those in time. No rush on that since she could still use a bit of weight on her!

9/13

2009-09-13T19:18:00.000-07:00

I was at work all day today but Darcy did manage to get into some mischief before I even left. Apparently my husband woke up to the wonderful smell of poo. That was a new one for Darcy! Thankfully that little present was not too messy considering what has been coming out of her last night and the rest of the day due to my over-salami'ing her at the CGC test yesterday. That on the bedroom carpet would not have been pretty!

Some time soon we really need to get the carpets replaced. But it brings up the age old question of when is a dog "fully" housebroken. I can say that I have no idea when that is. :(

9/12

2009-09-12T19:04:00.000-07:00

Well I won't keep you in suspense - we did NOT pass the CGC Test. We did prove my theory that the "Sit, Down, Stay" portion is what kills everyone. She would not lay down to save her life! She rocked the the first three tests which involve people approaching and/or interacting with her. We had a little stutter when we were doing the "Out For a Walk" because she wouldn't sit at the start. She doesn't really have to but she is so awful walking on leash that I needed every advantage I could get. We did it over again and she pulled but apparently that was not enough for us to need work. I think I would have failed her on that though!

She did great on walking through a crowd but then came the dreaded "Sit, Down, Stay". Her down has been shaky so I was practicing it the whole time we were waiting for our turn. When the evaluator came to us she suddenly found the ground the more interesting than ever. She just wouldn't stop sniffing! I finally got her into a sit but then she noticed the ceiling. I don't know what ACS does to their surfaces but it is fascinating to Darcy! When it was obvious she wasn't going to even look at me we did the coming when called which she aced. Then back to the evil "SDS" and the floor and ceiling took over her brain.

The evaluator went on with the test and she did a very good job. She started to cross in front of me to see the other dog in testing her reaction to another dog but she got back in line and did great. The other surprise was that she was good with the supervised separation. Apparently she just stared at the door I went out of. I guess her crate issues do revolve around the crate. We will try to let her out of the crate when we aren't home but I need a little more assurance that she will be fine since we have a brand new couch in the room she's in...

The great news is that two of our clients passed the test! Tito the Shih Tzu (pictured here) and Gracie the Dachshund. We are so proud of both of them! I guess it's true that those who can't do teach! :)

9/11

2009-09-11T18:50:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately not much training this week. I plead getting back from a trip and my son's first week of school as reasons for not keeping up with my plans. You can see how much it took out of us! It's really not the best timing to slack since tomorrow we are taking the Canine Good Citizen Test and she definitely needs practice. She was in the kennel a good amount and didn't move it much at all. We are still using the weights and the Comfort Zone but have stopped any kind of music. Maybe she really dislikes classical? Whatever makes her happy works for me!

9/8

2009-09-08T18:45:00.000-07:00

Just a little post today since I didn't get Darcy out of the kennel until after my class at about 8:30pm. But when I did get her out we did a "fun run" for agility with Stacey Hawk's class. She did two runs total. Her first one was a bit rough. Plus she took a dump in the middle of the ring though she had literally just gotten out of the kennel so I can't be upset with her about that. The second run was fantastic. I got my front cross in with ease, she didn't knock over any jumps and she took the A Frame like a champ. She's really starting to get her confidence with this and it is great to see!

9/3 through 9/7

2009-09-07T18:42:00.000-07:00

We are out of town now and won't pick up Darcy from the kennel until Tuesday, September 8th so not much to say about her training. We will see what kind of mental condition she is in when we pick her up!

While we are gone here is a picture of our son saying goodbye to his date for his uncle's wedding!

9/2

2009-09-02T18:37:00.000-07:00

We are leaving on our trip tomorrow and dropped Darcy off at Windy City tonight so there wasn't much time to train. I went through one hot dog in the kennel and pushed a tiny bit more time (paused about five seconds after walking ten steps away) and she only barked once. When she started barking I just put my hand on the door of the room she was in and waited for her to quiet for a split second. When she did that I burst in and let her out of the kennel.

She did have to be in the kennel again today and with the weights she moved it about three feet again. We'll see if we can get that down to nothing!

9/1

2009-09-01T18:30:00.000-07:00

In light of our issue with the kennel yesterday I vowed to work Darcy more on the crate training. Every day I am going to cut up a hot dog and she will get small handfuls of those thrown in the kennel throughout the day. I did this about five times throughout the day and she did well. I got to the point of locking the crate door, closing the door to the room she's in and walking about ten steps away. Then I would come right back and let her out.

When I did have to leave I tried blocking the kennel in the corner of the room with two 25 pound weights. Sometimes if dogs realize they can't move the kennel or break out of it they stop trying which calms them down. It helped a bit. She only moved it about three feet.

Tonight I confess that I skipped my agility graduation. We are going out of town for the Labor Day weekend so I had a bunch of last minute things to do. One of those was to get a pedicure so I guess I can't be too upset when students miss my class graduations... Though we will be starting a new session in a few weeks so there will be lots more graduations!

8/31

2009-08-31T18:26:00.000-07:00

In addition to this adorable picture of Darcy and our four year old son (don't Pit Bulls eat children???) here's some dog training math:

1 Beggin Strip of work on the agility plank
+ 3 hours in the kennel
= kennel moved 5 feet and turned 180 degrees by Darcy

Partly because of this we decided to board Darcy at Windy City instead of keeping her home with the sitter that will be there over Labor Day when we are out of town. She would have to be in there a minimum of five hours so she would lose her mind. Or hurt herself. It's more money but I'd rather pay that than have a dog that is totally traumatized from being in the kennel so long.

8/30

2009-08-30T18:42:00.000-07:00

Living with dogs is all about up's and down's, strikes and gutters. Today was one of the "down" days. No training done at all. The bad part was that Darcy had to be in the kennel for four hours and when we returned she had moved the crate about five feet, chewed the carpet pad from under the carpet and gave herself a huge bump on the top of her muzzle.

I'm doing Comfort Zone in a diffuser right by the kennel, classical music in the room and at least two stuffed Kongs in the kennel. I think we might add some Rescue Remedy to take more of the edge off. Obviously more training too. My goal is to cut up a hot dog a day and throw tiny handfuls into her kennel throughout the day so she is happy about going in the kennel. We will see how that progresses!

8/29

2009-08-29T18:20:00.000-07:00

Today was the last Canine Good Citizen prep class and we skipped it. Such a good student. My reason sounds so silly too. While folding laundry I jacked up my shoulder and just didn't like the thought of wrestling a 65 pound dog for an hour after that.

To make up for it (a bit) we worked on walking down to the Walgreens near us. Once there we sat outside the door watching all the interesting people walk in and out. At first I just wanted her to associate good things with all these different looking people so I popped her a treat each time she looked at a person. Once she was relaxed I started working with her on basic commands like sit, down and stay.

To work on the walking on leash I found out that we can't use treats much because she ignores them. She is much more interested in finding out if every movement is possibly a squirrel. The method that works best for her is give her only a specific amount of leash and then when that leash she gets tight we come to a stop. As long as she walks on a loose leash she gets to keep walking forward and continue to explore the world. The first half a mile is torture but after that she gets much better.

8/27

2009-08-27T19:06:00.000-07:00

Today in agility Darcy finally got over the A frame. She is such an interesting dog in that she is so goofy and confident in some situations but so freaked out in others. Loud noises, big trucks, all make her cower. But she walks up to every person on the street with total confidence. From experience with clients conquering these agility obstacles will not only tire her out but make her feel more confident.

One interesting thing I'm noticing about her is that especially towards the end of class if I use really high valued treats (ham this time) she takes them quite rough. Not too fun losing the skin off my fingers! I will have to work on finding some good rewards for her that don't get her too crazy.

The new experiene for me is being able to have a dog that can just hang out in a group class with other dogs. With Bella we always had to be hiding in the corner and avoiding all the other students with her reactivity. It's so relaxing to be able to actually talk to the other owners and not feel sheer terror when my dog looks at another dog. Dog reactivity is not a fun behavior to deal with!

8/26

2009-08-26T18:26:00.000-07:00

So now that I've caught you up I'll try to go day by day to keep track of the work that I've done with Darcy.

Today Darcy spent a half day at Windy City for day care. With our other dog Bella having such poor socialization skills I really want Darcy to continue to play well with other dogs. Plus she has so much more energy than I have time for so the day care helps with that.

My work with Darcy today consisted of doing a bunch of passes on an agility board that Stacey Hawk gave me to practice with. The board is about a foot wide and four feet long and has the same surface as the dog walk and A frame. I want to get Darcy comfortable walking across this board so the obstacles are easier for her. We just worked about five minutes on it but at the end was walking across with all four paws on the board.

With successes there are always pitfalls. Darcy's trouble being left in the kennel is not getting better but, as with everything, it is my fault for not working on it. Today I put her in the kennel for a few hours and when I got home the tray was out of the kennel, the kennel was moved about five feet and there was a ton of drool (I hope!) in the kennel. I really need to just put her in there for short periods of time while I am home so she gets comfortable with it. But even now as I sit here watching Spy Game on TV I'm still not doing it. I swear after I sign off I will put her in for a second... Best intentions are always the situation!

Darcy: In the beginning

2009-08-25T20:27:00.000-07:00

One day while out running I started wondering what a chef cooks each night for the family dinner. Or how a preschool teacher educates his or her own children. Then I wondered if people would be curious how a dog trainer would train her own dog and Educating Darcy was born. My name is Lisa Collins and I am a Certified Pet Dog Trainer and owner of Collins Canine, Inc. On June 27th, 2009 we took a two year old Lab/Pit Bull mix named Darcy into our home. She has a wonderful temperament but didn't appear to have much training so we started from scratch. I thought I'd start this blog partly for my own documentation (so I remember how much work it is when we think about getting another dog!) and in case other dog owners are interested in how a dog trainer trains her own dog. In this first post I will catch you up to speed on what we've worked on in the last two months.

Here's Darcy's background. In January she was found stray by the Kane County animal control. They were having a hard time finding a good home for her so they enlisted One Tail at a Time to help. While waiting for her new home Darcy was boarded at All For Doggies, one of the facilities we train out of. I met Darcy there and when One Tail asked for a home to foster Darcy we immediately offered. When she got along wonderfully with our 8 1/2 year old female Rottie, Bella and our four year old son, Justin that sealed the deal.

We started with the basics like Sit, polite greetings (she's a jumper), and housebreaking. Sit was a breeze for her. Polite greetings are still a work in progress. Thankfully she rarely jumps on people except for my husband and I. Sixty five pounds of muscle coming through the air at you can be intimidating! To work on the jumping we focused on having her sit for EVERYTHING - getting her food, toys and any attention. We would also turn our backs and walk away when she would jump. Since she is such a social dog just turning away from her is all the draw back that she needs to stop the behavior. She's getting better which is all we ask.

The housebreaking has been interesting. Our other dog Bella has always had issues with that because she is a stress pee'er. When she feels uncomfortable (usually when she's left alone) she makes herself feel better by urinating. Some of us relax with a massage, she pees. Gotta love her! Darcy picked up the concept of eliminating in the back yard pretty quickly but she also enjoys using the carpeted upstairs so we need to put a baby gate up to block her from going up there unless we are there. Funny we just took the baby gate down from our four year old and now it's up again... My only concern right now is that she will rarely eliminate outside our back yard. We will go for three mile runs and she won't go until we get home.

Speaking of running, Darcy has been a wonderful and frustrating running partner. Wonderful in that her natural pace is just slightly faster than mine so she gives me a good work out but frustrating because most of the run she is either trying to chase squirrels or she is so freaked out from a loud truck that she runs into my legs. We are getting better at that too. On Tuesday we did three miles and it only took an extra 15 minutes of stopping each time she pulled on leash and also slowing down to a walk when there was a loud vehicle so I could praise her as it went by so she started making good associations with these scary things.

As far as formal education, we are on our fifth week of agility class with Stacey Hawk at Best Friends Windy City. We are also taking a Canine Good Citizen Prep class at The Anti Cruelty Society since from the moment I met Darcy I thought she would make a wonderful therapy dog. We take the test in a little over two weeks and as a CGC evaluator I fully expect us to fail but it's good practice anyway!

So that's all for now. In future posts I will go into more detail about how I am training her to do certain things so keep checking back!