Luko the adult Rhodesian Ridgeback arrived this morning for his ten day Board and Train. He is here for off leash obedience and some intensive socialization. Luko is generally distrustful of strange people and growls inappropriately when someone new (and sometimes someone who he has met many times before!) approaches him. The larger issue here is that Luko is also not adapting well to the infant in the house who is just now becoming mobile. We are going to work very hard on Luko accepting the approach of strangers or things that make him nervous.
Today was a bonding day for Luko and myself. We took two walks and spent some time hanging out on the floor together. He was very distrustful of me at first. Luko would skirt around me, growl, at one point he lost control of his bladder. All this time the most extreme thing I did was to reach for him to put on a leash. Around mid-day we were sitting on the floor together and he was allowing me to pet him without growling though he still did not like eye contact. When he relaxed for an hour without stiffening, growling or skirting me I let him take a nap in his crate so he could truly relax.
Later in the afternoon we spent some more time on the floor together and he approached me when I invited him and seemed to enjoy a throat scratch. The goal is to have him trusting me soon so that we can work on other strangers.
On the obedience front today he did extremely well. This is not an unintelligent dog. He got Heel down in under 5 minutes and he will Sit when I stop if I ask him to. He seems very reluctant to sit in the snow and gives me a look of deepest reproach whenever I ask him to Sit. Tomorrow we are going to clean up Down (he seems to know this one already fairly well, at least he did it nicely in the house for me when something spooked him) and work on getting that Sit to be automatic. We will also introduce the Implied Stay.
While he is very nervous of me he has not been a total basket case (which is what trainers like to call dogs who are afraid of everything or random inanimate objects). He even took meeting the horses in stride. This is a dog who needs socialization to strange people and we need to work on him trusting his handler to direct him safely. His instinct to flee is very pronounced and this will be the biggest obstacle to overcome when it comes time for off leash.

Classes will be canceled on Feb. 21 and Feb. 22 2013 due to weather and county road conditions. Stay warm and safe!

Piper, Piper, Piper what am I going to do with you? Usually about halfway through a Board and Train a dog will become argumentative. It usually means they are finally comfortable enough with their surroundings that they start thinking for themselves again. I have rarely had a dog do this twice. Leave it to sweet little Piper to grow too big for her britches...again! Today she was all about argument and back talk. She plain did not want to work today. She even tried to bolt away from me once and I had to correct her to get her to come back to me. This wasn't helpful especially because I was trying to take her going home video today. Eventually I just made her do "puppy pushups" (Sit, Down, Sit, Down...) and let her take a break. 
She is now curled up on her mat with one of Kylie's rope toys (quite a magpie this girl!) and is in a much better mood. Tomorrow we are back to work and hopefully she will be feeling a bit more cooperative. She isn't ornery because she is mean spirited. She is ornery because she is extremely smart (what I like to call "problem solving intelligent") and doesn't always see the point of obedience. 
I have found, in my experience, that smart dogs also tend to be moodier. They are a bit more aware of their surroundings and so their surroundings affect them more. 
I am sure she will feel better tomorrow, and if she doesn't we may have a good play session instead of a third workout. WOOPS! She is trying to pull the tag off of her mat. Duty calls!

Well we are getting Bear ready to head home tomorrow and I feel confident that he is ready. He still makes mistakes sometimes but he does not make them because he does not know what to do. He makes mistakes because he is a soft dog who is easy to overwhelm or frighten. He is EXTREMELY sensitive to the tone of someone's voice and if you use too harsh a tone he will act frightened of you. The answer is not to always be soft spoken around him, nor does he need to be coddled. On the contrary, I would suggest strictness for him. His confidence in his owner will keep rising if he learns that they mean what they say. When they say "Sit" it means "Sit." The trick is to use a firm "Mom" voice and refrain from yelling at him. 
I am going to recommend that for the first few days he be kept on a leash when outdoors so that his boundaries can be redefined. Right now he knows not to enter the horse fence or to cross the tree line. At his home his boundaries will likely be the curb or property line but he won't know that until they are defined for him. It is a relatively easy process to define the boundaries but it would be unfair to simply release him and expect him to know what to do.
We had fun howling with him today. We were watching a basketball game and we noticed that when we cheered he would yodel a little bit. So I howled and he howled right back! I wonder if his kids will like howling with him when he gets home. But don't worry, he quieted right down when I told him to stop. 
He also had a breakthrough with his fear of getting into the car today. I had to get in with him at first and encourage him to follow me. After a while he was hopping right in and at one point he didn't want to get back out!
I will miss this young guy. He has been a delight and a challenge to work with. Not a challenge because he is poorly behaved but because of his fear and anxiety. Seeing him come out of his shell and become more playful has been extremely gratifying. I think he was traumatized by country life at first. Tomorrow I am going to give him one last hike in the field, a final workout, and take his glamor shot for the Photos page on the website and then he will be ready to go home!

Free State K-9 has 25 acres of woods and fields at its disposal for dog training and this morning about 24 of those acres were puddles. No puddle went unexplored this morning on our exercise walk and the dogs seemed to have a bit energy than usual as they ran through the soggy fields getting good and muddy. Sometimes it just takes a good puddle jump to get all canines in a good mood.
Bear had another okay day today. I had him off leash for one workout and he did alright except he got overwhelmed again and he kept getting ahead of me. I put him on an umbilical leash (leash attached to a belt- hands free) and he was much calmer. Being on the leash seemed to make him more comfortable that he wouldn't make a mistake and thus- he made fewer mistakes. I will probably continue using an umbilical leash on him for one workout a day and still encourage him to get comfortable being without a leash on during the other workouts. He again enjoyed a fast paced workout today and he really liked getting scratched under the chin while we walked. At one point he even gently held my hand in his mouth (absolutely no pressure put on my hand) and trotted happily for a few paces. I wonder if someone in his past allowed him to do this as a form of praise. It certainly made him laugh.
Bear LOVES his Placemat. As soon as I put it on the floor he hopped onto it and curled up. When I gave it a word he took to it immediately. He doesn't always stay perfectly but by the end of the day he had quit wandering off of his mat and was curled up sweetly. He obviously felt very safe with is mat. At one point his girlfriend sneaked off of her mat (bad girl!) and curled up with him on his mat with him. It was very cute but I eventually had to encourage her to stay on her own bed. It felt a lot like supervising nap time at a preschool.
I am pleased with how well Bear is doing. My guess is that he will need his follow ups to translate everything into his home life but the structure here has been good for him. He knows what to expect and when to expect it. His mistakes still stem from being too wrapped up in his head but I hardly need to use the collar anymore to correct him. A firm "NO" is getting the message across just fine now, for the most part. I am reserving the collar for when a verbal correction has, for whatever, reason not gotten through to him.

I keep expecting Piper to really argue with me. It usually happens around halfway through a Board and Train that a dog puts up road blocks and stops cooperating. So far I haven't had that issue with Piper though. Every day she is ready for the day's challenges and she is, if anything, becoming more cooperative. Don't get me wrong, whenever I give her something new to think about you can tell she is working out how she could possibly get around doing it how I want her to. Like today she was on her Placemat and instead of laying ON it she tried laying NEXT to it. Then when I left her on it while I walked across the driveway she decided that, because she is supposed to stay with her mat it would obviously be okay to pick her mat up and bring it over to me (check out FSK9's Facebook page to see a picture of her doing this). She was so proud of herself and so sweet that it was difficult to tell her that it was a mistake. By this afternoon she was happily spending time on her mat next to Bear, although she did try to sneak onto his mat to play with him. Stinker!
Her motion commands are doing fine. She still tries to army crawl after me when I ask her to Down in Motion. Her obedience doesn't look extremely polished and I wouldn't expect it to be perfect at her young age. She is quickly getting into the stage where she knows it and just needs practice. I often say that I don't make "robot dogs" and this girl will have her spunky personality no matter what.

The boarders ended up spending more time in their crates than usual today. I had lessons well into the afternoon but they got in a few workouts and Bear had a good day.
His day started with a game of "trainer says" with piper out in the field. Whoever performed the requested command first got the first praise (don't worry, all correct answers were rewarded). I was surprised at how well he did though he is still laying down if he gets overwhelmed and then I have to restart him. He is also still struggling with staying in a sitting position if I do an Implied Stay from a Sit, it has gotten better though.
I introduced motion commands today and in our last workout I tried something new and worked all his commands in rapid succession. This helped him because it didn't give him a chance to get overwhelmed. By the time he was finished processing the first thing we did I had moved him on to something else. By the end of the 20 minutes he had given up on his brooding and was having fun trotting next to me asking me what to do next. I will do this again tomorrow for at least one of his lessons if not only because he enjoyed it so much.
I am crossing my fingers that the weather cooperates tomorrow and the training can be pleasant. It looks like rain but it should be pretty much done by the afternoon. I will work dogs in the rain and it offers a good "real life" distraction but it does make the training room a little stinky.
I feel like I am finally seeing this guy's personality as he relaxes and enjoys the training more and more.

For some reason Wednesday has become a popular day for weekly lessons and so the boarders got to spend a little bit more time in their crates today than they otherwise would have (I am sure I will pay for this tomorrow with some hyperactive dogs). However, this morning I had fun doing double obedience with Piper and Bear. We played a game of "Trainer says" and whoever got it right first would get the praise first. I had two dogs doing some moderately complicated obedience simultaneously.
This afternoon I did a silent workout with Piper. This means I did not use my voice to give her commands. I had her on a leash to keep her better focused on me and to keep her from doing this funny thing she has started doing where she drifts off to the left while in a Heel. She did reasonably well with no voice commands. A few times I had to bust her for not focusing, a few more I had to encourage her when she was confused but 20 minutes into the workout she was keeping her eyes on me and doing all of her commands pretty well. She is having trouble with the Sit from a Down but as that is usually not something I teach until later in the follow-ups, I am not concerned. We will continue working on it.
I hope the weather cooperates and we only get rain when I am not working the dogs. I will work dogs in the rain but then they get their crates all muddy and it is generally unpleasant.

Bear and I had a good day. We went up to the big pasture to run around and practice his obedience and he did very well even with a shooting rabbit as a distraction.
He has virtually stopped jumping up on people but he still jumps -around- them. Baby steps. He does still get anxious when he makes a mistake but he is making fewer and fewer mistakes and so he is growing more comfortable. I worked him with his friend Piper today which was a major distraction and the both did well. They held a down stay nicely together even though they really really wanted to chase each other in huge sweeping circles. They laid down and wiggled until I told them "okay!" And they enjoyed a game before I called them back and asked them for a sit.
His sticky area is still the Implied Stay. He really really wants to stay right by me. If I leave his side while he is Sitting he lays down or tries to follow me almost 100% of the time and so I have to put him back into a Sit. We will continue working on this tomorrow, I wonder if I am battling some previous training he has had.
Tomorrow we are going to continue working on the implied stay and his other obedience. We are also going to work on his confidence in getting in and out of the car.

Today was a great day for Piper. Her recall is solid enough to take her up to the big pasture during our walks for a good run around. She was doing off leash obedience at a fair distance and only making a few puppy mistakes (like army crawling closer to me when I ask her to lay down).
She is also doing better at restraining herself. She isn't jumping up on the door anymore. She is sitting for her food, before she goes outside (that is the HARDEST thing in the world), she is choosing not to jump up on people. Even today, I called her and she came sprinting towards me at full speed and I said "Uhuh! No jumping!" But she was already in the air. However she ended up doing a flyin belly flop into the grass just next to me instead of into my legs. She was very pleased with herself.
Right now she is laying on a blanket with her boyfriend, Bear, and sleeping sweetly. Tomorrow we are working on her motion commands, and her Implied Stay when in a Down. Half way through the training I am very pleased with where this kid has gotten. She has some growing up to do but she is fast becoming a team player instead of a bully.