I ran all over the place searching for a possibly extremely injured dog and came up empty. The dog wandered into one of my clients yard where their dog was on his tie out. The dogs had an altercation and the strange dog ran off. I went on the hunt for the injured dog because temperatures are high and the land is pretty dry right now. Sadly, I never found the injured dog. I did check on my client's dog and he will be sore and has some gashes but overall he was in good spirits and was acting very normal by the time I stopped by.
There is a lesson to be learned here: NEVER let your dog out of your home unleashed and unattended! Accidents do happen though and I will get to more of that in a moment.
The other HUGE thing that happened today was one of my clients has a beautiful German Shepherd. He is a great dog; he loves children, isn't phased by a whole lot and he's terrified of getting into vehicles. Yep, it's a huge drawback when you want to take the kids and dog to the park and the park is all the way across town. He is a large German Shepherd too. The husband can lift him (for now since he's still a puppy) but the wife can not. So, in the last 12 sessions one of our major things we have worked on was getting in the car.
Up until today, it was still a no go. He was NOT getting in there unless he was picked up and sat on the seat. So, imagine our surprise when we were outside working on Canine Good Citizen testing and he hopped in the front seat of the car because the door was open. He got a TON of praise and played with for this! He hopped out and hopped right back in. Suddenly he figured out the game. "I jump in and I get love and attention and played with!" We repeated this several more times and needless to say he enjoyed the hot dog he got for his efforts!
Dogs have "AHA" moments. It's when the lightbulb flicks on and something amazing happens. I've seen it time and time again. In order to stop bad behavior I teach incompatible behaviors. Dog jumps? I teach the owners to have the dog down when someone comes in the door. You'll notice I don't say "I teach the dog". Why? Because I don't teach the dogs. I teach owners to work with their dogs. An owner who puts the work in like the family with the German Shepherd will see payoffs and it's more rewarding when the owners have it happen than when I do.
Now, I want to talk about Management. I have always thrived on management. My house is extremely managed because of Greyson. I have to watch who he interacts with because of him being reactive. When I got home from my client sessions I was still on a high from the car and the German Shepherd. As I got out of the car I was dancing along and realized I lost a $20 bill somewhere. I ran in the house and started going through my stuff to see if I dropped it into my bag.
One slip of not paying attention (and I'm very attentive in my house to what is going on around me) and I didn't notice the black dog walking out the back door. I shut the door behind me as I tossed my bag down to go through it. Once again, not noticing that I didn't have a dog jumping around me and going crazy because I wasn't paying attention! It only took a second for Greyson to waltz out the door.
I am lucky my deck has gates that Greyson can't get out of but what would have happened if someone had stole him? I know, it wasn't but a minute but see my point? If I didn't have that area secured Greyson could have escaped, been running and I wouldn't have realized it. Yes, accidents happen but it is our responsibility to set our dogs up for success every single time. It only takes a tiny slip of paying attention and a dog who is extremely reactive to humans and animals could have become a liability very quickly.
I've always heard "Management always fails at some point" and I've seen that a lot lately. People who have two dogs on crate and rotate having it fail and catastrophic damage to their dogs happening. People who always keep their dogs muzzled having an off leash dog confront them and their dog getting their muzzle off and almost getting out of their harness. We can only manage so much before it comes to the point of being a danger. Where do we draw the line? I really have no answer to that but I know it's something I need to start thinking more about.
In closing, I'm SUPER proud of my clients and all their hard work has paid off. I know it's frustrating when a dog can't do something that you want them to but I was able to give them options and through sheer determination and positive work their dog pulled it off!
Syn and Jelani when they graduated basic obedience!
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