Today was a day of utter distractions! Honing in on some things learnt in previous sessions and learnt a few safety related positions too.

Heel work with positions

Continuing with adding more commands to heel work. The trainer called out positions and we asked our dogs for the command, then asked them to wait. Then walk to one end of the lead and then walk to the other end of the lead, and finally call your dog to heel – all in one continuous movement.

Down The first time Artemis took ages to go in the down position, the second time was much better.

Sit This was fine.

These heel positions are fine at home in the garden but not so great in the field with other dogs. It appears that at home Artemis’s full attention is on me and so she listens and does the commands quite easily. Maybe I need to bring tastier treats to the sessions!

Stay

Next we practised stays with distractions.

Down stay The first distraction was the trainer walking close by each dog – and Artemis’s tail was wagging so much! The next distraction was a dog and owner walking close by and Artemis was fine with this distraction.

Sit stay The distraction was standing next to another dog. When another owner stood next to Artemis, Artemis sniffed her and went in a down position as if she wanted belly rubs! I went back to enforce the sit stay again.

Then the trainer asked me to run to the woods, almost out of sight. Artemis actually stayed put in a sit stay! I then eventually came back to praise and release her with lots of treats and belly rubs – I was so proud of her!

Novice recall

Usual novice recall response: I asked Artemis to come and she came hurtling down!

The trainer advised I keep my treat hands out further away from me and when Artemis is closer then to bring the treat hands in so she doesn’t knock me over – really good advice!

Positions

This was a new one. The steps are: ask your dog to be in the heel position, you walk right in front of them toe to paw, and ask your dog to go down, sit, stand, sit, and down.

So Artemis has been doing down, sit, and stand; but she has been using/ moving her front legs when she should be using her hind legs. The trainer explained that on a busy road, when you ask your dog to go down, using/ moving the hind legs would be safer especially if the dog’s front legs are close to the kerb.

When I asked Artemis to go down, she was like, “what”. Because when we practise at home there is usually space in front of her to go down and use/ move her front legs, so now we need to practise down with her moving her hind legs.

Very similar with the stand position, where she stands by using/ moving her front legs instead of her hind legs.

The trainer advised I use one treat hand in front of Artemis’s nose and the other hand, palm facing the ground, placed under her belly and moving towards the back of the dog coaxing the dog to stand using the hind legs. Took a little manoeuvring, but will definitely need to practise that so Artemis safely uses/ moves the hind legs.

Conclusion

Well that was the end of the Advanced classes. Learnt lots overall and still learning lots and getting good advice in the last session. Artemis likes to please so she does eventually get what I’m asking her to do, just need to be consistent.