Fearful dogs class, plus training goals for Rainer

Last night, Rainer and I went to a one-time, one-hour class at Canine Campus, called “Rescue Remedies: Fearful Dogs.”

Trying to take photos in class never works out so well. This is the best one I got! Those are his ears.

Canine Campus is where Pyrrha went for her obedience class, and I’m a big fan of the trainer, Deven. Deven has had numerous shy dogs herself, and she seems to really understand them.

While Rainer was mostly unable to calm down for the majority of the class (lots of pacing and circling), I was really thankful that we went. Deven reinforced so many concepts that are easy to forget with shy dogs. The class was also really motivating to me to stop being such a passive trainer. Now that Rainer has acclimated to our lifestyle, it’s time to start actively teaching him things. I can’t just wait around and hope that he’ll learn something.

Safe at home.

This lesson was really reinforced coming and going to the class. The worst part of last night was getting to and leaving class. This is the issue: Rainer has a severe fear of getting in cars. Severe to the point of nearing the biting threshold.

My husband was gone last night, and I was stuck with the Jeep, so getting Rainer into it was quite the ordeal. It took me about 15 minutes. I was plying him with tons of treats, but as soon as he’d get within a foot of the car, he would freak out: jerk back, trying to pull out of the collar, biting the leash, etc. I was finally able to get him in when I put some treats on the car seat, and he got brave enough to put his paws on the seat, and I lifted his back end into the car. Once in the car, he rides OK; he’s so scared of it that he doesn’t move much at all.

The traumatic part of last night was leaving Canine Campus. After class concluded, I asked Deven and her co-trainer Mary to come out to the car with me and help me strategize. Mary started by treating him for nearing the car, and then throwing treats away from the car, giving him the freedom to back up when he wanted. This went on for 10 minutes, however, with Rainer showing little inclination to get any closer to the vehicle.

Instead of diminishing, his fear was only growing, and when we approached him, his entire body tensed up, and I could tell this was a dog who was ready to bite if we tried anything else. Deven clearly recognized this too and came back out with a sheet and a muzzle. I felt so dejected. I hated to traumatize him further, but we were never going to get him in that car.

We put a meatball in the muzzle, and I could snap it on him; this freaked him out. While he was trying to get the muzzle off, we put a sheet beneath his abdomen, and Deven lifted his back end, while I picked up his front end and put him in the car. He was fighting the whole way. The poor guy. My adrenaline was racing, and I felt so upset. And embarrassed. He was so upset.

Upon leaving, Deven reminded me that this is something we would need to work on every day. Rainer’s fear of getting into cars will not go away on its own. Seeing him in such a state of panic last night really brought that home. This is a dog who really doesn’t know anything about the world; everything is frightening and new to him. It’s our job right now to help him take those baby steps toward confidence.

So, that said, here are some really basic things I want to teach Rainer in the time that we have him:

1. Car desensitization. Every day, practice working near and in the car. Treat him for approaching; treat him for just looking a it in the early stages. Move up to getting him to enter the car on his own.
2. Name recognition. Treat him and praise him for giving us any attention when we call his name.
3. Sitting for food. I know that this dog can sit, but we cannot get him to do it! I keep waiting for him to offer the behavior at meal time (luring him back with the bowl), but he won’t do it. I also wonder if this has something to do with his bad hips. Sitting could be painful for him, so we may need to find an alternate behavior.
4. Grooming desensitization. Treat and praise for whenever he submits to brushing, touching paws, opening his mouth. Move up to this gradually; brushing is the easiest place to start.
5. Leash manners. Learning how to walk politely on a leash; getting him not to freak out when we see other dogs (freaking out, for him, means frantic circling; no barking or anything like that, thankfully). Practice safe zone training (LOTS of distance between the stimulant) early on; only take short walks where I can control the environment without pushing him past threshold.

As you can see, we have a lot of work to do. But I believe in him and in his potential to overcome a lot of these fears, with our patient help.

2013 goals for Pyrrha

I am really big on goal-setting all year long, but I get particularly jazzed about it at the end of the year. Accordingly, here are some of my Pyrrha-centric goals for 2013.

Goals for Pyrrha and Me in 2013:

1. Help her get more comfortable around infants and small children. Get advice from our trainer. This is the big one.
2. Teach her 5–10 new tricks/behaviors.
3. Work on teaching her how to play more gently outdoors (e.g., teach her not to maul people’s back legs when they’re not looking).
4. Take her hiking! This is a shame I haven’t done this, because we live in a perfect place for great, mountainous hikes.
5. Brush her teeth twice a week. Whew. We’ll see.
6. Accordingly, help her get more comfortable with all aspects of grooming.
7. Have even more doggy play-dates!

Do you have any goals or resolutions for your dog(s) in the coming year?

Teaching kids and dogs how to behave with one another

Click for source.

NOTE: This is a piece I wrote a while ago, and since I don’t have any good photos of Pyrrha or any good updates lately, I thought I’d post it to start a conversation. Pyrrha is pretty scared of children, especially infants and toddlers, and this is an area I really want to work on with her. I welcome your thoughts, comments, and advice! — Abby

Despite what this adorable picture suggests, in general, kids are pretty terrible with dogs.

Kids like to tease dogs. Even if they’re just babies and unaware of what they’re doing, kids like to mess with dogs. They like to stick their hands in the dog’s eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. They like pulling the dog’s tail. They like riding on the dog’s back. They like squeezing dogs around the neck to express affection, even though the dog interprets this as invasive and frightening. This doesn’t mean that kids themselves are terrible. They’re often unaware of what they’re doing and how to read a dog’s body language.

Kids have a tendency to freak dogs out, for all the reasons listed above. Kids are really noisy. Their body language can be erratic and unpredictable to a dog. They like to get right up in dog’s faces, in their food, in their beds, on their backs. It’s no wonder that many dogs are afraid of children and that many, unfortunately, lash out in fear-based aggression.

But dogs, undoubtedly, bring (most) children an immense amount of glee. Even babies will light up at the sight of a dog. It always warms my heart when I see this. And there are many dogs who seem to love nothing more than children. (Bo is one of them: He drags me after strollers and runs up to every kid we see, beside himself with excitement, or with the prospect of food crumbs on grubby faces.)

There is a lot of circumstantial evidence that dogs and kids were “made for each other,” but that’s not always the case, and the majority of dogs AND kids need to be taught how to behave around one another. So how do we train them to behave well with each other? It’s not something that exactly comes naturally to either species.

TRAINING KIDS

As someone who doesn’t have kids, I often worry about those parents who don’t train their kids well with regard to dogs. I have responsibility for training my future dog how to act around kids; I expect that parents have the responsibility to train their children how to act around dogs. When we’re out walking, I can’t tell you how many times parents have let their little children run up to Bo to pet, squeeze, or hug him, without so much as a glance at me or a question if my dog is even friendly toward children. Thankfully, Bo is wonderful with kids, as I mentioned before. But what if he wasn’t?

I always walk Pyrrha very carefully around playgrounds and around people with young children. Thankfully, we haven’t had any parents let their tots run up to us (and I think this has a lot to do with breed; Pyrrha looks “scarier” than Bo, the golden retriever, does) and if a kid wants to pet her, they usually ask first. But this certainly wasn’t always the case with Bo. Parents would let their little children run right up to him without asking me.

But: Have you ever had to intervene in a situation between children and your dog? What would you tell the parents, perhaps by way of educating their kids?

Karen London posted a great short list of things she tells children about dogs, covered by the funny but true heading: “Don’t lick the dog,” from Wendy Wahman’s picture book for kids. That book sounds like a great resource for any parent of young children. I feel like I should buy a bunch of copies to hand out to parents on the downtown pedestrian mall here…

The Lab babysitter. Click for source.

TRAINING DOGS

One of Pyrrha’s last remaining big fear thresholds is little children. We seem to have ameliorated her previous big fear, which was greeting other dogs, and she hasn’t snarled or raised her hackles at a dog in two months. I consider this a huge victory! But the kid thing is another issue entirely.

Pyrrha is OK with kids who are calm and move slowly. This, unfortunately, is not many children. She’s submitted to attention from older children, perhaps 5-7 years of age, and she doesn’t seem bothered by pre-teens or teenagers.

It’s the babies and toddlers who really make her anxious. This is, obviously, a really difficult thing to work on. I wouldn’t let my infant around a German shepherd who was scared of babies, and I always keep Pyrrha removed and completely controlled when she’s in the presence of small children. So what do we do? How do I work on exposing her and acclimating her to this fear? It’s not like you can ask an infant to work with you, to make all of its movements calm and controlled, to stop squealing erratically.

She once growled at a toddler who tried to come near her. I removed Pyrrha from the situation and put her inside. It was a scary and disheartening moment. I want a dog who’s OK with little children. But how do we get there?

For those of you who adopted an adult dog, how did you expose your dog to kids? How can we help Pyrrha overcome her fear of small children, without endangering babies or eclipsing Pyrrha’s fear threshold?

As always, I’m very open to your suggestions!

Pyrrha is going to school

This past week, I decided that it was time for our shy princess to go to obedience school. We have signed her up for a 6-week basic obedience course at Canine Campus, a local training facility.

I feel confident about the head trainer, who is certified with several training organizations and has trained with Pat Miller, who wrote one of my favorite step-by-step training books. I e-mailed with her about what she thought about Pyrrha’s suitability for the group class, since Pyrrha’s history with strange dogs is not a good one. She assured me that the dogs aren’t supposed to interact with one another, and a portion of the class is just teaching the dog to focus on you and not the rest of the room. Alternately, she said that if the group class turns out to be too overwhelming for her, we can funnel our payment for the class into either private lessons or another class. She said that shy dogs have often done well in her nose-work class.

I expected that I’d take more initiative training her at home, but I have been so busy lately in the evenings that I haven’t put in nearly as much time as I have wanted to. Pyrrha knows her name, “come,” “sit,” and “down,” but that’s it–and she really only responds to me; she won’t take any commands from Guion, unless it’s clear that he has something delicious in his hand.

That said, here are my basic goals for these next six weeks of training class:

1. For Pyrrha and Guion to build a better relationship and for her fear of him to be mostly eliminated. (Guion will be coming to as many training classes as he can.)
2. To jump-start my incentive to train with her on a more regular basis.
3. For Pyrrha to be able to interact in a room with distractions, other dogs, new people and be able to focus on me.
4. For Pyrrha to gain confidence.

Our first class starts next week, so you’ll be sure to hear lots from me on how that goes!

Has your dog gone to school? What was your experience like?

Establishing daily routine

This will be what our morning walks look like. Right? Click for source.

As the days creep closer to our move, I’ve been thinking about how to restructure my day to accommodate a dog. I already worry about giving my dog enough time. A dog’s ideal human is someone who works out of the home, or better yet, someone who just lives there with them all day long and doesn’t do anything but walk, train, and love on said dog. This is a nice idea, but I don’t know anyone who has that kind of life.

I have a full-time job, but here are some things that I think are in my favor, with regard to scheduling and bringing a dog into our lives:

• My office is a 6-minute drive from our new house.
• My husband is a grad student and so his schedule is much more flexible than mine, meaning that he can often be home when I can’t.
• I have a very dog-friendly boss, who has already said she’ll let me come home for an hour at lunch each day to walk the dog.
• I’ll be done with work right at 5 p.m. and I never have to work late.

That said, I’m thinking a lot about our mornings. I have to be at work at 8 a.m., so my mornings start fairly early. Here’s the rudimentary schedule in my mind, on days that I don’t shower:

• 6 a.m. Wake up. Take dog on walk.
• 6:40 a.m. Feed dog/get self dressed
• 7 a.m. Pack lunch for self/eat breakfast
• 7:30 a.m. Play with dog/brief training or grooming/let dog out once more
• 7:50 a.m. In the car and off to work

Clearly, this is something that will have to be finessed once we actually bring a dog home and evaluate his or her needs, but I like to think about it now. It’s a weird form of daydreaming for my highly Type A personality.

What does your daily routine look like with your dog? I’m especially interested in hearing from those who also have full-time jobs. How do you manage it? Any recommendations?

Choosing a vet

Boy in Veterinarian's Office, Norman Rockwell.

Next on my list of things to do before bringing a dog home: Finding a local veterinarian. This one is also somewhat intimidating to me. I’m planning on asking friends with dogs who they’d recommend in the area, but beyond that, I’m curious what you think about how to go about this process.

What kinds of questions should I ask a prospective vet? What are some things to watch out for? How will I know to evaluate them if I don’t have a dog yet? Does anyone go to a vet who practices holistic or homeopathic medicine?

Still so many questions! And I’m, as always, grateful for your advice!

The kind of crazy dog lady I want to become

OK, maybe not THIS crazy... Click for source.

I don’t want to be the kind of crazy dog lady (CDL) who has so many dogs that she tiptoes the line of being an animal hoarder. I want to have the right number of dogs that I can adequately care for, train, and love. (In my mind, that’s 3 at max for me, but we’ll see… I know some people can definitely handle more. Starting with one for a few years, and then we’ll see how that goes!)

I don’t want to be the kind of CDL who is constantly judging other dog people or freaking out about differences in the way we rear and raise our canines. I want to be humble and gracious, always willing to learn from someone else and always willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt.

I don’t want to be the kind of CDL who neglects personal care. I want to take great care of my dogs and great care of myself–as much as that’s possible! I know people who do both.

I don’t want to be the kind of CDL who sacrifices human relationships constantly or pushes people out of her life for the sake of her dogs. I want to maintain strong, intimate, and healthy relationships with humans, as much as I may be tempted to neglect them for the love of dogs.

What do you think? Is it possible for a CDL to be all of these things?

New dog shopping list

Lab in a built-in dog bed. Click for source.

My serious type-A self has, of course, already made a detailed shopping list and budget for our future dog. Here’s my preliminary list. What do think? What’s missing?

BASIC GEAR

• Martingale collar.
• 6′ leash.
• ID tag.
• Clean-up bag dispenser for leash.

HOUSEHOLD

• Crate.
• Bed.
• Nature’s Miracle carpet cleaner.
• Old towels.

DIET, HEALTH, GROOMING

• High-quality, grain-free kibble/whatever the dog was eating previously to ease the transition.
• Stainless steel bowls in a raised feeder.
• Healthy treats.
• Furminator.
• Nail clippers.
• Shampoo.
• Toothbrush and toothpaste.

TRAVEL

• Car harness or other form of restraint.

TOYS

• Standard Kong, or assorted chew toys.
• Rope toy.
• Tennis balls.

Now, to figure out how to budget for this!

Places to go with my future dog

Places to Go, People to See, Things to Do with Our Future Pup: A Preliminary List

Click for source.

Let’s go to…

1. The dog-friendly downtown mall.
2. All of the beautiful parks in town (especially Pen Park).
3. Local rivers.
4. A lake.
5. A pet store.
6. A dog-friendly restaurant.
7. Someone’s backyard for a play date.
8. Carter Mountain Orchard in the fall.
9. A cookout with friends.
10. A campsite, for an overnight stay.
11. A playground.
12. Urban Outfitters, since they allow canines.
13. The woods.
14. Monticello.
15. An off-leash dog park.
16. The quarry.
17. That dog-friendly winery I’ve heard about.
18. My parents’ house.
19. His parents’ house.
20. My grandparents’ house on the lake.
21. A farm.
22. The beach.
23. A cabin in the woods.

Or, anywhere! I can’t wait. I want to take my future dog everywhere.

Where are some of your favorite places to take your pooch?

What should I feed my future dog?

Dog food canisters from Etsy.

Lately, my dog reading focus has been pretty heavy on the health and nutrition side of things. I’ve been scouring Dog Food Advisor constantly and I’ve been writing down all sorts of advice and ratings. I read the (pretty terrible) Natural Dog Care and the (really great) Raw and Natural Nutrition for Dogs. The latter book especially convinced me of the truth that dogs should not be exclusively eating low-grade, high-carb, and high-grain kibble.

So, this means I want to make food for my dog or supplement his or her kibble with fresh meat and natural food. Therein lies the rub. My husband and I are de facto vegetarians. I say “de facto” because we tend to eat vegetarian six nights a week; I don’t eat any meat myself for the rest of the week. This means we’re not really in the habit of buying a lot of meat. We’ll eat it occasionally and if we go to friends’ homes for dinner, but it’s not a regular part of our menu. We can buy meat, however, and we are blessed to be surrounded by plenty of local farms and butchers who raise and sell organic, free range beef and poultry.

These are my options, as I see them:

1. Kibble diet: Buy a high-quality, grain-free kibble and feed exclusively.
2. Half kibble/half homemade diet: Supplement homemade meals with high-quality, grain-free kibble.
3. Raw diet: All raw meat and fresh foods, all homemade and self-prepared.

Everyone I know who has a dog has them on an all-kibble diet. Most dog owners I know also stick to the adage that “people food” is bad for dogs (a myth quite successfully perpetuated by the pet food industry). These dogs eat the exact same thing, day in and day out, and don’t complain. They get fat, though, and often smell bad and shed terribly. After having read these excellent books, I don’t think I could feed my dog an all-kibble diet and feel good about it. Unless it was a really, really high-quality kibble. I might be eating my words on this in a few months, but from today’s vantage point, I don’t think my conscience would rest comfortably if I gave my dog only kibble.

I’m leaning most toward the half kibble/half homemade diet at this point, at least in the beginning.  If I find out that all homemade/raw is easy and affordable, we might just go for that. The plan would be to mix kibble with homemade recipes, including some raw meats, fruits and vegetables, and recommended dairy products. I think this plan could also help us cut down on the food that we throw away: Dog as (carefully moderated!) trash reducer. I plan on arming myself with books like Raw and Natural Nutrition for Dogs and other canine cookbooks to make sure that our future dog is getting all of the nutrients that he or she needs.

I’ve read some about raw diets for dogs. They make me a little nervous, for a few reasons: 1) I don’t cook all that well for myself; I’m not sure how reliable I would be at cooking every day for my dog; 2) It sounds really expensive; 3) It also sounds very time-consuming; and 4) It would take some effort to find reliable places to get such raw meats. Maybe I will work up to it. For right now, though, I’m not sure if I have the guts (or capital) to jump into a raw diet.

Either way, it’s a lot to think about, and I’m sure I may think differently about some of these things when I’m actually in the day in/day out grind of having a dog.

What kind of diet is your dog on? What do you recommend? If you feed kibble, do you have a particular brand you like? I’m all ears!