Thursday, March 8, 2012

Today's Sunshine

Monster and I have met with our trainer again today! It's pretty exhausting for both of us, but it feels great to see the progress.

We were again BATting against a staged dog (as well as whatever the surrounding world would throw at us), and I think this really is the way forward. While there certainly were a few failures, when Monster overloaded and couldn't tear himself away, he's overall a very different dog with this technique. He'll release tension much quicker, and he's more willing to engage with me even with distractions all around.

It was also nice to see how he greeted the trainer once he arrived! I won't say Monster was polite. He goes for the airborne attack eleven times out of ten, unfortunately.

I'm gonna get your nose!

But he was happy. Monster does like people, but on leash, out of his territory, with people he doesn't know very well, there's... a certain edge to how he views people, and especially people walking towards us. But as soon as he spotted the trainer (I've got to find a name for him soon, don't I? How about... Teach?) he perked up. And when Teach got close enough Monster could be certain he recognized him, he started doing the full body wagging and happy snorting reserved for Monster Favorites. While I suppose it doesn't really matter if Monster likes the trainer or not I think it says something about how Monster feels about this training. He's only met Teach in this specific place, doing these specific exercises. If Monster found these sessions unpleasant, I don't think he'd respond like this to him. So at least in my mind, if Monster loves the trainer, Monster loves the training. Plus, it's just nice to see him happy.

Of course, once Teach got close enough, Monster became a rubber piranha.


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