idle musings

I had my first meeting with my dog trainer today – Valerie, from In Partnership with Dogs. A lot of her information was the same as what Angela and Kim at the shelter have told me, but this was specific to my dog, in my house, with reference to Maia’s specific problems. I think (I hope!) that this training style will be effective with Maia. It is positive reinforcement based, with emphasis on leadership. However, it is not anything like the dominance style of training that so many people endorse. I have no interest in that, especially after having done my research, and heard and read many experts on dog behaviour state unequivocally that that style does not work and does more harm than good.

Anyway. I don’t want to get off on a rant about that. This leadership style is about there being consequences for actions. If Maia gets nippy while playing tug-o-war with a toy, the toy goes away. But it comes back and she gets to try again. If she does not stop barking at sounds she hears outside, she gets a time-out in the bathroom. But she gets to come out and try again. If she demands my attention by invading my space, I invade her space and then back out again to see how she reacts. If she invades again, I invade a bit further and then back out. So far, I haven’t had to do more than take one step into her – she’s smart and she gets it really quickly.

The big thing is of course the barking at people. It is fear-based – Maia unfortunately did not get socialized with people during the first six months of her life. Then she was crated and driven from Idaho up to North Van, where she lived at the shelter for a few weeks, and then I brought her home. No wonder things freak her the fuck out! I now have some concrete ways to work on that fear, and on our walk this evening when I practised those things, Maia did not freak out once. I’m still not allowing her off-leash until her recall is much better and she has shown progress at getting over her fear, but walking her on the leash was much more relaxing once I realized that hey! This is actually working!

The other great thing is that Valerie gave me ideas for keeping Maia mentally stimulated. One of those is to hide her kibble around the living room and let her sniff it out. I did that this evening, although Maia was not all that interested in it, but I also did it with a hotdog that I ripped into tiny pieces. That was entertaining to watch – her discovering the first piece and then sniffing out the rest of them! She is much quieter this evening than normal as well – a bonus side effect of getting her to use her brain is that it tires her out much more!