| STITCH the weBlog of a Service Dog In Training |
| 19 WEEKS OLD |
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We start this morning with Eye Contact - fantastic. I won't mark it passed because we use X10 to get up to it, but then she gives me three in a row of 30 seconds each, very solid, no glancing away or whining. WHEEE!! Since she's doing so well at that, I ask for Sit Stay. Same results. We do 5 seconds, 10 seconds, 15 seconds, 20 seconds, then 30 seconds three times with no fussing at all. FanTAStic. That went so well we go for some moving behaviours - Sit, Down, Back Up, Take A Bow, Princess Paw, Sore Paw - here she gives me a couple of nose swipes from her trick class. We'll have to distinguish sooner or later between Back Up, Down, and Take A Bow, these are overlapping quite a bit. Also Sit and Sore Paw, and Down and Princess Paw. I'm using a cue for Princess which is my two index fingers crossing each other, followed by her crossing her front legs in the same direction. Very cute. Draws AAAWWWWs everywhere. |
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At supper we test SitStay and Watch. 30 seconds each. I use one extra "chch" cue when she glances down at about 10 seconds on the Watch. For the SitStay, 1 cue to Sit, voice and hand cue to Stay and she's very steady. So exciting! Then we do some work on pivoting right with eye contact. Still hasn't quite got the ability to walk and watch and chew gum at the same time. Maybe if I try just walking... Within a 10' space, I walk veeerrrryyy slowly back and forth. If she's on the left side, click. If she makes contact, click. If she swings too far in front of me or starts going around me clockwise, I pivot slowly left. This makes her correct herself - basically following me through the beginning of the Swing Finish - and when she's back in Heel position, I start walking forward again. Maybe helped a bit on the Eye Contact problem. Looking at it strictly as a Heeling exercise, WOW! |
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The rest of the week is a total writeoff as we do the llama show and sleeeeep after it. Stitch gets to do the puppy thing - Scuba, who can jump the dog fence with ease, gets to stay in a crate all day, Stitch, who can't jump the dog fence (yet) has access to her crate, the dog room, and, through the dog doors, the dog yard. I don't think she uses the yard much, because when we come home at night, she's a maniac. She has the rips every night, racing around the house with her tail on the ground, crashing into things, and she and Scuba wrestle and tug well past the regular bedtime. Mostly what she gets worked on is a bunch of tired people sitting on the couch stuffing supper in their mouths and telling her she isn't welcome to browse off our plates. A necessary lesson, and she doesn't take it personally. She makes the rounds of each person, checks twice with the least adamant ones, then runs off to find a toy. |
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| Absolutely useless week | 20 weeks |
LIFE BEHAVIOURS : Don't jump up on me (or anyone) when I'm sitting on the couch eating. |
18 Weeks Old |
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