About a month ago, Justin and I began seriously discussing taking Pete and Annabelle to training classes. They're both nearly six years old (Pete is already six and Anne is less than two months away from turning six) and have had no previous training. Since they've been in Atlanta, some of their actions mimic those of puppies and not adult dogs. It has been frustrating for Justin and me since they were doing fairly well in South Georgia. They had the occasional accident in the house, but it wasn't an every night occurrence.
We got some information from Petsmart several months back, but tabled the discussion since we figured the bad behavior would quickly resolve itself. This did not happen. If anything, they've gotten worse. We've been working with them, but they're just not "getting it". We researched the classes and decided to try the Petsmart Beginner's Class. This class is for puppies and adult dogs that have had no prior training. The class is a one hour class that meets one evening a week for eight weeks. The class started last night.
I'm not sure about Justin, but I was a little embarrassed about being in a beginner class with six year old dogs. I didn't want people to think that we've lived with these hooligans for six years and waited until now to deal with them. I was also concerned that one or both dogs would misbehave and be asked to leave and not return. My fears quickly disappeared when class began. There are four dogs in the class, including Pete and Annabelle. One is a Boston terrier named Buckley. Buckley is six years old and has been having an occasional accident overnight and also needs obedience training. He already knows the sit command. The other dog is Pedro, a one year old chihuahua. Pedro has frequent accidents and needs some obedience training. Pete and Annabelle need some potty training for their frequent overnight accidents and lots of obedience training. They know the treat command.
The trainer is an older man named Robert who has been training dogs for fifteen years. He seems to be a very soft spoken man who is very patient, which is good since Pete and Anne are in the class. He brought his dog, a border collie named Sky, to demonstrate what the results of our class should be. His dog is soooo well trained. Justin and I were impressed. He never had to be told a command twice. When Robert placed a treat very near Sky and said, "Leave it", the dog left the treat alone. He never stopped looking at it, but he left it alone. Robert eventually said, "Ok" and Sky ate the treat. Wow!
Last night, we went around the room and discussed our individual needs and desires for the class. It was great that pretty much everyone in the class had basically the same needs and desires. Pedro's owner also said Pedro has some issues with larger dogs (barks and needs to show his dominance) and said she was very glad there were no large dogs in the class. Pete and Annabelle do this, too, sometimes. Robert went over some basic potty training ideas for us to try. One suggestion is to limit their time around food and water. The food thing I can do, but it will be very hard for me to keep water from them. I know they really don't need much, if any, water when they're asleep in the crates, but it's still hard to swallow that concept.
We began working on the look at me command. You hold a treat near your face so the dog will look at you and when he/she does, you give them the treat. Justin worked with Annabelle and she did very well with this command. Pete was over stimulated and wouldn't take the treats from me. She wasn't interested in any treats during the class.
The next command we worked on was the sit command. You hold a treat near the dog and say "sit". When the dog sits, you immediately give him/her the treat and say "yes". Annabelle took several tries for this command to work, but she eventually got it. Justin practiced with her at home and she did it very well. Once again, Pete just laid on the floor and shook. I felt so sorry for her, but I'm hoping we can get to class early next week or even take a field trip during the week and let her explore the room and get comfortable with it. She was happy once we got her in the carrier in the car. That's her safe place and she was fine in there.
I think the other two dogs did well with these two basic commands. Buckley already knew sit and demonstrated it very well. Hopefully class will go well next week, too!
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