Tuesday, September 21, 2010

I knew it was inevitable but I still feel awful ... I ran over Hardy for the first time!

Hardy and I had another manners class today. We worked on stays, stands, coming into heel position, recalls, waiting at doors before coming through, coming into a nice front and some loose leash walking. Hardy was generally a good boy although we are are having trouble with him sitting straight next to or in front of me (and he still has that sprawled puppy sit) and with his stays if I try to go around behind him. I realized  that I haven't done that before since we have worked on stays with a tether (and I couldn't go around behind him). Hardy also chased something white that was being blown across the ring and was very distracted by the feather toy on the stick Mary was twirling around. The worst thing about class though, was that while we were making a turn, I ran over Hardy's front foot. It's the first time it's ever happened and although I knew it was inevitable, I was really hoping to avoid it and felt terrible about doing it! Hardy was less than amused and it took a couple minutes to reconnect and have him willing to work near the chair again. The good news is that it doesn't seem to have hurt him physically and I'm sure we can rebuild his confidence - he is a resilient little guy! And we'll use chairs, walls and fences to work on him being straight next to me. I'm not sure how to handle the sloppy puppy sit - I've never had a puppy who sat like that before! Something else to learn!

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