July 2012 -- Day Ten

Mollie does great with her loose leash walking when there are no distractions around. That's a really good start but it doesn't do us much good if we can only walk in areas where there are no distractions.

Ideally we are getting her attention before we head into a lot of distractions but, if she has a nice foundation, she will learn how to handle it even when we walk into a distracting situation unexpectedly.

I like to do an exercise where Mollie walks towards a goal. What I like about this exercise is that Mollie really needs to figure out on her own how to move forward in order to walk towards the goal (treat or toy on the ground). I start out by showing her I have the treat and then toss it about 20 or so feet away. She then needs to walk towards it on a loose leash in order to get the treat. I will use words to encourage her but the only other feed back I will give her is that I will stop moving forward if she gets ahead of me.

If she pulls to get the treat, I'm just going to stand still.

It might take her awhile but the idea is for her to realize that pulling on the leash isn't working. At that point, she will turn towards me in an attempt to figure out how to get us to move forward. I'm going to praise her and wait for her to come back to me before we start moving forward again. She already knows that routine from all our drills we've been doing so it doesn't take her long to figure out to return to me.

If she is walking nicely next to me, we move forward. If she walks nicely the whole way up to the treat, I'll tell her "get it" and let her get the treat. We use the same concept when we are trying to walk towards something that is really exciting for her (dog park, home, etc.). We don't move forward until she is walking nicely beside me. This really helps her to think it through and figure out on her own how to get what she wants.

And when she's done it well several times in a row, it's time to play. But first, she earns the play by sitting and paying attention to me before I take the leash off.

And then it's time to run...

She even enticed the older dogs to join in on the fun...that's a rare sight around here.

Then time to rest. She is definitely getting her fair share of exercise here.