I recently found an awesome trainer at my favorite training facility. She has studied with Susan Garrett for years, so she has the training methods that I really like ingrained in her approach. She is an agility specialist, but does behavioral training too. I set up a series of semi private training sessions and invited a married couple I’m friends with who have two labs. One is a female that Diggity plays with a few times a month (they are very well matched and get along great) and the other is a male that doesn’t appreciate Diggity’s energy (snaps at him, understandably so), so we just walk together with the boys (on leash.) We are hoping someday the boys will be able to play together, but we are taking it slow.

Fast forward to the third agility class and we were learning how to run through a bunch of gates in a straight line. We aren’t doing jumps yet, but had the poles on the ground in between each gate. The trainer held each dog while the owner went to the end of the gates and called the dog. We were supposed to reward at the end in the “reinforcement zone” - Susan Garrett’s method of training the dog to get rewarded at your side instead of out front. Diggity ran through the gates great and I must not have been fast enough on the reward because he changed direction, took off and ran to the other side of the ring, where the other two dogs were waiting their turn. Guess who he went for? Yup, the boy dog who doesn’t like him. Snarling and snapping ensued and thankfully nothing happened, but oh Diggity, why must you always go for the things you aren’t supposed to have? We kept the leash on him for the rest of the class so it was easier to step on the leash or grab it if he took off again.

It reminds me of how Diggity plays with another friend of mine’s two male labs. The younger one loves to play with Diggity and they are perfect rough-and-tumble playmates. The older one will play for a few minutes and then is done and wants to be left alone. Guess who Diggity wants to play with? And even though he gets snapped at over and over again, THAT is the dog he wants to win over.

Anyway, the good news is Diggity is showing great aptitude for agility and he is slowly getting better in his impulse control. I really love Susan Garrett’s online Recallers class and am about to start doing privates with this new trainer as well. But, he is still a teenage boy with raging hormones and bundles of energy! Love him so much though!


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk