The Longest Walk

There were two homework assignments from dog training class this week: sit and loose leash.  After many, many, many failed attempts during class, Buckley and I have achieved a somewhat consistent sit.  It is far from pretty, but he is going down on his butt with decidedly less jumping, biting, back peddling, and/or completely ignoring me.  Today, in three distinct sessions, we achieved sit at least three times in a row. Houston, we have lift off.  But as concerned as I was about "sit", I was doubly concerned about loose leash. Loose leash means the dog is on leash, but not pulling.  With a crazy Beagle?  Impossible!

Loose leash training is somewhat counter intuitive until you think about it.  If the dog pulls, you simply stop allowing forward motion until the dog stops pulling, then you start forward motion again. Hmm.  The trainer told us not to do this with a time limit and distance because it may take an hour to simply get down the driveway. Yowza! Armed with that knowledge, we went to the park to practice. 

Buckley barely pulled at all going from the house to the car.  It was unheard of, but I figured all of the work we'd done on "sit" had made him lethargic.  That or all of the extra puppy treats. (I'm kidding, we're using Zuke's mini bites and 10 treats are about the size of one regular treat.) He loaded up into the car just fine, and when we got to the park, he was great waiting on leash for us to get all ready to go.  Good dog!  Thus encouraged, I decided to really go into full training mode on that walk. 

Here is how it went.  Every time Buckley pulled the leash taut, I'd stop walking and make a sound like eenh! (going forward, I'll simply refer to that sound as ! so I don't have to spell it over and over.) When he stopped pulling, I'd say "good boy" and we'd move forward.  This is a sample of the walk (all of the dialogue is mine except for Brian's laughing in the background):

"Ok everybody, let's !. Good boy, let's try again.  Let's go. ! Good boy, remember not to pull.  So Brian, did you hear about !. Good boy. ! Um, ! Hey, I said ! ! ! Let's just stand here for awhile.  Poor Katy, thank you for never pulling and for waiting with us every time. Let's go. Good boy! So, Brian, did you hear about ! Buckley, what did I tell you about pulling? Let's go. Good boy. ! Let's go. Good boy. ! Let's go. Good boy." (Repeat)

Shockingly, we were able to cover 3 miles in a mere two hours, which is slightly more than twice the time it usually takes. Considering that we were teaching a Beagle not to pull in a park where there are wild animals, dogs, human and all sorts of interesting smells, I'd say it went great! I was very proud of the work we both did.  Towards the end, every time I'd say !, he'd look at me as if to say, oops, I didn't mean to do that, let's try again.  He'd even run to the end of his leash, then walk there without pulling.  Obviously, this will take much more practice, but he did such a great job.  Good dog! Good Linda, too.  I tried very hard to be consistent and not allow him to pull.  Go us!

That is it for today.  Katy, Buckley and I are all ready for bed.  It is a whole lot of work learning how to be well behaved. I think we all earned our bedtime.

Be happy and healthy!