Great day!

I took a great jog with the dogs today. We saw tons of dogs and people, and there was no drama. Three things of note: one, we happened across a group of children playing duck duck goose on their front lawn with their mom. Perfect training opportunity! They were running and screaming, but totally predictable location-wise. We stood there and I fed treats until I saw a really relaxed Gustav (tail down, mouth open), then we left. I tried to time it such that maybe possibly he might associated relaxed behavior with leaving.

Then we saw two little yappy dogs on those long extenda-leashes barking like crazy at us from across the street. In addition the guy was walking really slowly, so it took a long time for them to pass. We just stopped and the dogs looked at me and I tossed treats in the grass. I like this technique because it gives them something to do for two seconds (sniff out the treat) and buys me more time to deal with two dogs at once.

Finally, we were doing our sprint across the park at the end, with Dottie off leash. I noticed her tense and pull the corners of her mouth forward and put her tail up like a flag. I looked back and there was an off leash dog running towards us (a dog I had "rescued" before, to the annoyance of the owner who clearly had no problem with her dog running around the neighborhood all alone). I told Dottie to come and we outran the dog and got across the bridge. By then the dog gave up. Hooray!

I feel really good that we can have a nice pleasant jog around the neighborhood without drama, provided there are streets to cross. I'm also experimenting with stopping in sight of some stationery trigger (like a dog on a line or behind a fence, or a person doing yard work or waiting for a bus) and waiting and watching for calm behavior. Once I get a low tail and no hackles and maybe an open mouth or small tail wag, I say "okay" and we increase distance. Kind of like a mini-CAT where we move instead of the trigger. It makes sense, since even though they like food, what they really really want is to get away from the thing. Like if your dog comes when called and then you release them to go chase the squirrel if it's safe. Why not use the reinforcers present in the environment if at all possible? Another way I use this is when Gustav pulls on the leash, and I stop. As soon as he looks back and loosens the leash, I say "good" and we get to go sniff whatever he was pulling for.