Jogging weather!

It's gotten really mild here, with highs in the upper 60s, so it means we can jog again without the dogs being completely useless due to overheating. We drove to a suburban area a few miles up the road for a change of scenery. It was lovely and we had a great time. We passed lots of dogs in houses and behind fences going crazy and my dogs didn't bark at all. They were handsomely rewarded for this choice. We jogged for about an hour and it's great to ditch the treadmill and have both the dogs and myself exercised at once.

Ever since I've been back from my trip I've noticed Gustav in particular has really regressed. He's bark/lunged at people nearly every day. I'm glad we have the fall routine, complete with jogging and our reactive rover class, to get us back on track. I also am setting up my weekly CAT sessions with my sister-in-law. I'd really like Gustav to like her. He loves her son and her boyfriend, so I know it's possible.

I'm working on two other things with Gustav: one, looking at me before we cross the street. I say "stop" and the dogs stop, then I just stand there until Gustav finally looks up at me out of boredom. Then I say "yes" and "okay" and we cross the street. Two, I picked up a booklet called the "Really Reliable Recall." It has you spend two weeks calling your dog in the house three times a day and spending literally one minute giving out great treats and praising. It's nice not to worry about criteria right now and Gustav has gotten quite speedy on his in-house recall. The booklet then has you test the recall in a set-up to see how it's going. I'll give that a try in a few weeks and see if a recall trained with no raising of criteria is of any use in difficult situations. I'm curious and it takes very little effort on my part, so why not?

The dogs are really tired now. It's a wonderful sight.