Two training sessions in two days!

Tuesday and Wednesday of last week were both good training days for Maggie and I.

On Tuesday we visited the College of Ag Ice cream social. The social is a large event with the several hundred people attending all crowded into a small circle of displays and tables out on the lawn in front of Lilly Hall. I took Maggie to this event last fall and overwhelmed her, so my goal this year was to pay more attention to the dog.

As soon as Maggie's feet hit the pavement in the parking area I noticed that she was more active than usual. I put her vest on and we set out. About 200 feet from the gathering of people, Maggie started showing signs of stress: tail tucked, panting, hyperactivity, lack of focus. I ended up taking the vest off - no change in behavior - and working for about 5 mins about 100 feet from the group before moving further way (~200 feet off). We worked on basic obedience for a total of about 25 mins before I decided to quit - Maggie remained stressed the entire time w/ a few brief moments of relaxed behavior that increased the further away from the crowd we moved. One good thing: Maggie met and allowed two young kids pet her and feed her treats; amazing given her shyness around toddlers and the stress over the gathering of people about 100 feet way.

On Wednesday Maggie and I attended the dog park association's dog walk benefit. Maggie wore her front lead harness almost the whole time and we only had one growly incident (low growl, stiffening, no lunge). Maggie did amazing with several hundred dogs and people and didn't react, even when another dog approached, sat down, and hit her with his tail! That dog even was allowed to lie about 6inches from Maggie for a few minutes without protest. I was thoroughly impressed. :)

Interesting note: there were probably more people here than at the social on Tuesday, but they were more spread out. Maggie showed very few stress signals over the 2.5 hours we were there and was very tolerant of petting and dogs in her space. She was even relaxed enough at the 2 hour mark that she won 2nd place in the talent contest.

Two very different training sessions to be sure!