Chloe shocks me at times (training update)

[Ritz459]

We are watching a little four-five month old Border Collie pup this week for a friend of my mom's. (The pup's name is Roxy and she is a very sweet girl.) She looks like a black and white version of Chloe when she was that age. She's an outside dog so she is staying in Chloe's kennel this week, which runs adjacent to Blackie and Rose's kennel.

When the pup first got here I had Blackie and Rose in the garage as I knew they were going to be barking and carrying on if they saw the puppy and I didn't want her to get scared. (It took a bit to get Blackie and Rose to tolorate her, but a couple of body blocks and some very firm "leave it" commands got the job done and they are now co-existing peacefully in their kennels, knock on wood.)

After Roxy got settled into her kennel, I decided, "Hey, why not have Chloe be my test dog to see how Roxy likes other dog?." Chloe is normally a B-R-A-T around other strange dogs (growling, pulling on the leash, and carrying on).
I took Chloe out on leash and, with Roxy still in the kennel, let them sniff noses. Roxy was growling and barking and her body posture was fearful. Chloe growled at first, but I scooted in between them and broke their eye contact. After that Chloe all but ignored Roxy.
Then I let Chloe off leash in Blackie and Rose's kennel. Roxy was still very very unsure of Chloe and was growling and snapping at her when she got too close (aka, stuck her nose between the chainlink), but Chloe was an absolute angel. Chloe, my bratty, bitchy dog, was averting her head when Roxy would growl, making brief eye contact then looking away, arcing her body, play bowing, and when Roxy would get very worked up Chloe would studiously ignore her. She never once took offense at Roxy for growling or snapping at her. Needless to say, she shocked me down to my toes. She did try to intice Roxy to play with her by doing her favorite puppy zoomies while play bowing, growling, and barking, but Roxy didn't take too well to that.
After about fifteen minutes, Roxy had calmed down and her and Chloe were having a grand time running back and forth along with fence while trying to play.
Who knew Chloe had it in her. Now if I can just get her to play with other dogs as sweetly as she was acting during introduction. She still has no common sense and will jump up on another dogs back and then look at them like, "What you gonna do about it?" (This has caused some almost-fights between her and Rose a couple of times.)

She's also gotten a TON better with her resource gaurding. She's still iffy around people she doesn't respect, but I can get her to drop an item by telling her "Nooo" and walking towards her. She actually dropped an old bone she found for me today when she had slipped outdoors and I was trying to get her back inside - a big "I must bite you" item previously. We can walk by her when she is chewing on a high-value treat without any issues - before she'd growl and tense up.

I can get her to drop toys during tug and fetch games now as well. Not on command per say, but if I hold on to the toy loosly, yet firmly, and say, "Give it to me," she'll give it to me and then sit down and give me her herding dog stare while she waits for me to throw it.

We've been working on our walks and she'll stop sniffing something alongside the road and catch up with me when I tell her "Come on, let's go!" She left a dead bird alone in the middle of the road when I said, "Leave it". She'll ignore the cat's food that is on the floor when I tell her "leave it" as well (if she is on leash, that is). It is actually really funny when I tell her leave it as she'll stop going towards it, but she still looks at it. Then you see a mental battle going on inside her head while training conflicts with her own interests. Then she'll shoot me a glance and then slowly walk away from the object while shooting it glances every now and then. LOL
She still counter surfs, but when she put her paws on the table to get at a paper plate, a quick, "Off!" is enough to get her down and stay down. Sometimes I can just look at her or say her name and she'll coem trotting over to me like, "What? I wasn't doing anything."

And guess what she did today? A car had stopped and I was talking to its passenger (they were some people I baby sit for) and Chloe, after doing some half jumps and whining because she wanted to have the people pet her, she sat down without me saying anything and calmly waited to be pet! Whoohoo! She got lots of praise from me for that one.
She was also out foraging ahead (she was on a retractable leash) and I half heartedly said, "Chloe, come here." (I didn't say it like a command, I just sort of said it because she was starting to sniff at something.) Low and behold she stopped what she was doing and started trotting towards me! Again, she got lots of praise and a quick jog session.

Her stay has gotten more solid as well. She won't do it for very long (still working on that), but it has gotten more solid. She'll sit and stay before jumping in the car now as well. I did it for the first time the other day and when I opened the door she started to go and I said, "Ahh!" so she looked at me and then sat back down. Then I released her and she jumped right in.

After almost a year it seems she's finally getting the picture! (I have to brag about her before she hits a relaps. lol) She must not be a lost cause after all.

[Rivsky]

It sounds like Chloe is doing great - it's amazing how all of a sudden things just seem to fall into place and you start wondering what happened to your "normal" dog!!!

I was actually thinking to myself today if they ever truly stop surprising us with what they can do at times - River has continually blown me away this past month with the way he's handled himself in some pretty unusual situations.

Keep up the good work Chloe and enjoy what you've achieved with her so far Ritz you've done a great job

[Swiftwind]

It's funny how dogs kind of reach a point where things just seem to click, and in a way they become a whole different dog. It's like they realise what you've been trying to ask of them for all those months/years!

[k9hullio_sam]

That is a great feeling! Congrats!

[Ritz459]

It is like things have started to "click" with her. I've had some of those moments with Blackie and Rose with a command or two, but this is all happening at once with Chloe and it is very, very nice.

[Doglover1988]

I'm glad everything is going so well with Chloe. She would probably be a great dog for agility or some type of other dog sport she seems very high energy. Her personality reminds me alot of Lucy. Lucy is just now "getting" the leave it command and will leave everything alone now. She also just gave a quick glance at some workers on the side of the road on our walk today when she would usually bark until we passed them completely. Her good behavior is really helping since I walk all three dogs at the same time.

[Ritz459]

She would probably be a great dog for agility or some type of other dog sport she seems very high energy.

I'm hoping to start her in agility this summer. The local kennel club that offers agility classes has a rule that the dogs participating must have obtained a CGC or passed the kennel club's basic obedience course (which is basically the same thing as the CGC), so Chloe's agility experience is going to be in our backyard for now, or at least until she gets a bit older and more well behaved. It won't be anything competative, but we'll have fun with it.

She doesn't have the attention span/concentration to do obedience as of yet, but I thourghly enjoyed doing obedience with Blackie so I'm hoping that when Chloe gets older and settles down a bit she'll be more suitable for the obedience ring. She sure has the brains for it, she just needs the patience. LOL