Saying goodbye to a dog

Yesterday a car pulled up just as I was shutting things down to go home. I did not have anyone on the schedule. The car looked vaguely familiar.

Lani got out of the car. I had not seen her in a while. Back in 2009 she and her roommate Tammi, brought me two very interesting dogs. The first was Billy, a Dutch Sheppard; the second was Bosco, a Dachshund.

They were a challenging pair. Bosco was deaf. Billy was a retired military bomb detection dog. And to make it even more interesting, Tammy is vision impaired.

The challenge with Billy was his former occupation. Military and Police dogs are trained to think of their jobs as a game. The reward for doing well is a Kong. So these dogs are toy aggressive. In addition Billy was dog aggressive. He could not let a dog near the patrol as it might be carrying an IED.

Billy was arguably the most dangerous dog I have had to train. He was willing to kill. At the same time he was also a very easy dog to work with because he had learned to trust his handler. My job was to show him that Lani, Tammi, and I were to get the same respect as his military handler.

Billy also had some difficulty with his back legs, they had been severely injured in a bomb blast.

The training went well. Billy and Bosco moved on to group. Billy kept his eye on every dog in the room but had learned to live with others.

No one comes to Neighborhood Pack forever so eventually Lani’s pack slid into memory.

About a year later Lani came by with an article from the Fort Carson paper. Billy was now a therapy dog in their Wounded Warriors program. He related well to the combat veterans because he too was a wounded vet.

Lani had come by yesterday for Billy to say goodbye. He is 14 now and that is the life expectancy of his breed. He has kidney problems.

I could hear him out in the car. He knew where he was and he wanted to come in.

Lani had us pose for some pictures. Billy let me scratch his ears. Then he took a treat from me.

He has lost some weight, his back legs are a little less reliable, and he has some breathing problems. But he seemed to enjoy visiting his old haunt.

Billy, like me, had found something to do when he retired. Lani and Tammi gave him a wonderful life. The joy this dog brought far outweighs the loss soon to come. Im grateful Lani and Tammi let me say goodbye.

And I am sure he will be waiting for us when our times come to cross the rainbow bridge.

Doug

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A dog nose how to go on a walk

     A while back I did a home visit with a client.  I do not do a lot of those since most problems can be diagnosed and dealt with in either my private lessons or in our neighborhood pack group sessions.  But this dog was bought from a puppy broker/trainer who seems to deliberately make his puppies and students dog aggressive.  That is because he is also a trainer who specializes in dog aggression.  And your dog always needs lots of extra lessons.

     Since the behavior wasn’t improving as quickly as I wanted I decided to see the dog on his turf.

     The walk was a success and I spotted what was delaying improvement, but I also saw something I realized a lot of people do.  They don’t let the dog get as much out of a walk as they do.

     A lot of us take our dogs for a brisk walk.  We are getting exercise as well as exercising the dog.  So we tend to keep the dog on a short leash next to us.   We will however, stop and chat with a neighbor or maybe pause to look at something interesting.   We even stop to smell the roses.

     Yet we don’t let our dog do the same.

     A dog gathers a lot of information through its sense of smell.  They in many ways use their nose to gather information the way we use our eyes.  So for a dog a walk is much more about what you can smell than what you can see.

     As we walked the dog I had the owners give him six foot of lead rather than one pull him in next to them.  And he was able to keep up.  He would bound ahead, almost to the end of the line, to check out an interesting smell.  He would finish his information gathering, and then bound ahead to the next great smell. 

     He never tugged ahead, nor forced them to slow down when they went past him to the end of the line.  Manners in Minutes training teaches your dog never to have a tight line. 

     As the walk progressed he got to be a dog doing dog things.  And as a result he was much more relaxed.  And since he was relaxed and having a good time, he did not spend the whole walk worrying about other dogs.  He even went up to a fence where there are other dogs.  With a short line, this sends him into a barking frenzy.  But with a relaxed line he said hello and kept going.

      So the next time you go for a brisk walk with your dog, give him or her a little line.  Let them get as much out of the walk as you do.  Your dog nose what to do.

Doug

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