When we first adopted Meadow, Nick asked if he could be her primary handler, and at first I was admittedly a little disapointed, since I wanted to be the one to say I mended this amazing little 'wild' dog. But I was also thrilled that Nick wanted to be more involved with working with our dogs, which had previously been my thing, and since I was so busy working with Toby in Rally anyway, I agreed to let him take over the reins. Not long after Meadow joined us, I got involved in both Rally and Nose Works with both Toby and Leah, and as my time grew even more limited, I ended up being glad that he did.
Because of this, I rarely walk Meadow, and I don't work on her training all that much, aside for the basics, (sit, stay, come), and a few cute tricks I taught her, like spin and roll-over. Instead, I've become her playmate, a relationship we've both grown comfortable with. I toss the ball for her and encourage her to pick it up, I play tug with her with random sticks, and I talk silly to her until she play bows at me and then zooms around the yard. There's no pressure on her, we both have fun, and she gets some exercise.
But now that I'm trying to get fit, I thought it would be fun to include Meadow in my walking routine.
And it's not going so well.
The first night, I got her to walk up the block and back and she was fine. But then, the very next walk, it was starting to grow dark, and we had only gone a few feet up the road when a car with headlights passed us and turned into the driveway of the house across from ours.
Meadow grew fixated on it, turning around every few steps to stare down the road and look at the car worriedly. Eventually, she put on the brakes and would not walk any farther, not even a step - no matter how much I tried to coax her, kneeling down, baby talking to her, and bribing her with treats.
Finally, I gave up and I brought her back home.
Since then, she is behaving in a similar manner if we pass any moving car, headlights or not, anywhere on our walk. She stops short, stares in the direction where the car went, and refuses to budge. Not one inch.
Did I mention our walks are not going well?
I discovered on Saturday that I can walk her in the woods - where there are no cars, but that requires me to get around to our walks earlier in the day, while it's still pretty light out, since walking through the woods at night is not a good idea, even in a nice area.
And, depending on my schedule, I'm not always able to walk the dogs during the day. Often, I'm busy with other things.
Which is why I'm mostly back to walking just Toby and Leah, and leaving Meadow's walks for Nick. I do plan to work on this, but I think giving her a little break is a good idea. We've learned with Meadow, when something spooks her, she tends to fixate on it for a while before finally snapping out of it. Hopefully, once the clocks change and I have more daylight, I can eventually take her through more romps in the woods. In the meantime, I'm enjoying exercising her by throwing the ball, playing with sticks, and talking funny to her until she bows at me and zooms around the yard...
Basically, we're back to being playmates, and the pressure is off.
Just because I want to do something with one of my dogs, doesn't mean they agree, so I try my best to listen to what they have to say.
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My Novel's Progress: Edited five chapters out of fifty.
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Times nearly over to enter my Mr. Chewy's giveaway - I'm giving away a gift certificate for $50.00 worth of dog supplies. It's as simple as a comment to enter - and it's free - so click the link to find out how and where to enter.
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