It is true that Annie has done a fantastic job of losing 1 lb in just three weeks. Well... she had a little help from her foster parents with food portioning, and lots of fun walks and hikes almost every day, but she hasn't complained at all and has really become a fan of all the veggies/fruit and quality protein sources she is getting. We even noticed that her harness needs to be adjusted in today when we were out on our walk.
Along with less Annie has come a more frisky Annie! She can jump into laps easier, do even faster rattie runs, leap across small streams, and she can run up the stairs in the house like the breeze. There is no walk that tires her out and we are planning a longer hike in the very near future. Annie is a typical terrier, ready for anything with a bit of terrier tude thrown in. But we can save that for a later post. :)
These videos were taken three weeks ago when we had just begun working on recall while on leash out on our walks. These first two show how Annie was clearly more interested in the environment than in coming back to see what foster mom was calling her for. Terriers are hard wired to hunt and when they are in hunt/prey drive mode or just sniffing for critters recall can be a bit tough for them. Plus Annie hadn't realized yet that foster mom has really good treats! No worries...she figures it out quickly.
Notice how I call her name once and when she doesn't respond I don't continue calling her name over and over. I have learned through many sources that once we start down that road of calling a dog's name over and over trying to get a response that it "poisons the name or cue word". To the dog it is similar to parents lecturing their child over and over about the same thing, the child will tune out and the words stop having any meaning. I have come to understand this is the same with dogs, if I were to call "Annie-Annie-Annie ANNIE!!!!!", trying to get a response, this is not the best way for me to set up my relationship with her, as she would learn to just tune me out and recall is so important, we want our dogs to be happy to come to us when we call their name
In this video I tried to call her name when she was in the process of turning to look at me so that she would be able to see I had a little pay check for her if she would come to me when I called her name. Her pay check is a high value treat, some really smelly homemade salmon treats. That got her attention!
Because we were just starting our recall work I tried to time my calling, "Annie!" with when she was not so interested in something in the environment. I wanted to set her up for success, catch her attention so when she heard her name she would look back and see foster mom always has something yummy to offer her. She nailed it!
I noticed in watching this video that Annie was giving me a head check as we were walking. This is great! She was starting to anticipate that I might be calling her so she was keeping a bit of her attention on me as well as environment. This is just one way we work on recall. There are many other recall games we do around the house formally and informally.
09-25-14 Annie's very first day in foster care, 3 weeks ago. She was at 13 lbs.
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| Someone said little Annie looked like a small Llama :) |
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| Annie after losing 1 lb, her neck and chest has thinned out and she is getting a waist! She has always been a doll baby, but now she is looking more like her young 2 1/2 year old self. |
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| And from the other side...looking good sweetheart! She is developing some nice muscle in her back legs too. |
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| Looking down on this sweet girl, her little waist is starting to curve in. Such a good girlie.... |
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