Superdog

As some of you may know, while I was spending much needed time with family and friends the past three weeks, Mr. Rocky Rockstar Gehring was attending "K-9 Bootcamp" here in California. It sounds a lot scarier than it is - K-9 Companions, the company that runs the program, is all about positive reinforcement, not about being scary! They've actually training many LA-area athletes, actors, and other celebrities (they're located in Riverside, which is halfway between Yucca Valley and LA). Check them out: K-9 Companions.

I dropped Rocky off on my way to the airport on July 1st, and had my "pick up lesson" with him this morning. Basically, after three weeks of training Rocky, now the trainers had to train me to practice everything he's learned. Right away, I could tell he's learned SO much! Most importantly, he no longer only obeys when there's a piece of food dangling in front of his face (admittedly our fault for getting him on this habit). Secondly, it's as if he's discovered how to use his ears. He's mastered sit, stay, come, down, heel, and knows not to come into a certain doorway if I tell him that. 

It was actually really hard to learn how to talk to him. For example, I'm only supposed to say his name when saying a command, such as "Rocky, heel." I'm not supposed to say "Bad dog, Rocky!" or "Rocky, no!", because then he thinks of his name as a negative thing, and will stop responding to it. Interesting. I now have to work with him for 20 minutes a day, six days a week for 90 days, to reinforce this behavior. After 90 days, I might be able to train him to do these things off leash. 

The Boot Camp program also consists of an in-home visit by the trainer a week after the boarding part. The trainer will come out here next weekend, and teach us (hopefully Greg will be home by then) how to train him in the house. After that, we have monthly visits to the kennel for a full year. 

He definitely still has a ways to go, but this is a huge improvement! He seems more confident, and just the fact that he's listening to me is amazing. Now that the ball's in my court to keep him so well trained, I feel nervous! Hopefully we'll keep it up!