Heart Like a Dog

The Good, the Bad, and the Oh My God of living with dogs!

Tasty Tuesday

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We have two vastly different treat eaters in our house.

Mr. Picky Sampson who has been known to accept a milk bone and then drop it in my purse because it wasn’t to his liking.

And I’ll eat a rock if you tell me it’s a treat Delilah who will eat almost anything you hand to her.

Sara at The Mellow Mutt started carrying an Australian line of dog treats and I picked up some Kangaroo.

It comes in three or four different flavors but Sampson absolutely loves the Kangaroo.  In fact the couple of times I’ve used it to lure him into his spot on the bed, I thought he was going to do flips for it.

I’m always on the lookout for new, high value treats which can be used on our walks to work on our recalls.   In one of my recent posts I asked you all what yummy, low carb treats you used and I got a lot of answers.  I plan on putting a post together for anyone else who might be interested in the same thing.

Saturday I headed to the pet store armed with your treat suggestions and came up empty.  Pfffft!

I did however find this one which looked somewhat appealing to me.  So I picked it up.

Usually I’m pretty good about reading the label to see where it is manufactured, but I dropped the ball on this one.  The distributor is in CA but the treats are a product of China.  🙁

I did check out the websites and looked at recall lists and I could not find anything negative on them, so I figured big dogs/small doses we should be ok.  These treats are really soft and easy to break into smaller pieces.

Mr. Picky Sampson LOVED them!

Hubby and I have an agreement, I get up with the dogs on Saturday and he gets up with them on Sunday, this way each of us gets a day to sleep in…..unless Hubby has to work on Saturdays.  Then my Sunday becomes his, which was the case this past weekend.

So at 6:15 am Sunday I was up with Delilah.  Sampson decided he didn’t want to get up, so he climbed up on the bed next to Hubby.  But I know how his mind works…..he will lie there for a short while then Hubby will roll over and since he can’t sleep with his mouth closed, will blow his stinky morning breath out and Sampson will start licking at that stank his mouth.

Most days when I need to coax Sampson out of the bedroom I will use a carrot, but Sunday I thought, let me try these new duck treats.  I fed one to Delilah and told her to stay, then went into the bedroom where I stuck the treat in front of Sampson’s nose.

Have you ever seen a big old alligator move like lightning?  YUP that’s what my puppy turned into.  He took the treat out of my hand faster than Shiva snarfs mud.  In fact, I had to reach in and take it out in order to coax him from the room.

I would have to say, these treats are a hit in my house.  I’ve been dishing them out sparingly and if Sampson knows I have them on our walk, he keeps running back like Delilah does.

Considering they are a product of China, would you have tried them with your pup?

Would you believe I’m taking part in the Tasty Tuesday Blog Hop hosted by Kol’s Notes and Sugar the Golden Retriever?  You can get your linky code at either of their blogs. (The free wordpress does not support the linky tool.)

Just One Day

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Today was Just One Day.

I feel really bad that I haven’t posted about this event before now.  When I first heard about it I thought what a great idea, liked it on facebook, shared it when I saw it pop up in my feed, but totally forgot to blog about it.

In retrospect I should have blogged about it sooner so YOU could have blogged, tweeted, and shared it yourselves.  Ah the best laid plans.

If you haven’t heard about it, let me share their goal from their website, “We are asking animal shelters across the USA to take a pledge not to kill any savable animals on June 11, 2012. For Just One Day, “Euthanasia Technicians” will put down their syringes and pick up cameras. Instead of injecting animals with lethal doses of sodium pentobarbital, they will photograph them and post them on the Internet, on Facebook, on twitter. On June 11, 2012, they will market their animals to the public, they will reach out to rescue groups, they will host adoption events with discounted rates, they will stay open for extended hours, and they will ask their communities to help them empty the shelter the good way.”

Their facebook page had a map of the United States with a color chart at the bottom.  Each color represented a number of shelters and as shelters joined the cause, colors changed and the update would say, “California just turned pink.”  It was exciting to see the amount of shelters participating in such a worthwhile cause.  California was the winner with 41 to 50 shelters participating.

My facebook page kept getting updated with the exciting news like this, “More exciting news: Roanoke Valley SPCA in Virginia reports 33 adoptions on a day they are normally closed. They report adoptions at the municipal shelter, which is also normally closed. And they report a full parking lot. Way to go Roanoke!

Meanwhile, one shelter ran out of animals after their 186th adoption in Florida, another shelter was emptied in Tennessee, another in Arizona report lots and lots of empty cages as animals are being adopted in droves! “

When I took a look at the map I realized every single state had organizations that participated. Some of the shelters were reporting they don’t have hard numbers on how many animals have been adopted because their computer systems just couldn’t keep up, they won’t have hard figures until tomorrow.

I’m not sure when there will be a total number but I just can’t wait to hear about it.

Now doesn’t THAT warm the cockles of your heart?

Check In

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I recently finished reading, “Bonding with Your Dog: A Trainer’s Secrets for Building a Better Relationship” by Victoria Schade.

I’ve been feeling like Delilah and I are not bonded, hence her tendency to ignore me on off-leash hikes.  As with any thought I have, it could of course be wrong.  But I’m going with it for the sake of this post.

This book was suggested to me by Pamela, at Something Wagging in one of my comments a while back.  I downloaded the book on my Kindle and then took my time reading it.

Why?  Well two reasons really.

1) When I read a training book, I want to take notes.  I want to highlight areas of interest and I find that I don’t do that with my Kindle.

My bad.

Yes I know it’s easily rectified with the highlighting option on the Kindle, but then there’s the pesky matter of trying to find it.

2) Most dog training books I’ve read give LOTS of stories, emphasizing the lesson.

I want the lesson.

Quick and dirty.  Give me the story later.  I’m trying to bond with my dog here. :-0

Don’t get me wrong, it was a good book, BUT I got so caught up in the stories that I sometimes forgot the lesson.

Ok, maybe it’s just me and my menopausal mind.

ANYHOOO, I’m not going to give you all her tips here (that would spoil the book for you) but I will say one of her suggestions was talking to your dog while walking.  After reading the book I realized, I already do that and quite frequently.

I also realized I could be sending Delilah mixed messages.

Delilah’s command for returning to me is HERE.   Sampson’s is COME.  Don’t ask me why because I couldn’t tell you if I had to.

Since I talk to them while we’re walking I noticed I say Come on, Over Here,  and This Way when we’re walking.  So how is Delilah supposed to know when I say Here that it means, get your butt back pronto?

As humans we are capable of understanding how words are used in different contexts, but dogs aren’t.  They haven’t as yet developed that skill….notice my use of the word yet.  (I have high hopes for my dogs.)

I started working on a new command with Delilah.  When we’re walking and I see her turn and look at me, or she starts running toward me I sing (and yes, it really sounds like I’m singing) Check In.  As soon as she reaches me I give her a treat and tell her good check in.

Once she’s checked in, I can very easily (and sometimes do) give her another command, or play a quick game of kibble catch.

For Delilah the only thing Check In means is she is getting a treat.  That’s it.

So many times with our dogs we will call them to us, and clip a leash on them or something else that in their eyes equates to my fun is done.  Why would a dog like Delilah want to return to someone who’s putting the kibash on her fun?

Yeah, I don’t know either.

Oh, you just want to give me a treat? Sure I’ll take it.

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