|
Location: East Sussex
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 3,314
|
|
Back on track with socialising
I haven't been around a lot lately & have had a nightmare 2 months having to work full time & more covering for my boss who was taken ill.
Although Tilly has still been getting her regular walks, the morning ones have been so early that you don't see another dog in sight & other ones have just been around the farm. I haven't been able to meet up for group/pack walks for so long & it really seemed to affect her. She started to either run away from other dogs or have a go at them, something we have never encountered before - she even had a go at 2 of her "best friend" dogs!
So I contacted my lovely behaviourist & joined her for her first pack walk in a while today to be observed. I felt in my head that Tilly needed to find her place again within a group & so lots of obervations!
There were 7 dogs of all varieties (including a chocolate lab puppy having a first time offlead), a guarding collie, a playful beagle, a wandering westie, an old lab, a shepherd (the boss) & a spaniel.
Tilly was immediately warned by the collie to back off & found her place within the group as "in the middle"
The moment came when the westie pushed his luck with her, it started off as a play & the westie started it but Tilly went for it & was noted that it looked like she did this because it was all so close to me - so possibly Tilly was guarding me which makes sense because we've been walking alone for a couple of months. The good thing was that as soon as Tilly was told to stop, she did & backed off we continued without a fuss & I was shown how to react to the situation with minimum fuss & a whistle.Then she played zoomies with beagle
When we got back, Tilly ended her walk by falling in the pond - but once in she seemed to like it! I called her out & she fell in again!!
We are going to do it all again tomorrow, it was a great walk