Walking off the Wiggles

Tuttle is a busy little guy and when a person isn't entertaining him then he finds his own fun, which often isn't an activity I'd like him to be doing. He also will start to bug the other dogs, barking in their faces to get them to play with him. Don't get me wrong, he's a very sweet guy, but he's all terrier and can be a handful.

"Wanna play?!"

Today it got to the point where I was a bit concerned someone was going to strangle the little guy - either Chima, Sal, Frodo or me. So I decided rain or no rain Tuttle and I were going for a walk.

I can't say he was super excited about this. He loves to sniff though so off we went at a snails pace, him inspecting every blade of grass and fallen leaf and me doing deep breathing since I really don't like to walk slow.

Reading the "p-mail"

But this walk was for Tuttle, not me. While us humans love to walk in straight lines at a brisk pace, that's not how dogs walk. For them a walk is about exploration and all that sniffing and wandering and experiencing new things uses all of their senses, working their brain and really wearing them out.

Another leaf to sniff and bark to walk on

Checking out one of the many waste bins along the route

Along with all the sniffing and licking of things, Tuttle worked on being brave as garbage trucks and cars drove by, dogs barked at fences, and strangers walked down the other side of the street. He sniffed the trash cans at each house which probably had a load of interesting smells, and walked on a bunch of different textured surfaces: grass, various grates, asphalt, moss, beauty bark and wood chips.

Tuttle went all the way under this hedge and then popped his head out to get a sniff of it

About 1/2 mile into our walk the rain really picked up and Tuttle started to drag. He was no longer having much fun or even doing much exploring - he was just cold and wet. By the time we reached the 3/4 mile mark he was really done so I picked him up and carried him the last 1/4 mile back to the house. There he practiced more bravery as he experienced the garage door opening near him and the recycling bin being wheeled into the garage.

Hitching a ride home after deciding he was too wet to move his legs. 

Hopefully we'll get some nicer weather so Tuttle will get to walk in the sunshine. Then maybe it won't take us a full 30 minutes to get around the block.

The Fine Art of Dog Play

With some dogs there is an ultra fine line between play and fighting. The reason for this usually is that the dogs get ramped up so quickly that they become pretty reactive and they don't know how to stop and give themselves breaks before that happens.

Both Chima and Tuttle really struggle with this problem. They start to play, the intensity quickly ramps up (by quickly I'm talking about 15 seconds here) and if I don't step in I have a fight on my hands.

At a seminar I went to once I remember the speaker talking about how dog play should be like a boxing match - every three minutes everyone is forced to take a time out and rest for awhile. And if you watch two dogs together who play well you will notice that they naturally will take these breaks, backing off and waiting until the body language of the other lets them know they are ready for round 2 or 3 or 20.

When dogs don't naturally take breaks the intensity will build until fights happen and so it's the human's job as the guardian in the situation to manage this. Some dogs will never be well matched to play together because one will end up being bullied by the other. Neither dogs are bad, they just aren't a good match. But when two dogs are pretty evenly matched in temperament but struggle with giving themselves breaks, the human can facilitate this by creating distractions and interruptions to the play that cause short little breaks for the dogs.

I will call out their names, walk between them, pick up a treat bag, etc. Anything that causes them to pause and take the attention off of each other. After a bit if they seem to have taken things down a notch then the human ignores them a bit so they will start up again. When it gets to a point that the dogs struggle to bring their intensity down during the breaks then it's time to end the play and try again another time.

I do this often by a break in their crates with a treat and a favorite chew. This reinforces the play time, gives them a chance to fully calm down, and the chew is a way to work out some of that intensity as their body slowly returns to normal.

Chima and Tuttle and I have been working carefully on this over the week. I started noticing that Chima was interested in playing with Tuttle but she was quickly overwhelmed by him and then it would turn into a scuffle. By teaching them to take breaks and relax a bit, they have slowly started creating the breaks by themselves, Tuttle jumping up on a couch or chair and lying down. Then Chima will back off and watch him, wagging her tail until he attempts to jump her from the couch and the game is back on. It's been slow going - initially I would step in soon after play was initiated but by now we've worked up to a full 3-5 minutes of wrestling punctuated by short little self-initiated breaks to calm themselves down.

The video above shows them playing and taking small breaks and it was taken after about 3-4 minutes of play. After this session I stepped in and ended the session so it would stay a fun experience and everyone could rest and take down their intensity. Chima is very loud, vocal and intense in her play so a short session goes a long way for most dogs.

Tuttle says "will you play with me Sal?" and Sal says "NO". This time Tuttle took no for an answer. Yay, Tuttle! You are learning to be more respectful of your elders. 

Adopted!

Who's adopted? Salinas is! And where is she going? Nowhere. We have thought long and hard about this since we really never wanted to add another dog to the pack, but the reality is that Salinas has pretty much been ours for awhile now and so we are making it official and adopting her.

The longer she was with us, the clearer it became how strong the bond between Sal and Chima was and how difficult a time she would have if she had to be separated from her, even to go to the very best of adopters. Unlike Chima, Sal is pretty brittle when experiencing new situations and environments and although we work on this she's never going to be a dog  who happily embraces change without her sister by her side. She finds life a bit scary and having Chima there to blaze the way gives her a bit of resiliency that she doesn't naturally have on her own.

And Chima would have struggled with the loss of Sal as well although she is more resilient so would have eventually bounced back, I believe.

We didn't just adopt her because it would be tough for her to manage life without Chima, though. She's a wonderful, sweet dog who is full of love and snuggles and does great with other dogs so she is a wonderful "addition" to our family.

So for those followers of "The Great Adventures of Chima and Sal" there will be many more posts to follow with I am sure, many more laughs. They are definitely a couple of very silly girls.

Cone Redux

When Tuttle was neutered and had his rear dew claws removed last Sunday we were told to come back in a week and he could get his stitches removed. Following that surgery a week battling the cone took place: Tuttle battling the cone and me battling Tuttle to keep a cone on him.

One of his old cones that did not work well for him

It was wet and gross outside so we had been daily rewrapping his paws and he was wearing his cone 24/7. However, he quickly figured out that his body was long enough that he could wrap himself around and still get his rear foot in his mouth - cone be damned!

I tried tying the cone on so it was higher on his neck and also using a donut cone in tandem with the plastic one to keep the cone higher. The problem is that the longer the cone, the wider the neck. So for a pinheaded little Rat Terrier with a tiny neck and a long snout, the cones are next to worthless.

Yesterday we were back at the vet for the 1 week recheck and as I suspected, he had bugged the incisions enough that they were starting to get a bit infected. Instead of getting his stitches out he instead needs to wear his cone another 5 days, and take 10 days of Clavamox to get rid of the infection. The vet techs, who absolutely adore this little maniac, found a cone that was a bit longer and more flexible at the neck. They then showed me how to do a "cat harness tie" using gauze to tie the cone around the neck and then around the body behind the shoulders. Tuttle was not impressed.

His new cone setup. So far this is working.

So we are heading into week two of the cone. The other dogs are really looking forward to a cone-free Tuttle since he likes to run up to them for a butt sniff and then ends up jabbing them with his cone.

Sunny Saturday

It's that time of year in the Pacific Northwest where panic starts to set it. Each time there is a clear sunny day we start to panic that it might be the last one until late Spring. Because of that there is almost a maniacal need to be outside every moment the sky is clear.

Yesterday was one of those days - beautiful, clear, and temps in the low 70's. So the dogs and I were out enjoying the great weather and working in the yard - me doing a bit of weeding and them continuing to develop their master plan to oust some rodent who has moved in under the shed. They are frustrated that I nixed their "dig it out" idea.

Pictures below are of some sunbathing the dogs were doing. Tuttle found that too boring so kept himself busy exploring.

Salinas, Tilly and Frodo enjoyed sunning on the bench beneath the bamboo while Chima chose the deck

Tuttle thinks sunning is boring so instead inspected the fountain

Chima's Journey: A Reflection on Progress

We live in a world that is always about that next step, focusing on future goals. I'm not saying that's a completely awful thing, but I think that often we forget to reflect on our progress.

Over the years I've worked with many dogs who had a long journey to get to a place where they were comfortable living in the human world. I learned to not focus on the dogs' struggles or their history, or even more importantly, not to compare them to a static "end goal" that I had created for them. Instead we learned to just live in that moment of learning - on the tiny baby step we were working on - and in that way I was regularly reinforced by the tiny pieces of progress that we made.

Unfortunately many of us forget to pause and celebrate the overall progress that has been made. After all, 100 baby steps adds up to a lot of progress. Last week I had a reminder to stop and celebrate a whole mess of baby steps that have added up to a pretty amazing dog.

Last Thursday Chima and I had a lot on our to-do list: a vet visit, followed by a trip to the pet store to pick up some supplements followed by our evening Nose Work class.

Chima has always been hypersensitive to touch and to people she doesn't have a long history with so we've worked long and hard to make our nail trims at the vet a positive experience. As the tech clipped her nails she said, "man, it's amazing how relaxed Chima is now during trims." I smiled, agreed with her and really didn't think much more about it.

After the vet visit we loaded into the car for our stop at Mud Bay, a natural pet food store, to pick up some supplements. Chima stood cautiously in the entryway as three well meaning clerks descended on us with treats. Chima slowly walked up to each of them, gave them a quick sniffdown, gently took the treat from their fingers and then walked around the store with me on a loose leash sniffing all the bulk bins and behaving herself like she's never had a naughty thought in her life.

Then it was home to unload the car and get reloaded to drive the 40 minute drive over to our Nose Work class. Chima rocked the class, prancing as she quickly found the hides, and after each search, walking up to participants and giving them a quick sniff (or licking their pocket if they had particularly great treats.)

On the drive home I had 40 minutes to think about our day together and realized that while this might be a normal day for some dogs, for Chima this was amazing. For a dog who started out semi-feral this was like an Olympic gold medal for being a domestic pet dog. I needed to value how amazing her accomplishments were, even though those accomplishments had become the norm.

So I looked back at some of the posts (Stupendously Wonderful Baby Steps and Touchdown)  that I did about Chima soon after she arrived in our home. It amazed me how far she has come - from not wanting to be on the couch if another person is there, to doing her best to always claim the spot closest to me if I am on the couch, even if that means sitting on top of Salinas. We went from dreaming that one day she would want to sit on my lap to now, complaining because she crowds us so much.

So stick with it. One day all those baby steps will add up to some great progress.

Battle of the Bone

Tuttle loves to chew on the bones we have mixed in with the dog toys in the dogs' toy basket. Because he's wearing a cone most of the time right now it's rather difficult for him to keep the bone from rolling away and one time I saw him use the cone to scoop it up and carry it across the room.

He had some cone-free time earlier and he made sure to spend some of it chewing on his favorite bone. But later the cone went back on and much cuteness ensued as he attempted to get control of the bone.

Nom, nom, nom

Sentries Chima and Salinas wait stoically for Tuttle to grow tired of the bone