Thursday night's class went really well :o)
The class consisted of everyone taking the bronze and the silver tomorrow and Bran was thrilled to see the lovely lady from our clicker class only she had her very handsome boy dog with her and not Holly. He was so thrilled, in fact, that he had to do his special Bran dance whilst wuffing at her. She laughed at the fact that he has learnt 'bark' so well that he can even command himself now!
We were split into relevant classes and we had 6 of us in the bronze class, including Janie and her mum from our usual class. Bran was not in the least bit fazed by all of the other dogs and I was so proud as we "performed" under exam conditions and he was absolutely spot on with everything.
Although I would have earned us a fail on the recall :o( I put him into a 'sit', told him to 'wait' and headed off down the paddock, then turned and recalled him. He bombed up to me and into a perfect 'sit' at my feet, and then our faux examiner said "I didn't tell you to recall him". Oh the shame!! I set him up again then headed off, turned and he started towards me. Instinctively I put my hand up and shouted "Stop! Sit! Wait!" and he did it all. Miraculous as I haven't taught him 'stop'!! This time, faux examiner slipped a slip lead through his collar so that he didn't set off on the basis that we'd broken it twice and a third was inevitable. After a third, spot on, recall she did say that he hadn't needed the lead though as he'd not moved a muscle and had just glanced at her as if to say "My mummy told me to wait - I'm not going anywhere, silly lady". LOL!
We have been up to the park this morning to do a bit more work on waiting before I recall him and after 2 pre-emptive recalls, he got it and just sat and watched and waited for the command - even when Jacob and Casey were chasing balls right behind him or when Casey was dancing in circles around him and barking, trying to entice him into playing!!
Deep breaths and fingers crossed that all goes well tomorrow now.....
Fingers crossed - hope you have better luck than when Nick did the silver with Barty. A flock of seagulls took off right next to him as he was sat waiting. Jolly good sport.
ReplyDeleteAmazingly - the boy actually sat and waited and did a perfect recall when asked. No doubt Bran will be as perfect