It really all started with Chico. He was a lot of firsts for me. My first Pit Bull breed, my first dog after moving out of my parents house and the first dog I took to obedience classes.
Overall, he was a fun and pretty easy dog to train. We only competed in AKC Rally Trials, but we both enjoyed the work of training.
Chico was also the first dog I registered with as a therapy animal team. We were registered from 2009 until 2015 with a Complex rating.
The dogs to follow have not been quite as easy.
Blue was the second dog I did any type of obedience training with. We began in about 2012, when Blue was 5 years old.
To say he was a handful is putting it mildly. I wish I had videos of the way he behaved when I first took him to classes. He was reactive to other dogs, so would bark and lunge at them. He could look quite scary to some people.
And it was A LOT of work, but we were able to end Blue's AKC Trial career with 11 AKC titles in Obedience, Rally, Trick Dog and Canine Good Citizen. And he was just 3 qualifying scores away from a Rally Master title (10 qualifying scores are needed for that title).
Blue and I also registered as a therapy dog team with Pet Partners first in 2015 with a Predictable rating. We passed our re-stest in 2017 with a Complex rating. We visited nursing homes, schools and libraries. We even received a request to visit a patient in the cardiac unit of Essentia Hospital in Fargo.
Zeus was quite something. We got him because of the similarity of his coloring to that which Chico had been.
As with Blue, Zeus was dog reactive, but for what I learned to be different reasons.
Blue was reactive to dogs, particularly those larger than he was because he was fearful. Zeus, on the other hand, would bark and lunge on leash because he was excited.
But something else new to me with Zeus was that he was also a little bit reactive to some people.
Zeus was a very, very smart boy and picked up on things so fast. He was doing some Open level Obedience exercises and was beginning to learn some Utility exercises too.
Unfortunately, Zeus developed Lymphoma and I lost him when he was only 4 years old. We never made it into the Obedience or Rally Trial ring because we were still working to overcome Zeus' reactivity issues, however, he did earn a Novice Trick Dog title.
Currently, I only have one dog, Draco. He is a pit bull/border collie mix. You wouldn’t guess that he is part border collie by looking at him. But it comes out in the way he behaves. He has nipped at people in a way that seems he is trying to "herd" them.
Draco is a pretty good dog overall. He listens pretty well when we are out and he is good in the house (aside from a bit of rambunctious playing).
However, he does have a couple issues that need to be worked on. First is that he has separation anxiety, and it’s pretty bad. He will break out of crates (I even zip tied one shut once) and hurts himself in the process. Or he will knock everything off tables and counters, not to eat anything, but I think just because he kinda freaks out. But as long as he has a babysitter, he is fine.
I didn’t socialize Draco much when he was a puppy. As a result, he has a minor issue with people. He is a bit timid and afraid around strangers. And he is even more uncertain of kids, but he has never really been around kids much.
And Draco is a bit of a spoiled brat. He loves attention and if people are talking and not paying attention to him, he will go get a ball or some other toy and make a bunch of noise. I think he just likes to be noisy in general. He will take a bone (which he has far too many of) and stand at the top of the basement stairs. He will then check to see if anyone Is watching him, and as soon as he feels someone is paying attention, he will throw his bone down the stairs.
He will also put his toys where he knows people might trip over them. Like put his ball behind someone and wait for them to turn around and trip over it.
But he is also a very sweet boy. If I am upset about something, he will come and get in my face to try to make me feel better. And he loves it when he can make someone happy by them watching him play. He gets excited when someone talks to him when he is playing.
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