I have been contemplating writing a Post covering some aspects of responsible dog ownership. The ideas are numerous and the trigger was that “used dog” comment noted in an earlier Post*. My daughter, who lives on the other side (West coast) of this vast country, read the “Used Dog” post* and sent me a link to a recent article about dog abuse in her part of the world. Continue reading
German Shepherd
Gotta Luv Lululemon!
Those of you who have been following the exploits of Ray and I will already know that one of his favorite places to visit downtown is the Lululemon store*. He has been there many times now and appears to be quite comfortable going in and waiting near their biscuit bowl for his treats. Continue reading
A Snow Day!
We recently had our first significant snowfall of the winter. We totaled around 12”/30cm which, because of strong gusting winds, created some “interesting” snow drifts! Continue reading
Adapting a Toyota for Ray!
I could write a small book covering our exploits with finding a suitable traveling spot in the SUV for Ray. In a nutshell however, my SUV is an early Toyota RAV4 and the obvious place (at least to us) was to put him in the very back. He made it extremely clear that the idea was not going to work so his place then became the rear passenger seat. Continue reading
Remembering Clicker Training!
Clicker training is a way of teaching a dog to respond as desired, with the “click” being a very precise and “clean” sound which can be created very quickly to mark success to a vocal and/or body language instruction. The dog soon recognizes that a “click” means a reward is imminent, just as it recognizes that no “click” means something went wrong. Continue reading
Treats vs Loyalty?
When the three of us are out walking, Ray will often try and impact whatever route decisions need to be made and, in many cases, we let him. The walk is, after all, designed around his needs and if it wasn’t for Ray, would we be out walking this regularly? We do, however, sometimes have an agenda of our own which we fit in with Ray’s walk as best we can. Continue reading
Fetch – Round 2.
Those of you who read about my earlier totally futile and humiliating experiences of teaching Ray to “Fetch” (see Post “Ray … Fetch” November 26), may be interested to know that he has done it! Continue reading
Ray’s Skype Account!
In one of my earlier attempts at resolving Ray’s separation anxiety, I thought that it would be a distinct advantage to be able to monitor him while I was away. Technology came to my assistance in the form of Skype! Continue reading
Used dog!
Adopting a dog, as most of you would already know, opens up a whole additional aspect to your world. With Ray, our constant visits to the Oakville & Milton Humane Society and subsequent drawing from their expertise has been an education, and the contacts made invaluable. Continue reading
Ray-sitting!
The Town of Oakville has a very good symphony orchestra and, as we both enjoy classical music, we support them by subscribing to their annual concert series. The performances start in the Fall and go through to the Spring.
The 2013/2014 concert season presented us with a bit of a problem. Ray had relatively recently completed his heart worm treatment program and was now presenting us with some new challenges! During the treatment program, one of the key directives was to keep his heart rate as low as possible as this would increase his chances of surviving the treatment. For us this meant that we did not get him into any stressful situations, which therefore eliminated any work regarding his separation anxiety. Continue reading
A New Direction Perhaps? 