More dog training at the shelter-Comedy and insight

Yesterday I went for the next phase of clicker training at our local shelter. We started with a dog named Augustus who has had a few weeks of training. Augustus is a  large pitbull/terrier mix with some kind of brindle marble coat. Just a beautiful dog who loved the attention of the six ladies in the room. We took turns practicing the commands sit, lay down, and stay wait while opening a door. Next we moved on to crate training. The idea is to reward the dog for going into his crate so that he would view it as a positive friendly place to be. Well, as dogs often do, Augustus decide to clown around a bit. When the trainer moved toward the crate, Augustus decided he would take a leap and jumped up on top of the crate. We all howled with laughter and he beamed setting up there wagging his tail with the pride of a performer who just nailed a good punch line. Of coarse August immediatly picked up on the laughter and jumped down and back up 3 or 4 times before we could contain ourselves enough to redirect him.

Once Augustus had trained us on the basics, we brought in a dog who had not received any training. Duke is a mastif chow mix large enough to drag me across the floor with my feet skidding, and he did. LOL. Much to my amazement within only a few minutes this smart boy was getting the basic commands about 90% of the time. Remember this was his first training session. As I worked with Duke I was taken by the ease of trainning and what a shame it is that the owners who surrendered him did not take advantage of the free training that would have enabled them to keep this dog who came in looking buck A wild. I have no doubt that both of these dogs will make fabulous companions for the right owner who is willing to spend the training time, which from what I have seen so far, can actually be very minimal.

I have to add the joy and gratification I feel after being privileged to behavior train these pooches keeps a smile on my face for hours after I leave the shelter. I think I am benefiting as much as the dogs.