#training things

I think that most of the emotion needs to be taken out of service dog training. It should be a very practical yes/no situation- if a dog doesn’t meet one aspect, they should be washed. All too often people delay washing a dog waaaay too long. Some folks who owner-train service dogs are so emotionally attached and try to push a dog into a job just because it is their dog and their bond is the best. If a dog is unsafe in public, don’t continue to try to train it for SD work. Same goes for dogs who are stressed in certain situations- that becomes a huge welfare concern for the dog. It’s not fair to the dog, while it may not necessarily be “liability” level stress (like provoking into aggression), but it is still a pretty sucky life for the dog if they go in public and are severely stressed. It doesn’t matter how much the owner is attached to the dog. VERY FEW dogs should actually be service dogs, and can handle that type of work in general. I would never keep a dog in a working state if I knew they were stressed. While, I don’t have an SD, but Liam is a therapy dog. If I discovered one day he was stressed out by going and visiting children at the ASD school, I would not make him go anymore. I work with many other therapy dogs (in fact, my thesis for my Master’s has to do with stress in therapy dogs), all of the dogs are stressed and it’s super heartbreaking to see. No matter your bond with your dog, your emotion, and love towards your dog, putting your dog in an uncomfortable position for them sucks and is unethical. 

Alright! So Liam nosework class update: He did a birch scent blind search with ten boxes. His recorded time was 9.81 seconds. He, again, did better than the two German shepherds in the class! So proud of my sighthound boy!