TRAINING DAY

Doc is fine at home but not so good outside the yard. He is getting better but while my knee and then my toe were healing, he decided to be afraid of everything except us and Basset Hounds.

 

You can almost see the doubt in those pretty brown eyes and that nervous lick.

 

But he is doomed because he is a show dog and I plan to get him back into the ring. The problem is I have re-socialize him a bit and get him relaxed so we have been going to training and trying to get him to remember how much fun showing was.

 

Here's the REAL problem.

Doc has a handler who is barely trainable.

Doc has a handler who gets so nervous in the rings that it runs and vibrates right down the leash to Doc who immediately reads that message and begins looking around for the danger. He has decided that the dogs behind him must be the problem and so he looks over his shoulder and tucks his tail, just in case.

 

This began one time when the dog behind him was a Briard, a huge hairy thing he had never seen before, gaining on him, or so he thought.

 

The 12 week old Havanese puppy behind him at training did not bother him.

He was so friggin cute.

 

He looked....wait a minute...he looked a lot like...

 

NO DOC! It is a puppy, not a Squirrel. Stop turning around. How many times can one say "watch me" in a row without being ridiculous?

Finally, he decides it isn't a squirrel at all that it is just a puppy and he got back to work.

So I figure as long as we don't have a Briard or a squirrel behind us, we might be able to get around the ring without mishap.

                                    He's done it before.