barking, showing, and chasing

Attention barking

Inko's attention barking had been getting a little out of hand at home! She's usually ok during the day if we're in (as far as we can tell she is always asleep when we are out), but it is the evenings when things can get noisy - and it's worst when we are both in with her. After trying to consistently pop her in her naughty crate when she barked (which gets a bit annoying to constantly be getting up, putting her in, letting her out, every few minutes) we decided we needed to try something else.

We had realised very early on after getting her that Pet Corrector does nothing with the Dink, who just looks at it as if it is nothing! We also found the stones or coins in a jar shaken at her had much the same effect! Water in a spray she actually really likes and it tends to make her bark even more!! So we needed something new. After chatting with a few people who we knew already used them, we decided to try a citronella collar for her. We knew that our old trainer hired these out and so we decided to start with that option. Given Inko's past responses to things that make a noise as a distraction, we knew that things often don't work with her as they should due to her total lack of fear or concern about loud noises etc! Another reason for wanting to try it out on hire first was that we weren't sure whether it might freak her out slightly, and we really didn't want anything that might worry her or frighten her.

We picked up the collar about 2 weeks ago and were amazed that it actually worked!! We needn't have worried about it stressing her...as with everything she comes across she just took it on board and was completely relaxed!! She happily pottered round with the collar on, eating, playing and sleeping, and didn't seemed bothered at all. It is remote controlled so we press a button when we want to release the spray, rather than it being bark activated. We wanted that control so that we could control the attention barking, but can still allow to have a small bit of a bark as passers by, just so that we retain a certain amount of guarding, as that is a benefit of having a dog. This also means that we can use the collar to distract her from other unwanted behaviour if needed (e.g. her chewing at my arm, or if she refuses to drop something she shouldn't have). It was magic - when she started barking and we pressed the remote control to release the spray of citronella, she stopped what she was doing, and actually gave us enough time to reward her for being quiet!!! It was brilliant because it stopped us spending the whole of evenings telling her off for being noisy - much more peaceful for us and her!!

Based on her response to it we decided to buy one for ourselves and we now have to hope that it continues to work as well as it has so far!!

Latest show

Shame she can't wear it in the show ring!! Inko had her latest show yesterday at the Bristol and District show in Weston Super Mare. We could tell from early on that she clearly wasn't in the mood to be on best behaviour, and it wasn't really helped by the fact that we were on fairly early, in quite cramped hall, so that didn't give us long to have Inko out of her crate and doing some training to try and get her focused on working and used to all the goings on in the hall. We had really hoped she'd be well behaved at this one as this would be the first time she was going to be up against other lappies, as there was an actual lappy class this time, rather than her being in AVNSC. No such luck! From the moment we got into the ring she was on fine vocal form and barked all the way round!! She stood fairly still when being checked over which was nice as she had been bad at that before (and I've been working quite hard on that), I just need to really work on the walking around bit now as that was less good, mainly because her barking makes her legs jump as she walks, making it a little messy!! She ended up getting 3rd of 3 in the puppy class!!

Lappy walk

Today Inko had a fantastic time on the SFLS monthly walk, this one being down in the lovely sunny New Forest. Inko had a great time running round with her half sis' Keksi!! They were chasing each other everywhere and having so much fun. Inko spotted a few new forest ponies at one point and started running off barking, presumably in full on herding mode!! We were actually very impressed that she about-turned and came running back when called!! Very nice to see this as her recall can be a little variable!! She managed to get completely covered in mud after wading through puddles all through the walk, and even sitting down in quite a large puddle!! Luckily Karen let us go back to her house after the walk to hose her down before we headed home!! It was a reall lovely day...and means we now have a lovely and quiet lappy...and she's not even wearing her collar tonight!!