The Continued Skinny on Delilah

The next part of Delilah's training has been what Holly calls Couch Training 101. I have to admit that couch training is probably the only kind of training that Dave is going to get. He is a TV junky and the only time he's conscious is during commercials. Holly's couch training works nicely right in with Dave's idea of paying attention to the dog. He's there during commercial breaks only.

The first thing Holly wanted me to work on in this series was the "down" command. Delilah can't be jumping on the furniture and climbing the walls if she is down. It makes perfect sense to me but sometimes I wish I could just whisper in her ear what I need from her. It'd be soooooooo much easier.

We started off with me throwing a treat for Delilah to retrieve every time she laid down. I have to admit I had to coax her down to even throw a treat to try this approach in the first place. But we got it figured out and Delilah was soon laying down even to eat her treat once she located it. Before long she was coming to me and laying down to get me to toss another treat. She is just so darn smart..........

By the time we get finished with a session, Delilah is exhausted. It doesn't take nearly as long to wear her out when she's working that little brain of hers as it does with sheer physical play of some kind or another. Delilah loves a challenge! She plays hard and then crashes in a heap sleeping for hours.

We have no more night time hysteria but it's still very obvious she must have the stimulation of a game like this to reach this restful period where we can all breathe a sigh of relief. Delilah is down for the count and we have a respite from being hyper vigilant.

Obviously this is not a full time thing, this beware of what the dog is up to vigilance. When we are working outside the puppy goes with us. She is getting chained for the time being but she is right there in the middle of things. She has her own jolly ball, which she loves and she has the horses to interact with her as well.

Both Tag and Percy are stalled where she is tied. Both horses love to reach down and sniff at Delilah. At first she was frightened of them but now she likes to play with them. She's already learned that playing with the jolly ball attracts both horses to watch. There's nothing that Delilah likes more than being the center of attention........and attention from her Arabian horse friends is a desirable part of her afternoon barn play.

Although she loves the horses reaching over the wall to play, and she even likes going into their stalls to investigate, she's pretty sure that the horses walking her direction is NOT a good thing. Whenever I unload the horse trailer, Delilah sits closely against the door of the barn out of the way. No way this puppy wants to be stepped on by a horse.

To be continued............

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