�Jake ate great last night and slept about as long as he ever has. Today we drove out to meet my friend Joan at the fenced field area where the dogs can run and do agility. Jake had a ball and ran all over the five acres until he was quite actually out of breath. The drive home is about 30 miles (45 minutes) and Jake slept the whole way. We took him over for a very, very needed bath at the Pet�s Plus dog wash facility and now he smells quite like the day he came home with us� Buddy Wash! He is lying next to me on his dog bed with eye lids drooping. What a great fun weekend with Jake. Thank you so much for all of your care and work on his behalf and for helping him find his home with us. He is one of the most wonderful gifts I have ever received.�
Sunday, April 2, 2006
Jake�s dad emailed, �Because of the trainer's schedule of travel and appointments we are not going to start our weekly (agility) sessions until the last Thursday in April. I am going to have two individual clicker training sessions with one of the trainer's other trainers prior to that. I want to work on the loose lead and softer muzzle stuff before we start agility.�
Sunday, April 9, 2006
�Jake is taking his second morning nap on his bed in the sunroom. He has his dolly in his mouth and his eyes closed two-thirds. Very cute!�
Thursday, April 27, 2006
I emailed Jake�s parents about meeting Brenna and her parents for a short doggie party over Memorial Day weekend. John emailed back and said he would be free on Monday, May 29, but Kate would have to be at work on that day.
�Jake has been doing great with his lead walking work. He has had only two obedience sessions with Kate and I but we learned a lot. Too, Jake now has a lovely fenced back yard that allows him a lot of freedom while we are at home. (A good place for a birthday party, I think.) Likely Kate will need to be working on the Monday afternoon but I would love to meet Jake�s Nashville �cousin� and family.�
Tuesday, May 2, 2006
I sent Jake a box of doggie Oreo treats and a bag of all-natural treats they were interested in when Keely and I were visiting.
�Kate liked the ingredient list so much on the Newman�s Own bag that she had one as a pre-dinner snack last night. I trusted the expression on her face instead of her verbal critique and opted to skip eating one myself.
Jake loves the back yard! He has, however, made it clear that even on the rainiest of mornings a trip to the back yard does not substitute for the morning walk. He is such a funny guy. He comes in the back door from the yard and runs to the front door to begin his �let�s get going on my walk� cavort. Seems my exercise program will be unaffected by fence.
Jake likes tunnel the best. He actually veers toward and runs through it sometimes even though it�s not on the way to where he�s going. We are in the midst of doing some landscaping work in the back so I folded and stored all of the equipment in the garage for a couple of weeks. He was in the garage this weekend and took his toy over and laid it at the opening of the collapsed tunnel.
He is doing really well with clicker training. Most of his walks are 70-80% good. He is and likely will remain a bit intense when distracted from the job at hand. Every once in awhile I still get jerked across half of someone�s yard when he happens to notice a squirrel before I do.
Jake is a love and we are often grateful for your care of him and for your help in bringing him to our lives.�
Tuesday, May 9, 2006
�Jake is doing well. He has taken to gardening in his �spare� time. So far only un-planting things. We�ll have to begin some work on teaching him some more useable skills.�
Monday, May 15, 2006
I emailed Jake�s parents offering to dog-sit him if they are traveling to somewhere they can�t take him over the summer. Kate emailed back and said they are going to visit her parents in New England for ten days over the summer, �Speaking as Jake�s mother (and advocate and friend and true love � good grief, how did this happen?), I can�t think of anyone I would trust more to care for Jake. And I know Jake would absolutely love to be with you. If you are serious about pet sitting for him, going away would be far less stressful for me!�
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Jake�s mom emailed to say, �I�m going to miss my morning ritual with Jake. He gets to climb up on the bed and cuddle for a few minutes before we get up, and I get a doggie facial. Bad breath, giant heart.�
Wednesday, May 31, 2006
Kate emailed, �Your party idea was a smashing success! I was glad to be able to attend part of it, and to see all of the joy being expressed in our back yard. What truly great dogs! I really appreciate you for your many efforts to enrich the lives of the dogs you foster, and the people who give them homes. Jake has been such a lovely addition to our hearts, and so have you and your generous spirit. True confessions: I tried your cake. I doubt that comes as a surprise since John snitched on me and told about me trying his cookies too. But YOUR CAKE!! I love carob, and am not fond of terribly sweet things, and your cake was very very good. Don�t worry, I only had a little corner and left all the rest for your buddy Jake, but I wonder if I can have the recipe. I think with just a tad more sweet it would make a divine human treat. Of course, if I make it just as you did, it could be a treat to share with Jake too . . . I�m glad you like the changes in the back yard. We�ve been working hard all spring to pull it together. Gardening has become my passion, and it�s such a treat to be able to work with Jake in the yard too. He isn�t exactly careful with plants, but it seems he would choose to run around them more often than through them, which I appreciate. And he only digs to find a cool earthy spot to lie on, or to capture a critter. I can live with that.�
John also emailed, �It was wonderful to see you in the midst of �your� dogs. We are quite grateful for your hard work in organizing the party. The cake was a treat. Kate actually tried some of Jake�s second piece and would love to have the recipe (seems Jake is going to continue to have Kate as competition for food). I noticed shortly after you left a watermelon on the dining room chair. I looked out the front window but you had already driven off and left us the present. We haven�t had a chance to cut into it yet. I�ll let you know how Jake likes watermelon. I was very pleased with how all of the critters seemed to get along. I�m quite certain behaviors are even more interesting to you knowing the history of each of the three. I especially thought Keely did well. She seemed much more social than on our first meeting. She truly has a sweet nature.�
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
�Jake has been such an incredible love these past weeks. He is just a really good guy! I thought I would send along some brief info about what he is up to in his life these days along with a list of what I thought I might bring for his stay with you, Keely, and Anastasia.
Walks and clicker work:
We are walking in the morning and again around mid-afternoon. His evening routine is just a brief visit outdoors with me around bedtime. His morning walk is the longer of the two. He is doing terrific on lead. He still wants to wander a bit ahead at times but I have been working with a close heel at our trainer�s suggestion. I stop several places on his walk to let him sniff and pee. I choose the place and I try (more-or-less) to make it a different place from day-to-day. He learns all of my route variations within two walks and wants to lead the parade at most turns. I stop at these places if he pulls (even if it�s in the direction we�re eventually headed). We are working with verbal commands on walks when we�re not doing clicker work. When I stop I ask him to return to my side with a �Jake, heel�, then a �good heel�, and then I pause momentarily for some space. Then I use a �Jake, heel� to get us going again. He usually does great with this routine. When he gets to pulling (it is never the old hard pull anymore) I use an �uh-uh� followed by the above �heel command. I usually don�t have to use that signal much. When he comes back to heel but immediately starts out on his own� or when he insists on control in the direction we�re walking; I call him to heel and then give him a �Jake, sit�. If he ignores me all I have to do is turn my physical posture toward him and look impatiently at the standing dog. In a few seconds he sits slowly with a sheepish, sideward glance at me. When he is really being stubborn I resort to the worst tactics and make him go from a sit to a full down (yes, in public).
We seem to have his beginning of the walk tugging and A.D.D. behavior on the mend. Terry recommended that I give him a lot of �sits�, �downs�, and �stays� as I am preparing to go on the walk. He has to �sit � for leash and the door opening and he has to �wait� for me to move through the door and then he is asked to �heel�. (I am becoming a well trained partner.)
We�re doing clicker work these days mostly for off lead. I walk him around the house at heel with stops and plenty of turns (both left and right turns). I have him �down�, and �stay� while I walk a good distance and now out of the room. He seems pretty patient with this. He is being asked to �come� from a distance, for his dinner, from another room, etc. We work on this outside in the fenced back yard and lately we have been working off lead in the front yard as well. (And I still have a dog!). We do occasionally do a bit of clicker work on his walks for the first few minutes. Terry suggested we do this when Jake shows signs that he is forgetting to check-in visually while on lead. If he gets rowdy for a walk or two we do ten minutes of clicker work on the next walk.
Play:
Still likes a tennis ball better than about anything on the planet. He is playing short distance catch with the ball and is really good with a ball that�s tossed up. WE speculate that he will do this for up to 24 hours straight.
Food and treats:
Still likes his Nutro. We are feeding two of the half cup servings in the morning (dry) and in the evening three. We have been giving him some special food evenings but have decided that it would be a good idea to have him simply on Nutro this week with a little of the canned food supplemented at night if you are feeling generous or if he simply cons you into it. He likes the Nutro biscuits and usually give him one or two a day. He will catch these in mid-air, he will �down� himself when he sees the box being opened, and we are working on �leave it� with the biscuit right in front of his �down�. He turned his nose up at the watermelon. The look appeared to be a comment like �chick food?, no thanks�. His favorite clicker treat is the chicken hot dogs.
Sleeping
He is sleeping on his bed next to ours (on Kate�s side of the bed). He does not seem to stir much at night but his snoring is a fright some nights.
Grooming:
He is two weeks from his last bath but otherwise a clean and brushed out guy. I�m still cleaning his ears per your recommendation and brushing his teeth weekly.
What he�s bringing with him:
Toys (tennis balls, tennis balls, and �)
Water and food bowls
Nutro
Nutro biscuits
Clicker treats
A bit of B�ham water to get him started
Clicker and his treat pouch
Collar and leash (also going to send his harness even though he has not had it on for months but I know you used it and I want it there in case)
Tooth brush
Slicker brush
I�m going to bring his collapsible kennel along in the truck (feel free not to have me leave it if it�s too much. Terry suggested we use it for �time-outs� as needed but we haven�t had to do that much. With Keely and Anastasia and all the change you may or, may not, want it. You decide.)
Bed
I think that will do it but if something else springs to mind I will of course bring it. If you think of anything I have forgotten please email me and I�ll add it in. If there is anything on the list you want me to leave out � let me know that also.
Thank you so much for offering to let Jake be with you while we are traveling. Kate and I will be so much more comfortable knowing he is in your good care. And I cannot imagine that Jake could be more comfortable with anyone else except you in our absence.�
Jake and his dad arrived this morning around 9 AM. I just woke up about five minutes before they got to my apartment, after returning from the lab at midnight and again at 4 AM. I decided to work extra for one week prior to Jake�s arrival, so then I could stay more time at home during Jake�s visit. John said when they got into Auburn, Jake sniffed the air, and it seemed like Jake knew he's in Auburn. Keely was very excited seeing visitors. She and Jake sniffed each other very briefly, I'm sure they remember each other, and then she immediately went up to John for petting. John always pets Keely a lot when they see each other and he says Keely is very pretty. He also asked me if Keely's always this quiet, I told him that she's usually a little shy around strangers, but I think she's just fully enjoying John rubbing her ears. Jake is a happy boy as always, flipped right over for me to rub his tummy. John says, "Jake's not shy at all!" Jake walked around a little bit, but not too much, I think he recognizes the place, but is not worried about being left here. Anastasia came out, Jake took one sniffed at her and that was all. John then went out to get some of Jake's stuff out of his truck, while I held on to the collars to keep both dogs inside. Jake acted just like day of adoption, he just sat right by the front door, waiting for his dad to come back. After a few minutes, he came to me for some more petting.
John came back with Jake's bed and toy box. He wasn't very interested in playing with the toys, all except the tennis ball of course. Jake's eyes just lights up when his dad brought out the tennis ball. John showed me how they throw the ball for Jake to catch right in the air. When we set Jake's bed down on the floor, he immediately went lie on it.
John brought back a big ice chest with Jake's Nutro Ultra kibbles, Nutro Ultra cans to mix with dinner, a couple bottles of water, Nutro Ultra biscuits as snacks, gourmet biscuits to share with Keely, cut up chicken hot dogs for clicker training, and small biscuits for training as well. John also brought me some muffins made with fresh Alabama blueberries that Kate made. When John rolled out the bag of hot dogs to show me, Keely immediately pushed Jake out of the way and sat right in front of John. John asked me if he could give Keely some and I said yes. John then showed me how they do clicker training with Jake. He said they mainly do it without leash, so mostly in the backyard or inside the house. Not so much during leashed walks actually. I'm glad he said that, because I'm not sure I can do clicker training when I'm walking two dogs at the same time anyways, but I can definitely practice some with Jake in the tennis court or inside the apartment everyday. John then pet Keely some more as I was petting Jake. I could tell Keely was getting attached to, and possessive of John, and I told John so. Sure enough, two minutes later, when Jake approached his dad, Keely growled. Jake backed off of course. I think John was a little surprised, but not scared, and told Keely, "That's not very nice", and immediately stopped petting her. I hope Keely learns her lesson. John asked me a little bit about Keely's issues, and I told him we're still working on it. He said their obedience trainers are all very surprised how well-adjusted and happy Jake is, that it appears Jake doesn't have any baggage from before he was rescued. John also said Jake�s �tall, dark, and handsome�, and I think that�s true too!
After John left, Jake did sit by the door for a couple minutes, but he's well-adjusted enough that he came to me for more petting after that. I guess I was petting Jake a lot that Keely got a little jealous and growled. Jake was a little confused and walked away. But overall I think they are doing fine, and I left them together with the run of the apartment this morning as I came to school. Before I left, I took them for another potty walk around the apartment complex. This time, I followed what John told me what he does when Jake pulls. So whenever he pulls, I stand still, and sure enough, just like John said, Jake would come back and stand right next to my leg in heel position. I had to do that at least five times during the 7 minute walk, but hopefully it'll get better. I think paying more attention to Jake's leash pulling also helps Keely to shape up on her walking too, as I had been slacking off a little bit with her, but with two dogs pulling, that's just too much. But Keely's pretty good with it too, after two tries of "stand like a tree", she didn't pull either.
Photo of Jake with his tennis balls, with Anastasia sleeping on Keely�s dog bed right next to him.
Well, within 24 hours, Jake has figured out that there�s no way I can keep him from pulling with a regular collar alone, especially when I�m taking Keely out at the same time. This morning, he pretty much dragged me all the way across the playground at the apartment complex. I think he saw a squirrel and wouldn�t stop going after it. I didn�t want to let go of the leash, so Keely and I ended up going with him. There were two guys sitting on the picnic table watching us, I guess I must�ve looked pretty funny to them being dragged by a 65 pound dog. So, I ended up having to use the no-pull harness Jake�s parents brought for me for the duration of Jake�s visit.
In the picture is Keely trying out Jake�s bed.
