Dogs on the Run dot net

I sent Luna on her way today. She rallied on the prednisone for a few days and then returned to her enfeebled condition, struggling to breathe, acting out of it, uninterested in food. We will miss her.

Luna was very enthusiastic about her new job herding sheep.

Luna learning about sheep

Luna was a powerful agility dog, but very sensitive to changes. I was a very novice handler and had no understanding of her issues - and no idea what to do with her. So she retired.

Lovely Luna. She was an honest working dog and gave me all she could.

Farewell, sweet girl. Enjoy your sheep and groundhogs and freedom over there.

It’s now January 2008. Joon’s last entry was on January 15, 2007. Shame on me!

Just because I haven’t written in her blog, it doesn’t mean that I haven’t worked with the dog. I just haven’t shared. We’re not where I want to be, considering it’s been a year, but then there’s life that gets in the way. So it did, and does.

If I look at Joon’s Checklist, we’ve made progress. One thing I’ve learned when working with dogs, especially difficult dogs, is that it’s insanity to do anything but evaluate their progress over the long term. It can be quite frustrating to see improvement when you look at a week, or even a month, but given 3 or 6 months it’s far more obvious that the mountains are moving; the only way to move one of these canine mountains is slowly and deliberately. So over the past year we’ve made huge progress.

Down to details (‘fess-up time): Joon is still not housebroken. Read more…