Dogs on the Run dot net

One of the things I love about Puppy Kindergarten classes at Mountain View is the fact that puppies come! – and I get to photograph them. Here’s a lovely lab pup in a rare quiet, thoughtful moment.

Lab pup caught during a quiet moment in puppy class.

Not to brag or anything – actually pretty much anything BUT bragging in this case, because I was shocked and overjoyed when Genie and I went to her second puppy class on Thursday evening. She was a different dog from her first class, far improved and just wonderful! And it wasn’t anything I did. I fully expected her to act similarly to her first class two weeks ago; I had spent a week on vacation, away from home, returned on Monday, so we didn’t have much time to train. I did take some little pork bits I had left over from dinner, in addition to cheese and meatballs, and she was quite attentive and appreciative of all of it.

From the moment we arrived, Genie was looking at me and asking me what I wanted her to do. She was lovely.

One “trick” I’ve taught her is to lie on a mat. Read more…

I’m a dog trainer with many years’ experience. I’ve taught puppy classes, basic and competition obedience, beginner and advanced agility. I’ve studied dog behavior extensively. I’ve observed thousands of dogs and their human partners in countless situations. I’ve watched both dogs and their humans become happy, sad, thrilled, impatient, excited, bored, ecstatic, confused, astonished, overwhelmed, pleased, angry, embarrassed – pretty much the entire gamut of vertebrate emotion. In all of these situations, the dogs act as dogs do – quite uncomplicated, no games, no underlying motives, no hang-ups. The humans, on the other hand, bring much more to the game. I experienced this myself, last night at my first puppy kindergarten class in ages.

Yes, we have a new puppy. Genie is a petite thing, adopted through Australian Shepherd Rescue (ARPH) and transported to us from Georgia Read more…