Making Progress!

Last night we attended a make up training class for one we missed during a snow storm. We have been enrolled in the Basic Life Skills class with Sublime Canine for the last 5 weeks with our main goal being for Kobi to simply remain calm around other dogs and people. Sounds easy enough, but not for Kobi. Kobi is so social just the sight of other people and dogs used to make him go crazy with barking and pulling to get to them and trying to jump all over people. The obedience aspect of the class was a breeze for Kobi, paying attention when other things are going on, not so much. Monday night was a great class with the new liver jerky treats I started making. He was finally more interested in the treats than some of the other stuff going on. Last night though was unreal. He was silent the entire evening, paid attention in all the exercises, walked politely on his leash, and felt comfortable enough to expose his belly several times during class! When I first found Kobi at the SPCA one of the reasons I fell in love with him is any time someone took him out to the yard he would immediately flop onto his back for some tummy rubs. I knew that was a sign of confidence and that he was comfortable with people. Boy were we suckered! Within the first two weeks that all but stopped except for us at home. So to see him repeatedly showing his tummy last night in class was a break through. At one point another puppy even walked up to him when he was like that and he was totally fine. It goes to show that even if you have an unrully puppy or dog that seems to be making zero progress with their training, keep working on it and it eventually pays off! I can't wait for our Monday night class to see if it wasn't a fluke or if he really is begging to settle down!

Below is a video of Kobi from last night. We were supposed to be working on Leave It, resisting the temptation to grab treats off his paws, but as we started filming another dog decided to get worked up so you can see me clicking and rewarding him for looking at the other dog while choosing to not get up or bark at them.