Of Fires and Puppies

Our puppy raiser meeting was to be a scavenger hunt at Bed, Bath and Beyond and Sports Authority.  We were going to do some obedience outside and then inside for the fun. (although, true to my competitive nature, I was interested in completing my form first! 8-)

Little Ava, a black lab puppy, create quite a stir with her big belly. Here she is with raiser Nancy showing off her cute pink belly.

 We all fell in love with Ava, a dark beauty and I am always reminded of Ava Gardner when I hear her name, although Ava Gardner didn't have a pot belly that gently swayed to and fro when she walked.

Golden Gail made the meeting and was calm as she was being greeted by Steve.

 Golden Gail was at the meeting and she was fully recovered from her surgery.  She had a cyst removed from the top of her head and wasn't wearing the cone of shame anymore.  Coastie and Coach were with their raisers and Gail's raiser Roger were waiting in the parking lot for things to get started

Hershey, our group's first chocolate puppy, arrived.  Here she is greeting Katie.

 Our AC Carolyn was anxiously awaiting the arrival of Hershey, which her family sponsored.  Hershey is a chocolate lab puppy and is being raised by one of our new puppy raiser families.

Carolyn comes over to say hello to little Hershey.

 Poor Ava got knocked off her cute puppy pedestal in less than 30 minutes! But we all still love you Ava!

Hershey sits and gazes into the distance.

 Then it was off to the obedience races and we were lined up and doing sit stays and down stays with our pups.

The group is lined up against the wall in various stages of doing a stay and return to your dog.

The camera catches Gail in a rare moment of calm sitting by her raiser Roger. (Roger told me to say that!)

 Gail may have been near the edge of the circle of acceptance, but I think she was doing pretty well as the photo above shows (see Roger 8-).  Our obedience continued with some distractions and then we heard an alarm sound.

Carolyn walks by with some paper mache corona bottles for a distraction.

Coastie was interested, but he didn't break his sit!

 After the alarm sounded, we noticed that there were some people streaming out of the Bed, Bath and Beyond store.  Then, we heard what sounded like a siren.

As you can see from the video, the puppies were amazingly good natured about the noise and the sirens.

Carolyn holds Hershey in her arms.

Carolyn took the opportunity to pose with Hershey.  Turns out that there was some kind of fire on the roof and they sent out two fire trucks.

Photo of the ladder truck with firemen going up on the roof.

 It was a great distraction for the dogs: men in fire suits, alarms, sirens, flashing lights, huge fire trucks and ladder trucks.  The dogs were not impressed.

The puppies weren't impressed by the firetrucks.  They were more captivated by each other.

We ended the meeting by doing a short scavenger hunt through Sports Authority.  Coach teamed up with Ava (I think he has a little crush).  Ava had a little accident inside (Nancy, you do NOT need to return the Shamwow! Keep it with my compliments.  Ava may have future need of it. 8-), but we were very quick and efficient and cleaned it up before anyone even knew it was there.

We were going to take a cute photo of Ava in one of the tiny tents, but we didn't realize that they were all up on the shelves for display.  It made the photo a bit difficult.  So we passed on that.

All in all it was a successful evening.

Distractions, Distractions, Distractions!

Saturday was our Southeastern Guide Dog puppy raiser monthly meeting and we had it at the clubhouse at Waterchase.  AC Carolyn brought along a host of noisy and innovative distractions with which to subject our puppies and we also used the public.

Children walk by our puppies and serve as distractions as the puppies try to maintain a down stay.

A mom and her two children were just coming out of the pool, so Carolyn had them walk by the puppies a couple of times to see if any of them would break their down stays.  The kids seemed to enjoy being the center of attention and the dogs really liked them as well.

Gail sitting up and staring at the red and black broom making its way toward her.

Carolyn also brought a broom and swept up the sidewalk.  Some pups were curious, like Gail in the above photo.  Some didn't care (like Coach).

Carolyn also used silk flowers which she flapped together in front of the dogs.  Here she is in front of Gail, but Gail didn't break.

 Carolyn also used silk flowers and a very small red wagon.  It was interesting to note which items the dogs reacted to.  Gail had no reaction to the flowers. Coach went to smell them.  Coach didn't have any interest in the wagon, but Gail was fearful of it.

Gail runs behind Michele when the wagon comes her way.  She did come out and go sniff the wagon  though!

 These distractions also give Carolyn a good idea of what needs to be worked on with each puppy raiser's dog and she can then give helpful advice to the puppy raiser about what can be done if any of the dogs exhibit any fear reactions.  In Gail's case, they were pretty easily able to get her to go sniff the wagon.

Orchid, a yellow goldadore, sniffs at the wagon, but doesn't break her sit stay.

Babe, a yellow lab, gets some loving by Tim, a new puppy raiser waiting on a puppy.

Then we all went on a walk that included a wooden bridge that went over a river/creek.  Coach did a nifty poo on the move, which was interesting.  This was despite my pulling over a couple of times and giving him the opportunity to poo.  Sigh.

Puppies laid out on the tic tac toe board on the shady parking lot.  All  are in a down stay but one in the far corner.

Then we played a couple of games of puppy tic tac toe and took off for our air-conditioned cars and home!

Celebration Station

Thursday, a rainy, rainy night, we all trooped out to Celebration station, to participate in our monthly meeting.  Carolyn, in addition to having some great noise (apart from the thunderstorm) distraction games for us to play had a lot of news to pass on like the very cool puppy raiser training conference that was coming up in June.  Many in our group were going to be participate in it.
 

Roger is holding Sunny, a yellow lab, who is sitting and Fred and Jam , who is sitting as well, are on the right.  They flank the doorways of Celebration Station.

Since it was raining so hard, we met under the canopy, so everyone going to Celebration Station walked a puppy gauntlet.  It was a very cute puppy gauntlet and we even had a crowd at the windows who just stood eating their ice creams and watching us go through our obedience exercises.  Carolyn is so crazy good about obedience exercises, she draws a crowd! 8-)

Stephanie and yellow lab Coastie come up the path.

Fred and Jam, Brian and black lab Liz, Lois and yellow lab Babe, and Stephanie and Coastie are waiting for Carolyn and her hat.

Carolyn tried to get Liz to react to the sombrero.

Soon, Carolyn put on her sombrero and walked around to each puppy to see if they would react to the hat.  Reacting to hats, sunglasses, earphones, etc., is one of the tests that a puppy will have to go through once they go in for training.  So wearing a hat or doing an exercise like this one is useful to get your puppy used to strange things happening.

I think Jam is laughing at the sombrero. (Jam is in a sit on the left of Fred looking up at Carolyn.)

I think Jam found the hat amusing.  Carolyn told us that she had four sombreros.  Then she had to tell us why.

Shadow, a very sturdy black lab, thinks the sombrero smells like tacos.

Every puppy was pretty even tempered when it came to the hats.

Babe, a yellow lab, wants to know why Carolyn has four sombreros. "Why, Carolyn?"

The only exception was one of the puppy raisers, who will remain nameless, who said near the end of the exercise, "Oh, your wearing the hat for the exercise?!" That was pretty funny!

Carolyn surrounded by puppies staring at her huge hat.

In addition to the hat distraction, we worked on noise distractions.  I took a little bit of film on it.

Since Jam was still limping, when everyone went inside and upstairs, we went home.  But inside was a wealth of loud games, pinball machines, all sorts of noises and things to distract and give a good exposure to your pet.  It also includes lots of children.  So be prepared for the public and to be stopped and asked to have your dog pet or if your dog is over 10 months, be prepared to say no in a polite way and explain the rules.  You can always have them follow you outside where you can take off the coat.  If you want and if your puppy is calm.